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World of Warcraft 3.0.2 Update – Live!World of Warcraft 3.0.2 Update – Live!

October 14, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 3:18 pm

Echo’s of Doom will be live when the systems come back for maintenance. WorldofWarcraft.com was down for a bit today, probably to revamp and push the Lich King messages (which now splash the homepage prior to landing).

This patch brings a crap ton of content to the game including a lot of the lich king updates for character classes, user interface changes, calendar and other crazy awesome stuff. When you start the client, now, you’ll notice the front screen has changed to promote the Lich King content; it now resembles the client for all those in the beta.

The only downfall to the beta will be, once again, re-distributing your talent points. It’s free, so now is your time to re-spec and get ready for battling death knights in our near future!

Check out the full 3.0.2 Echo’s of Doom patch.

Starcraft 2 Part Eins, Zwei and DreiStarcraft 2 Part Eins, Zwei and Drei

October 11, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 9:55 am

Nobody is perfect. When it comes to creating an epic story arc, awesome pre-rendered movies and a fully fleshed campaign Blizzard has done well. Now, Blizzard speaks of Starcraft 2 and the world shuts their mouth and listens to each and every word. What’s the word?

A Trilogy.

We’re not talking about the Lord of The Rings style trilogy, but three games with full stories which all end with the gamer being satisfied at the closure, not cliffhangers.

The three standalone games will be (says GameStooge):

Terrans – Wings of Liberty
Zerg – Heart of the Swarm
Protoss – Legacy of the Void

Gamers are probably thinking, “so, I can play multiplayer with only one race?” No! The campaign is split into three separete games, not the races and multiplayer features. Although, each title is sure to introduce something new to the game engine, Blizzard has said:

“Nothing changes for multiplayer or skirmish mode. All three races are fully implemented from the get go. Each campaign will feel like an epic story – not a cliffhanger into the next one. They will each have separate arcs that have a clear start, middle, end – and you will feel like you’ve really finished *something* at the end of each game. More content than we’d previously planned – many more Movies, Missions, etc.” (games.on.net)

From our perspective, it seems Blizzard is itching to release the multiplayer system to the world sooner than later, considering some countries use Starcraft as a professional league, but they don’t want to rush out fast to market campaigns just to satisfy this multiplayer desire.

Instead, they’re going to take their time, in usual Blizzard style, by releasing the game as they finish it… per races story. This should give us a less watered down storyline or having one or two races with a piss poor storyline while another has a kick ass storyline because it was done first.

End result? Multiplayer gamers will be happy in the end while those that play Starcraft for the story will need to wait for each game to be completed. We know Blizzards release schedule is “when it’s ready” so we can only imagine how long it will take to reach that third game in the trilogy.

Guitar Hero: HendrixGuitar Hero: Hendrix

September 18, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 7:16 pm

As if the week of rumors hasn’t ended, Slash all but confirmed Hendrix as one of Activision Blizzard’s next big hit Guitar Hero games in Rolling Stone Magazine says GameSpot. During the interview with Slash he explained that even “Hendrix will have one” speaking to a stand alone Guitar Hero title.

While Slash isn’t exactly Activision Blizzard’s mouthpiece, he’s probably got a bit of inside information in the industry and probably might not have wanted to say it, but he did. What does that mean to us gamers? Well, for Hendrix fans it means a potential must have Guitar Hero title.

For a few of us, it means another game we’re not going to pickup. Mainly because Guitar Hero is a great franchise when it diversifies its artist across multiple genre’s and multiple artists. It’s hard to doubt the monetary success of putting out a single-artist title game if the artist is as epic and respect as Jimmy Hendrix; a few gamers would surely burn their plastic Guitar Hero guitar to get their hands on this.

This is only a rumor but it’s a pretty solid concept for a real game so we’ll see how it goes. Personally, I’d rather see a full Disturbed Guitar Hero title.

Wrath of The Lich King – Rune SystemWrath of The Lich King – Rune System

September 16, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 11:07 pm

As the Wrath of the Lich King beta lives on, the world (and software behind it) is ever changing. Apparently, the rune system has changed a lot since its first inception. This requires a delicate balance, as the goal is a well rounded Death Knight class without epically overpowered features. Too much power and people will feel cheated while others feel overly destructive. End result, everyone would be a Death Knight.

The rune system that Blizzard has created is more straight forward than the initial system because it contains less variables. The Death Knight has a secondary bar, much like a Warrior, that starts empty and slowly climbs with “Runic Power,” an energy generated when you cast spells and expend rune energy. It works much like the warrior class, as it builds it will open up some abilities in your bar that were “grayed out” because they couldn’t be cast yet.

What the heck is a rune? Above your character profile you’ll have six little circles, called runes, these little guys work much like the rogues energy. The three styles of runes are: Blood, Frost and Unholy runes and they’re coordinated with your spells and sword strike abilities much like a paladin or warrior. Each rune “goes dark” when you expend its energy – this limits your access to use the Death Knights abilities much like expending all your rogues energy stops the rogue from using their neat features. However, once its energy is expended, it will grow your runic power a slight bit, “charging” it for later use.

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Beta: Wrath of the Lich King – Initial ReactionBeta: Wrath of the Lich King – Initial Reaction

September 12, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 9:25 pm

The long awaited Wrath of the Lich King is here! By long awaited, really, I mean, I waited a long time to get patch after patch of the next expansion to Blizzards best of MMORPG. Although I don’t know the architecture to creating the patches, it seems so dated in methodology. Why must I download 5GB of patches when one can just supply me with an option to pull everything.

The initial download was roughly 1.8GB for what I assume would be “the DVD” you’d be buying in the store. Once I install that baseline it requires another roughly 1.2GB “update” before you can launch the application. Once you launch the WoW executable it must download another 500MB or so of patch data followed by another 100MB of patch data followed by another 500MB of patch data. Then, and only then, can you login and start playing!

My first option was to use the character I transferred over from Scarlet Crusade and jump into the world. Wishfully thinking, I also migrated over my addons to see what would work. After receiving more errors than I can explain I logged out and disabled all the addons. We’ll wait on those.

Within seconds I noticed the date in the top corner, it seems WoW has evolved over the years from a black vortex of time suckage to something a bit more user friendly. An older patch included a clock on the map so you know how many hours you’ve got before the sunrises, allowing you to sneak in a few hours of sleep before work. Now, they’ve included a calendar so you will know just how many days you’ve been up without food or drink. I kid.

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Trials of a World of Warcraft Player: Entry FourTrials of a World of Warcraft Player: Entry Four

September 12, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 3:45 pm

“Beta”

The second letter of the Greek alphabet, also holds a value of “2.” Beta, in the gaming and general computer industry is a time where people are, usually, invited into a product prior to launch to test the product under the assumptions that “it’s not polished yet” and “things may go wrong.” Somehow, however, people get amped and excited over being included into a product that isn’t always stable.

Wrath of the Lich King (WotLK) is in public beta where internal and external gamers alike get to bang on the software to get the bugs out while having a bit of fun doing it. I’ve always enjoyed an MMORPG beta because it is more relaxed, more forgiving and less crowded with people. Ultima Online was one of the most memorable beta’s, so great however, that the game launched and I was sad the small population was gone, replaced by an abundance of players.

I’m proud to announce I’ve been enlisted into the World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King public beta. Many folks have cursed me with jealousy because they were not picked; many gamers just never opted into the beta enlistment even after we posted it publicly for all to see. Why did I opt into the chance to play a game which may be unstable?

Blizzard is known for quality and I feel that being a part of that quality is important because I can impact the game for others by making it slightly better. From an exclusivity point of view, I feel special for being picked, even if it were a random process; it’s much like an exclusive club. Most importantly, we’ve established a website where we write about topics and nothing would please me more than writing about Wrath of the Lich King which had the NDA expire in July. We’re free to talk as we please and I plan to do so.

From install to play test I’ll keep people informed on what’s going on up until the release or they stop the public beta test. It will be a delicate balancing, playing WotLK enough to get a clear perspective yet continuing to play the real game with my guild and my friends.

My goal is not to be starstruck by the elite privilege to be playing a game prior to its release, I’ve made plenty of game betas in my years, but to look at it from a “window into the future” view and record my findings for non-beta folks to see.

Now, we must finish downloading the 1GB patch update…

World of Warcraft, Early November Release RumorWorld of Warcraft, Early November Release Rumor

September 5, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 3:25 pm

There is a new rumor running around showing off some 7-eleven computer systems which list World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King showing a “tentative” release date of November 4th, 2008. The suggested retail price is $39.99 and this source also claims a “midnight” release (again) which, at this point, should be common sense.

Their Burning Crusade content had a great turn out when we went to pick it up at BestBuy’s midnight release, this expansion should be no less. An early November release would be great for those planning to stand in line during the late night rather than sticking it out in the cold winter nights here in New England.

This is just a rumor, but many of the rumors involving employees covertly sliding out photos or paperwork on games at retail stores tend to be closer to the mark than not.

Anyone planning on waiting in the line if this turns out to be true?

(Thanks, 1up)

Starcraft 2: A 2009 Release ScheduleStarcraft 2: A 2009 Release Schedule

September 3, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 10:35 am

If you thought you’d be getting a release of Starcraft 2 for the holiday of 2008 you’ll be upset at the news. The heavily awaited RTS title Starcraft 2 will be arriving sometime in 2009. The original title arrived in 1998 but we’re not going to see the first sequel until sometime next year, amazing people even remember the game after eleven years, right?

Activision Blizzard hardly makes a game we’d forget. The reason we all have fond memories of Starcraft, Warcraft and Diablo is due to the craftsmanship that goes into the game titles (and a bit of the marketing). The developers take their time to hand craft and test a solid product, which is reason alone to see a release next year rather than in this one.

“Next year’s offerings from Activision Blizzard should include highly anticipated PC strategy title StarCraft II, the sequel to one of the world’s most enduringly popular games.” (starcraftwire.com)

It won’t make the 2008 holiday schedule, making us wonder if it’s a 2009 holiday schedule. Although Activision Blizzard doesn’t need to time their games for the biggest sales seasons it doesn’t hurt to push the title out when gamers are actively looking for new blockbusters.

Personally, we’d love to see a Spring/Summer release time frame to give us something to fill the void, but we’re sure Activision’s marketing team has plans revolving around money than a few gamers personal preferences. Regardless to the launch time we’re at least privvy to the knowledge that it’s coming next year.

Diablo 3 Content Creation PhaseDiablo 3 Content Creation Phase

August 31, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 3:16 pm

Now that Blizzard feels their engine is solid, it’s time to move on to creating content for the full game. Jay Wilson, Diablo 3‘s lead designer, says the game engine is in an advance stage of completion and much of the art team has moved onto Act 2. Don’t read into that, he said game engine.

Blizzard is obviously not hurting for money, given the success of World of Warcraft and they’ve always taken their time with projects to make them solid products. Blizzard’s name is on the line and they’re brand consists of three major franchises: Warcraft, Starcraft and Diablo. When you produce so few games you’re expected to do them perfectly.

How do they do it? As Wilson says, “If we haven’t rebuilt something five times it really doesn’t deserve to be shipped. That’s pretty much our policy.” (eurogamer) While a game engine is the foundation for a great game experience, the content is king. Blizzard is deep in the mire of content production so, although the engine might be solid, the final product is probably still far from complete.

End result, expect a high quality product once again from Blizzard.

World of Warcraft: Guild Petition [ Fallen Souls ]World of Warcraft: Guild Petition [ Fallen Souls ]

August 30, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 2:32 pm

If you’re looking to get into a new guild of über casual gamers, gamingpodcast.net‘s new guild is looking for you! We’d love some of the gaming podcast fans to jump into our PvE (RP) realm at Scarlet Crusade!

The guild is new and, although we’ve transferred some higher level characters to Scarlet Crusade, there is nothing saying you can’t start new (some of us have anyway). The guild is new, so new we’re still looking for six more signatures on the petition.

The guild name is: Fallen Souls and we’re on the Horde side of the battle. We’re setting up some gaming podcast forums this weekend and will have a section for our guild Fallen Souls to chat as well.

If you’d like to join, comment on this post or send us contact us and we’ll setup a time to login and get you into the guild!! If you jump in, add Säyde, VogelRetter and Birgwraith to your friends list and whisper me!