Project Lore

Finally, subscribing to @Warcraft on Twitter has paid off.  Yesterday, Blizzard, by way of said Twitter account, updated all its followers with news that Jaina Proudmoore "needed new attire for an urgent upcoming event.  So our artists obliged."  Obliged indeed, but they didn't just stop at her attire (which is the same look, but appears to actually be fashioned armor, instead of squishy cloth). Jaina also received a much needed makeover, complete with a unique face.  The whole ensemble clocks in at a higher resolution (is that a belly button?!), giving the famed character all the glam and curves any NPC could ever want.  It's not exactly how the comics portray her though.  I am of course referring to the size of her...staff.  It's much taller than her in the comic...Yeap, the staff. /me looks around shifty-eyed. This is actually the Ruler of Theramore's second major update since her former lover became the focus of our attention.  The first being minor adjustments to her face and stomach.  She wants to save him so badly that she's resorted to cosmetic surgery to return him to the light! With Jaina all dolled up, the artists can now focus on some of the other leaders.  I don't know about you, but after almost five years I'd think Thrall would have replaced his gear.  Especially since he's been chasing Jaina all over Azeroth.  Even orcs should realize that human females enjoy men who change their outfits! A forum thread on the topic prompted Zarhym, everyone's favorite disembodied chattering head, to tease us with further Patch 3.3 details.  "We feel now is a very good time to get Jaina an update since her and Sylvanas will play key roles in the five-player Icecrown Citadel dungeon. That isn't to say other heroes will not receive similar treatment in the future. ;)" Seems safe to say that Jaina and Sylvanas will be appearing during the assault on Icecrown Citadel, and hopefully in the absolutely epic death of Arthas.  I hope I am not overselling the upcoming event, but I am quiet excited to see which direction Blizzard takes us.  After all, it'll be the culmination of Warcraft III's events, allowing us to progress into uncharted territory. Here's a link to the old image of Jaina for comparison.

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We saw a glimmer of this when installing Wrath, and its now beginning. Players now have the option to create an overarching Battle.net account and link all of their Blizzard games together. This may become mandatory in the future. After registering, you can "merge" your WoW account and your Battle.net account. Whenever you login to WoW, you then use your Battle.net credentials, namely the email address you used for your Battle.net account and your new password. Login for the non-WoW Blizzard games still uses their existing logon system and they will not (yet?) accept the new Battle.net credentials. You can add StarCraft Anthology, Warcraft III, Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne, Warcraft Battle Chest, Diablo II, Diablo II: Lord of Destruction, and Diablo II Battle Chest into your Battle.net account by providing the site with your CD key. You can also buy a CD key online from the Blizzard store. You are then able to download the fully patched game to your computer using the standard Blizzard downloader used for all WoW patches and media, and in the future there may be more integrated features to unify the games. Warcraft II Battle.net edition is notably not on the list. In the future, its likely that we will see "account wide achievements" and other such things. Its unclear how or if the older games will play into this, but you can be certain that Starcraft II, Diablo III, and the currently unannounced MMO that Blizzard is working on will use the new Battle.net heavily. Warcraft II, Warcraft III, Diablo II, and Starcraft all shared the same Battle.net servers and game channels could be joined by anyone from any of those games. I'd love to see WoW join in on this, as I still hop on Warcraft III and Starcraft once in a while and would like to chat with players across all of these games. In addition, Blizzard annouced that the highly popular Blizzard authenticator will be available as an application for mobile devices, namely the iPhone and iPod touch. Its a great piece of equipment that improves account security. It is being re-branded as the Battle.net authenticator. The authenticator will work with all Battle.net games. Downloadable software is much easier to keep in stock than hardware, so hopefully this will provide players with a venue to get an authenticator. Price is not yet announced, and it may be free to increase account security. Since mobile devices (especially the iPod) must authenticate over the internet, I don't think its unlikely that an exploit to replicate the authenticator will happen at some point in the future.

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