BlizzCon 2009: Battle.net Panel Summary
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Amatera on Friday, August 21, 2009 - 9 Comments Tags: Achievements, World of Warcraft, battle.net, blizzcon 2009, chat, real id, starcraft 2
Amatera on Friday, August 21, 2009 - 9 Comments Tags: Achievements, World of Warcraft, battle.net, blizzcon 2009, chat, real id, starcraft 2
While focused primarily on its integration with StarCraft 2, the Battle.net panel revealed a number of service-based features that will also impact how we interact with our friends inside and outside of World of Warcraft.
One of the key concepts of the new Battle.net is a universal account (called the Battle.net Real ID). If you've already merged your WoW account with the service, then you already have one of these, but you might be asking yourself what sort of advantages are offered by doing so. Currently, you can expect increased account security, as well as the ability to register your Blizzard games and download them at will from the internet, but the panel today revealed new aspects of Battle.net that will no doubt make the concept even more appealing.
Having a Real ID (something that will likely become mandatory very soon) will allow you to chat with your friends cross- realm and cross-game. That's right, if your friends play on a different server or are even playing a completely different game, you will still be able to talk to them no matter what they are doing. Due to this new feature, you'll have to accept and send friend invites (a la Facebook) so that completely random people aren't sending you nasty messages.
But it shows just how far ahead Blizzard is thinking. They know that when StarCraft 2 or Diablo III comes out, a lot of your WoW friends might stop logging on for awhile. But through the cross-game chat system and "broadcast" feature, you can still ask them to fill in raid spots or ask who on your list might want to run some heroics.
As WoW chat functions somewhat differently from those in other Blizzard games, it's not yet clear how certain restrictions will be handled, such as those relating to faction choice. Sadly, you likely won't be able to engage in Guild Chat just anywhere, although there are reports that there might be an iPhone app in the works allowing you to do just that.
It also seems as though the achievement system will be consolidated under the new account structure. When you earn an achievement on one character, you've essentially earned it for all of your characters. No longer do you have to worry about trudging around Azeroth when you create an alt just to earn those pesky exploration achievements again.
Once again, as the panel was focused primarily on StarCraft 2, it's unclear whether or not every new Battle.net feature will find its way into WarCraft, nor was a release date for the new service given. Launching with StarCraft, we may see its implementation before Cataclysm hits store shelves.
One of the key concepts of the new Battle.net is a universal account (called the Battle.net Real ID). If you've already merged your WoW account with the service, then you already have one of these, but you might be asking yourself what sort of advantages are offered by doing so. Currently, you can expect increased account security, as well as the ability to register your Blizzard games and download them at will from the internet, but the panel today revealed new aspects of Battle.net that will no doubt make the concept even more appealing.
Having a Real ID (something that will likely become mandatory very soon) will allow you to chat with your friends cross- realm and cross-game. That's right, if your friends play on a different server or are even playing a completely different game, you will still be able to talk to them no matter what they are doing. Due to this new feature, you'll have to accept and send friend invites (a la Facebook) so that completely random people aren't sending you nasty messages.But it shows just how far ahead Blizzard is thinking. They know that when StarCraft 2 or Diablo III comes out, a lot of your WoW friends might stop logging on for awhile. But through the cross-game chat system and "broadcast" feature, you can still ask them to fill in raid spots or ask who on your list might want to run some heroics.
As WoW chat functions somewhat differently from those in other Blizzard games, it's not yet clear how certain restrictions will be handled, such as those relating to faction choice. Sadly, you likely won't be able to engage in Guild Chat just anywhere, although there are reports that there might be an iPhone app in the works allowing you to do just that.
It also seems as though the achievement system will be consolidated under the new account structure. When you earn an achievement on one character, you've essentially earned it for all of your characters. No longer do you have to worry about trudging around Azeroth when you create an alt just to earn those pesky exploration achievements again.
Once again, as the panel was focused primarily on StarCraft 2, it's unclear whether or not every new Battle.net feature will find its way into WarCraft, nor was a release date for the new service given. Launching with StarCraft, we may see its implementation before Cataclysm hits store shelves.
Reader Comments (9)
sounds really cool because i know a ton of my friends are going to stop play wow as much as they do once those other games come out.
the achievement system sounds very nice. hopefully you will also recieve the prizes along with some achievements so alts can have mounts and tabards too.
agreed having a black war bear on all my alts once they hit 40 would be nice as would their explorations helping out my main without having to return to the low level zones.
Only thing I don't like about what is mentioned here is the "Having a Real ID (something that will likely become mandatory very soon)".
What if I don't want to merge my WoW account with battle.net? Does this mean I can't play anymore? If so, screw you Blizzard, I'll find something else to do...somehow... maybe I'll actually leave the house once in awhile. >.>
you knew this was going to be happening, get over it
manditory battle.net account with my wow account? hope not itired to make a battlenet account still waitig for my registration e-mail
so when my mage downs ulduar (hopefully in the near future LK) so will have my level 39 warlock? or if i create a new character will he just authomaticly get it? and what about those class specific quest? or the level 10,20,30,40,50,60,70,80 achievements how about the profession achievements are they all not going to be included? or are they going to be showed in another catagory something like feats of strengh that shows on which character you did a specific acheivement?
I'm sorry but having our alts have the same achviments as our mains doesn't make any sense...That's why we have alts and main characters, no?
Why should we get the tabards and mounts or titles if we didn't do the achviments???
But to talk with friends through chat that i like a lot...
@Keltoroq
There were mains and alts before achievements. Alts give you the opportunity to play a different class and experience the game in different ways. Shared achievements just mean that you don't ever have to suffer through doing the same one twice.
They didn't specifically address how this would impact vanity awards, but I imagine level and riding restrictions will remain on the mounts, at the very least.
I like how most of this sounds...
About the Achievements, I see it more of a way of consolidating all the things you've done as a player instead of only what you've done on one character. Even if you're playing a level 10 alt, it doesn't mean that you as a player haven't cleared a given raid instance, or that you haven't leveled a character higher than said alt.
I imagine the Real ID feature will be in addition to the current Friends list in WoW. As in, someone may be able to add your one character to their friend's list and see when that one character is logged in, but they would need your permission to get your Real ID and see you on other characters/games.