World of Warcraft Message Board older than one year ago

Blizzcon won't be returning to the Anaheim Convention Center until this November, but tickets will go on sale (and inevitably sell out) this month. Specifically, tickets will be available in two batches, with the first going on sale April 24 at 7pm Pacific. The second batch is set for April 27 at 10am Pacific. Tickets will cost $175 and will be available directly from Blizzcon.com.

Additionally, approximately 200 tickets for the Blizzcon Benefit Dinner, an event benefiting the Children's Hospital of Orange County, will go on sale on May 1 at 7pm Pacific. These tickets will run for $500 and include full Blizzcon admission. Proceeds will go the Children's Hospital of Orange County.

The convention itself will take place on November 8 and 9, and will doubtless feature all the latest news regarding World of Warcraft, StarCraft 2, Diablo 3 and possibly Blizzard's mysterious new "Titan" MMO.

#worldofwarcraft World of Warcraft player Alex found a really creative way to present an engagement ring to his girlfriend Clara, who also plays the game: A quest chain, which includes some romantic real-life activities. All he needed was a papercraft template for a chest, a site where he could make custom WoW tooltips, and of course the ring (a legendary one, probably). More »

#starcraftii Like all Blizzard games, the recently-released StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm is swarming with easter aggs and pop culture references. Here are some of the best ones we've found so far. More »

#polidicks Did you know the government is spending $1.2 million to pay people to play World of Warcraft? I didn't either! More »

Blizzcon is back with a vengeance this year, scheduled for Friday, November 8 and Saturday, November 9 at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California. The convention took a vacation last year, making Blizzcon 2013 a super-special occasion.

This year's show will feature all the trappings of previous installments, including panels, tournaments, contests, rare merchandise, demos of the newest Blizzard games and the Global finals of Blizzard esports, all focused on the World of Warcraft, StarCraft and Diablo franchises.

There's no word yet on when tickets to Blizzcon 2013 will go on sale, though hotel reservations are live through the Blizzcon portal. Keep in mind that in 2011, tickets to Blizzcon sold out within seconds.

When the Mists of Pandaria expansion launched for World of Warcraft, Activision Blizzard reported more than 10 million players, up from 9.1 million after Cataclysm. In today's financial call, Activision reported World of Warcraft had 9.6 million subscribers. It's like a roller coaster, kind of.

#worldofwarcraft A chat log in which a Chinese gamer discussed his one-night stands has gone viral in China. In the chat log, the gamer dished on sleeping with several female guild members. The gamer was asked, "So you switched servers and came into our guild just to do our girls?" His reply was simply, "For the Alliance." More »

#pleaseanswerthequestion A reader named Ryan writes: "I've got a question that I hoped could be posed to the readers of Kotaku. I'm curious if World of Warcraft is a series to even bother getting back involved with, after I'd spent some time on it (this is prior to the Lich King and Cataclysm releases/updates/mandatory you-must-buy releases). More »

Jones on set.

Of all the current video game movies kind of/sort of in development in Hollywood, few have seemed less likely to actually get off the ground than the often spoken of World of Warcraft movie. After Spider-Man and Evil Dead director Sam Raimi had initially been tagged as the film's initial director, the project more or less went into hibernation, until production company Legendary Pictures grabbed Charles Leavitt's screenplay back and began searching for a new director. Now, apparently, it has found one.

Duncan Jones, the 41-year-old director of recent sci-fi highlights Moon and Source Code, has signed on to oversee the project, according to the Hollywood Reporter. This will be a considerable step up in terms of budget for Jones, who is expected to have in the range of $100 million to make the movie.

Legendary has kept Leavitt's script extremely close to the vest, so it's tough to assume much of anything about the project at this point. Still, Jones' involvement is at least an encouraging thing, given his active and outspoken interest in video games.

Legendary is currently planning on beginning shooting this year, with a 2015 release date. We'll see if that sticks. Or if this even happens at all. Because video game movies, you know?

Once upon time, Legendary Pictures’ long-stalled Warcraft movie had a director. Then it didn’t. In the wake of Spider-Man and Evil Dead maestro Sam Raimi’s mighty battle-leap into Oz, Blizzard’s own heaving epic seemed destined to stall. Surprisingly, however, it’s once again back on track. With David Bowie’s son at the helm, naturally. But Duncan Jones is an excellent creator in his own right, having previously been responsible for the likes of Moon and Source Code, both of which did super interesting sci-fi things with unique settings and characters. Granted, he’s not the first person I’d think of for a preposterously mega-budgeted fantasy swordsplosion, but who knows? I’d have never tagged Chris Nolan for Batman, either.

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#showus It's not that hard to find great pirate-themed video game zones and levels. Gigantic ships, pirate hideouts on mysterious islands (or in space), full of treasure, topped with a Caribbean atmosphere; an ever-returning element of video games that will always be a pleasure to the eye. We've collected some of the most gorgeous and memorable ones. More »

#showus Whether they're allies or foes, tiny or towering beasts, robotic, undead or living, the kings of reptiles will always represent brutal power in any game. When they make their appearance, you can be certain that devastation, destruction, and, well, probably the end of the game, will follow. More »

#rip FlameofWesternesse has made this terrific short film, which catalogues some of the memorials placed throughout Azeroth in honour of World of Warcraft players who have passed away during the game's tenure. More »

That’s StarCraft II, mind you. Otherwise, I think that’d be a dequel, and I’m not sure anyone actually wants one of those. But yes, WarCraft: A New Dawn is picking up the severed orc hand of maximum strategy Blizzard dropped after WoW exploded. As of now, it’s very much a work-in-progress, but the end goal is to craftily craft StarCraft into “a breathtaking, lore-abiding storyline spanning several emotionally-gripping campaigns containing new units, new heroes, and new features as well as a fully fledged melee mode.” Lofty goals, huh? Maybe even too lofty. The team’s released their first video, though, so you can judge for yourself.

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#worldofwarcraft This weekend Redditor FrancescaO_O paid a visit to Joyland, the World of Warcraft-themed park in China, and reported back with this amusing picture. Each ride comes with a five-star happiness rating! More »

Tweeria is a web-based role-playing game that advertises itself as the "laziest MMORPG ever." It uses Twitter to passively power and level up a virtual character set in a fantasy-based world, and has now been accused of stealing art from the World of Warcraft collectible card game.

Mike Sacco, a representative of WoW CCG owner Cryptozoic Entertainment and columnist for WoW Insider, points out that artwork uploaded by the Tweeria staff for the title is ripped right off from the cards.

Tweeria's creator, a Russian company called Twee Game, claims it's a "mostly experimental" project, and the game has since added a "copyright notice" at the bottom of its pages to try and attribute the artwork to its creators. For now, the game is still up and running, despite user feedback saying that it's unclear just how it all works anyway.

#worldofwarcraft World of Warcraft is 8 this year, so Blizzard put this video together highlighting... well, lots of gameplay. You could joke that the reason there's no "then and now" shots is because the game has barely changed in that time, but seeing as it still attracts millions of players a month that's probably more of a compliment than a potshot. More »

#chriskluwe Football is a role-playing game. That's how Chris Kluwe, the Minnesota Vikings punter and noted World of Warcraft and RPG fan, is approaching it. Each week in the NFL, ChrisWarcraft characterizes his upcoming game in terms of an MMO quest. We're going to chart his progress and see how fast he levels up. More »

#worldofwarcraft An East Carolina University doctoral student studying MMOs and video game addiction is looking for survey participants to help in a key component of his dissertation. Notably, the researcher conducting the survey is himself a World of Warcraft player. More »

#legal A law firm specializing in consumer protection cases slapped Blizzard, the makers of World of Warcraft, StarCraft and Diablo III, with a class action lawsuit over its sale of two-factor account authenticators, a claim the company says is without merit. More »

#worldofwarcraft Okay. I may not love playing World of Warcraft, but I am happy to give credit where credit is due: this is both cute and awesome. More »

It may not seem like an immediately fascinating news story to say that an MMOs subscriber numbers have stayed the same, as mentioned in Nathan’s post earlier, but I think there’s an interesting point to be made when noting that World Of Warcraft is back over 10m. While the game has previously peaked at over 12m paying subscribers, a lot of fuss and soothsaying took place over the past year, declaring the MMO’s demise as inevitable. Subs numbers dropped to 9.1m, and much of the media declared, or at least speculated, that this was it. Rather than noticing that it was just a long time since there’d been a new expansion, so as you’d expect some players would have felt they’d seen all the current content so looked elsewhere for their gaming crack. In fact, the media has been gleefully predicting the doom of WoW for years. So why isn’t anyone reporting the real story here? Why isn’t anyone spotting that this is a phenomenon?

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#worldofwarcraft She plays as an Orc, characters who are arguably the bad guys of the World of Warcraft universe. But last night, Colleen Lachowicz—the Democratic candidate whose activity in World of Warcraft was the subject of a Republican smear campaign—won an election that leveled up her political career. More »

#worldofwarcraft It's been, what, only a few weeks since Slooshi was caught jerking off on camera after a League of Legends livestream event? Well, looks like somebody - and by somebody, I mean World of Warcraft player murdaralph - didn't learn their lesson. More »

#chriskluwe Football is a role-playing game. That's how Chris Kluwe, the Minnesota Vikings punter and noted World of Warcraft and RPG fan, is approaching it. Each week in the NFL, ChrisWarcraft characterizes his upcoming game in terms of an MMO quest. We're going to chart his progress and see how fast he levels up. More »

#halloween Halloween is still a week from today, so you'll have to wait until next Wednesday if you want to go trick-or-treating in the real world. (Or at least, if you want to do it without getting the cops called.) More »

#cosplay Tasha form South Korean cosplay collective Spiral Cats is back with a slew of new cosplay. She and her team are among the best cosplayers in Asia—and the world. Their outfits, in particular, are stellar. More »

#chriskluwe Football is a role-playing game. That's how Chris Kluwe, the Minnesota Vikings punter and noted World of Warcraft and RPG fan, is approaching it. Each week in the NFL, ChrisWarcraft characterizes his upcoming game in terms of an MMO quest. We're going to chart his progress and see how fast he levels up. More »

Whether you’re a sucker for their furry brand of kung-fury or not, World of Warcraft‘s pandas are officially here to stay. Fortunately, Pandaria’s mysterious de-misting actually revealed one of the better WoW expansions in recent memory, so life goes on – and quite merrily at that. But while fresh competitors like Guild Wars 2 continue to be the talk of the town, MoP didn’t quite take the world (Warcraft-flavored or otherwise) by storm. Slow and steady though the process might be, MMOs are evolving. Sure, WoW’s world is bigger than ever, but its every strained lurch is followed by a deafening creak. So what’s next? How does Blizzard plan to keep WoW relevant? Does it involve free-to-play? A return to the Horde vs Alliance glory days? More species of playable bear? During GDC Online, I sat down with production director J. Allen Brack to find out.

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#worldofwarcraft Meet Irenic, a Tauren Druid. Irenic is a level 90, the new maximum a World of Warcraft character can reach. And Irenic did it without killing a single thing. More »