Watch BlizzCon 2009 live stream
It's almost time for Blizzard's BlizzCon 2009 and this year they actually offered a method for international customers to watch the events. It'll cost about $39 though. Here's what you get:
* Exclusive interviews and commentary
* Main stage presentations including opening ceremony
* Tournament coverage and team highlights
* BlizzCon 2009-exclusive World of Warcraft in-game pet, Grunty the Murloc Marine.
Hey, A little Murloc Marine never hurts! BlizzCon 2009 live stream will be aired August 21-22, 2009 and you can find more information about it from Blizzard's site.
The new Battle.net
If you are playing World of Warcraft, a classic Blizzard game or planning on buying any of the new Blizzard games (Diablo 3, Starcraft 2). Then make sure you are registered on Battle.net.
You can "merge" your World of Warcraft accounts with it as well. Unfortunatly it is restricted to American World of Warcraft accounts. European are "Coming Soon! The World of Warcraft account merge process is not yet available in your region".
World of Warcraft 3.0.2
Blizzard finally released World of Warcraft patch 3.0.2 also known as "The Echoes of Doom". The patch is 1.62GB and prepares players for the upcoming expansion "Wrath of the Lich King" which will be released November the 13th.
The update will add new talent points, achievements, inscriptions, hair cuts and many improvements. You can check out WoW Insider's coverage of WoW 3.0.2.
BlizzCon 2008 coverage part 3
Covering the second and last day of BlizzCon 2008. To be honest I was expecting more from Blizzard at this event. At least a major announcement other than a Diablo 3 Class.
Let's start with Podcasts and other audio recordings:
- All Things Azeroth #56 - The Blizzcon Without the Bang Medros and Graece talk about BlizzCon.
- In The World Podcast is discussing the opening day of BlizzCon.
- The Instance recorded a new episode on a live stream, but it won't be available until later today.
- WoW Radio have audio recordings of most of the sessions available here.
Ripten have uploaded videos from some of the panels at BlizzCon:
- WoW WotLK Dungeons and Raids Panel Highlights with Video.
- Swag Bag Video Reveal.
- Wotlk Class Highlight Videos Hunter, Priest, Mage, Druid.
And finally, some more news:
BlizzCon 2008 coverage part 2
Welcome to the second part of my collection of BlizzCon 2008 news! Let's start with Podcasts:
- Medros of the All things Azeroth Podcast released (after a hiatus) a pre BlizzCon episode.
- The Instance just released their Day one of BlizzCon 2008 podcast.
Next, news and photos:
- Starman's BlizzCon photo set on flickr. More updates will be available on it.
- Details of upcoming 3.x patches.
- Opening Ceremonies liveblog.
- UI Panel liveblog. A lot of interesting stuff there.
- Class Panel liveblog. An excellent read, Re-speccing in the middle of the raid will be possible.
- Wrath of the Lich King goes Gold!
- WoW Insider interviews J. Allen Brack, lead producer of World of Warcraft.
- Notes from the BlizzCon 2008 art panel.
And finally, videos:
- StarCraft II BlizzCon Bonus Footage
- WoTLK Bonus Footage BlizzCon
- Diablo III: The Wizard
- BlizzCon 2008 Costume Finals part 1 and part 2
BlizzCon 2008 coverage part 1
As a World of Warcraft player I am looking forward to Blizzard's BlizzCon 2008. I will link to almost every update I can find online! Hope you enjoy it like I will!
Let's start with podcasts:
- Outlandish Podcast have their first BlizzCon Episode: BlizzCon Part 1
- The Instance Podcast have a pre-BlizzCon episode as well.
And now, some pre-BlizzCon news:
- Diablo 3, Starcraft 2 and Wrath of the Lich King will be playable at BlizzCon.
- BlizzCon swag bag content.
WoW Radio will also offer free and live streaming of the BlizzCon keynotes. But with our unstable Internet (Thanks STC!!!) listening to a live stream might not be the best choice for most players in Saudi Arabia. Hopefully WoW Radio will offer downloadable content as well. I will post the links as I find them.
Blizzard allows PVE to PVP paid realm transfers
Via the Blizzard Forums:
Why are you now allowing character transfers from PvE realms to PvP realms? Because World of Warcraft has matured significantly since the inception of Paid Character Transfers, we don’t feel that PvE-to-PvP transfers will have the negative impact on the game that we initially wanted to avoid when we started the service in 2006. This change will provide more mobility and freedom for players to experience the game with friends or play in the type of environment they’re looking for. So I can transfer any character to any PvP realm of my choosing now? Yes, as long as there are no other existing restrictions that would prevent the transfer from taking place, such as trying to transfer a Horde character to a PvP realm where you already play an Alliance character. Please see the Paid Character Transfer FAQ for more details and restrictions.
It's about time Blizzard finally removed that restriction, now I can transfer my character off that slow PVE realm.
Restricted World of Warcraft services to Saudi Arabia subscribers
I have been a World of Warcraft subscriber since 2005, probably one of my favorite games and I switched from Final Fantasy XI Online.
I am not sure of how many players in Saudi Arabia or the Middle East do play it though. But I am aware of a huge player base in Dubai, UAE and montada.com, one of the biggest Arabic speaking gaming forums, have an entire forum dedicated to World of Warcraft. People there still openly talk about buying gold and private servers though (which are against the rules of the game).
You can buy the game (and monthly game cards) locally from Jarir bookstore... yeah, not just a bookstore, silly slogan.
My issue with Blizzard is that the extra features available to most subscribers are inaccessible for subscribers in Saudi Arabia. For example, a service for reinventing former world of warcraft subscribers, "Scroll of Resurrection" is inaccessible because of "Your account is not allowed to access to this page because of its country". Same goes to the Recruit-a-Friend program where you get this error "Not all accounts are eligible to recruit a friend. For a full list of restrictions, please see the FAQ". Contacting Blizzard support is useless since they reply with no information at all, and it sounded like an automated response anyway.
I do not want Blizzard to open local Middle East servers or have an Arabic localized World of Warcraft client, I just want access to those services which are easy to implement.
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