Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Role Playing (Games) Entertainment Games

Large Content Patch To Precede Upcoming WoW Expansion 159

Posted by Soulskill from the three-point-oh dept.
Blizzard has announced they will be releasing a sizable patch to prepare for the upcoming Wrath of the Lich King expansion to World of Warcraft. The patch, similar to one they released prior to the first expansion, will include the new profession (Inscription), new talents for each class, and two new arenas. The patch will be up on the Public Test Realm "soon," according to a Blizzard rep, but it will require significant testing before reaching the live servers. Blizzard developers Tom Chilton and J. Allen Brack gave a related interview recently to Videogamer in which they mentioned that a graphical reboot for World of Warcraft "may never be necessary." We've been following the development of Wrath of the Lich King for a while now.
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Large Content Patch To Precede Upcoming WoW Expansion More

Large Content Patch To Precede Upcoming WoW Expansion

Comments Filter:

  • this just in (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    game receives update! alert the media!

  • Beautiful woman and yet she has a boyfriend who lives in that game. (6hrs a day or more of playing, especially weekdays = living in the game.) MMO's, they're a helluva drug.

    • Re:I work with a warcraft widow (Score:5, Funny)

      by Syncerus ( 213609 ) on Wednesday August 27, 2008 @05:48PM (#24770969)

      Maybe if you paid more attention to her character and personality and less to her looks, you'd understand why her boyfriend played WoW all the time.

      Just a thought.

      • Beauty is not confined to the exterior of people.

        A beautiful person can be as homely as they get. Conversely, The most physically attractive person can be a mass-murderer.

        Your assumption about previous posters comment was quite possibly faulty.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Bloodoflethe ( 1058166 )

        Sad that you think it is more likely her fault than his. I've known a fair number of people who play warcraft that will even ignore their wife/girlfriend's advances because they feel some silly raid obligation or somesuch. Most of these women are actually awesome people and some of those awesome people are attractive women.

        I play WoW myself, but find that, for me, the game can't hold a candle to my woman. The great thing is that I managed to find a group of like minded people with a guild large enough and

        • Re:I work with a warcraft widow (Score:5, Insightful)

          by bigstrat2003 ( 1058574 ) * on Wednesday August 27, 2008 @07:37PM (#24772463)
          I don't think you should assume it's either side's fault. I knew a girl who felt like she got dumped for WoW, but I also knew her boyfriend, and knew perfectly well that it had nothing to do with WoW: that was just his escape from the fact that he was in a relationship with a girl who was utterly crazy. If you only looked on the surface, you would say, "That bastard ignored and then dumped his girlfriend for WoW!", but you'd be wrong. It was merely a symptom of the fact that their relationship was toast... if it wouldn't have been WoW, it would've been something else.

          • Thanks for fleshing out what was intended to be an inference.

            I have second-hand knowledge of that side of things, as well.

          • She did get dumped for WoW. Like you said, it might have been something else, sure. But it wasn't. She got dumped, not because of WoW but because of issues; but this doesn't change the fact instead of telling her something like "I'm sorry, but you're nuts, and I can't take it. I'm leaving" he chose to hide behind something else.

            This may be a fairly common tactic (I wouldn't know), but it's still not the nicest way to break up with somebody. And it does mean that it's not entirely unfair to feel like s

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Rakarra ( 112805 )

              She did get dumped for WoW. Like you said, it might have been something else, sure. But it wasn't. She got dumped, not because of WoW but because of issues; but this doesn't change the fact instead of telling her something like "I'm sorry, but you're nuts, and I can't take it. I'm leaving" he chose to hide behind something else.

              I don't think you can blame WoW or claim it's the game's fault though. Guys and girls have been lying to each other about the real reasons for breakups since the advent of communication.

      • It's not her who has the character, it's the boyfriend.

        I would never go out with someone just cause they had a level 70 though, pah.

      • Maybe if you paid more attention to her character and personality and less to her looks, you'd understand why her boyfriend played WoW all the time.

        Just a thought.

        Yah, there's the picture of the hot chick with the tag "No matter how good she looks, someone somewhere is sick of her shit." And relationship screwups are rarely ever 100% one person's fault. Who knows how she's like at home, if there's nagging or crazy shit or whatever. But from what I see working with her, I have no idea what her contribution to the situation cold be, she seems great.

        The reason why I tend to come down more on the MMO's is because I find them an abominable time-sink and I say this as some

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by T.E.D. ( 34228 )

        Maybe if you paid more attention to her character ...

        Let her level her own character. I'm busy.

    • No joke. I had a roommate who, I swear, played WoW more hours than he did sleeping/spent outside his room combined.

      My group of friends and I all played for a while as well. Great game when you can all meet at lunch the next day and bullshit about the raid and who was a n00b. Not too much fun when you're on a server all by yourself.

      • True story: For awhile I roomed with a guy who plays WoW. Since the apartment's rather small, we both had our computers in the living room. He would come home, start playing, then go to sleep. Every day. But that's not the worst of it; no, what he had to do to keep up with his friends is the bad part. See, they played some when he wasn't on; in order to keep up, therefore, he had to play when they weren't on.

        This apparently was too much for him; occasionally, I'd hear him say "This is getting kind of

    • Re:I work with a warcraft widow (Score:4, Interesting)

      by _Sprocket_ ( 42527 ) on Wednesday August 27, 2008 @06:58PM (#24771911)

      Beautiful woman and yet she has a boyfriend who lives in that game. (6hrs a day or more of playing, especially weekdays = living in the game.) MMO's, they're a helluva drug.

      Ahhh - the oddity of human behavior. WoW (being a successful example of an MMO) is just another in the long line of activities that impact personal interactions. Ever hear of a "football widow"? Ever really seen a sign that reads "gone fishing"?

      Yeah, sure... MMOs and other such ilk touch all these interesting psychological behaviors [wikipedia.org]. But they're hardly unique in the realm of personal interaction (neglected or otherwise).

      As for me... in about an hour, I'm going to be sitting down at the computer area with my wife and leveling up some alts. We got matching recruit-a-friend accounts to play with. Re-running all this old content with player classes we rarely use has been a blast.

    • You know, it might sound crazy, but why doesn't she try joining him? Best case scenario, they discover a common topic and interest, and they live happily ever after. Worst case, well, he discovers that he can't escape her even in WoW, gives up WoW.

      As a personal anecdote, I present my parents: they're both complete nerds, but otherwise they're as close to polar opposite personalities as you can get together without causing a paradox. They weren't happy together. In fact, as far as I can tell, they only staye

  • Obligitory Generic MMORPG /. Comment (Score:5, Funny)

    by VoxMagis ( 1036530 ) on Wednesday August 27, 2008 @05:43PM (#24770919)

    I played GAME for years - Then I realized that GAME was just a massive waste and only losers/basement-dwellers/twits/sexless-wonders play GAME anymore.

    Thank goodness I quit GAME! I can't believe anyone still plays GAME anymore! Everyone should quit!

    Besides, NEXT-GAME is the best thing ever! I don't even know why GAME makes news anymore!

  • Living in the past (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Krater76 ( 810350 ) on Wednesday August 27, 2008 @05:56PM (#24771041) Journal

    VideoGamer.com: Do you guys expect a drop off when Warhammer Online comes out?

    TC: It's hard to say. We haven't really experienced any meaningful drop-offs in the past.

    After how successful the WAR Preview Weekend was and how exciting it was playing a new game with new classes and new areas, I think it's hubris for them to think that they aren't going to lose a lot of their player base. I know my household will have two accounts cancelled, and I know of about 10+ friends who are going to play as well. I don't know if they will cancel their WOW accounts but they won't be logged in.

    I think the hardcore and casual PvP'ers will be playing WAR soon after launch if not at launch. The RvR in the preview was fantastic and just like what everyone has always wanted in WOW. It exists in every zone in WAR or you can do scenarios (battlegrounds). There aren't just 4 battlegrounds to play in and you can queue any where at any time and return to where you were when done. It's also possible to get gear without having to rely on a raid. And when you PvP you get XP.

    Blizzard is going to try to implement some world PvP in with the expansion but it will probably be too little too late for the fans of PvP. Don't get me wrong, it won't kill WOW by any means, WOW will continue positive growth for a while until there is a contender in Asia, where the bulk of their user accounts exist. But WAR will make them stop and think about their direction. They might finally relent and merge many of their low-population servers. Maybe they'll drop their insane e-sport fetish that they've had for the last couple years and put more RPG into their MMO Arena Game.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by geekoid ( 135745 )

      After how successful the NEW GAME Preview Weekend was and how exciting it was playing a new game with new classes and new areas, I think it's hubris for them to think that they aren't going to lose a lot of their player base. I know my household will have two accounts cancelled, and I know of about 10+ friends who are going to play as well. I don't know if they will cancel their WOW accounts but they won't be logged in.

      I think the hardcore and casual PvP'ers will be playing NEW GAME soon after launch if not

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Avatar8 ( 748465 )

      ...how exciting it was playing a new game with new classes and new areas, I think it's hubris for them to think that they aren't going to lose a lot of their player base.

      You just described the Wrath of the Lich King expansion and the reactions of players in the beta test. Of course new and different is exciting. Sounds like you are an explorer type. I've been playing MMOs since 1997. This sort of statement occurs every time a new MMO comes out. "This is better than that." "It's what the players have always wanted." "They'll see how wrong they are when X people leave."

      What really surprised me is that when WoW came out and really did kill UO and EQ, very little was said.

      I

    • Here's a prediction: WAR's active player base will never exceed 15% of WoW's.

    • You will be back. Same thing happened when LOTRO launched, and the majority of those players came back.

      • I *might* come back for WotLK but that would require WAR to be monumentally disappointing. After playing the preview weekend I can say that is definitely not the case. As someone who enjoys PvP more than raiding (I lean 70:30 towards PvP) I can say that that WAR is right up my alley.

    • Well, I hope you realize that we've heard the same "doom-and-gloom as soon as NEXT-GAME launches" predictions half a dozen times before, and nothing spectacular happened.

      "As soon as LOTRO launches, I'm cancelling my WoW account for good! And so does everyone I know! That'll make Blizzard think twice!" Sounds familiar? There was about a month or two of that talk non-stop in my guild on WoW before LOTRO launched. Turns out that it didn't do jack squat for WoW subscriptions.

      And before that it was various other

      • As soon as LOTRO launches...
        Dungeons and Dragons Online, for example. ...
        Vanguard. ...
        AOC. ...
        Tabula Rasa.

        I think the problem with most of those games is that they are primarily PvE and grind-heavy. AoC is probably the exception but has really floundered on content at their level cap. Having to buy a new computer to play some of these because of their graphics was a downfall too (AoC, definitely Vanguard). D&D was just so-so. But all of that was predicted in commercial and beta tester reviews. Read the DDO [slashdot.org] & Tabula Rasa [slashdot.org] reviews from slashdot. Not pretty but were mostly just rehashes of other earli

        • Well, I'm not saying that WAR will necessarily fail, or anything. Just that I see why the Blizzard guy was saying that. When you've heard people crying "Wolf!" half a dozen times, and there was no wolf after all, you tend to be skeptical when it happens yet again. That's all, really.

    • In my experience every mmo that has challenged WoW's superiority has fallen flat on its face because a good majority of mmo's lack polish.

      WoW isn't perfect either, but its easy to learn, controls are responsive and work (good example - don't ever ever ever jump in the water on lineage 2) and it has a broad spectrum of activities to do for most players.

      People said the same thing about lotro - from what a few players in my WoW guild who left (and came back) said it was really awesome up to level 30 or so the

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Stormie ( 708 )

      A bunch of my WoW guildmates were making plans to jump ship to WAR, but the preview weekend basically derailed any momentum they had. The reaction was pretty much unanimous disappointment, we were all very unimpressed with the "feel" of WAR, and it's really way too buggy at the moment to have any confidence that it will be in good shape come release. I expect some of us will still check it out, but any thoughts of it replacing WoW as "the game to play" have evaporated.

      It won't be another Age of Conan debacl

  • It seems Illidan is going to be revealing himself based on some sound files that have been extracted from the beta files. Probably put up some quests and maybe some bosses to fight, hopefully for a variety of levels. Shouldn't just be the 70s getting in on the fun. As for Wrath, a lot of the changes and improvements will be quite good, but there will likely still be some growing pains. But flying carpets man! We'll be getting flying carpets!

  • Race (Score:1)

    by iblum ( 894775 )
    For me, its a race. Will our guild be able to progress into the next tier of content before this patch comes out and basically brutalizes the guild structure. What happened last time was that a guild I had been raiding with for 6 months all of a sudden lost about a third of its membership. and the rest of them had incredible amounts of trouble ajusting to their new talents. raid attendence became spotty, then non-existent. Once the actual expansion came out, some levelled their characters as fast a
  • My wife got us into the 3 day Warhammer beta last weekend and since then I've found that playing wow just annoys the heck out of me. Here are the reasons why:
    1. Quests that require that you run for long periods of time. Who thought this was a good idea?! I've never liked this, but now I've lost all tolerance for it
    2. There's an overall lack of theme or purpose. My first quest is to kill sprites, then boars, then harpies, then turtles, then orcs.... wait, I'm playing an orc. It seems like your people are f

    • Re:I can't play wow anymore (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gweihir ( 88907 ) on Wednesday August 27, 2008 @09:28PM (#24773745)

      Those who play on a PvP realm, get what they deserve....

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by T.E.D. ( 34228 )

        Those who play on a PvP realm, get what they deserve....

        The Kid: "He had it coming, right, Will?"
        Munny: "We've all got it coming, Kid."
        (The Unforgiven)

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Skadet ( 528657 )
        Sort of. . . I think it's disingenous to say that you deserve to be ganked if you roll on a PvP realm. What if you like world PvP if you have a fair chance? You shouldn't be forced to roll PvE just because you don't want to be camped by 3 70s in Hillsbrad. WoW needs a global reputation system similar to Fable's. Do dishonorable stuff, and NPCs dislike you more and more. Vendors charge more. Repairs cost more. Etc. How much ganking would you do if your repair bill went up 10% every 10 lowbies you ganked? T

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by gweihir ( 88907 )

          I agree that a reputation system would be nice. However I do not think Blizzard does not care. They probably just have no idea to implement such a system in a way that meeds their high quality standards and so that it is very hard to circumvent (as the ganker trash will certainly try to do).

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by brkello ( 642429 )
      And what does that have to do with the articles posted? If you don't like playing WoW, don't. Don't read the articles about WoW. Don't post in forums about WoW. People like you are strange.
    • I believe there's a system in Warhammer that turns high level players who try to gank into chickens. I mean, literally, little chickens that run around and can't do anything. I haven't played though, so I don't know the exact details.
  • The younger generation of nerds needs to know what women look like, we need to set an example. So!

    Youtube to the rescue. [youtube.com]

    And of Course [youtube.com]... enjoy.

  • Way back when, I played the hell out of Warcraft. The original one, Orcs & Humans, where you had to left-click twice to do anything and could only select four units at a time. Still a great time, as are War2, War2x, War3, and War3x. I fell in love with the universe at some point, probably the point where I realized that sheep exploded when you clicked on them too much. There was a bizarre personality that other games seemed to lack, and it was all entwined with wonderfully polished gameplay.

    I've dab

Slashdot Top Deals

If you have a procedure with 10 parameters, you probably missed some.

Close