Expansion Hints From... Soundblaster?
Posted by 
Amatera on Monday, August 17, 2009 - 20 Comments Tags: azshara, blizzcon, cataclysm, creative, expansion, gilneas, kezan, soundblaster, worgen
Amatera on Monday, August 17, 2009 - 20 Comments Tags: azshara, blizzcon, cataclysm, creative, expansion, gilneas, kezan, soundblaster, worgen
I expected teasers to start popping up any day now, but Creative Labs' Soundblaster page isn't the first place I would've looked. Loading up the site will treat you to a short flash movie which depicts a half-glowing Horde symbol inside the ring of what seems to be the outside of a headset speaker.
Considering what the company sells, this may end up being nothing more than an ad campaign for high-quality, World of Warcraft-themed gaming headphones to be revealed at Blizzcon (to be clear, this is speculation on my part). But that doesn't make it any less mysterious. Looking -- and listening -- closer reveals several interesting clues.
First of all is the fact that the Maelstrom appears in the movie. As the short animation plays, a swirling light consumes the screen, eventually fading into the shape of the infamous spiral, supposed home to Queen Azshara. This, in and of itself, isn't earth-shattering news (did you catch the pun?). What intrigues me more is why the emblem of the Horde is overlaid on top of it, and why it is only "sort of" glowing. I hope I'm not reading too much into this, but from all we heard, the Horde is impacted far more by coming events than the Alliance. Of course, it says "To Be Continued...," which may indicate that we'll see more of the other faction in coming days.
Likewise, the music playing you might recognize as "Lament of the Highborne." This is the song that Lady Sylvanas sings when you complete the quest "The Lady's Necklace." Sylvanas' role in the expansion is not yet known (she's still got those pesky betrayers to deal with), but guess what central character is a former Highborne? That's right, good old Azshara.
In the background, you can also see also see part of the world map, though it's obscured by shadows and the various runes floating around. To the immediate right is Gilneas, which is determined to be home of the new race, the Worgen. The interesting thing about this is that the Maelstrom does not appear that close, or that far north on the official map. If you go take a line straight across the map from Gilneas and try to match it up to the corresponding coast on Kalimdor, you would find that it touches the zone of Azshara.
The land mass on the left side of the image is even harder to make out, but it does not seem to correspond with the crescent shape of Azshara's coastline. I'm tempted to say that it might be the Goblin island, Kezan, simply to provide duality with the Worgen, but even of that I can't be sure. You can see what seems to be the peaks of mountains, but Kezan's mountainous region is found in the southwest portion of the island. Could it be some other part of Kalimdor? Durotar seems a likely candidate.
Geez, I feel an awful lot like one of those gossiping tools on entertainment shows, trying to pick apart a new celebrity photo in the tabloids. The only thing we can be sure of is that it's a clever way for Creative to attract some attention during this tumultuous time for WoW fans.
In the end, it doesn't really tell us anything we haven't already speculated upon. We can only wait to see what happens to the animation in the coming days and hope that new information can be gleaned then.
Now that I've had my go, can you readers pick out anything that I missed? Why not offer up your own theories on what these symbols represents in the comments section?
Update: As expected, this was an advertisement for new wireless headsets to be revealed at Blizzcon. Still, there's no denying that even the folks over at Soundblaster are clued into this whole Cataclysm thing. It's a shame we couldn't get anything more out of them!
Considering what the company sells, this may end up being nothing more than an ad campaign for high-quality, World of Warcraft-themed gaming headphones to be revealed at Blizzcon (to be clear, this is speculation on my part). But that doesn't make it any less mysterious. Looking -- and listening -- closer reveals several interesting clues.
First of all is the fact that the Maelstrom appears in the movie. As the short animation plays, a swirling light consumes the screen, eventually fading into the shape of the infamous spiral, supposed home to Queen Azshara. This, in and of itself, isn't earth-shattering news (did you catch the pun?). What intrigues me more is why the emblem of the Horde is overlaid on top of it, and why it is only "sort of" glowing. I hope I'm not reading too much into this, but from all we heard, the Horde is impacted far more by coming events than the Alliance. Of course, it says "To Be Continued...," which may indicate that we'll see more of the other faction in coming days.Likewise, the music playing you might recognize as "Lament of the Highborne." This is the song that Lady Sylvanas sings when you complete the quest "The Lady's Necklace." Sylvanas' role in the expansion is not yet known (she's still got those pesky betrayers to deal with), but guess what central character is a former Highborne? That's right, good old Azshara.
In the background, you can also see also see part of the world map, though it's obscured by shadows and the various runes floating around. To the immediate right is Gilneas, which is determined to be home of the new race, the Worgen. The interesting thing about this is that the Maelstrom does not appear that close, or that far north on the official map. If you go take a line straight across the map from Gilneas and try to match it up to the corresponding coast on Kalimdor, you would find that it touches the zone of Azshara.
The land mass on the left side of the image is even harder to make out, but it does not seem to correspond with the crescent shape of Azshara's coastline. I'm tempted to say that it might be the Goblin island, Kezan, simply to provide duality with the Worgen, but even of that I can't be sure. You can see what seems to be the peaks of mountains, but Kezan's mountainous region is found in the southwest portion of the island. Could it be some other part of Kalimdor? Durotar seems a likely candidate.
Geez, I feel an awful lot like one of those gossiping tools on entertainment shows, trying to pick apart a new celebrity photo in the tabloids. The only thing we can be sure of is that it's a clever way for Creative to attract some attention during this tumultuous time for WoW fans.
In the end, it doesn't really tell us anything we haven't already speculated upon. We can only wait to see what happens to the animation in the coming days and hope that new information can be gleaned then.
Now that I've had my go, can you readers pick out anything that I missed? Why not offer up your own theories on what these symbols represents in the comments section?
Update: As expected, this was an advertisement for new wireless headsets to be revealed at Blizzcon. Still, there's no denying that even the folks over at Soundblaster are clued into this whole Cataclysm thing. It's a shame we couldn't get anything more out of them!
Reader Comments (20)
wouldn't the worgen capital be in the eastern kingdoms closer to shadow fang keep?
if you go to mmo-champion some people brightened the picture up and it looks like some places are under water. Also the file is called day1 so i think it will be like another d3 teaser.
@kevin
Hmm, I could've been wrong about the left side not being Azshara.
@decado
Gilneas is the peninsula just south of SFK.
While evidence suggests that this is a teaser for Cat. (New, Streamlike Horde Symbol; Sundered Land), there is something that bugs me.
Soundblaster is all about that. Sound. Headsets, Sounds Cards, you name it. I feel that they are advertising a WoW headset, tbh.
ALSO: S.B is in no way in a Partnership w/ Blizz (that we know of). These teasers can cen attacks; SB punished
After thinking through my above post, I recant my statement of it being a headset...welll.it still could be.
HOWEVER: What it looks like is the Demon Soul (Known as the Dragon Soul also). Search it. That thing keeps coming back. I believe it will be what causes the Cataclysm, ampliphied by Azshara's magic
@Octaviax
Oh, I certainly believe that Soundblaster is advertising some sort of upcoming product. There would be no reason to tease on their site otherwise. Now, the real issue is figuring out what the teaser means. Do they know something? Has Blizzard authorized them to tease the public in this manner? Or are they simply trying to ride the hype by latching onto common internet speculation in the hopes of getting a few extra hits?
Who knows? It could be both.
Is the animation supposed to load up from the link at the top of the page, because I can't see it from it, but there looks like there is a space for it. Maybe I need to update my flash player or something =S
Anyone else having any problems?
Yep, me too. Can't see the video on Creative's website
Oh, and i already have Flash 10
Yeah. Something's wigged out with the animation. It can take a minute to load this first time around.
hmmm wierd it worked teh first time but not working anymorre and thiers a huge possibility that i could be wrong on this as mentioned some post ago thrall will resighn as teh warchief and pass the ledership of the horde over to garosh a hot head who declares all out war on the alliance and destroys any possibility of peace between alliance and the horde and that mark isnt just half lid and blinking to as if broken so i think that flashing half lid symbol represents war and death and bloodd the war between horde and alliance th death of the members of the horde and thiier blood
I hope the new expansion does center around the Maelstrom and a Goblin empire, as well as refresh Vanilla WoW's look to a certain extent but:
1) Goblins (and Worgen) as a new racial type would be hideous. Seriously, its bad enough that there are Gnomes as PC's. I vomit in my mouth a little every time I see a Gnome DK. The races we have already are rich enough in back-story, I want to see more of that developed; like a Troll city...
2) I would rather there be a new race-specific Hero Class eg: Pandaren Brewmaster, Night Elf Wildheart(think cross between druid and shaman with a model like Cenarius's). A Blood Elf Bloodmage.. C'mon! This would be far better than two very 'meh' races being introduced.
To those who can not see it on soundblaster.com, if you have an adblocker disable it this helps, click on the black space in the middle a few times till it starts loading it should eventually start after it has loaded the first tiime the next few times you go to the site it should play with no problems.
@ WML
1) Pandaren will not be in this game "due to cultural differences" (or sumthing like that...only thing Blizzard will actually NOT do at the time)
2) Goblins are a staple of Fantasy, and of the Horde. Read up on it. Play WCII. You'll see
well its cool there's gonna be another expansion but the lich king raid hasent been released yet and he was the cover boy for wotlk
When is this expansion supposed to come out?:o
Its just new headphones, they have an alliance one too...recheck the site
I will actually have a comment in 30 mins when the page finishes loading lol
confirmed, it's jist a set of wireless headphones with customizable "Glyphs"
Why Worgen and Goblins? If its with Queen Azshara why not introduce a Naga and Murloc race... seeing as how its from the Maelstrom and that in WCIII Illidan raised them from the sea. Why not have a group of Naga join the Alliance and Murlocs for the Horde? Not sure why those two specific races are chosen and not some others that could have a bit more sense to them... Thats just we though and I probably missed the explanation of why Worgen and Goblins. If someone knows let me know.