Breakfast Topic: Were you impressed with the Mists of Pandaria press event?
by Mathew McCurley 
Mar 23rd 2012 at 8:00AM
What no one complained about was how gorgeous the environments, characters, and effects looked. For a game with a decade-old engine, WoW is really pulling some "rovers on Mars" crap on us. One day, when the Martian storms blow the final WoW server offline, we can put this game to bed.
Did you get what you wanted out of the Mists of Pandaria presser? Will all this knowledge and the very important fact that Mists seems close to completion be enough to tide you over until beta? Sound off in the comments.
Filed under: Breakfast Topics
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
Bamshackle Mar 23rd 2012 8:07AM
I was impressed with the amount of info that was given. I could have learned more, but considering that the beta is now active I think Blizzard gave more then was expected.
ratmaggot Mar 23rd 2012 8:08AM
Quite honestly I thought it was a major let down but now the reason is clear. With the beta starting so soon afterwards, they simply didn't need to give lots away.
gewalt Mar 23rd 2012 9:41AM
what was likely the biggest letdown to me was the NDA. it was a week long press event, but nobody could talk about anything til the entire event was over, and then all media parties released all info in one big dump (cause if they didnt, the others would have)
this completely ruined all the discussion about said info that I hold dear.
Nightly NDA lifting so everyone could publish that days info at the same time would have been far more stimulating to the interested parties, or even no NDA at all would have been fine too.
The way it was handled.. just plain sucked.
Josh Mar 23rd 2012 9:48AM
I disagree. Maybe it's some people's cup-of-tea, but I think releasing info in a clear manner that includes their gameplay intent is way better than drawing the wrong conclusions from data mining lines of code.
dpoyesac Mar 23rd 2012 10:11AM
I agree.
After the NDA was lifted I thought "Golly, this is all the stuff the told us before. That doesn't bode well." But now that beta stuff is leaking I'm dancing around like a kid at Christmas.
Joe Mar 23rd 2012 10:56AM
I'm pretty sure (based on the timing) that the beta was supposed to launch with the press event. That was going to be the Jobsian "one more thing" moment of the press event.
But I think that there ended up being some last minute serious bugs that prevented a perfectly timed beta launch.
Trey Mar 23rd 2012 8:08AM
YES. Not specifically the actual press event, but watching the beta testers. I WANT THE NEW TALENTS/GLYPHS!
Narayana Mar 23rd 2012 8:10AM
I'm more dumbfounded that there was no announcement that the beta would be starting- only to have the thing launch a few days later.
Do you think they intended to launch it after the press event, but something hit the skids right before the event?
Narayana Mar 23rd 2012 8:12AM
And by "after the press event" I mean "announce at press event, launch on 19th..."
Luotian Mar 23rd 2012 8:20AM
I think that's plausible. One little bug that made it unreleasable right then, so they had to delay a few days. It happens.
xvkarbear Mar 23rd 2012 8:23AM
I totally believe it was a way to get that information out there before the beta started. It was all orchestrated.
Narayana Mar 23rd 2012 9:08AM
@xv I see where you're coming from, and maybe my expectations were just borked, but going into the event it definitely seemed like beta was just around the corner. Blue posters were indicating that we'd be pleasantly surprised by where the game stood right now (note: no site really did a good job conveying this- only the WoW Insider Show touched on it), the Mists beta popped up momentarily on people's accounts and there were the constant reminders (GC's post mortem) that they are trying to push stuff out faster than we're used to.
All of this led me personally to think that a beta announcement was one of the big things that was coming from the event. When that didn't happen, I was a little bummed. However, to have it come out just a few days after the NDA was lifted made it even more strange to me.
Helston Mar 23rd 2012 9:25AM
If you read the interviews, you'll notice that they said that beta would be soon. Not Soon™, but soon. As in very soon. Sounds like they knew beta was right around the corner, but they couldn't officially announce it because:
a) they decided it would be better to wait a couple of days
b) they weren't 100% sure it was going to start by now
or
c) there was some red tape they needed to get through before launching the beta, but it was otherwise ready to be launched
Greg Mar 24th 2012 12:14AM
I know what the bug was.
Some nice lawyer at Blizzard legal said, "Hey, I'm not entirely sure it's on the up-and-up to send out those beta invites in waves when we already promised they'd get them when it went live." He probably said it while he was bringing meals on wheels meals to hungry people in need.
But then Ghostcrawler stepped in and said, "Put those meals on wheels meals back in the Blizzard breakroom refrigerator NOW. Those beta invites will go out when I say so- annual pass subscriber agreement be damned!" He said this all, of course, with much cackling enthusiasm, as he added another glistening golden gem to his throne of lies.
Bazbez Mar 23rd 2012 8:13AM
I got a lot out of it. Some very interesting things are coming to wow, which I say is incredible to be able to get a game that had been around as long as it has fresh. Now only if we could get past the whining fiasco about initial beta - things would be even better.
Luotian Mar 23rd 2012 8:18AM
You're asking for all the whiners to resume again. Why, McCurley?
Honestly, I was pleased with it. It gave us details on so many things, but held back just enough that I am ridiculously curious. Which is exactly how it should be.
Nina Katarina Mar 23rd 2012 8:18AM
I thought that it could have gone better. Blizzard controlled the flow of information in advance quite nicely, but during the availability they should have released more appetizers for us while we were waiting for the main course. I remember getting quite angry and snappish at people, and that can't be a good emotion to invoke in your fans.
Noyou Mar 23rd 2012 2:45PM
I agree with that. There seems to be a disconnect somewhere in their communication from marketing/PR to the CMs who are posting. Sometimes you get info out of the blue. Then other times, when you might expect a little heads up, you get nothing. Which ends in them almost always having to explain themselves. It would behoove them to actually put out a little list/reminder - this is how it will unfold. etc. Kind of like this beta thing. It is totally unreasonable for anyone to think/expect to get in right away, even though they have the annual pass. But once again, instead of clearly telling people, they say nothing, and thus people getting their panties all twisted. I was not impressed with the press event- more because I wasn't there. I was impressed with WoW Insider's write ups and the detail in which they displayed all that beautiful information. And there was a ton of detail, even though it was lost on a good amount of people, sadly.
Sterb Mar 23rd 2012 8:19AM
Underwhelming especially considering the weeklong NDA heightened hype mechanic.
They barely touched on account wide stuff (achievements, mounts), which I'd really hoped they'd do sooner than later.
Transit Mar 23rd 2012 8:19AM
Well, personally i was not there. It sounds like it was impressive though.
But as for the info itself, the Garrosh news was a huge let down for me. It's kinda funny that I just purchased his figure from the blizz store about 2 weeks earlier.
The rest of the news sounded great, but the Garrosh news certainly tempered it.