Blizzard S.A.S. (France) to publish WoW in the EU
by Lesley Smith 
Apr 11th 2009 at 6:00PM
From April 14th (that's this Tuesday), Blizzard Entertainment Inc. (USA) will no longer publishing the game in Europe. Pause for dramatic effect. Rather that will be done by a new European arm of the company, Blizzard S.A.S. (France). The email itself is basically a courtesy -- after all, you wouldn't actually cancel your account just for an admin change, would you?
Personally I think this a great move, it means that we, the European players of World of Warcraft, are finally being recognised as the legion we are. We're a separate territory (as should be obvious from Blizzard's European job site) and proud of it, it's just nice for it all to be official.
Filed under: Odds and ends, Blizzard, News items
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Futue Apr 11th 2009 6:03PM
Hooray! ... I think?
Ted Apr 12th 2009 1:52PM
Yah, who cares?
Chaosprime Apr 11th 2009 6:22PM
Yay! Now if only WoWInsider would do the same :P
Alex Ziebart Apr 11th 2009 6:33PM
Psst, Lesley is from Europe. ;)
Chaosprime Apr 11th 2009 6:35PM
Pffff.... More should be :D
Slashee the Cow Apr 11th 2009 6:35PM
Now if only they'd recognise that Australia (or Oceania as a whole) is a separate territory, and get some servers over here so I can get a decent ping sometime...
kia Apr 11th 2009 6:43PM
Lol. You realise that Australia has something like 0.03% of the worlds population, right? We're nobodies to the rest of the world. Most people don't even know our country exists. Stop thinking we could ever be equal in status with "Europe". We won't ever get our own servers, deal with it.
Slashee the Cow Apr 11th 2009 6:55PM
According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population), it's 0.32%, but that's not the point, as not everybody in the world plays WoW. I'd say with 100% certainty that of the territories Blizzard manage, we make up a lot more than 0.32% of players.
Hoggersbud Apr 11th 2009 8:45PM
Get some Aussie company to offer to pony up dollars to Blizzard to run local servers, maybe you'd have a chance.
trafik Apr 11th 2009 10:05PM
Blizzard asked Telstra to run servers, Telstra refused. So Internode put their hand up and Blizzard refused...
Some DID want to pony up the money to do it, and I would put my money on the fact that Internode's offer would have been cheaper anything Telstra could have put together. Telstra will only ever do things if their is a good profit to be had (Just look at the current NBN mess). Internode understands gamers much more and realised that running WoW servers would have had fantastic effects on their own ISP subscriber base as all of Internode's game servers do not count towards your quota.
I realise it's very unlikely for us to ever get one, im just QQing cause it makes me feel better. =)
Antistes Apr 12th 2009 4:04AM
Australia might only have .32% of the worlds population but only about .183% of the worlds population plays WoW.
Australia being an industrialized nation with good IT development and a high standard of living would probably constitue quite a significant part of the player-base.
After all Scandinavia has one of the larger %s of players in Europe, though only containing ca 5% of Europe's population.
Leandar Apr 11th 2009 6:39PM
so umm, will this change anything in europe or is it just somone else is doing the same job as the US blizz?
Gary Apr 11th 2009 6:46PM
The S.A.S.? Oh sh-
Blayze Apr 11th 2009 6:56PM
It's the *French* SAS. Chances are they'll surrender at the first sign of hostile emails.
Hoggersbud Apr 11th 2009 8:48PM
S.A.S. in France is nothing more than an acronym used to describe a particular type of corporation.
Bloodletter Apr 11th 2009 7:15PM
"It's the *French* SAS. Chances are they'll surrender at the first sign of hostile emails."
ROFL!! +25 Internet Points
Zamn10210 Apr 11th 2009 8:22PM
The French get a lot of hassle from people who don't know any history.
SaintStryfe Apr 11th 2009 9:14PM
Oh I do - the French succeed only when lead by a non-Frenchman. First Rule of French Warfare (See: Hastings [Viking], Napoleon [Corsican]). The second: France wins when Americans do most of the fighting.
Zorganist Apr 12th 2009 5:01AM
Hastings was fought by Vikings?
You seriously need a reality check, The Battle of Hastings was fought between the Anglo-Saxon army of King Harold II and the Norman Army of Duke William (the Conquerer), and even then he wasn't leading a French army, but rather a Norman one who considered themselves independent from the French crown.
The Vikings tended to do their Rape and Pillage a bit further north mate. Get your facts right next time.
(I'm English, by the way, don't ask me why I'm defending the French)
Longstalker Apr 12th 2009 10:33AM
Hi Zorganist, since you're English, you really ought to better know the Normans who conquered your land in 1066.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normans
They're Vikings who settled in the north coast of France and gave the land its name. I believe SaintStryfe was referring to this.