Project Lore

BlizzCon! Rumors incoming! With BlizzCon less than two weeks away there is no surprise that we are starting to see leaks and rumors. MMO-Champion had reported on the races first with their data mining showing new Halloween masks that featured Goblin and Worgen races (of both sexes) and then pixiestixy brought us news today that WoW.com confirmed this information with sources close to the company, and specifically that Goblin will be Horde and Worgen will be Alliance. To be quite honest, this news is a little underwhelming. This doesn't specifically add content outside of the starting zones and is quite a bit of work (all items have to be remodeled/skinned for these new races) for something that really doesn't ADD to the gameplay (argue all you want but it's merely a cosmetic upgrade). With the races apparently set in stone (we will know for sure at BlizzCon) I find that to be disappointing. The announcement of Blood Elves and Draenei had a much stronger impact because of the classes that you could use with those races, which were previously exclusive to the Horde (Shaman) and Alliance (Paladin). Blizzard really should make these races start out neutral (can't interact with any Alliance/Horde player characters) and either the actions you take through your questing will decide your faction at, say level 20, or you just flat out get to choose. With faction transfers incoming, this would seem to be a logical extension of that model and where Blizzard wants to make the game as accessible and varied as possible. This alongside the lore implications that both these races are (generally) faction nuetral. Based on past experience though I am inclined to believe that the new races are in the next expansion. We knew about Burning Crusade days before BlizzCon 2005 and BlizzCon 2007's announcement of Wrath of the Lich King was known a few days before as well. Funny though was that when I picked up my press badge that year they gave me a program guide with all the details about WotLK (which hadn't been officially announced) so that kind of killed the suspense of the opening ceremony but it was nice to see that the rumors were true. With BlizzCon so close I expect to see a lot more "rumors" pop up, at this point be skeptical of nearly everything from this point on and we will all know August 21st (and we hope to see you there!)! Let us know what you'd like to see related to the new races, do you think picking your faction in game (rather than associated race) would be a good idea? What kind of ideas do you have if they continue down this path of alternating race/class additions every other expansion?

Click to read more ...

It may come as no surprise since we've been speculating on this for quite some time, but it seems that folks over at WoW.com have confirmed from "multiple sources close to the situation" that the next expansion will be World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, and will include the Worgen and Goblin as playable races.

While Goblins have up until now remained neutral, with currency their only faction of choice, WoW.com reports that the Goblin will be playable for the Horde in the new expansion (Go Green!). We've already received a ton of feedback from our previous speculative posts on what the implications will be for having this wide-spread race specific to only one faction. What will happen to the neutral cities, such as Ratchet, where they are a mainstay? I suppose we'll find out with time - perhaps some of the Goblin NPCs will remain neutral, or maybe we'll see a major upheaval of some of those villages. It could make for some great new lore - not to mention the Great Sundering, which also should make for a fun expansion topic.

So that leaves the Worgen, who up until now have played a much smaller role than that of the Goblin. They apparently will be joining up with the Alliance. We've already seen a glimpse of what the female may look like through Halloween masks revealed a while back. Now it just makes me wonder if all the additional masks revealed later (murloc, Naga, plus already available playable races) may have just been added to throw us off the trail? Maybe they're just included because they inevitably will play a large role in an expansion about the Cataclysm. Or, perhaps we'll see a couple more playable races still (One can hope, right?).

All this is still very preliminary and I'll feel a lot better about the information once we've gotten some kind of official comment from Blizzard. But that likely won't come until BlizzCon - and hopefully we'll learn much, much more at that point. New playable races alone don't equal a full expansion, so I'm sure there will be plenty more to report on in the coming weeks. Until then, I'll be crossing my fingers that I will soon be able to play green!

What does everyone make of these leaks and the possible lore behind them? Would you play a Worgen or Goblin? How do you think Blizz will handle all the complications related to turning Goblins for the Horde?

Click to read more ...

Just last week, I was wondering who owned WoW.com and why Blizzard didn't just lay down a few hundred thousand or even million to pick it up. The acronym "WoW" is very common and I'd rather type "wow.com" into my address bar than "worldofwarcraft.com" to get to things like forums and account management. Well, my question was recently answered. The owners of WoW Insider picked up WoW.com and now WoW Insider has been re-branded WoW.com. They have a new layout and lots of new features. There are three methods of registration for WoW.com. You can make a new registration or login using Facebook Connect or using your AIM account. I've had a good experience using my Facebook account on other sites, like Digg, so I went ahead and did that. I didn't have to enter any information; I instantly had an account without even logging into the site. I was able to pick a username for my account (Heartbourne naturally) and had the ability to use the new features. My favorite feature are the user profiles. You can download their addon and application which tracks your activities in WoW. After entering in your user key from wow.com into the addon, it can track quests completed, zones entered or left, achievements, raids, leveling, and guild membership. You can write one line messages that are like tweets. After logging off, simply run the bundled application to upload your data. Users can "follow" or "friend" each other, like on Twitter, to receive updates from their friends and fans. I highly suggest that if you plan to use the addon that you think carefully about what information you want to submit. Chances are nobody cares about what zones you enter or leave, and it will spam your profile pretty badly, as evidenced by my escapade with the addon. I don't know why that feature is on by default; it really slowed down the upload process. The uploading application was slow and crashed a couple times for me, but that was with dozens of pages of zoning data. I was kind of hoping it would make an RSS feed or report back to Facebook or something with the updates. I don't really foresee myself using the WoW.com website much, and I already use Hearthstone to keep up with my friend's activities in WoW. My auto-updating Twitter is full of updates already and the updates are pushed out to people who are interested, instead of them having to sign into a website. Finally, you get your own blog and screenshot gallery setup. I think this may be a crowning feature if users decide to use it. Anyone can start blogging to a huge potential audience at a WoW-centric site. Its a great chance for new people to break the mold. If you are interested in following me, check out my profile. Do you think this is a worthwhile service, or would you rather spend your time on major blogs and in-game?

Click to read more ...