Project Lore

Earlier this week this video (thanks Kotaku) showing that someone had created a way to play World of Warcraft on the iPhone started circulating. TechCrunch called it the end of the world, and Gizmodo thought it had some potential. I just want it in my hands! The technology behind the program is a program called Vollee. Most of the processing is not actually done on the iPhone, but instead uses streaming video of the rendering done on another machine. The functionality was pretty basic, but it includes auction house access and also what would at least be a great way to get some dailies done without having to bring your computer on vacation. Unfortunately, the future of this and all WoW related iPhone Apps is up in the air. Blizzard just issued a Cease and Desist order to the makers of the popular apps, Armory Browser, Warcraft Characters, and Warcraft Arena Calculator. These apps used information that is freely available on the Armory, so why Blizzard would do such a thing is not quite clear at the moment. Perhaps Blizzard is making its own version of those Apps listed and doesn't want any other products out there to confuse users. Perhaps they're working closely with the creators of the Vollee application to give all of us addicts a way to get some WoW in while we're on the go. Whatever the reasoning, there is still a lot of potential in the iPhone and other smart phones for all of us. As a user of an iPhone and a couple of the apps that got Cease and Desists, Blizzard's decision to send out those C&Ds is a little frustrating to me. Hopefully Blizzard creates something amazing or gives up some control to the huge number of developers out there. I'd love a way to log in and chat with people while I wait for the bus and using the Auction House on the road would be amazing. What do you guys think? What kind of phone are you guys using? What World of Warcraft apps are you using on your phone? Would you play WoW on it if you could? What other WoW-related apps would you like to see?

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My long-awaited vacation has finally arrived. And one of the top items on my priority list (although I'm sot sure yet whether it will happen) is playing more WoW and getting a feel for all the 3.1 patch changes. The only problem: I'm more than 800 miles from home and in a much different atmosphere than usual. Here, there's no permanent desk setup, which isn't a huge deal since I normally play on my laptop anyway. It's just a bit less comfortable playing from a hard, wood chair than in my much softer desk chair. But since I need my mouse accessible, I can't exactly sink into a couch. I wish I would have remembered to bring my lapdesk - that would have solved that issue beautifully. Thankfully, latency isn't much of an issue. The DSL here versus cable back home both have me hovering at about 200 ms. But I doubt we'd have enough bandwidth here to run two (or three) windows of WoW simultaneously. Needless to say, my escapades with dual-boxing have temporarily halted. I'm just glad I'm not staying with someone who still runs dialup! So it's not quite the same as back home, but I'm able to squeeze in a bit of WoW in between fun vacation-esque stuff. Enough to feed the addiction. For any of you all looking to leave town for spring break or whatever reason and still hope to get in some gaming on a laptop you can travel with, I recommend: find a comfortable spot - bring a lapdesk (do as I say, not as I do). Don't forget your mouse - touchpads are incredibly difficult to use in-game. And if you have anything like a Zboard that you can fit in your luggage, bring it along, too. Even if you can't fit your entire desktop, a keyboard doesn't take up a ton of space. Of course, if you CAN bring a more powerful desktop, that also would be nice. Though it may limit your options for a spot to play. And no matter what the case, remember: You're on vacation! Don't forget to run some RL quests for fun, too! So what's your WoW routine while on vacation - do you still find the time to squeeze in some playtime? And do you have any more tips to offer for those traveling?

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Wow, is my Google Reader ever full after my little excursion to the east and west coast of St. Croix. Good thing I took that little ski trip a few weeks ago as a warm up to the withdrawal. Otherwise, I do not know if I could have made nine days without a PC to entertain me and record my thoughts. Like a good little rogue (Irish to boot), I did my best to stay in the shadows at all times.

Boy, oh boy, do I have a lot of catching up to do. It will likely take a whole week to be up to snuff on everything that has happened. The prolific writers over at WoWInsider have over 200 articles for me alone – not that I will read it all – then there are all the blues to filter through and likely a good amount of in-game mail to round out the schedule.

I am sure I am not the only person who managed to sneak away for the holiday season, so just in case you missed them, here are some of the stories that perked my interest.

Donations to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society = WoW Subscriptions – A Blizzard Employee will be offering those who donate a chance at one of three one-year subscriptions to WoW. One lucky winner will score themselves a LIFETIME SUBSCRIPTION  ($_$).  This is still running, so be sure to donate.

2008 MMO Trends Analyzed – Get this, GamerDNA and Massively find out that WoW is the most popular MMO! They also believe that the title's reign is coming closer to its end, due to additional subscribers plateauing in recent months.  Me likey graffs!

FCC Commissioner Resigns – Deborah Tate, the commissioner that WoW players love to hate (...) decided to step down after getting made fun of on the Internet. Okay, that wasn't the real reason, her previous actions – like taking corporation opinions into consideration – probably had more to do with it.

Ulduar Won't Be “Hard” In The Normal Sense – PvEers have proclaimed Wrath to be entirely too easy, but Blizzard demands that available raids are just the beginning. Vaneras promised that Ulduar will be more difficult, but only if your guild is brave enough to try a more challenging encounter than the norm.

Mage Solos Naxxaramas Military Quarter – Just watch the video, Ms. Mage did some creative stuff to pull this off.

These are the items that jumped off the page for me, but I am sure there is additional interesting stuff that has happened in the last week and a half. For instance, the nerf to required enchanting materials is one. Anything big that I should make sure I speed read?

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I don't know about you guys, but I have enough turkey left in the fridge to make open-face turkey sammies for a week. Coincidentally, that is the perfect meal to eat while you are slaving away at those XP bubbles or taking down your next heroic. Quick and easy to prepare, with little need to devour it in a timely manner. Damn, I am hungry now.

I knew it was going to be fairly difficult for me to get a lot of play time in during the holiday, so I came up with a different kind of Warcraft-based goal. Rather than do a mad push to level 80 (which, I did my best at anyways) or get trampled at Walmart, I decided to try and sign up that 11,000,001st subscriber to World of Warcraft.

My brother was my first target, seeing as he is a retired hardcore raider. The numerous Priest changes, a demonstration of the differences between vanilla WoW and Wrath with my Holy alt, and general curiosity drew him towards the dark side. After playing for a bit, and seemingly having fun, he put the laptop down and walked away muttering something like “QQ in the channels and guild drama is why I left in the first place.” Damn you new Barrens Chat!

My younger cousin (who can now out bench press me...) was my secondary target. He took up gaming during the GoldenEye days, and has played most big titles since then. The little punk is by no means a hardcore gamer, but he is certainly not casual either. One would think that World of Warcraft would be on his PC gaming rig, and it was! It turns out that he had joined an Azerothian race without consulting me. Sad fact is that his friends set him up, having him roll the opposing faction so they could corpse camp him for hours as he tried to level. He didn't make it past level 20 before his experience was ruined, and has sworn off the genre entirely. I'll have to work on him further.

At this point, my hopes were dashed and the family get togethers had all past. With no more targets I sat down with little old SolidSamm to work his way towards level 80 and noticed that I had caught the attention from one of the last people I would expect, my girlfriend. “Your guy is so little” she said. “Yes,” I replied, “but he can do big things.” I quickly ran off to find the biggest mob in Dragonblight and showed her how rogues like to do it.

Perhaps, just maybe, I can suck her in? Tips, tricks, strategies and secret potions are appreciated. How many of you managed to ding level 80 over the holiday break? Or did you have alternative goals like I did?

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