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Posts with tag iphone

WoW up your iPhone

Here's another user-made iPhone theme featuring the icons from World of Warcraft, made and sent to us by Nasum of Garithos, Hordeside. We covered one of these almost a year ago when the iPhone first came out, but this one is apparently made from scratch, and features the new iTunes store as well as an icon for the Installer.app (man, today is just a Mac gear day on WoW Insider, isn't it? I feel like I'm blogging for TUAW).

Hopefully, when the official iPhone app store drops in June, we'll see some non-jailbreak uses of this stuff -- right now, to use either one of these themes on the phone, you have to hack into the firmware and go places Apple doesn't officially want you to go. But those WoW icons definitely work great for all kinds of things: even Blizzard officially put them to OS use in a downloadable theme for XP. There are so many WoW icons floating around that they're a natural (if not exactly legal) fit for almost any use -- here's hoping that in June, Apple's SDK will turn out at least one theming program, and we'll be able to do this stuff without hacking away at the iPhone.

Update: Nasum (whose name we spelled wrong originally, sorry about that) says the theme is now in Installer.app, if you'd like to install it yourself.

WoW Insider webclip and galleries


Two new improvements to announce on this, your favorite site about World of Warcraft. First of all, iPhone and iPod touch users will likely be happy to see that this site, along with all the others in the Joystiq network, are now equipped with Webclip icons (these are epic icons with a +15 to stamina, which any iPhone user will appreciate). Just make a Webclip with the browser on your iPhone or iPod touch, and our shiny icon will automatically appear on your home screen.

Also, we are extremely proud to announce that we have some shiny new galleries here on the site -- our design team has implemented an awesome (and slick black) interface for browsing all of the pics we've ever posted so far, so if you've never browsed our patch 2.4, BlizzCon costumes, Around Azeroth or Tales from the Lion's Pride Inn galleries, now's the time to do so.

More design updates are still on the way here at WoW Insider -- stay tuned!

Gallery: BlizzCon Costumes



Gallery: GDC08: Blizzard's approach to MMOs

Mobile WoW officially being considered


Here's another one from the files of things we've desired/dreaded for years. In a post-DICE interview with Blizzard cofounder Frank Pearce, MTV learned that Blizzard is definitely thinking about making some kind of mobile WoW interface. He says it would probably just allow you to chat and monitor auctions and mail, without actually being able to buy and sell things. Still, I don't think I'm exaggerating much when I say hundreds of thousands of players would use an app like that. When last this was discussed here on WoW Insider, many of you were of the opinion that a mobile WoW would be yet another infringement on our already dwindling time for "real life," and that's a definite threat, but ultimately I think it's just as easy (or as hard) to exercise self-control on a cell phone as on a PC.

Other fun news from that interview:
  • Players in Taiwan have the shortest wait time for tickets
  • Blizz is working on a way to stream a trial version of WoW so people who want to try the game can be playing in 10 minutes. Is that even possible? Edit: Apparently, not only possible but already achieved. Magic!
  • Wrath "should feel at least as substantial as BC"
  • The movie was delayed by the just-ended WGA strike, but the project is now running again and looking for directors. Pearce: "When we talk about the quality of our movie and the quality of the movie we want to see delivered, we're talking about the 'Lord of the Rings' trilogy. That's what we want to deliver, that kind of epic experience." Yeah, good luck with that.
[via Joystiq]

A WoW iPhone theme

It's been a good few weeks since we've had an iPhone-related post here at the Insider, so it's probably time for another one. While this may not be any form of playing WoW on the iPhone, it's definitely pretty cool: this is a WoW theme that can be applied to the iPhone, changing all its menu icons and background image. And in my opinion, it's pretty sweet. If I had an iPhone I'd definitely take this for a spin.

This is the work of Dimos (Darkspear-H), and if you want to Blizz up your own phone, the files to do so are at ModMyiPhone.com. I particularly enjoy the Phone icon being a hearthstone. A common conception on RP servers is that the hearthstone is what enables us to communicate in chat channels, serving as some sort of radio-like device. I don't know if this is what Dimos was going for, but it pleases me either way. The Safari icon is also an uncanny match -- does anyone know what that icon is used for in-game?

WoW on the iPhone-- just barely


Apple's little sliver of gadget joy supposedly has a full installation of OS X hidden somewhere in there, and since WoW is available on OS X, you just knew WoW was going to appear on the iPhone sometime. It hasn't happened yet, but as the video shows, we're getting there.

In this case, the magic key is a little program called Telekinesis (created by the same guy who created Quicksilver, if you're part of the Cult), which lets you channel monitor output to your iPhone, as well as allows mouseclicks and even simply typing back into your computer.

So it's not really WoW running on the iPhone (yet), but rather an instance of WoW controlled by an iPhone-- it still has to be run on a separate computer. Unfortunately, implementation actually turns out to be pretty poor-- this is not even barely playable. The guy who did it says he can chat, so I guess it's a first step. But while I'm sure we'll get there, we've got a long way to go.

[ via a newly redesigned Joystiq ]

Get a job...with Blizzard

Many of us who play online games often have a faraway dream of somehow working in the industry. Productivity gurus constantly tell us we need to do what we love if we're going to have real job satisfaction. It's one of the reasons I applied to work at WoW Insider, to combine my passion for writing and my obsession with online games.

Now you can check out the reality on Blizzard's official job listing site. You might just find something that justifies those 3:00 am raid wipes.

First up is a call for a Mobile Producer. A few months back, we posted this mock up of WoW on an IPhone. It was derided as unmanageable, but I think Blizzard disagrees. And who's going to argue with their success? As well as this report I found predicting the mobile game industry will be worth $11.2 billion by 2010.

But let's move on to some juicy Starcraft 2 job openings.

Continue reading Get a job...with Blizzard

Blizz posts job openings for mobile developers



Apparently Blizzard is looking for a few good people to work on unspecified projects for mobile platforms. Might this have something to do with a mobile WoW-related app? Of course, it could also be something completely unrelated. Still, pretty much ever since the iPhone was announced, there's been speculation about a possible "WoW Lite" for it that would let you check the AH, maybe chat with your guildies, and so forth. I know I'd certainly be a bit more tempted to grab an iPhone if I knew it was going to have some WoW capabilities. On the other hand, this could easily oppose my girlfriend to the device...

I think all I'd want in a WoW Lite client would be AH, chat, tradeskills, and maybe a talent calculator. After all, I still don't think it'd be possible to do much "real" gameplay on a small screen with no mouse/keyboard, even if the platform could handle it (which I doubt). What would you guys like to see WoW Lite include, if such a thing every got made? Oh, by the way, the image above is a quick Photoshop I did when the "WoW on iPhone" rumor first came out, not some sort of secret spy photo. The job postings are copied after the cut; see if you can make anything of them.

Continue reading Blizz posts job openings for mobile developers

Hackers get AppleTV running WoW

Reader Randomdruid sent along this tip that might interest you if you've picked up Apple's new AppleTV set-top box (I'm too busy working on Sha'tar rep to watch TV, but our good friends at Engadget and TUAW have been doing almost nothing but since the thing came out). Apparently, hackers have already gotten WoW up and running on it.

It's not too big a deal, since I'm pretty sure the box is running a specialized version of OS X anyway, and of course WoW runs on that. The guys at Tutorial Ninja have worked up detailed instructions on how to get any number of applications working on the AppleTV (including Firefox and Centerstage, the open source Mac media center). Scroll down to the middle of the page there, and on the list of "confirmed working apps," you'll find World of Warcraft.

But there is one catch: it looks like pretty much everything has to be installed onto the hard drive by plugging it into another computer. So not only will you have to crack open your pretty new AppleTV, but odds are that you'll have to somehow run WoW from a text interface. And I don't know how you'd actually play it even if it is running-- one of TN's goals is to "get USB working so people can play WoW comfortably." So it's not as easy as throwing the WoW disc in and jumping into Azeroth.

Of course, if you're someone with the time and talent to do all this, you're probably not playing WoW anyway. But if you've got an AppleTV and are already cracking it open to put all the other cool stuff on it, it's good to know that you have the option to get WoW running on your TV screen. Now all we have to figure out is how to get WoW on the iPhone...

WoW on iPhone?



iPhone World is reporting on an anonymous tip from a "reliable source" that Apple's forthcoming iPhone will run WoW:
  • The Source said, "watch out for the iPhone and their new video iPod when it comes to gaming. Imagine playing WOW on them using the touch screen interface. Think of the impact its going to have on the handheld game market and Apple's revenue."
  • He/she said He/she was told that WOW on the iPhone worked with both WiFi and EDGE (without simultaneous phone use) and full multi-tasking with 3G in the future. New iPod will utilize WiFi.
My instincts say "no" on this one. I don't know much about the iPhone's ARM11 processor, but I'd be surprised if even the most powerful of phone CPUs could render a game like WoW playably. And even if it could, would you really want to play on a screen that size? Heck, I had enough trouble on my old laptop's 12". Furthermore, I believe Blizz have said that they think a keyboard and mouse are essential for playing WoW, when giving reasons for not porting the game to consoles. But enough baseless speculation. Does anybody know about that ARM11 CPU? Let me know in the comments if this is impossible or merely unlikely.

P.S. The above image isn't evidence of WoW on iPhone, it's just a quick Photoshop.


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