Do you really need to have the gurgling murloc sound as your telephone ringtone? Do you not hear the World of Warcraft opening theme enough on your PC? Perhaps you can't figure out how to create your own mobile phone wallpapers and would rather spend a couple bucks on letting the extremely nosy know that you're into Diablo or StarCraft? Well you're in luck, as Blizzard has just opened up a ringtone and wallpaper store at Mobile.Blizzard.Com. In partnership with Echovox, Inc., the store carries a wide selection of wallpapers from Blizzard's three biggest money makers, along with choice sounds from World of Warcraft that could very well lead to an awkward conversation with a total stranger that reinforces the fact that with 20 million servers and two factions, chance of you knowing them are slim to none.

Currently the service mainly services Europe, South America, and a few bits of Asia, so those of us in the U.S. will have to make due with obsessively humming the theme song to WoW until allowances are made.

Blizzard Mobile Store [Official Site via WorldofWar.net]

Eyonix over at the official World of Warcraft forums has dropped some details about a new patch due to be released "in the coming weeks" that slips in some of the new Wrath of the Lich King content before the release of the eagerly anticipated expansion pack. Included in the patch are nifty new features like barbershops in all capital cities, allowing players to change their look, Stormwind Harbour and new zeppelin towers outside Ogrimmar and Tirisfal to help facilitate transportation to Northrend, two brand new arenas with moving obstacles and terrain hazards, new spells and talents, revamped hunter pet skills, the incredibly nifty guild calendar feature, and a new profession - Inscription. Players who own Burning Crusade will be able to level Inscription up to 375, continuing past that cap once the expansion is released.

Exciting news, but not as exciting as the news it implies. Wrath of the Lich King is coming, perhaps sooner than we've hoped. I for one welcome our new Death Knight overlords.

Content Patch Before Wrath of the Lich King [WoW Forums via Wired - Thanks Wingsoverglory!]

While waiting for my turn to click-click through an all too brief taste of StarCraft II, I asked Blizzard reps the inevitable "Since Diablo III isn't here, I assume will it be playable at BlizzCon?" After all, when the sequel to StarCraft was announced, it was publicly playable just four months later at BlizzCon 2007. Surely, we'll be getting our hands on the Barbarian and Witch Doctor in October... right?

We got one of those non-answers that was very telling. "We haven't announced anything about what will be playable at Blizzcon", a Blizzard rep told us. Inconclusive, yes, but delivered with one of those smiles that one frustratingly can't print.

It sure sounds like Blizzard is working to bring a playable copy of Diablo III to BlizzCon this year, but we realise that things can change at the last minute. However, if you're going to the 'Con in Anaheim this year, don't be surprised if you're knee deep in hellspawn and rainbows all weekend.

Blizzard's set up at Games Convention this year was identical to the last — one half dedicated to World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, the other to StarCraft II. What had changed, rather dramatically, was how StarCraft II played, with massively rebalanced Terran and Protoss forces, as well as the inclusion of a playable Zerg.

Having spent considerable time with the Terran and Protoss at BlizzCon last year — and no access to the Zerg at Blizzard's Worldwide Invitational — I thought it might be fun to take out my old favourite class for a spin.

As you might expect, there was a wait, one that gave me ample opportunity to watch the Zerg in action. Most noticeable was the lovely look of the Creep, the purplish goo that the hivemind race builds upon. It has a constant visual pulse to it, not something that distracts when one actually gets one's hands on the keyboard and mouse.

When Blizzard announced the first two classes in Diablo III, the Barbarian and the Witch Doctor, at least one fan of the series was taken aback by the class rehash. That would be me, for the purpose of this post. After enduring such a long wait for the third Diablo installment, why resuscitate the Barbarian, when there are plenty of perfectly good fantasy game archetypes still left to explore?

Diablo III lead designer Jay Wilson says the reason is simple. The Barbarian in Diablo II could've been better. He was a bit more diplomatic in his dissing, saying that the brute force attack class had "room for improvement".

And by "you", they probably mean "me", as I was wondering the same thing. Talking to Executive Vice President of Product Development Frank Pearce and PR Manager Bob Colayco at Games Convention, my prying into the current status of StarCraft II didn't put us any closer to a hard date.

"No, there's no hard date", Pearce told us. So that's that. More pylons needed, maybe. Clearly, we should just leave Blizzard alone and let them do their thing, which currently is continually iterating the internal StarCraft II alpha, exposing it to larger and larger circles of players.

Those who have gotten their hands on the playable version of Blizzard's spacey real-time strategy game may think that the thing is ready for beta, but to the folks on the development side, despite near complete appearances, there's still plenty of work to be done. So what's Blizzard working on now for StarCraft II?

Don't like WoW? Not up to date on the latest expansion, Wrath of the Lich King? Doesn't really matter. Blizzard's cinematic sequences are normally great viewing whether you like the game or not, and this, their latest, is no different. It's really great.

If you're into stock and finances you might recall that BlizzAct offered to buy up as much as 146.5 million shares of their common stock at $US 27.5 a pop. Well their offer wrapped up last week and they're announcing today they managed to snag nearly 86,000 shares for about $US 2.3 million.

I'm a little surprised that they weren't able to grab up more of their stock, but I'm even more surprised that they planned on financing the entire buy up with cash on hand. Am I the only one who thinks that the BlizzAct folks walk around with life-sized, solid-gold avatars that they dress up for fun. Wasteful! I'd spend all my WoW loot on monkeys and monkey training. And maybe monkey nappies... maybe.

Mike McWhertor and Michael Fahey are jetting their way to German as we speak, so they can cover the antics and news of Games Convention. It was last year at Games Convention that I had my first chance to play a bit of StarCraft II. Unfortunately, this year's Blizzard showcase will not include hands-on with Diablo III.

The good news is that Blizzard plans to unveil the opening cinematic movie for World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King at the big show. They also will be hosting a Q&A session following the airing on Thursday. Blizzard also plans to have more hands on time with StarCraft II and Lich King as well as other Q&A sessions with members of the StarCraft II and Diablo III teams.

Make sure to check back here starting Wednesday for our in-depth and live coverage of the biggest and best public gaming show in Europe (personally, i think the world).

BlizzCon tickets went fast, completely selling out. And while Fahey didn't have the best of lucky unluckily trying to secure tickets. Blizzard CEO Mark Morhaime released a statement on the WoW Forums: