So, this is the patch with all of the Deathwing content and other changes that are "paving the way" for the Shattering.

I'm still collecting more information on what WASN'T announced in their official patch notes, so I'll have more soon. But, it appears that most of the official changes are just bug fixes.

Here's the undocumented stuff though not found in the link above:

- One big change will affect players working on the [Insane in the Membrane] achievement. New changes are now in effect so that the [Gordok Shackle Key] no longer drops, and the Gordok Suit quest only rewards 75 points now (instead of 250 per turn in). So, if you've just gotten your Bloodsail Admiral title and were planning on building up your Steamwheedle Cartel reputation - you're pretty much screwed now until after Cataclysm. Stay away from Cartel cities in the meantime. :)

(Note: You can still kill Bloodsail Pirates at a rate of 5 rep per kill (for Booty Bay, 2-3 rep for other cartel members), but you'll lose Honored reputation. However, once you've obtained Honored for the first time, it already counts towards the Insane achievement.. so it doesn't really matter that your reputation with them decreases again unless you want to stay honored with the pirates.)

- The [Insane in the Membrane] achievement still includes the Exalted Shen'dralar requirement, however it will officially be removed on 4.0.3a when the Shattering occurs.

* Update: I'm told that the Shackle Key is still dropping, so I'm not sure if the change has been made yet. Right after the servers (US realms) went live, 3 guild members ran DM separately about 5-7 times without the key dropping which they noted has never happened before. So, there are some conflicting reports on this and it would probably be best if you just test this out yourself on your own realm.

- The new patch also contains more data for the various landscape and zone changes for the upcoming Shattering event which will take place within the next couple weeks.

- Wintergrasp tenacity has now been removed so there a limitations to a 1:1 ratio now. So if your server has an overabundance of Horde PVP players, you'll notice that you won't be able to join WG much anymore (it will be locked out and you'll be placed in queue.)

- Rewards for Random Heroics are now displayed properly in the LFD window.

- Shift-click buying of those Inks from Jessica Sellers is finally working again. It's been down for over a month and a lot of right-clicking was needed. =]

- It doesn't look like there are too many other interesting changes (that's all I'm really interested in). [Glyph of Mage Armor], [Glyph of Long Word], [Glyph of Vanish] and [Glyph of Armors] are all still broken too - they're still not available from the trainers and they cannot be researched. And there's a Cataclysm Cinematic available at the Login Screen, however it can't be launched just yet. Video is going to be streamed now for the Digital Purchase users.

I was hoping for more, but this recent patch is just a whole ton of data/maps/textures/sound/etc for the Shattering event.

4.0.3a is currently on the PTR, so you can see most of the aesthetic changes yourself. Old World Flying will not be live Cataclysm however, and I'm not sure if Archaeology will be implemented Pre-Cataclysm (* Confirmed: Archaeology cannot be trained in 4.0.3a, will only be available after Dec 7.)

[Glyph of Mage Armor] is working again on the PTR, so if you have any left you should sell those as quickly as possible before the next patch hits and Scribes will be able to start making them again. You can also sell a bunch for high prices that first week before other Scribes clue in too.

Yay, I was right again. It's almost as if I knew all of this information ahead of time.. ;)

So, back in August I was expecting Diablo's "BIG NEWS" at Blizzcon to just be the introduction of the final class (I was still hoping for more though), but my number 2 runner up was Diablo 3 for consoles.

Looks like I was 3 weeks off on the Diablo console "announcement" as Blizzard has just updated their Careers section with 3 new job opportunities.

Diablo 3 Lead Designer, Console

Diablo 3 Lead Programmer, Console

Diablo 3 Senior Producer, Console

I wonder if they have an official announcement planned.. but I think that these recent developments are very strong indications to convince the unbelievers. (Keep in mind that it won't be Diablo 3 exactly, they'll focus on the PC/Mac first of course and probably release the console version at a later date.. maybe under a slightly different name too like what most game developers have done with their PC to console/portable conversions.)

It's too bad they never made this revelation at Blizzcon, but they're probably still thinking it over. They've worked on console games in the past (Ghost), and ended up cancelling them.. so, it will all depend on how the game plays and if the console version is up to Blizzard's expectations and level of standard.

Anyhow - if you're bored and want to have some fun, do a Google search for "Diablo 3" and "will never happen", "Blizzard will never", etc. and reply to their forum posts/comments with something rude. =]

Oh! One interesting note, when Blizzard was asked a couple years ago whether there would be a console version for Diablo, their response was "We don't have any plans." Sound familiar? I've written about that very common (corporate) phrase in the past. =] It's actually the same thing Rockstar said about RDR for the PC.

* Quick Update:

Ah! Here we go, there was an update regarding the new jobs on the Diablo 3 Community Site.

It's what I was saying earlier: "We’re exploring a Diablo-related concept for consoles and are currently looking to fill a few senior console-related positions on the Diablo III team. We are first and foremost developing Diablo III for Windows and Mac PCs and don’t intend to allow any possibility of a console interpretation to delay or affect the release of the game."

Posting Date: March 26, 2011

As you all are aware, yesterday is when THQ's highly anticipated tactical shooter "HOMEFRONT" game was released for the PS3 and XBOX 360. News sites are reporting that over 4 million copies of the game have been sold so far, making the game a highly successful venture for the company and opening up future growth with this new intellectual property.

However, last year in November of 2010, THQ CEO Brian Farrell told the BMO Capital Markets conference that, in a nutshell, video games need to be cheaper. Here are some old posts from 5 months ago as a helpful reminder: Eurogamer, Gamasutra and VG247.

THQ planned on an "alternative business model for retail games" and instead wanted to launch at lower price points and selling more incremental content later. "That's where the industry is headed", said Brian Farrell. Launching at $60 for example was considered too expensive and "keeping people out", however a mass market-friendly price of $40 would do much better.

So how much did Homefront retail for? That's right: $59.99 USD.

I still don't know what the PC version will cost (since it was pushed back as you're aware) but we should know within the next few months.

tl;dr; THQ said games are too expensive, then sold a game that was too expensive.

In other news, THQ is planning a "United Kingdom" expansion pack which will be "released sometime next year." The official title of the expansion pack has not been decided as of yet. THQ representatives also hinted at a Zombie DLC planned sometime within the next few years (possibily influenced due to the massive success of AMC's "The Walking Dead" - and I hear there's also another new zombie-based TV series in development too!).

And finally, it's estimated that Blizzard's Cataclysm expansion pack sold a "record number" of just under 3 million sales within the first month, making Cataclysm "the most successful fantasy expansion pack in 2010" according to Blizzard's latest news release.

Anyhow.. I'm heading back into Cataclysm. I heard there's a major nerf coming down the pipe that's affecting most of the classes. It was fun while it latest.. =[

This is sort of a continuation of my last post, I wanted to further examine Blizzard's "repeated history of abuse".

It was originally a very long post, so I'm trying to break it down into components for easier reading and because I go off on tangents. =]

So..

Other than unintended changes (bugs) that have had negative effects on customers, how about intentional changes?

A profitable business operates like a professional con artist: they'll take your money and you'll thank them for it. Or, they'll cheat you out of money but you'll never know that it even happened. The only difference between the two is that "marks" are called "customers" and the scams are actually "business strategies".

Blizzard has done a lot of cool things from a customer perspective (like charitable donations), but how about examining those critically and from a business perspective? (After all, I'm pretty critical.)

Race Changes

Let's ignore the fact that Blizzard charges $25 for a simple database record change. (It's like charging $800 for pouring windshield wiper fluid while claiming that the service is in fact a highly complex procedure that requires dismantling of your vehicle.)

When Race Changes were first introduced, Will of the Forsaken was the most powerful PVP ability in the game. Many players switched races to Undead purely for the WOTF ability. However, Blizzard secretly nerfed the ability on that same day. =] Players who switched to Undead had to pay another $25 to switch to another race with the next overpowered racial trait.

What excellent timing. They had months and months to make the change (it was planned after all), but chose to make the change when it would be most financially beneficial to the company. =]

More Paid Faction/Race Changes

Blizzard recently announced that they will be allowed Paid Faction/Race changes on the first day of Cataclysm. This was unexpected, but welcomed, by many players.

What this tells me though, is that they're desperate to ensure highly profitable numbers during that quarter. They could have just relied on Cataclysm sales numbers alone, but with all of the hype and promises made to investors they're desperate to ensure that strong revenue figures are reflected. There are also other services/features being introduced in the same quarter (coincidentally) as the Cataclysm release, and you'll probably see a lot of other new services, class buffs, and other stuff in the following quarter to keep revenue figures high.

All of these changes within the same quarter tell me that they're worried though.

Digital Sales

This also relates to the item above. Digital Sales will be available for the first time when Cataclysm is released. This is very convenient for customers, but how about from Blizzard's perspective?

- Blizzard is cutting out the middle-man, so that they receive pure profit now.
- Digital Sales do not include physical boxes, so Blizzard has eliminated the huge costs associated with shipping, packaging, and the physical boxes/contents themselves (ie, no need to manufacture manuals, DVDs, boxes, etc.)
- However, they're still charging the same cost as the physical box! (The best part!)

This new service will dramatically increase revenue figures for the quarter and it was very well timed (it could have been implemented at any time within the past couple years.) =]

Also with the introduction of Digital Sales, several research groups will no longer have access to accurate sales numbers to determine subscriber counts or revenue figures. For obvious reasons, Blizzard doesn't want to announce player subscription counts (like when they lost 5-6 million players in China) and cause investor panic. But with this "new service for the customers", they can now keep all sales information secretly hidden within the company. Very clever indeed, and another example of their dedication to reputation management. =]

You're A Good Person If You Donate To Charity

Blizzard also recently announced that the pet store will have "Lil' Ragnaros" and the "Moonkin Hatchling" pets available during the same quarter as the Cataclysm release (yay, more revenue for the quarter.)

Not only that, but 50% of the proceeds goto charity.

There are a few things to keep in mind here:

- The graphics model for these virtual pets probably cost like $50 to make (that's including the $0.05 worth of electricity used by the development station) but Blizzard will be re-selling this virtual item in the hundreds of thousands. It won't cost Blizzard anything to donate 100% of the profits (donating 99.99% of the proceeds would still cover all of their associated expenses) but they need that massive profit for their quarterly results. Was this truly altruism or was it business? Based on history, I'm thinking the latter.
- It's like selling bottles of air (except they don't have to pay for the bottles).
- Charitable Donations = Tax Cuts + Public Relations + Reputation Management + Good Feelings For All
- As human beings, we're all very selfish. Everything we do is for actually for a selfish purpose when you think about it (donating to charity makes you feel good about yourself for example). However, we're very good at pigeonholing our selfish acts into different levels. Buying a pet for vanity purposes is "bad" and some will do it.. BUT if the proceeds are going to charity, then that will JUSTIFY the purchase and you can feel good about yourself. This is a common business strategy actually.. manipulation of our feelings is just proper marketing strategy, so don't take it personally. If you ever wanted to sell something that makes a person look vain, just tell them you'll donate some of the proceeds to charity - it works wonders.

Anyhow.. yeah yeah, I'm a jerk for mentioning all of this. "Blizzard could have just kept all of the profits themselves you know!!" is what the Blizzard fanboys will probably say. =]

Buffing During Sales Periods and De-Buffing After

The Death Knight was originally extremely overpowered. Everyone was lead to believe that because they were a "Hero Class" that they would remain overpowered with reason. It was kept overpowered during the highest sales period of the year, and then they "suddenly" nerfed the class to hell approx 3-4 months after (when the big sales period ended.) Coincidental? The DK class sure did bring in a lot of new players via word-of-mouth and friends inviting friends due to their "special abilities". =]

The DK class was tested for years internally, beta testing, and PTR testing - but Blizzard kept them OP until after sales dwindled. I'm predicting the same thing with Cataclysm - ridiculously easy dungeons and item/gear collection, overpowered abilities and classes, and then there will be a massive nerf followed by the reset of items or "introduction of new gear" the replaces all existing gear. It will probably happen in March/April. You know.. because all of the awesome changes (that have been tested for years mind you) were in fact "accidental" or "unintentional".

Promises Promises

When World of Warcraft was first released, I was very hesitant about paying $15 per month for their service. However, Blizzard reassured me that they had major content upgrades planned to be released every month. That was the big selling point for me.. the promise of major content updates on a month by month basis.

It never happened.. they later changed the idea into "Expansion Packs" so that they could reap additional profit on top of the existing monthly subscription payments. What a huge disappointment. They also removed all forum posts that had mentioned monthly "major content" patches, if I had known I would have taken screenshots.

In 2008, Mike Morhaime revised that statement and changed it to yearly expansion packs. That was the plan anyways.

Over the years though, Blizzard has made a lot of changes to their public announcement process and they are much more careful about what they say now. But even then, they still make announcements or hints of upcoming features and services that never materialize. They lead us to believe something big is coming, so that we keep playing, but word their announcements so that they can be interpreted many different ways. (I've talked about this sort of thing in the past.. it's all about wording.)

You can also expect Blizzard to make regular changes to their forum system (ie, "clean up operations"), which is also extremely beneficial to their Reputation Management process. Whenever a new expansion pack comes out or there are forum changes, you can expect forum posts to be deleted. Typically, negative forum posts (ie, ones that cast Blizzard in a bad light) are removed right away - but not all moderators can catch them. So "starting fresh" on the forum system is more like deleting evidence (ie, the posts that weren't caught or promises and comments made no longer exist and cannot be linked to anymore) even though forum posts can easily be migrated over to new systems.

Class "Balancing" Acts

Ever notice that every class is given the opportunity to be overpowered for a month or two, and then it switches to another class? That might not be a coincidence or unintended. It's almost as if every class goes through a rotation, buffed intentionally, and then nerfed later on purpose (as though it was all planned all along.)

After 6 years, the classes still haven't been balanced properly even though they have been tested by millions of players world wide. The balance issues are just a very small finite number of permutations and variations in class gameplay compared to the variations in gear (and raid/NPC mechanics) which is balanced. I think this is just another game Blizzard plays, and I'm sure others believe it as well.

Sure, sometimes there are some unintentional bugs.. it happens. But the constant balancing act encourages players to switch classes, level them up, and then switch to another class. More time is spent playing the game, and therefore more revenue for Blizzard. Taking subscriptions numbers into account and game size, I've never encountered any other game or MMORPG that has gone through as many balancing acts as WoW. If I ever get a chance, I might look into this in more detail.. but right now, there are just too many coincidences in opposition of the claim that class balance is a result of unintended effects.

Realm Character Limitations

Everyone has always been restricted to 10 characters per realm. It's very easy to increase this limitation, as it's only a database entry and it applies no extra load on the servers. There's nothing keeping Blizzard from increasing this number.. who knows, maybe additional character slots will become a "Paid Service". But because of this restriction, once players are full they are forced to delete characters and start from scratch or create new characters on other realms and start from nothing.

I'm okay with a limitation of 50 total characters across all realms, but I sure would like to create a Worgen or Goblin on my two realms that are full. It's a very heavy investment of time to create a new character, level them up, and start collecting gold again from zero, but it's a way Blizzard can keep players addicted and busy wasting time. It's also a way for force players to purchase Race changes if they want to play the new races. Time-wasting activities (such as pets, achievements, and archaeology) are actually an indirect method of increasing revenue when you consider the domino effect.

Minor "Features"

These are the small tweaks here and there and increase the amount of time playing the game at the excuse of fixing "Lore" or improving the game-play experience.

For example,

- In Cataclysm, Blizzard will be removing portals so that travel time is increased (no changes to mount speeds however - how about a 400% mount that anyone can get?).
- Players will need to visit dungeons first before they can queue for them.
- Auction posts and cancellations now require confirmation (it does not prevent automated auctions at all.. that's why they're called "automated"), increasing the amount of time on AH dramatically.
- Blizzard always lowers the XP requirements before each expansion pack, and you can expect the same with Cataclysm. This is so that players can level more quickly to 70 or 80, are encouraged to level more characters, but they get "stuck" at 80 when they get hit with all of the time intensive activities that shouldn't be there.
- Big changes to racial traits (for other races) will occur after everyone gets used to Goblin/Worgens, encouraging them to swap characters again and spend more time playing.
- And don't get me started on the queue times for Battleground and Dungeons (that were originally promoted as time saving, but had the opposite effect.)