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Archive for November, 2004

[Official] Beta Ending

Published 11/18/2004 in Blizzard, Frostbolt.com and General. 1 Comment

In preparation for the upcoming retail launch of World of Warcraft, we will be taking the North American open beta servers offline on Thursday, November 18. While this will mark the end of the open beta test, there will still be some work left for us to do. To provide the best experience possible at launch, we will be making numerous final optimizations to our hardware based on the data we’ve acquired during the open beta test.

During our closed and open beta test phases, thousands of improvements were made to World of Warcraft. Those changes were made through game-client patches and updates to the game’s server and database infrastructure.

As we moved closer to retail, we continued to make changes and optimize all of the code that makes up World of Warcraft until we reached the point where we felt we could create a gold master — the version of the game that’s currently being pressed onto the discs which will be available for purchase at retail.

Likewise, these processes must also take place on the server side to ensure that no out-of-date code, which could corrupt the retail version of the game, still exists. Before the retail version of the code can be installed, the current hardware must be wiped clean. This also includes the information on current accounts and characters that are being played on our test servers. So that all World of Warcraft players will be able to make a fresh start on our community site at launch, the same procedure will be taking place for the North American beta forums when the open beta test ends.

We realize that you’ve grown attached to your characters, and we’re sorry that the end of the open beta test will require you to part ways with them. However, with the retail launch of World of Warcraft on November 23 comes the opportunity to begin a new adventure in Azeroth on fresh, untouched servers. Along with that, you’ll have the knowledge that you played an instrumental role in the creation of a game of epic proportions that players will enjoy for many years to come.

We greatly appreciate all the time you’ve spent with us testing World of Warcraft, and we look forward to seeing you in-game!

Please note that this does not affect the ongoing European closed beta test. Further details regarding our plans for the closed and final beta tests in Europe will be announced on the European community sites next week.

As I was arriving to home after college, a few hours ago, my brother told me about this. When I was able to play … didn’t really feel like it I took a couple of screenshots of people that were dancing, prolly I’ll post them tomorrow. No word yet on what will happen with the servers and the localized rules… I’m still not sure if I’ll be allowed to play (even tho I live in what is commonly known in US as South America, but it’s really Central America). There are a lot of fights (but I have bad graphic lag on them so it would be frustrating), and seems that Onyxia hit Stormwind as well a while ago (I could take a screenshot of the corpse of one of her guards, tho).

At least these days I’ll be able to sleep I still hope I can make it to retail, tho, as I’ve said before, I’m interested in getting the CE As for now, my highest character is a level 38 Night Elf Rogue, which was created at the end of december. Joined Closed Beta by those times (thanks, Slat), got a second character up to 26 as well (which is my dwarf hunter).

Retail plans, “if” I’m allowed to play (that’s the most important thing right now) on US Servers, I’m prolly going to be on Alliance’s Side. It’s uncertain which would be the server because, as far as I know, Blizzard haven’t released them, yet. They took the boards down because, IMO, they knew a lot of people would be posting…

Anyways, if I got a chance tomorrow I’ll post a couple of pictures.

Before I end this post I have to thank Slatsky (Slatter) and also all of Arsenal‘s Crew. This blog isn’t going to die… well, Blizzard has the last word on that, tho. Ahhh, hopefully I can make it to retail =/

NO TO LOCALIZED SERVER RULES!!

/pray

PS: There’s always a good side of everything… at least I’m going to sleep early today! /lol

Update: I forgot to thank Blizzard as well, for creating such an awesome game that will certainly be a hit (that is, more without the localization rules *cough *cough ). I may not have a lot of experience on MMORPGs like people out there, but it’s one of the best games I’ve played up-to-date. Beats the previous MMORPG I used to play by far (which is Lineage).

Gank!

Published 11/16/2004 in General. 0 Comments

Before writing what happened last night, I would like to say that I’ve noticed that I use a lot the term “gank“, to the point that I use it even on situations that the definition does not apply. Gank means when you are attacked by someone when you are hunting (for example, you are hitting a mob, someone comes and takes advantage of that and kills you). I’ve been using that term, tho, to refer when people that is way higher than you attacks and kills you… so if you see too much of “gank“, then you know what I mean Like a few days ago, my hunter got killed by a rogue that was six levels above him, then I went back to kill him with my rogue and then my rogue was also killed by a level 60 horde (not sure of the class)… Sorry if anyone got confused by how I use the word “gank”

Now, going to the topic, last night I did quests, as always. There was this place that, if I farmed, I could get +200 experience and even nice drops, but leveling was rather slow. I decided to make several quests, a few on Redridge Mountains and others in Westfall. The most important one would be VanCleef, which is the last boss of a series of four, in Deadmines (an instance), located in Moonbrook, Westfall.

We were kind of nice group. There were a rogue (which was the highest one, level 28), two paladins, something else and me.. hehe. We only died once because most of my group lagged when we were beating the mechanical-goblin boss. Overall was great, I wasn’t really lucky with the loot rolls, tho

My hunter’s equipment was also improved last night. I’ve always been surprised by the generosity of a few people on World of Warcraft. The first picture shows someone that gave me leather to make myself a few items, while my guildmate, Xandera, crafted a few others for me.

111604-02

111604-03

My hunter is Miner/Engineer, First Aid/Fisher. I could make myself some flying helm (or something like that), and also a new gun ^_^ These are the current stats of my Hunter

111604-04

The thing on the head, the flying thing, might not give a lot, but at least is something, considering I didn’t have anything at all on that slot. I could also manage to level my hunter to 24 last night

That would be it. Nothing really interesting, tho, because I’m doing most of the things I did with my rogue, but I’m always feeling that this is faster, and with the pet it’s easier to hunt on places that my rogue never could.

7 days until retail… no word yet on what will happen to those countries that have been left out of the Localized Server Rules… T.T There are two official threads in World of Warcraft’s Forums, the first one (here) has 28 pages and +550 posts, while the new one (here) has +38 pages so far, and more than 660 posts, not to mention the petition that all of us have filled as well (this one), featuring +8400 signs!! I’m still hoping I can play on US Servers

More to be seen tonight! Gahlok leaves now… dancing and drinking on Ironforge’s Inn… Yeeehaaw~

111604-05

Houston, we have problems

Published 11/14/2004 in General. 0 Comments

Yesterday night World of Warcraft‘s servers had a few problems with all the people that was playing. Since Stress Test/Open Beta, servers have been getting hammered (as someone of my guild said weeks ago), and then it goes down more frequently (two nights that servers have been having problems). You can see on WoW’s Forums three kinds of people: those that are unhappy with server problems, those that are polishing the apple with Blizzard, and those that are neutral. I wonder those that like to polish the apple will say if these problems comes up as well on retail, 500,000 people registered for Open Beta, my guess is that World of Warcraft is such a great game that the number of people that will register might be around there (maybe not as much, but near IMO). (No to localized server rules!*cough)

Anyways, I could just play this morning a bit, since servers were down after I came back from work. What I keep saying is that, always when server got problems… Closed Beta’s PvP Server is always down, or one with the worst problem >_<

Now, this morning I could level my hunter to 20, he did learn interesting things but the things I can remember now are that some kind of freezing trap, Dual Wield and Aspect of the Cheetah (30% movement speed improved, but if you are attacked, you are dazed for 4 seconds), which is cool for traveling (you can also invest 5 talent points to make it 5% faster as well). I also invested the point on that Beast Mastery talent that makes your pet’s movement (that is normal walk or attack speed as well?) 30% faster, you can only invest 1 point there. Population on PvP Servers is kinda low, so getting people for groups is hard as hell. Luckily for me there was a level 41 hunter around that was working on his skills (he switched weapons), so he helped me on the major quests of Loch Modan (Mercenaries and Chok’sul).

Also, in one of the recent patches, after doing quests you will get reputation points (or something like that). My dwarf got the honored title on Ironforge ^_^ I guess I’ve completed most of the quests (but there are still tuff ones on the way, for example, those related to Gnomeraan, not sure of the spelling but it’s the instance in Ironforge with level +30 elites).

111404-02

I also tried doing Deadmines but, as I said, it was hard to get someone, and even tho people say that some of the mobs are not elite now down there, the ones I saw were all elite T.T

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Archive for November, 2004

[Official] Beta Ending

Gank!

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