I know it’s automated and probably pretty typical, but I was surprised to find an email from Blizzard sitting in my mailbox yesterday.
No rest for the weary! Expansion World of Warcraft: The Wrath of the Lich King might just have gone on sale, but the Blizzard wheels are turning and the developer is busy plotting its next MMO. According to Blizzard COO Paul Sams, the game is still in the early stages of development, but sounds like it will be a departure from WoW. Says Sams: We want to create a great game… Something that’s cool, and new, and different, and kind of next generation in terms of look and feel and gameplay. That’s a challenging endeavour…We’re definitely at the beginning, in the first half of development… [Eds Note: Blizzard's development is two part.]
Not all World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King launches are ugly! Besides the San Francisco signing event, there are only three other midnight Blizzard-sponsored launches in the US: Austin, New York and Anaheim. According to game site Multiplayer, there were 20 people lined up in 45 degrees Fahrenheit cold by 5:00pm with the first lining up at midnight the night before yesterday. Across the pound, things reached fever pitch at London’s Oxford Street HMV. An estimated 2,000 or 2,500 people lined up for the WoW expansion pack, breaking the store record set previously by World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. Anyone else experience lines?
Yes, we know, you have a DVD drive in your PC. Most of your buddies will as well. But not everybody has a DVD drive in their PC yet, which is why World of Warcraft still ships on four compact discs instead of a single digital versatile disc. Lich King, though, Lich King will be shipping on DVD only, the first WoW release to do so (Burning crusade shipped on both DVD and CD). So, uh, why does this matter? Being so low-spec-friendly, WoW was the last bastion of the CD in PC gaming, a format that dominated the industry from the mid-90s til the early years of this decade. With Lich King shipping on DVD only, we’ve probably seen the last of the CD, at least in non-shovelware titles. Goobye, old friend! We had some good, good times.
The World of Warcraft expansion Wrath of the Lich King may very well achieve something that many games before it have attempted to do but failed. The forthcoming collector’s edition of the WoW expansion may actually be a collector’s item. While we’re not holding our breath, it would appear that retailer GameStop (and EBgames) may have already reached its allocation for Wrath of the Lich King and will be ending pre-orders at the close of business today.
AU: True or not, now we have real release timings I doubt the CE editions will last very long anywhere in the world. Don’t wait too long, folks. -SB
As we announced yesterday, expansion pack World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King has officially been priced and dated, hitting stores on November 13th for US$40. Blizzard has released new Lich King screenshots, which should hopefully hold you over until November 13th. They may not though! Click through the gallery here. WoW: Wrath of Lich King Images [GameSpot via VG247]
World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King hits stores on Nov. 13 for US$40, Activision-Blizzard announced today.
I know Gamestop has listed a tentative date for World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King for some time now. Now we’re getting inside information from 7-Eleven of all places.
According to several different store employees, the game will be streeting on November 4 for $US 40. 7-Eleven, we’re told, will be selling the game starting at midnight. Can you imagine? Lining up at 7-Eleven. How odd, though at least there would be Slurpees readily available.
