Posts with tag registration

World of Warcraft has, as you have probably heard, been offline in China for a while now. Even though The9 originally said they'd transfer over their servers to NetEase, they later decided to fight it out, leaving WoW offline for a matter of weeks. And it isn't quite up yet, but they're getting there -- this (very roughly) translated article says that Battle.net servers are now up and running, so Chinese players can now at least sign in to Battle.net, if not into the game itself. We already went through the same thing here in the US and the EU, so Azeroth should be back online in China any day now.

Meanwhile, the poor folks at The9 have not been doing so well -- they were on top of the world last year, but when World of Warcraft up and flew the griffon out of there, they lost the majority of their business. A new AP article has them revising their expected earnings down by an "estimated 55 to 75 percent." Ouch.

Let that be a lesson, NetEase. Keep your instances running and your downtime low, because if Blizzard pulls the plug on a game you're running, they'll be taking a ton of money with them.

EU CM Wryxian has good news for everyone who attended BlizzCon last year (or just bought the beta key cards off of eBay): the codes given out last year will be used for the Wrath of the Lich King beta. Wryx says if you've got a code, register it immediately, and then do what everyone else is doing -- wait for the beta email to show up.

To tell the truth, I'm a little disappointed. I've got a beta key from BlizzCon, but I've already signed up for the Wrath beta through the usual channels. Of course, we still don't know how this works -- maybe those with a key will be given access before those who just signed up randomly, but it sure seems like everybody will get in eventually. Which means that even if you didn't get a key at BlizzCon, you'll still get into the beta anyway. I thought that Blizzard would have treated those who came out to their event a little better (and, at the very least, been a lot clearer about how registration for the beta is working -- are they making it up as they go along?).

But on the other hand, the open registration just means more people will get into the beta, and I don't have a problem with that -- the more the merrier. As always, the problem with Blizzard is communication -- it's fine if they want to keep which beta these WWI or BlizzCon keys are for a secret, but when the beta registration actually starts, they should make a plan, stick with it, and let all of us would-be beta testers in on what it is.