Wowhead.com sold to Affinity for $1 Million!

Woah, seems there really are big bucks to be made in many aspects related to WoW. Who'd have thought Wowhead would turn out to be such a profitable asset, sure it is arguably used by more people for talent calculation than the official blizzard calculator, with heavy traffic towards the site, and much more than just a calculator, I'm not fully aware with the affiliates to Wowhead, but theres no doubt thats a premier-league acquisition by Affinity Media. I can only imagine the kinds of traffic that passes through those sites, sites that are high up on Google, used by the extremely large wow community and also passed around/linked between friends on a daily basis, WoW is indeed more than just a game now, at least to some.

Insider information has rustled up that Affinity Media has purchased WoWHead.com for over $1 Million USD. After the story broke on http://www.techsoapbox.com/, WoWHead eventually confirmed the sale http://www.wowhead.com/. That means Affinity Media now owns Allahkazam, Thottbot, and WoWHead.

JM: Affinity Media is basically a holding company for different gaming assets. Clearly, there were three parts to the company. There was an IGE division, which everyone knows about. And while we’re not releasing the details, it’s common knowledge now that IGE is no longer a part of Affinity Media, that we’re no longer in that business.

Confirmation of IGE's new owner seems to come via Allakhazam's site owner, who commented in April: "A month ago, IGE was owned by Affinity Media who also owns us. Now, IGE is owned by Jon Yantis, who, I believe, was one of the original founders of IGE but had sold off his share years ago."]

Additional info on WoWheads background can be found here http://www.wowwiki.com/Talk:Wowhead#Ownership

There is big money involved in WoW, if you have a niche market, make it interesting for others, you can capitalize on almost anything, with the E-Sport side of WoW really getting some spotlight, and players being able to bring heavy traffic to their sites, I just hope blizzard starts pushing more areas and versatility in its gaming division and brings more entertaining competition to WoW.

You can brag about Arena players, and try to give them a superhero-like status to help make this thing mainstream and casual-friendly, its a very smart thing Ming is doing to make it all interesting and generate even more talk to ones site, be it positive and negative. You can stereotype the community into envying these people as if they're superhuman figures, but at the end of the day it will get boring and repetitive, I'd like to see big names and competition don't get me wrong, but we need more choices in Warcraft, like I said, bring ladder WSG as well as arena, and then it will get even more interesting.

Blizzard INFO and Update!!!

Damn, why didnt I get that Blizzcon ticket before they sold out? and why do I get the feeling i'll end up paying double the price for one off ebay a week or so before the event? Anyway, some small word from blizz that is REALLY exciting for me and i can't wait to see the footage/feeds if and when they leak onto the internet come august, firstly;

Some interesting words from Blizzard thus far;

Blizzard today announced that its eagerly-anticipated strategy sequel StarCraft 2 will be in playable form at this year's BlizzCon convention. !!!!!!

DAMN, I need some peeps from RL or Vashj to come upto me and say IM GOING, COMING WITH ME?!?! and its a rap :)

Now if that wasnt reason enough to go, then I dont know what is, also they commented on Mage season 2 items, perhaps this is a good thing for us mages,

We've been able to identify what went wrong and the stats for the Mage Season 2 items are being corrected in a future patch.

I guess alot of people don't rate the set that highly compared to others, oh well lets wait and see, I wonder how long its going to be 'till they make changes to it, hopefully within the coming weeks.

Anyway, so far its been alright into season 2, i'd like to rebuild a solid 5v5 team and get some good players who prioritise PvP over Pve. I need one more piece of gladiator to get 3/5 and i'll stick with that, then perhaps a weapon, nothing major that I'll be upgrading on.

Did you bank 75k? Get that PvP trinket binded!

Just a quick one as its late. Well I banked only 69k honor, I wasnt on as much as i'd hoped. I'll probably get some more honor tomorrow if I have the time. Not sure when my Arena team will be playing, more than likely late during the week, hopefully we can climb some rating then and get some good games in for the new season.

Also, I will indeed be going Shoulder, Legs and Wand like I said. I need a better bind for my PvP trinket come patch, i'm not gonna lie I was never an avid user of the 2minute trinket, although I really should have, I opted for the spell haste one instead, anyway, it would be insane not to go 2min pvp trinket this time round, so I need to find a comfortable key, I'm pretty much full atm

If you didnt see already
"With the large amount of players wanting to get a glimpse of the Season 2 rewards we're temporarily adding the Arena Season 2 item vendor, Krixel Pinchwhistle, to the Alliance barracks in Stormwind "Champion's Hall", Horde barracks in Orgrimmar "Hall of Legends", and outside of the Blade's Edge Arena."

As a sidenote, bear with me on the layout, I was experimenting with a 3 column layout through blogspot, but I think i'll end up reverting back to the original at some point tomorrow, do you think its better or worse now? :P

Calling out the Vashj / Local community & More - PT II

My Wishlist of Movie Makers, Likes and Dislikes

Before I start, may I just say that some people have been intentionally/unintentionally stealing my ideas and thoughts. I had the movie making idea rundown in my head about a week before Ming made a post about the rogue and his "most entertaining TBC video yet", I was also thinking about mentioning why movie making criticism should be taken in a positive way and should be the main driving force in how to improve yourself as a player a while before, like I mention later in this post. Anyways!

I really want to get more people movie making in the local community, I also want to encourage new movie makers to have a go at making something even if they are hesitant. At some point in time i'd really like to take my time in writing a guide with some hints and tips for new moviemakers. So now its time for the Vashj players whom I think are worth calling out for one reason or another, be it for the content of a current movie they've done, or a request for them to make something.

Vashj honorable mentions - I'll list some Vashj names that I think are worth a watch, or ones that would be worth a watch if they put out a movie in the future. Stars are the one to look out for

Sypher, Creato, Yuber, Jorl, Ambergo, Trotanoob, Kamiklees, Atec, Whisper, Lubbo, Thirin, Konaz, Chidorii, Bartkn

* Sypher (James) you did a good movie, props for it. it was actually one of my favorites from all Vashj videos. Great example of how to make an exciting movie through the use of good music and playstyle combined. One thing I'd like to see in your next movie though, is a better introduction, or a more story-based one, other than that, great job. Maybe we'll play in the same Arena team in Season 2

Creato you did a nice job, you improved allot towards the end, though you always have something annoying about your movies that stops them from being great (too much panning and cropping in the first) or speeded up TOO fast for the ENTIRE duration of the second movie

Frein - You are a good warrior, with one of the best reputations on the server, however your inability to make an entertaining movie is pulling you down and I think you need to work on this. Make something that the people want to see, No one wants to hear that music in a video, and step up the pace a bit, don't take this as a diss, rather some constructive criticism! Also to quote "When (if) I make another movie, it will probably be strictly arena PVP because it hasn't been done as much and it gives a better view on good players versus good players combat." - It has been done heavily actually, and will continue to be done much more than World PvP, its the easy route to take, but each to their own

Yuber, why didn't you make a movie? It could have been awesome. You were one of the best rogues and you had R14 and awesome gear for a long time, a wasted opportunity by not putting anything out, make something on your druid! Everyone knows your a good player, so why not show them what you are truly capable of?

* Jorl still needs to make a movie imo. Undoubtedly the best mage on Vashj and one of the first too.
Also an awesome guy to talk to, knows everything that needs to be known, and unlike Chrynarx, who only talks the talk,, Jorl also walks the walk. So oldschool that most players don't even know who he is because they weren't playing when he was around.

Kamiklees - Stop being lazy and wake up at the right time of day, set out to make something really good, you have the experience with both your character and video editing to be able to put something out thats potentially great, so why not do so? Put your bubble where your mouth is! Also i've heard a lot of people claiming Hubris is a better paladin than you, whats all that about, I thought you were the best Paladin on Vashj?

Thirin - You're one of those rogues that I always mess up on badly if i find you in world PvP, props for having that effect one someone, regardless of this though, I know you're a great player generally speaking, you have been that class for a long time, yet you seem obsessed with taking those PvE "epix" from 24/7 farming in a guild full of PvE clicking peasants in Forte, and you've done it ever since you left Epic. Why not go for the fame or do something thats worthy rather than wasting your life in repetitive instances banking DKP? You know you want to

Konaz - A really good & slightly insane player, it doesnt matter what class you play, you know he'll master it and be one of the best, since you love to PvP, a movie should have gone hand in hand with you & WoW, so pick one of your 5 level 70's and make a movie with it :)

I would recommend anyone from the local community to start making PvP movies, especially if you are interested in the whole idea of doing so, always aim to improve with each movie you release and learn from your mistakes, through trial and error... Don't see peoples negative responses as a personal attack on yourself or your playstyle, see it as ways to make improvements and better yourself as a player and movie maker. If you'd like any advise on movie making, please feel free to ask me through comments or other forms of contact, I'm not sayingim master, far from it, but I'll try and assist if you want any advise

Driftings top Movies - A rundown in WoW videos ! PT1

OK time for the blog of all blogs! I went a bit overboard on the text side of things :)

PART 1 - WoW General Top Videos
PART 2 - Vashj & Local Community Videos

Well, these are just a few of my favorite WoW videos from over the years, please take into account the time of release for each of the videos and try to appreciate the quality:skill:entertainment ratio's for the time of release! For anyone who doesn't watch much PvP movies, you should definitely check some of these out if you want to be entertained, or just want to expand your horizon on movie making in general, I'll be including a lot more movie-related information within the coming weeks/months, so check this out!

These are all videos I hold close to me, for one reason or another. Some I have lots of nostalgia towards, others I just love for pure entertainment value, if you don't know some of the ones I mention below, I would recommend checking any of them out!

Laintime - The drakedog of warriors, if I'm allowed to make that comparison, very popular warrior who is known for his insane trinketswapping during fights and generally fast paced-playstyle. I'd rather he just played without them for some of his fights, although it has helped him win allot of fights, so i can't really argue. I was really tied as to which movie of his to pick, since he has multiple good ones, but I decided to go with his more recent offering. 2006's "LAINTIME"

Released 06-09-28
Link

Hector - Hector, a rogue of Magtheridon/Khadgars rage, made video editing with model changing a widespread thing, when it was regarded as something that wasn't cool to do, because alot of people at the time thought making a movie with a different character model would de-value the movie and perhaps how it related to you. It was more of an artform than a fun video to Hector, you could tell by the huge amount of effort he put into moviemaking, he had his own style of movies, you couldn't compare him to Grim movies because they are in a different category and a completely different vibe, the scene is set on longer, more enduring fights rather than downing your opponent in the blink of an eye.

One of the most entertaining rogue moviemakers out there I'd say, also one of the most underrated rogue moviemakers, his movies averaged out at around 30k a piece, should have been much higher. One thing that hector offers that most other movie makers don't, is an extreme consistency throughout all of his movies, one of the few authors who has done 5+ movies, and i'd recommend checking any of them out. I decided to go with his "Caped Avenger" movie, as its one of my personal favourites

Released 06-07-11
Pros: Top class editing, Enticing movies
Link

Grim - Total Annhilation, destruction, decimation, obliteration vibe Grim's vids gave off, don't get me wrong, his first movie was also excellent too, but this one definitely set a new benchmark for "pure pwnage" rogue videos, going 2 specs in the same video is risky and can sometimes ruin the consistency of a video, but I think it worked very well for this one.

Its quite funny really, if you asked me why his movies are so popular, there isn't any elements that stand out way above others, the editing isn't the best, the skills aren't incredible compared to other rogues out there, but there is definitely a style he puts forth in the movie that he knows is appealing to the masses. Word around the Internet is Grim 3 is coming soon, lets hope so. If you don't know about his video's, then were have you been the last few years?!

like he says in his WCM movie description
"This movie was made mainly for entertainment purposes and to show how rogues can trash pretty much anything when played right. Although I have noted that a minority of people did want to see the more skilled side of things, there were two reasons I did not show that side of my playing style. Firstly the small amount of the tricks shown in rogue movies over the period of WoW's history have been nerfed shortly after the films release (remember the frost reflector?)"

Pros: Overwhelming your enemies, Appealing to the masses
Released 06-09-07
Link

Voidim 2 - Mage against world? One man army? Definition of solo! Of course frost is easymode kiting spec, those 2v1's and 3v1's can look more than they're worth on "camera", but in actual play, its not that hard to do, regardless though, this is an excellent movie with a completely unique style. People say there aren't many "skilled" alliance mages making movies, in a way that works to their advantage though, it allows the ones that do make movies to be more easily-recognized and distinguishable from the thousands of unread horde mages.

Either way, Voidim has made 3 movies, all got the recommended, this one however is my personal favorite of the 3, music is also nicely used, uniqueness and has some Talib in it, not only that but his use of the RJD2 track works perfectly with the movie, a true example of how to blend music + video together resulting in a top notch movie! Nice use of frost/manapool/kiting, with a little trinket and spelldamage boost here and there, nonetheless great movie!

This is one great take on how frostmage movies should be made
Released 06-09-19
Link

Ming - I stumbled across this video by accident one day, I really enjoyed it and became a fan overnight, long before Ming was regarded as a "celebrity" across the WoW circut, this video was arguably his best to date, he might not be the best rogue out there, but he knows how to make a huge name for himself, this video combines his Chinese roots with his unique style, you know what to expect in his movies, particularly on the audio side of things, perhaps not the best blend of music and video, but at the time a very good video for the masses and a nice blend of playstyle and burst damage

Pros: Unique style, Unique take with the music
released 05-12-30
Link

* Albis 3 - The Mage who went Elementalist before it became widespread and regarded as a 'viable' option at the time, though it was always a good route to take, people didn't like it because of its inability to cast aoe. How much I would have loved to take frost/fire spec when AOE instant was 5points req'. I mean, how many elemental mages were there at this stage of WoW? I'm telling you it wasn't many, maybe 5-10% if that, I'd have taken elementalist and been in bliss if I knew then what I know now. This vid is pure cloud9 for me in mage vids, also in terms of showing you how entertaining this kind of movie can be with the right editing and playstyle. It made me look at it while i was r14 and think "shit, i need to rethink my game, and BADLY". This has got quick reactions, some nice skills combined with excellent editing, he's the complete all-round-package when it comes to video making. Where Albis excels is that he pushes all the right switches to make highly watchable movies, it dosent sway too much towards one direction, ie. just skill & boring video, or nice editing but no skill, its a perfect mix of the two, take into consideration that this vid was released in December of 05, I'd say it was one of the great vids for its time in terms of having that all round wow factor. One of my main inspirations for movie making is because of you Albis, and I thank you for it! I look forward to Albis 5

Pros: Quick Reactions, Excellent editing
Stage6 HQ Streaming
Streaming

Again, I really wish i could've had the privilege to spec elemental before icelance and icebarrier came into the elementalists equation along with level 70, but oh well, fire it was


Worthy mentions: Saerdna, Vurtne, Seksi, Pat, Otherguy, Corrupt

PS. This isnt meant as a "The following players are uber", just a unique take on the WoW community / Moviemakers whom influenced or inspired me with my own moviemaking.

And a big thanks to Warcraftmovies.com, who made a large majority of this possible for the masses to see :)

Nearing 75k banked (+5k) & Community News

I will probably go on PTR tomorrow, for anyone interested (PvP). Will also have a look at our new girly-looking arena set.. bah... I still need honor though, and even for someone like me, i'm not playing as much atm, getting 75k banked is quite tedious, 61k... 14k to go in a few days, doubt I can do it, I got a game of football on sunday too, so getting it before tuesday off AV alone might be tough. I regret spending honor on the +10 spell crit rating gem, that dragged me down alot (these days it'd take me ages to bank up that much)

I still havent decided what I will spend my Arena points on next week, since I'm lacking resilience on my pants and wand, that may be something to consider starting with, although im not 100% yet.

BTW, some advice though I wouldnt recommend everyon doing it, you are entitled to get 1 refund per character, be it accidental or *cough* deliberate. So if you havent got 5k banked and want a refund, a GM can do it if you word it right. I *accidentally* bought Gladiator Pants and got a refund for those.

On another note, I'm trying to start a little project going by attempting to link together all the community blogsites, I'm doing the rounds by emailing a lot of the big-name blogsites and requesting if they can link to one another, it would make it alot easier for the new reader to be able to check out all the different offerings available to them, at first I only knew of one or two decent sites, now I check out around 10-20, and i'm sure theres plenty more that I don't even know about. So if you are in the group of WoW/Blizzard related blogs, feel free to contact me and let me know, i'll add you to the list!

Thanks to Oozo for setting the ball rolling, i've also emailed Radikal and Dahis. Havent bothered with Ming as getting a response out of him is almost impossible - maybe I'll try another time shortly

If you havent seen those links already, I advise you check them out, some of the other peoples blogsites are really good. If anyone on Vashj is thinking of doing similar, then let me know and I'll check you out too

Blizzcon 2007 tickets selling out quick! Decision Time

Approximately half the available tickets for BlizzCon 2007 have been sold in the first 24 hours, and they're continuing to go rapidly. If you plan to attend, we recommend getting your tickets quickly, as they are likely to sell out soon. We thank you for your enthusiasm, and look forward to seeing all of you in Anaheim, California on August 3 and 4.

I thought this was neccesarry to quote for those seing this who are planning going to Blizzcon, didn't expect the tickets to be selling this fast, guess i'll have to make my mind up as to weather im going faster!

I was going to go with some of my RL friends, failing that (they're all low on RL gold so they might decide not to) I'd have gone and met up with some people from Vashj maybe, or even Stormscale

Would have been nice to meet up with Quiver and Silvio, if you guys decide to go!

Starcraft - Best RTS EVER for its time

I really can't wait for this game. Its so close to my heart and had a huge impact on me during my younger years. After Warcraft 2 the next RTS in line came Starcraft, the unique thing about this game was its amazing ability to have 3 races that are very very well balanced across the board, offering many tactics to compete in high skilled games against other opponents from across the pond, at a much higher APM rate than WoW, following vanilla SC came Broodwar. the expansion pack offering even more versatility to the game, giving birth to DT's, Lurkers, Medics and much more, the game (for its time) is arguably the best RTS ever made, and IMO it always will be, its truly the gem of blizzards back catalogue, I hope they can live up to expectations with Starcraft 2. Even if it dosent turn out to be all that, which i'm sure it will, they could always manipulate it to the games original setup through the form of a mod via a total conversion or even use Snowflake Entertainments port for the WC3 engine using the SCUM editor (presuming they carry on with the TC - they're a third party), it always has potential to be an E-sport for many years, especially in Korea, I can't wait! This movie has started making its rounds over the net, features some of the units as we've never seen them before, check it here

PS. I'll be posting a rundown of my favourite Warcraft movies soon, and the influences they had on me, I would advise anyone who is interested in PvP to check it out!

Crossrealm killed the Local-Server community

Don't you think crossrealm killed the local community(s)? For me on Vashj I felt it did. What was left of it, atleast. Xrealm ruins the local server community, mainly with the opposing faction, why? because you don't fight against those people as frequently anymore, and the volume of people in BG is greater, hence why you don't know as many names, as a result you can't keep track of 95% of players on the realm, you don't really know who is good and who sucks anymore. Nowadays, the most likely way you'll know someone from the other faction through PvP is from a Movie, forumtroll, extreme event of ninjaing or IRC, gone are the days of local communities for the majority of realms

The great thing I used to love about WoW in general was having a community of people you knew, even if you didn't necessarily like those people, it was like a local village, full of names you knew and got familiar with, you usually had the one village idiot also, but when crossrealm came those days were almost destroyed overnight, gone are the times of seing people in BG you knew, or picking opponents to deliberately go for that you either didn't like or wanted to kill for the fun of it, it completely took out the local community feel, to compensate for this you get instant BG queues, well personally, i'd rather queue for half an hour for a BG and face opponents/teams I knew, than facing randomers from a foreign realm whom I had never seen before. They should have really kept an option so the player can choose to queue from a battleground locally on the server or through crossrealm, or both.

When I used to join a battleground back in the day, I'd usually be solo queued and either face a random Vashj PuG, premade 'Epic', Verve or in the later days Rubicon, going back to the older times, the Epic mix of players with some other guildnames I can't quite remember the names of all of them. Regardless of if I was in a premade or not, it was a lot more entertaining than the Xrealm days, perhaps nostalgic selective memory plays a part in this, though I still think it was genuinely better, Why? simply because it was satisfying killing Abraham, Gonzo, Thirin, Troj or Draster, we got killed by them alot also, sure, but the point being these are people you know, and have respect or atleast understood who was who on the realm and if they'd be worth prioritising in killing or not, be it for rep or to win you the game.

When I Premade' it with my old Four Seasons mates though, we had IMO one of the best teams of many, some of the best priests in the guild for PvP, our Jing Svindar Silanah are some of the best PvP/PvE healers around, combine this with Los, Ryann Fosters, Yuber, Frein and Bartkn, then throw in a wildcard like Jorl equates to a killer team,. 4s/CNF was so much more than just a guild to me, the players were all very determined and would NEVER go down without a fight, most knew how to PvP to the fullest, had done the rank 14 grinds, losing just wasn't an option, or if it was it wouldn't happen without a fight, though our CNF team was pretty much undefeated for its reign in BG's

I'm sure they'll never implement such a feature to queue vs your own servers opponents again, but I'd love it if they did!

To anyone who put up worthy fights in PvP on vashj back in the day, props to you!

#Vashj Quakenet IRC

Warcraftmovies.com isnt branching out to WAR anytime soon

I contacted Gedan, one of the main people at WCM.com and asked him if they are planning on branching out to other MMO related movies and publishing, he says they arent, so don't expect a Warhammermovies.com anytime soon unless they can be persuaded at some point in the future.

IMO it wouldve been a nice idea to branch out into other game categories, especially with the hype WAR has been recieving, i'm sure it would be popular enough to support a moviemaking on a similar scale to what WoW is now, especially on the PvP side of things. lets see if any alternatives come up or if they change their minds

Coming back to Vashj

ok well from my point of view the Stormscale project to bring PvP to Cyclone has good intentions and still has much potential until the project is complete, however I wasnt as good as it looked on paper for me PERSONALLY, heavy hitters from Arena teams are still debating transferring there after Season 1 is done but i'm also in it for the World PvP side of things, not to mention the local community I somewhat miss on Vashj, so...

I'll probably be going back to Vashj when my cooldown is up (thats if i'm still playing WoW then) for anyone who cares.

Atleast one or two good things came from the experience though,

1) learn that the grass indeed isnt always greener, and infact Vashj is actually quite a good realm

2) I'll be able to regain a name without the ascii character, which is atleast a small plus for me

Reasons why I disliked it are because there wasnt much interest in pushing anything other than the arena teams transferring to the realm. I'd go as far to say World PvP on SS is not even on par with Vashj, and SS was the target realm from the beginning.

WoW's current status

Are you having fun in WoW? Does it still entertain you like it used to?

I don't get much out of the game anymore, but why? I think most of the elements of fun that it once had are now gone. Mostly BRM, WPL EPL and ofcourse the oldschool TM/SS PvP scenes are all but gone. Nothing TBC offered has helped world pvp, one of the main things they got out of TBC is making an Esport out of WoW, which for some is good, but for people like me just isnt the key element I seek out of a game

Not only this, but flying mounts has also hurt wPvP alot, and instead of just letting pvp "happen", they've got it set up in designated zones, which isnt really fun.

Don't see it changing anytime soon, if ever, which is why I will consider WAR as a final option before i go Starcraft 2

The only real thing that keeps me going is the idea of making a fun movie that people would like, although it can also get stressful when you can't find any footage

Blizzcon 2007

Considering going to Blizzcon 2007 and it seems they are giving free beta keys for an upcoming title that will, with a bit of luck hopefully be Starcraft 2. Since i'm a big fan of Starcraft 2, this would also be a huge plus for me - I've also never been to an event like this so it'd be a whole new experience, also thinking about getting some friends together if I do decide to go, i'm sure they'd be up for it

Its a long way though since i'm in the UK so i'd have to give it quite a bit of thought, also with me not being such a big traveler it will be quite the decision to make - I'll see what the others say :)