The WoW Minis Game has a bit to go before it sees release in Fall 2008, but wowminifan.com has some news fresh from the New York Toy Fair to whet your appetite, including a few pictures. The miniatures themselves especially look pretty awesome, and I can see a lot of non-players buying sets just for display purposes, especially if they haven't managed to get their hands on a Figureprint.

Zv of Destromath has an interesting argument on the forums -- he says that Blizzard has overextended themselves, and that by producing everything from trading cards to credit cards to WoW minis, the board game, and the upcoming movie (and he even forgot the FigurePrints and Dell deals), they've lost sight of what they should be working on: the game itself. While Zv does admit on the second page what Bornakk points out on the first (that it's not the same people or even the same company working on all of this stuff, and that the devs are still working on designing the game, not writing a script for the movie), there is still the same old argument here when anything goes mainstream and starts selling a brand: has the original material been neglected?

It's up to you, of course, whether you think that's the case or not, but there's no question at all that Blizzard is a completely different company because of World of Warcraft. Before this game, they were a popular-but-still-boutique games studio famous for just a few quality titles in even fewer franchises. But now, they're part of not one but two multinational corporations (one of which shares their name), and they oversee a global empire not just of rights and license releases, but of millions of players and financial interests all over the place. As Zv says, why are they making more deals for expensive swords when they still claim they don't have the manpower to let us use flying mounts in Azeroth?

The problem here is that you can't really second guess Blizzard -- despite the fact that you may agree or disagree with the decisions they've made, there's no question that they've got a successful game on their hands and that they've done nothing but make money with it. But though the Warcraft licensing universe seems to be growing at an exponential rate, we hope (and we'll find out, we guess, with the release of patch 2.4 and the expansion), that the core game is still as strong as ever.

WoW Insider has obtained a copy of the "sell sheet" sent to distributors about the upcoming WoW minis game, and it contains information about pricing, pack size, and even some hints at a release date.

Basically, the minis will become available in three different ways: there will be the core booster sets, which will contain three minis of the same Horde or Alliance faction, plus three character cards and six ability cards, and will have a suggested retail price (SRP) of $14.99 per booster. Additionally, each booster will have a chance to include an ingame Loot Card, supposedly from the Trading Card Game (there is no word if there will be loot cards specifically for the minis game), and a 1/8 chance to have an "epic" character.

More info on the starter sets, including the full text of the "sell sheet," after the break.

Are you looking around your WoWspace and thinking, "gee, I could really use more World of Warcraft action figures" then you may just be in luck. As we announced recently, coming this fall, from Upper Deck Entertainment, is the World of Warcraft Miniatures Game.

You will be able to acquire miniatures that will serve as both game pieces and collectibles, as each one "will be mounted on a uniquely engineered removable base". Each miniature will reportedly be a highly detailed 3-D rendering of characters in the game, including not only each race and class, but bigwigs like Thrall and, evidently, Leeroy Jenkins, who has already appeared in the Trading Card Game.

Your minis will face their opponents in head-on battles as well as raid and dungeon scenarios, which can include player co-operation, much like in-game.

These little guys and gals even have their own site, over at WoWMinis.com. Let's take a sneak peak, shall we?

Upper Deck has dropped an announcement about the final conquest of the Warcraft universe over the complete whole of nerd-dom: they're going to make a WoW minis game (yes, there's already an RPG system, so until someone puts together an official LARPing league, I think we're done here). The miniatures will come out in Fall of this year, and the game will feature standalone raid and dungeon scenarios, which means you can play against your friends or play by yourself against "automated dungeons." Upper Deck also says that there will be an Organized Play structure for the game, including Local and World Championships.

There's nothing yet about any "loot minis"-- Blizzard is apparently working closely with Upper Deck to put this together, so you'd think they might try to replicate the loot cards of the TCG, but I'm sure that if they do come up with something like that, we'll hear about it. There's also no word on actual gameplay yet, but Upper Deck says that they'll update the site with a downloadable gameplay demo, so we can see exactly how it will work.

Excited about this? Halo has been to the mini universe already, as has Marvel and DC. Will Warcraft have success in this, the last of the realms of nerd-dom?