If you are still shivering in pain and agony, wondering if your soon-to-be number one reason for computer addiction will work on your computer, fear not, because almighty Blizzard, in their infinite and candid lust to satisfy their customers, have revealed the system requirements for the upcoming World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King expansion. Here we have it:

Processor:
Minimum: Intel Pentium 4 1.3 GHz or AMD Athlon XP 1500+
Recommended: Dual-core processor, such as the Intel Pentium D or AMD Athlon 64 X2

Memory:
Minimum: 512 MB RAM (1GB for Vista users)
Recommended: 1 GB RAM (2 GB for Vista users)

Video:
Minimum: 3D graphics processor with Hardware Transform and Lighting with 32 MB VRAM Such as an ATI Radeon 7200 or NVIDIA GeForce 2 class card or better
Recommended: 3D graphics processor with Vertex and Pixel Shader capability with 128 MB VRAM Such as an ATI Radeon X1600 or NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT class card or better

For the Mac specs, check the official post here.



Speaking of satisfied customers, I would just like to thank Blizzard for the incredible amount of fun it gave me in the English Beta. It was so awesome, testing that log-in screen for 90% of my time... I guess I actually had sex with that damn dragon by now.

All my bets are lost. I was dead-sure that WotLK would only be released in 2009, but fortunately, it seems that me and my fellow horde of skeptics (no pun intended) were wrong. If you visit the WoW website right now, odds are you'll be greeted with a page announcing the release date for the World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King expansion - "In Stores 11.13.08". That's like... really bloody soon! Better get your pre-orders sorted out, fast.


The same thing is also beeing announced by Blizzard in a full-fledged press release, which also sheds some light on when the expansion will land in different territories: November 13 in North America, Europe, Mexico, Argentina, Chile, and Russia. November 14 in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand. And finally November 18 in Korea and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau.

The Lich King's wrath will be sealed in a DVD box inscriptioned with a $39.99 price tag, and a special Collector's Edition priced at $69.99 will also be available "in select regions".

To complement our previous story bringing the announcement of Diablo III, here is a selection of screenshots we handpicked from the debut collection posted by Blizzard on the game's website today.

 (...)

 Continue reading 'Diablo 3 Screenshots'...

Twenty years after the cataclysmic events of Diablo II - and eight years after its release in the real world back in 2000 - the long-speculated, and even longer-awaited sequel Diablo III has finally been unveiled today, at Blizzard's 2008 Worldwide Invitational event. Aside from the announcement itself, fans are already treated with dozens of screenshots, a few wallpapers, artworks and, best of all, the first three Diablo III trailers covering all of the above, and a whole lot more! Need I say they're a must-see?

We've already added the HD trailers locally, and we'll return in a bit with a selection of screenshots as well, but in the meantime all there is to know about the game can be found on the newly-opened Diablo III website. No release date yet, obviously, just some stuff about the game's story, locations, characters, monsters, and adventures awaiting you upon your return to the world of Sanctuary. Dig in!


Below we're including the gist of today's press release: (...)

 Continue reading 'Diablo 3 Announced, With Pics And Trailers'...

One must, with the power of mighty Thor, love Internet rumors. They are just fabulous. Recently, the dudes and dudettes (and all their little sisters combined) from Blizz Planet gave the fanboys some new wanking material, stating that the more-than-purple, legendary gaming guru magazine, PC Gamer, will feature a full fledged Diablo 3 announcement, from the golden mouth of Blizzard itself.

You have to realize the insanity this little thing spawned on the web. I bet if those people reading the said “news” had guns, they would have gone to some country in South Africa and start a revolution, proclaiming the Everlasting Empire of Diablo’s Left Kidney. Ah well, sadly, things are not so bright beyond the Looking Glass, since the ladies at Voodoo Extreme just received word from PC Gamer itself that the whole thing whas just a big, smelly fuss. More exactly, We're officially squelching the Diablo rumor. We've got two big announcements coming in our August issue, but neither is from Blizzard.

Rumors come and go, and folks should be accustomed by now that no rumor regarding Blizzard is true until they say so. As for the said two big announcements, who gives a crap.

Playing catch-up with some Blizzard news while patching WoW to version 2.4.2, I noticed something everyone else must have known about since two days ago: BlizzCon 2008 was announced this week, "now with 50% more hall space for your convention-going enjoyment". This will be the third edition of Blizzard's gaming convention, and for those interested in attending, the venue and dates are Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California, on October 10-11. Tickets will go on sale in the next few weeks, priced at $100 per person.

"BlizzCon will offer a wide variety of activities to help all attendees get the most out of the two-day event. In addition to serving as a gathering place for the different Blizzard Entertainment gaming communities, attendees will be able to enjoy:

- Hands-on play time with upcoming Blizzard Entertainment releases
- Discussion panels with Blizzard Entertainment developers
- Competitive and casual tournaments for players to showcase their talents
- Areas and activities devoted to licensed products such as the World of Warcraft - Trading Card Game
- Costume, machinima, and character sound-alike contests with great prizes
- Commemorative merchandise based on the Blizzard Entertainment franchises
- A silent auction
- More exciting activities to be announced"

The press release isn't hinting at any new game announcements during the event, but you never know...

That Zerg trailer was all fine and well, but a bit more detail never hurts. So here is the latest double-pack of StarCraft II screenshots issued by Blizzard this month, showing more diverse gameplay environments.



 (...)

 Continue reading 'StarCraft II Screenshots'...

And yet again, Mr. Kotick blows me up. Almost literally. Not only does Blizzard already have an extremely successful milking cow (actually, they have more of those, but one in particular here has 10 million subscribers), but the company will try, with the soon to be released Starcraft 2, to increase their earnings even further. Much further.

You’ve probably heard about in-game advertising, and if you didn’t you should be shot in a leg. Well, Kotick (which, for those of you who didn’t read the last Activision/Blizzard related news regarding a future CoD MMO, is Activision’s CEO), stated loud and clear that, although advertising in games hasn’t been a successful business yet (but sure as hell will be), his company is eyeing, while also salivating like a true Pavlovian dog, the big bucks that could come out if they implement it in Starcraft 2.

So prepare yourself for some nice Coca-Cola banners, while you try to take over Aiur, or whatever other planet hasn’t been yet obliterated by the Zerg. I’m feeling a bit sad right now.

"[Blizzard] has been thinking about how StarCraft, because it is a short-session experience, can actually be the model for in-game advertising and sponsorship and tournament play and ladder play for the future,"

IGN scoop.

There I was, getting my hopes (and other things) up that Blizzard will be allowed to carry on with its own franchises, after the merger with Activision will be complete. Well, me and the others who thought about that were tremendously stupid, to say the least.

Having a nice chat with some hungry for gossip analysts, Bobby Kotick, Activision’s almighty CEO, pointed out the “possibility” that Call of Duty, Infinity Wards’ awesome FPS, could receive the MMO treatment in a near future.

He started by taking a look at the MMO market as we see it today, and what he saw was a bit grim: after the dreaded World of Warcraft launch, most other companies that tried to fit in the market only managed low-selling titles, canceled titles, or failing titles. Of course, with some little exceptions. Now Kotick looks down into Blizzard’s yard, hoping that his team(s) will learn a good deal from their veterans, plus the fact that Activision has a chance to “borrow” some of Blizzard’s subscriber base.

In short, Kotick kinda said: “Fuck Blizzard’s projects, ours are more important.”

Which would explain why the vast majority of MMOs in recent years were relative failures, and why the situation won't change much for those upcoming hot-shots, either (I'm not giving names... *cough*). After all, who on Earth is so filthy rich to afford spending up to $1 billion, just to make a WoW-killer MMO, instead of buying a couple of African countries and playing a real-life war-game.

The billion-dolar figure was estimated by Activision's CEO, Bobby Kotick speaking at the Goldman Sachs Technology Investment Symposium 2008 Conference this Tuesday, as reported by GI.biz.

"We don't think that even if we made the USD 500 million or billion-dollar investment to get a product out [to compete with WOW] that we would even be successful doing it. (...) When you... Look at all the money that's already gone to these businesses that have failed (ed. - EA, Microsoft, Sony & co.), there didn't seem a likelihood that even a well-managed company like Activision would have the prospect for profit any time soon in this category."

When you look at it that way, Activision were really the smartest guys around. Honestly, why spend a crapload of money and waste people's time trying to develop a WoW-killer, when you can just merge with Vivendi-aka-Blizzard-aka-WoW itself. Kind of makes you wonder how much Funcom is investing in Age of Onan...