Empire magazine is already posting pictures from this weekend's ComicCon out in San Diego (WoW Insider also has correspondents there on site), and though they have no idea what they've stumbled across, it sure looks to us like what might be DC Unlimited's Series 4 WoW figurines. And rather than just the standard player characters, Blizzard and DC are going a little NPC for this series -- as you can see above, they've included everyone's favorite elite gnoll, Hogger himself. Also included in the series are a Succubus of some sort (with what looks like a Tauren with a polearm in the back there), and a gun-wielding Tauren Hunter.
The figures all have signs that say "Worldwide Debut Friday 4pm" on them, so it looks like we're getting to see them a little early. And Blizzard is excited, too -- Slorkuz has even written a poetic ode to Hogger in honor of his likeness being immortalized.
We'll keep an eye out for more info -- looks like DC is expanding their action figure line to include a few more less traditional character types. Who else should they honor with a figure in the future?
Those wacky folks of the Sleeper Cartel guild (on Perenolde) emailed to let us know they are having their annual summer party this coming weekend, July 26th at 7pm server time, and it looks to be a hootenanny. They'll have player-run quests, trivia contests, and scavenger hunts, there'll be a snowball fight and fireworks aplenty, and they're even planning to give away an honest-to-goodness epic. If you're a fan of player-run events, this is the Super Bowl -- as you can see from their last party, they do it up right. Roll Alliance and show up in Perenolde on Saturday if you want in on the fun.
And here's another player-run party: on July 27th, a couple of Hordies on Steamwheedle are planning a "Tribune of the Horde" RP event -- apparently they think the Horde needs leaders, and Thrall and the rest of the gang aren't cutting it. (see Update) So they're having a Horde meetup in ZG to talk things out -- one Horde member of each race has been chosen as diplomat, and diplomats will give their own speeches, while those in attendance will be able to ask questions and speak their mind as well.
Sounds interesting -- we always love hearing about (and hopefully attending) events like this. If you're putting one on, feel free to tip us about it, and if you go, take lots of screenshots and send them back to us so we can see what players are up to in the realms.
Update: I never did understand RP -- the people running the Horde event emailed us to say that they're not looking to replace Thrall at all. Instead, they're convening a Tribune of the various Horde races to voice their concerns and working up a scroll to take to the Warchief himself -- they're working in complete concert with the current Horde, they just want to make sure the voices of the little people (and trolls, and Undead, and so on) are heard. Our apologies for the misunderstanding, especially for the suggestion that anyone was trying to take over from Thrall. For the Horde!
That Murloc was just the beginning -- since the Spore creature creator demo dropped officially yesterday, and along with this cute little C'thun (thanks, Andrew!), there are a whole crowd of Warcraft-related creatures showing up on the Sporepedia. We've collected our favorites so far in a gallery below -- while you'll need to actually put the creatures in game to see them shuffle, saunter, and dance around in Spore, you can get a pretty good idea of just how versatile Will Wright's little creator is. I've said it before and I'll say it again: while everyone is expecting Warhammer to give WoW a run for its money, the PC game that Blizzard should really be worried about this year is Spore.
If you see any other great Warcraft-related creature creations in Spore, feel free to send them along and you just might see them here. And in the meantime, our sister site BigDownload (who are also hosting the demo) is holding a creature creator contest -- send them your best creature and you could win a EVGA NVIDIA e-GeForce 8800GT, EVGA NVIDIA e-GeForce 9600GT or a free upgrade to the full version of the creature creator game. It's Sporelicious!
Seriously, look at the C'thun. We haven't seen a tentacled, ancient monster this cute since, well, Hello Cthulu.
WoW Insiderreaders are a talkative bunch. All of us here at WI monitor our own posts for comments, but there's not always time to keep up with what's happening on all the other posts. And if those of us who hang around here all the time can't keep up, we wondered how much our readers were missing, too?
Enter [1.Local], our new roundup bringing you a smattering of the zingers that may have gotten buried in the peanut gallery. We'll serve up both the sublime and the ridiculous, the thought-provoking and the just plain silly -- definitely a cut above Barrens chat (although we do admit that "Barrens Chat" was a strong contender for the feature's title).
This week's reader comments ranged from thoughtful ruminations on gender and modern culture's definition of "beauty" to an ongoing tussle over what constitutes success for an MMO. Be sure to dive into the comments area and add your own thoughts – unlike your mama, we like us some hot, fresh backtalk.
Warning: Some offensive language mentioned after the jump.
When you've accomplished everything on your checklist, what's left to do in WoW? For Ganouille and Esmereth, the answer was to open a travel agency. Their first customer, Hogger, was only level 11! It took them many attempts to actually make it to their destination because anyone that crossed their path killed him for them thinking that they needed help.
Sunday's Tournament Test Realm stress test was, in my opinion, a huge success. Despite the lag, the occasional crash or kick, and a one-hour maintenance downtime, the server held up quite well considering just how many people were bombing around on it. After maintenance, the lag improved quite a bit, and I'm guessing that Blizzard learned a fair amount that will help them to design the arena tournament realm.
Of course, interaction with the GMs, fighting spawned bosses dropping orange epics, being polymorphed into all sorts of things, receiving rare mounts, and reading through /general, /say, and /yell, not to mention tells, were the real highlights from yesterday. While Alex has already given a fairly detailed account of our adventures, I have some stories of my own to tell.
The competitors are just getting started this morning in San Diego, but here's a wrapup of everything that went down yesterday at the WoW TCG World Championship tournament there.
Manager of Organized Play Ben Drago made some announcements regarding the future of organized play for the TCG-- he rounds them all up on his blog. Looks like UD is going to choose a "TCG Player of the Year," and the contest starts right now at World Champs.
There was also some chaos from the online game, as Blizzard reps went head to head against a Warsong Gulch, and brought everyone from Jaina Proudmoore to Hogger into the battle. Upper Deck: you've got to give us bigger versions of those pictures. That looks hilarious.
There's something about the people who play Gnomes... perhaps it's their diminutive stature or the fact that other races commonly joke about punting them, but they often seem to feel the need to prove themselves, as in this level 1, all-Gnome raid on Hogger (though they seemed to have picked up some friends by the end). Though it's a bit long at 7 minutes, this video documents the perilous journey from the Gnomish starting area all the way to Hogger's domain in Elwynn forest. (Warning: some not-entirely-safe for work language over voice chat when the raid starts the Hogger encounter.)
... and died to tell about it. Yup, on Wednesday night a whole bunch of WoW Insider readers and writers took our Horde guild on Zangarmarsh to Elywnn Forest to visit the Darkmoon Faire, and much, much fun was had. To get there, we congregated in Grom'gol, and along with the help of Krystalle's lock and another nice lock named Dartruby, we summoned up. When we numbered about 30 or so, we ran out onto the road in STV and.. died.
We didn't last long. But once we got up to Elwynn, we did kill Hogger! After a little PvP (read: getting killed by a 70 Pally), we headed up to Stormwind as ghosts, and took some nice pictures of our ghostly selves outside the Cathedral. Finally we rezzed and avoided the guards long enough to visit the Darkmoon Faire (I'm surprised I remember it, as I had a little too much Shpecial Resherve, if you know what I mean). Afterwards, Brab and I took a small group into WSG where, just to finish off a perfect evening, we died over and over again.
But I think good times were had by all, so we're going to do it again! Next Friday, June 15th at 8pmServer (we're switching up the times constantly so more people can join us), we'll finally take ICftB into those swirly portal things-- we're going to be running Deadmines, Wailing Caverns, SFK, RFC, and any other instances you crazy people want to run with us. And as always, you can join us if you haven't yet-- just roll Horde on Zangarmarsh and /whisper anyone in the guild for an invite. Check the gallery below to see what we did on Wednesday, and join us next week for a little Instancy fun.
I don't think I've ever seen a forum thread that has promised so much, and yet delivered so little-- so far. Then again, if ths above image of Hogger is all that ever comes out of this thread, it'll all be worth it.
Caela on Earthen Ring has kicked off a "Draw Your Favorite NPC" contest, and it has the potential to be legendary. So far, there are only two pictures submitted-- the one above is amazing, and it's by Arity of ER. The other one is of Cookie McWeaksauce, and it's drawn by Umilluer, also of ER.
Now, the contest (though, as Caela says, it's really more of an exercise) doesn't end until Saturday the 21st, so I'd expect that people might still be working on their pictures-- hopefully we'll see a lot more of these. In the meantime, if you've got pictures for the contest, throw them in the comments below, or put them on that forum post. It'll be tough to beat that Hogger picture, I know, but if you've got any interest in drawing your favorite NPC (I'd draw High Overlord Saurfang if I had any artistic skillz whatsoever), please, please do so.
...to down Hogger? This video suggests that a group of around 20 can do it. (And before you shake your head and start talking about how easy this is, do remember that Hogger is a level 11 elite -- just think about the miss rate a level one character would have to have.) And this is, yes, what World of Warcraft players do when they get bored -- oh, so bored!
I can't say I understand this game's fascination with the low-level elite in Elwynn Forest -- Hogger. Sure, he's a pain to kill when you're running through the area in a level-appropriate fashion, but I've seen everything, all the way up to a 40-player raid being organized to take him down. And, in this video, we have Hogger being taken on the long walk from his Elwynn home to the Gurubashi Arena in Stranglethorn Vale. (How do you kite him that far without killing him, anyway?)
That Murloc was just the beginning -- since the Spore creature creator demo dropped officially yesterday, and along with this cute little C'thun (thanks, Andrew!), there are a whole crowd of Warcraft-related creatures showing up on the Sporepedia. We've collected our favorites so far in a gallery below -- while you'll need to actually put the creatures in game to see them shuffle, saunter, and dance around in Spore, you can get a pretty good idea of just how versatile Will Wright's little creator is. I've said it before and I'll say it again: while everyone is expecting Warhammer to give WoW a run for its money, the PC game that Blizzard should really be worried about this year is Spore.
The competitors are just getting started this morning in San Diego, but here's a wrapup of everything that went down yesterday at the WoW TCG World Championship tournament there.
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