GGL Wire

Alex Yue

Mar

WoW gets 2.4 patch, Sunwell dungeons

Filed under: blizzard, Fury of the Sunwell, Games for Windows, Kilkaeden, patch, PC, Sunwell, warcraft, World of Warcraft, WoW

World of Warcraft addicts everywhere celebrated this morning as the highly anticipated 2.4 patch, dubbed Fury of the Sunwell, was released.

The new patch introduces adventurers to Sunwell Isle. Here new quests can be found, along with new 5-man dungeons and a 25-man raid where gamers get to battle Kil’jaeden.

The rest of the patch has less noticeable changes. All the details can be found here.

Read: Blizzard Unleashes Fury Of The Sunwell.

Alex Yue

Feb

Epileptic Gaming #153

Filed under: 153, cry, devil, dmc4, eg, eg153, epileptic, fifa, fighter, frontlines, gaming, GGL, iv, kart, LIVE, Mario, may, microsoft, MMORPG, nintendo, of, Patapon, SF4, sony, street, warcraft, Wii, world, WoW, xbox

GGL is hosting a Frontlines Tournament, if an Epileptic Gaming team wins djWheat will hook you up! djWheat thinks your an idiot for playing Tribes. How can chatting in Mario Kart get any worse? A World of Warcraft killer could cost billions, what makes World of Warcraft so great and every MMO so bad? The font, that’s what. We take a look at a new Street Fighter IV video, straight from GDC. The crew reviews Patapon, Devil May Cry 4 and Fifa Street 3 live!

EpilepticGaming

GGL Admin

Feb

More details on Blizzard’s $120,000 World of Warcraft tournament

Filed under: blizzard, Blizzard Entertainment, Competitive, eSports, mmo, MMORPG, PC, RPG, starcraft 2, Tournament, World of Warcraft, WoW

Blizzard has released more details on its upcoming World of Warcraft tournament, showcasing NPCs who will equip you for all your battles.

In what I consider to be a brilliant move, the tournament will not require players to level up their characters. Instead, you will start at level 70 and get free epics in order to compete–separating the PVP and PVE portions of the game, hopefully, forever.

Gold will be obtained by speaking to an NPC gold giver. If you ask him/her for gold, you’ll get an easy 5,000 in order to pay for respecs, repair damage, and buy pretty much whatever you want. Speak to another NPC to get free epic items, and so on. Continued…

Feb

Blizzard preps $120,000 World of Warcraft tournament!

Filed under: blizzard, Blizzard Entertainment, Competitive, eSports, mmo, MMORPG, PC, RPG, starcraft 2, Tournament, World of Warcraft, WoW

Today Blizzard Entertainment announced that they will be hosting a series of tournaments using the Arena system in World of Warcraft. Competitors will come from Europe, South Korea, North America, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau and will have to pay a $20.00 entry fee.

Due to the fact that you don’t need to level a character to play in the tournament, and epic/arena-quality gear is available from the start, all 10 million-plus WoW players are potential competitors.

The tournament will run for six weeks on special tournament realms. Throughout these six weeks, teams will play 3-vs.-3 matches. The top four teams from each round will advance to the regional finals. Here players will compete for more than $27,000 in cash prizes. Those who win the regional will then move on to a global championship event. At the championship event, players will then compete for $120,000 in cash prizes, including a $75,000 grand prize.

Competitors won’t actually be using their characters they put all that time and effort into leveling. When they go to make a character on the special realm, they will “instantly create level-70 characters with epic equipment.” According to Blizzard, this is to place the focus “on tactics and execution rather than normal adventuring.” Continued…

ClanBase’s Kincaid submitted this report.

News, E-Sports

Alex Yue

Feb

China’s government decides what games its children should play?

Filed under: call of duty, CB, Chess, China, ClanBase, CoD, Counter Strike, CS, government censorship, massively multiplayer online role playing game, MMORPG, role playing game, RPG, Sun Jiazheng, World of Warcraft, WoW

Personal choice and civil liberties for gamers took another bashing as China’s Ministry of Culture published details of ten games it deems “suitable” for minors.

In an effort to “purify the ‘on-line environment,” ten games have been selected by the ministry’s on-line games censorship committee, that are deemed healthy and can “enhance intelligence.” The games are all domestic products so you won’t see the likes of World of Warcraft, Counter-Strike or Call of Duty on the list.

Instead they are made up of five role playing games, four recreational/chess games and one educational game.

This isn’t the first time though - in 2005 People’s Daily Online published an article relating to the Culture Minister’s 15 clean online games. Another list was collated again in January 2006. Continued…

News, E-Sports

Feb

Chinese TV uses WoW map in military documentary

Filed under: China, tv, WoW

From the WTFWTT deaprtment:

China’s military TV channel broadcasted a documentary about recent war exercises.

Compare this map graphic of Turkey, Iraq and Iran…

…to this map of the Arathi Highlands in World of Warcraft: (below fold) Continued…

Erik David Even

Jan

World of Warcraft generates $1.2 billion in 2007

Filed under: blizzard, Blizzard Activision, it prints money, massively multiplayer online role playing game, Mike Morhaime, mmo, MMORPG, multiplayer, Online, PC Gaming, role playing game, RPG, Vivendi, World of Warcraft, WoW

Most game studios dream about making $1.2 billion for their parent companies on a yearly basis. Blizzard is living that dream as we speak.

Vivendi Games, parent company of the Irvine, CA-based Blizzard, generated €1.02 billion last year, or around $1.8 billion in USD monopoly money. Of that, €814 million ($1.2 billion USD) came directly from World of Warcraft.

We all knew it was printing money, but, geez. Still, you should know that figure doesn’t refer to profit, which is calculated after business expenses such as salaries, server maintenance, and Mike Morhaime’s blow fund are deducted. Now you know…and knowing is half the battle!

Read: WoW Blasts Vivendi Games Past €1 bln

GGL’s Reid Landeen translated this GGL China article.

World of Warcraft had a tumultuous 2007 in China, with the release of The Burning Crusade expansion and addition of many new players. Here’s a journal-style rundown of the year for TBC in China and around the world.

Jan. 16, 2007
World of Warcraft’s first expansion, The Burning Crusade, ships to North America and Europe.

March 8, 2007
Blizzard Entertainment announced today that WoW’s expansion (The Burning Crusade) has already sold more than 3.5 million copies in North America. In the first 24 hours of release, it sold more than 2.4 million copies, which is more than any PC game has ever sold in a single month. Blizzard’s President, Mike Morhaime explained, “The passion that gamers have for The Burning Crusade makes us feel really excited.” At this time, Chinese gamers did not know when The Burning Crusade would be released in China.
Continued…

Features, News, E-Sports

Reid Landeen

Jan

Faces for Radio #2

Filed under: 149, american, djWHEAT, eg149, epileptic, faces, for, gaming, hdtv, idol, Internet, lost, MMORPG, of, radio, simon, warcraft, world, WoW

Faces for Radio is the official name! What gaming genres are dying and which ones are emerging? Can we get rid of everyone but Simon on American Idol? TV Is making a come back this week! Are MMORGPGS on the downfall? What makes a demo good? Where did djWHEAT get his name from? If you hear something on the internet, it MUST be real!

Build your own DIY RockBand drum pedal
Mario Doom Total Conversion
Hamster Mario
Get to level 70 in World of Warcraft — without killing anything
Goatse in Zelda (SFW)

EpilepticGaming

GGL Admin

Jan

Today’s Link Roundup

Filed under: animals, Conversions, diy, DOOM, goatse, Mario, pacifism, rock band, WoW, Zelda

The HyperText Markup Language allows users to “click” on a text “link,” which loads a new “web page.”

Got a link? Share it!

1 Comment

Erik David Even

Jan

World of Warcraft claims 10 million souls

Filed under: 10 million subscribers, Activision Blizzard, Black Portal, blizzard, hopelessly addicted, internet cafes, it prints money, monthly fee, nerf hunters, pay to play, subscription model, TBC, The Burning Crusade, Vivendi, World of Warcraft, WoW

Bow down, mortals and worship at the altar that is World of Warcraft! 10 million of your puny brethren have already joined the religion!

Your initiation begins with you jumping up and down repeatedly on a nationally televised talk show’s couch proclaiming your love for the game. Then, we’ll send you a free game card. Afterward, you can begin paying the low price of $14.99 a month to further your ~~addiction~~ subscription.

Here’s how Blizzard counts the masses of levelers that grovel at the Dark Portal, waiting to enter the mythical realm of Outland: The 10 million number counts those who have paid a~~n addiction~~ subscription fee or hold an active prepaid card. Visitors to Internet cafes also count toward the total.

Essentially what your overlords are saying is that they’re not counting expired subscriptions in any fashion. There really are 10 million active players scattered throughout the realms.

What are you waiting for? We’ll see you on the other side!