Double Bubble

We're five days into Wrath and it's our first Tuesday maintenance, so it's a good time to reflect a little on what's been going on.

The release went off rather well in my opinion. I actually went to the midnight release at my local Gamestop.  I arrived shortly after 11:45 PM and was on my way home with my Collector's Edition less than an hour later.   I had heard that the line had started assembling at about 9:00 PM and there were probably about 100-120 people in line by the time I arrived and more people were arriving as midnight approached.  The Gamestop people kept the pace of distribution deliberately slow and besides that, the whole ordeal went quite smoothly.   I got home and had enough time to install Wrath, upgrade my account, and get Ziv to the Howling Fjord before going to sleep.

The short time I was able to play after installation, I was thoroughly impressed.  I took a quick look around the Borean Tundra, but started questing in the Howling Fjord. Northrend is beautiful and the quests that I was able to work on were very well done.  I could tell that Blizzard put a lot of effort into making the new content more engaging, interesting, and fun.  The visuals are stunning and the subtle details make it that much more impressive. There's a definite reason why WoW is enjoyed by so many people worldwide, and this new expansion is no different. I  believe this expansion will be more popular than the Burning Crusade. Great job Blizzard!

The release wasn't without it's problems however.  There are a few bugged quests in Howling Fjord and I've heard of a few in Borean Tundra as well.   Since I haven't quested outside of Howling Fjord yet, I don't know if there are other bugged quests in other zones, but I have a feeling there are.   Another big, but expected, issues was that of the login server queues.  I had a feeling by the time the weekend rolled around that we'd see the login queues at prime time, but I didn't think it would be as bad as I've seen:

I've almost completed all the quests in the Howling Fjord and Ziv dinged 72 last night and got the achievement, I've Toured the Fjord.  This is the achievement for completing 130 quests in the Howling Fjord, so there are at least that many in this zone alone.  I still have a few remaining quests to finish, and I still haven't been into Utgarde Keep.   I'm being directed by the NPCs to make it over to, Dragonblight, but I'll finish up the zone first then head over there.

Looking back now, starting in the Howling Fjord probably wasn't the best zone to level quickly because there's a lot of cliffs, bluffs, and other obstacles that means a lot more running around to get to quest objectives.  However I told myself I'd slow it down a bit and really take in the new content, so it didn't matter to me that I probably picked the slower starting area of the two.  So if you're looking to level as quickly as possible, Borean Tundra is probably the place to start, and save the Howling Fjord for after you get your flying mount defrosted.

Death Knight?  I haven't created one just yet.  I hear the Death Knight's starting area and storyline are fantastic so I know I'll make one at some point.  I know there are a lot of Death Knights running around already and if they are as cool and fun as people are saying, then I'm sure we'll see our fair share of them throughout the expansion.  I'm going to wait a little longer before starting one, and take leveling him to 80 as the opportunity to see the other starting zone, Borean Tundra.  Maybe I'll start one up sooner rather than later?

I've been so busy with soloing through WotLK with Ziv that I haven't had any time to dual box at all.  I'll get back to it eventually, but it looks like leveling the Twins will be on hold for a while.  I may actually mix the teams up again and make one with a Death Knight as one of the pairs once I get one to 60.  Since I don't plan on dual boxing any time soon, I haven't upgraded the second account yet, but now that Blizzard has announced direct digital upgrades and downloads, doing so will be easy. 

A few more hours still before the realms come back online.  Let's hope there aren't any new problems like what happened last week.

Sedna Logic Limited released the latest update to Warcraft Chest [iTunes link]. Warcraft Chest is an offline browser for item drops from raid and instance bosses, as well as items from reputation and PvP vendors.  This update brings Warcraft Chest to version 1.1 but it DOES NOT include content from the Wrath of the Lich King.  Apprently this release was submitted to Apple before Wrath and just made it through their approval process.

Though it doesn't include any Wrath content, it's still a significant update and includes the following changes:

• Update item data to WOW 3.0.x
• Smaller App Size (14Mb)
• Faster download and installation
• Improved Startup time
• Now display long English text correctly
• Improved application stability & memory usage.
• Bug fixes and more ...

The functionality of the program remains the same as the original release, however the bug fixes and performance improvements are significant.  It looks like the developers put a lot of effort into reducing the application's memory footprint and improving it's performance.

In my original review, one major issue with the program was the application's startup time (14 seconds).  This new version now starts up in only a few seconds, and it's size has been reduced from 31.1 MB to 14.1 MB.  It's interesting that the developers noted "Faster download and installation" of the program.  The reason this is significant is because the original version took a painful amount of time to upload from iTunes to the iPhone/Touch.  I retested this several times with the original version and it took 10 minutes each time!  I have no idea why a 31.1 MB program would take so long especially since other programs of similar size would easily take less than a minute.  The good news is that this new version took less than a minute to transfer.  Though that's a small issue that only arises when uploading the program to the iPhone/Touch, it's was important enough and a large enough improvement to make it noteworthy.

One thing I still noticed is that they still don't have the Frostsaber Trainers in the "Classic" Reputation Rewards. Again not a big deal but I did mention it in my original review and even sent the developers an email, but never got a response from them.  Maybe in the next release?

The improvements in performance are huge and make this program a lot more useable.  It is very nice to have an offline tool to browse instance and raid drops, but if you're working through WotLK right now this doesn't have the new content yet.  I'm sure the next release will be updated to include the WotLK instances, raids, and reputation rewards. 

So if you're using this program now for pre-Wrath content definitely give it an update, the performance improvements are well worth it.  If you're waiting for WotLK content, then you'll have to wait a little longer. 

Related:
     iPhone App: Warcraft Chest (30 October 2008)

Just a quick note to say that the latest update to WoWTalent [iTunes link] is available for download or update on the App Store.

This update makes it current with the Wrath of the Lich King release and opens the previously locked Death Knight talent tree.  

What's new in this version:

• Talents updated to 3.0.3
• Level cap raised to 80
• Death Knight tree unlocked
• Localization support added

      

Related:
     iPhone App: WoWTalent (22 September 2008)
     iPhone App: WoWTalent now free (25 September 2008)
     iPhone App: WoWTalent 1.1 (22 October 2008)
     iPhone App: WoWTalent 1.2 (24 October 2008)

"So come then you heroes! Come in all your power and glory! For the final hour, all must serve the one true King."

I didn't think there would be any updates to the existing WoW related iPhone/Touch apps and definitely didn't expect any new apps until after the Wrath of the Lich King was released, but today I noticed a new native iPhone / iPod Touch application called WOW NEWS [iTunes link] was available on the App Store.  With all the news surrounding the current problems with WoW and the release of the Wrath of the Lich King, the timing of this app is definitely appropriate.

The application is being developed by Steve Caudle and Matrixsites Inc. and is available for 99 cents (US) on Apple's App Store.  The application description listed is quite thorough and goes over it's functionality quite nicely:

WOW TOTAL NEWS!!!

WOW TOTAL NEWS covers everything for the game of World of Warcraft.  Now you can enjoy all the latest information anywhere right on your iphone.  With the release or WotLK this will be a very valuable tool to learn all the new content as fast as possible.

Free Updates.

Most sections are updated Daily.

You can add your comments to every Article that is posted and read others who have posted comments.

The Sections list.

TOP Breaking News
This section will keep you up to date on everything for game, patches, add-ons, maps, quest information, guild information.

WotLK News and Videos
This section is everything just for WotLK from quests, guides, leveling information, tricks and hints.

Class News
This is class related news.  Changes to class, new talents, Hero Class, anything that you need to know for your class and other classes.

Video Section
The video section is great, with tons of videos and more added each week.  Nice samples of new spells, walk thru guides, all kinds of player made videos right on your iphone.

We are working hard for the next release and will be adding several new items covering WotLK when it gets release and we have some time spent with it.  Also customer feed back to us if you would like something added just email to support @matrixsites.com

Check out the screen shots for more information.

Network connection is required!

Ipod supported on Wifi connection.

This is not a RSS only reader.  Most of the articles are reformatted for display on the iphone.  You will not be dropped out of the application into Safari when viewing the full articles as this is done within the application.  We pull the news from several locations and each article has full link back to main story.

New source's will be added as they become available.

Reading through the description you'd think this is just a glorified, WoW themed RSS reader, and quite frankly you'd be mostly correct.  As the developers mentioned, the news that WOW NEWS is getting and showing has been reformatted for the iPhone/Touch display, and it does make for a nice and clean interface.  Reading the news is actually quite nice.  You could browse the main headlines, hit the down arrow to read a teaser if the headline piqued your interest, and of course you have access to the full story.  One of the features that's actually quite unique is the ability to view and actually leave comments on the selected news stories.

      

There are currently three sections for News: Breaking, WotLK, and Class which is self explanatory, and one for WoW related videos. The Videos section is of special interest because once you find a video you'd like to watch, it seemlessly moves you in and out of the iPhone/Touch's builtin YouTube video player.  There was a slight delay in displaying the news headlines, but it's most likely due to my internet connection or the server responsivness than the application itself.  The speed at which the news and of course videos are downloaded will depend on your internet connection (Edge, 3G, or WiFi), quality of connection, and file size.  News came up rather quickly over all the network connection types, and when I tried the same video over the three, I found the typical performance scenario: WiFi > 3G > Edge.  Navigating the application is both intuitive and fluid.

The application seems to aggregate news from a few sources.  Though there isn't a consolidated list of which news sources are being used by the aggregator, each news listing does have the source listed and linked.  So far I've seen news coming from WoW Insider, Ten Ton Hammer, WoWInterface, WoW Vault, and World of Warcraft Stratics to name a few.  I'm sure there are more but those are what I was able to see while trying out the application.  The videos seem to all come from YouTube and probably has gone through some kind of selection process to make sure the videos are appropriately WoW related.  The developers did say that more news sources would be added as they become relevant or available.  It'd be nice to have a list somewhere of where it's currently pulling from and at what frequency it's checking these news sources.

So it is just a glorified, WoW themed RSS news reader then?  Well, yes, but it's limited to what news sources the developer has decided to aggregate and display.  There isn't a way for you to select or add any of your own news sources if you wanted, so it's unlike a regular RSS news reader in that way.  If you want this kind of customization and control however, you would have to move to any of available full featured RSS readers or the builtin one in mobile Safari.  But, if you want focused WoW news in one application, then this will do the trick just fine. 

I like this application and have been using it throughout the day.  One thing that I would like to see added is a "Blue Tracker".  A news section that tracks posts from the Blizzard GM's specifically.  I frequent MMO-Champion BlueTracker and could easily see something like this integrated into WOW NEWS.  I've heard from one of the other iPhone/Touch app developers that they've thought of making a specific Blue tracking app, so I may not be the only one awaiting some way to track what those Blizzard GM's are posting.  At times like this past Black Tuesday Maintenance, knowing what the GM's were saying was extremely helpful.

Naturally I bought this application.  I believe I've actually bought every WoW related iPhone/Touch application that had charged something for it when it was first released.  Now I've written before about Blizzard and their cease and desist letters [1, 2] to developers that were charging money for WoW related/themed applications, and because of these, all the programs presently available are for free.  A few initially charged for their application but quickly switched the price to free to avoid any legal letters from Blizzard.  I'm not sure if this application will garner the attention of Blizzard's legal team since it's not directly accessing any of Blizzard's freely available resources (like some of the other applications were).  If anything, the ones that may have an issue would be the news content creators, but all news stories are just aggregated and are back linked to their original sites.  I suppose only time will tell if Blizzard would take offense to this application or not.  Let's hope this one isn't one to fall to Blizzard's epic legal hammer.

So now the big question, is it worth 99 cents (US)? Is it worth paying anything when one could use freely available news readers or Safari bookmarks?  For me it is for a couple reasons.  Review purposes aside, it's worth it because it saves me time.  The convenience of having focused and consolidated WoW news in one application is nice. Also, I personally like supporting developers especially if they are working on a product that I would either use or find useful.  Now I realize there are people that wouldn't pay for something they could do for free and that's perfectly fine. So whether it's worth the price of admission is really up to you. I have mine already and am keeping up with the latest news.

[Update 7:20 PM PST:] As I was browsing the WoW Top News using WOW NEWS, I noticed that Steve posted a request for some help with some news feeds. Since this was released on the WOW NEWS aggregator feed I think only current users would have seen it. I have been in contact with Steve about the program and he's been very responsive seems genuinely excited about making a feature rich product. He's even already integrated the MMO-Champion BlueTracker that I requested in my original post. I hope he doesn't mind me re-posting his post here:

WOW NEWS REQUEST
NOV / 12 / 08 - 5:55pm > admin

First I would like to thank everyone that has purchased this application. I wanted to post an update on the status of the application and ask for your help. We are currently adding several new features to the application and should submit it to Apple for approval by Monday. Not sure how long it will take Apple to approve but it seem Appls is getting really fast with the updates.

Next, as you all know we aggregate news from a few sources right now and want to add several more as soon as possible. But we are having a hard time finding good WOW news feeds. We are not interested in the 5 word fee that really is just a link, but a nice feed that offers content lead in to full a story. Most of the feeds we have reviewed are very old and do no offer current news feeds. If you know any good news feeds please post a comment here with a URL so we can review and write the aggregate code to pull to our servers.

It is our goal to make this a great app for the WOW fans and we know we have a long way to go but we will have nice updates each week until we feel it is what the user would like to have and use.

Any suggestions would also be welcome and we will try to work them into the application.

Thanks and have a great time with WotLK and hope to see you in the game.

Steve Caudle
CEO
Matrixsites Inc.

If you know of any good feeds you could post here and I could forward them along, or even better is to just send them directly, support@matrixsites.com.

The Tuesday maintenanace turned into one major SNAFU.  What was suppose to be a normal Tuesday maintenance (5am - 11am) turned out to be one huge headache for Blizzard.

The realms came online at the expected 11am (PST) time but were brought down only a few minutes later.  I actually was able to log in a couple minutes after 11am but was immediately greeted with [Server Shutdown 5:00].  The GM's realized that everyone's in-game mail was empty.  The magnitude of this didn't become clear until later when it was acknowledged that all in-game mail was lost for the past 15 days!

The realms were down for at least an additional eight hours.  I know that Caelestrasz finally came online at 9pm (PST), making that a sixteen hour downtime. When I logged in at 9pm, I still didn't have any mail except the mail from Blizzard explaining the problem with the mail and what would be done about it.

If that wasn't enough trouble, news started coming over the Trade channel that there was a bug in the game and people could get PvP gear for FREE.  Naturally that sparked a massive migration to the PvP vendors.  It was absolute insanity in Champion's Hall in Stormwind, and I have a feeling it was the same on the Horde side as well. Champion's Hall was so crowded that no one could see any of the NPC vendors.  The chat channels were flooded with people yelling at each other, and especially at those that had their pets out.  Something about free stuff just drives people crazy.  If there was an ability to riot there definitely would have been one.

The realms went down once again this morning (4am PST) to fix the free PvP gear bug.  If you obtained gear this way, it will be taken back.  Did anyone ever think that Blizzard would have let people just rob the vendors?  I didn't which is why I didn't even try. This new maintenance is suppose to last until 7am PST, but Blizzard has missed every single time estimate so far, so I'm not too confident at this point.

A Black Tuesday indeed for Blizzard, and continued problems on the day before the release of Wrath of the Lich King doesn't bode well for a smooth release.

[Update 8:20am PST:] I just tried to log in only to find some "Breaking News" on the login screen.

November 12, 2008, 7:15AM PST
We ran into some database issues during the maintenance which will require additional downtime. We have no current ETA to provide at this time, however, we will provide and update within the hour.

This definitely does not bode well for a smooth release of Wrath

Another Tuesday maintenance and another time for a little reflection.  It's been a calm week as there weren't any new scourge or zombie invasions or other new events leading up to the Wrath release.  Hallow's End came to a close, but other than that it was just another relatively normal week in WoW.

I've been playing my hunter main, Ziv, almost exclusively since Patch 3.0.2 came out.  Getting to know the new changes to the hunter class and this week I've really focused on hunter pets.  I've went about Azeroth taming new pets to try to get an understanding of their abilities, and whether they will find a home within my stable as I head into Northred in a little over a week.  As I've been taming and testing a lot of new pets, I've found some to be rather useless or don't have abilities that are particularly attractive.  Many are situational or it may be better to say that specific pets are better suited for particular situations than others.  My stable of pets is almost complete, but there will be an open slot to tame and test those pets that will be introduced in Wrath.

I haven't dual boxed any of my teams at all this past week so none of them have advanced any levels.  I know I said I was hoping to get a couple alts to 70 before the expansion, but I was just having too much fun playing Ziv.  So I've decided to change up the teams a bit, and put a few alts into semi-retirement.  I created Team Interlude as the team I'd level to 70 before the expansion, though I did get them to level 44 rather quickly, I wasn't particularly excited about leveling with a warrior.  I had stopped Team DoubleD at level 59 in favor of Team Interlude, but the real reason was so I would still have levels to grant via the Recruit-A-Friend program.  So what I decided to do was utilize some of those "free" levels earned and grant them to my priest, Fourier, of Team Interlude and bring him to level 59.  I'm forming a new team with my paladin, Nyquist, and my shadow priest, Fourier, and will call them the Twins.  I'm going to have to put Rumpus, and Zaley into semi-retirement for now.  Let's see if I could get the Twins to 70 before the expansion.

We're still a few more hours away until the realms come back online, but in the meantime you may want to start up your Background Downloader and get the 20.6 MB file for Patch 3.0.3 and take a look at the latest patch notes.  Besides all the changes listed in the patch notes, who knows what else Blizzard will be implementing into the game.  Since Wrath is a mere nine days away, I have no doubt that there will be some new content and activities coming this week.  More scourge invasions?  More zombies?  Or something more sinister?

We'll have to wait and see and I'm looking forward to this upcoming week!

iPhone / Touch users just got a nice new native application that will allow them to browse item drops from raids and dungeons as well as reputation and PvP rewards from the various faction vendors.  Warcraft Chest [iTunes link] is a brand new Warcraft themed application written by Sedna Logic Limited for the iPhone / Touch.  It's available now on the App Store and like all the other WoW related apps, it's free.

Application description from the App Store:

Want to access items drop in the World of Warcraft while out-game?
Warcraft Chest is a browser for items drops available in dungeons, raids, badge of justice rewards, reputation as well as PVP rewards.
Inspect your favorite items and prepare for you next adventure!

FEATURES:
Browse items for TBC and Classic (2.4.3) including:

• Dungeon and Raid Drops
• Badge of Justice Rewards
• Reputation Rewards
• PVP Rewards

General impressions is that the program is nicely written with a clean and inutitive interface.  Initial startup is very slow and  took about 14 seconds before the first screen appeared.  You'll need a little patience starting up this program, but afterwards the performace is pretty snappy.  Once the program loads, you are asked to select your language preference (English, Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, or Korean are supported), and you could now start browsing the various raid and instance drops, as well as reputation and Badge of Justice vendor rewards.

      

It appears that the program is an offline browser so you could still browse those items regardless of internet connectivity or not.  The program's large size (31.1 MB) is probably partly due to having all the items stored within the program's database.  I'm sure when the new content for WotLK becomes available, this program will be updated as the new content becomes available. 

As I was using the program, it crashed and closed at seemingly random times.  I remember that the another program, WoW Talent 1.1, had a similar issue when the iPhone was on for extended periods of time and had to be power-cycled.  Since I don't usually turn off my iPhone, I went and did a power-cycle reset and that seems to have resolved the issue.  So if you are getting frequent crashes with this program, try power-cycling your device.  Perhaps the developers are already aware of this and have a hotfix in the works.

One other very minor exclusion I noticed was the absence of the Frostsaber Trainers under the "Classic" reputation vendors.  I know they only offer Reigns of the Winterspring Frostsaber at Exalted, but since I spent many hours grinding reputation for them, I just thought I'd mention it. 

Overall it's a nice little program and I see some utility in this both in- and out- of game.  So if you want a mobile, offline way to browse raid and instance drops, as well as reputation and PvP rewards this program will do the trick nicely.

Things seem to have quieted down all around Azeroth and Outland, and with the realms down for their weekly maintenance, it's a good time to reflect what the hell just happened.

Two weeks ago we where hit with the Patch of Doom, I mean Echoes of Doom, which not only brought a lot changes to the game, but also a lot of problems.  Most of the glaring problems were resolved quickly, and people were able to experience and enjoy the new content and updates.  Four days later Hallow's End started up and brought some fun holiday activities and candy treats.  But another four days and some strange things started happening.  Zombies started appearing and infecting people, waves of Scourge invaders appeared throughout the land, and the zombie epidemic reached epic and deadly proportions:

Then as fast as it appeared, the zombie plague quickly ended. It was a blast, and I hope everyone that got to experience it had a blast as well. It was one major world event that not only changed the way people played and interacted, but was so disruptive that it brought uncertainty and anxiety about the game. It was not only a major annoyance, but it actually made people angry and running to the forums to complain. Isn't that awesome! I think this world event was so masterfully executed and did as they were intended, . . . to bring a sense of urgency on the inevitable coming of the Lich King and his army.

I will not go into a rant about those that complained about the zombie invasion because it's my opinion that those people completely missed the point.  Well, whether you liked it or not, it was truly a memorable event. Blizzard Poster, Tigole, had this to say about it on the official forums:

0. Regarding the Zombie Plague… 10/27/2008 09:27:02 AM PDT

We'd like to thank players for participating so zealously (and valiantly!) during the Great Zombie Plague of '08. Our intention with this event was to create something memorable and to literally change the face of Azeroth for a few days. This event is just one of many leading up to Wrath of the Lich King. As you know, the Scourge Invasion is now live as well and there is some other cool stuff coming up before all is said and done. Also, Hallow's End continues on!

While we recognize that the event could prove to be disruptive at times, we hope you made the most out of it while it lasted. Part of playing in a "living and breathing world" means that things are going to change from time to time. We meant no harm but only wanted to create a lasting impression on players as they head to Northrend to defeat the Lich King. The Lich King's goals (as you will soon learn) are to turn the Horde and Alliance not only on one another, but on their own kind as well. I think the plague truly demonstrated this firsthand.

So it looks like a cure has finally been found… for now.

Thank you for participating in our most memorable event to date… for better or for… brrrrrrraaaaaains…

While we await for the maintenance to end, what are your thoughts on what just happened?

The latest update to WoWTalent [iTunes link] is available for download on the App Store. The release is version 1.2 and addresses a serious known bug in the previous version, 1.1. If you have version 1.1 or an earlier version, it is highly recommended you update the application as soon as possible.

Other improvements in this version also include:

• Improved Stability
• Modified summary formatting
• Hold durations for talent button functions adjusted
• Save/Load improvements
• Tabbing added to info pages, tap left or right edges to move

The last feature is actually pretty nice as you don't have to back out to the talent tree to select another talent description. I wonder why they decided to use tapping of the edges to move from page to page instead of the built in feature many iPhone users are accustomed to when tabbing multiple pages, the nifty "finger slide" across the screen. They already have this feature applied to switch between talent tree branches, so why not in this part as well?

I suppose while I'm commenting on the talent tree feature I think it would be nice to perhaps have some kind of "split screen" mode where I could see both the talent tree as well as the talent information. Perhaps rotating the screen while in the talent tree will put it into this "spit screen" mode? A split screen mode would require more screen space so rotating it into landscape mode seems reasonable. I think I'll suggest this to Robert and Peter. They've been very responsive to bug fixes, updates, and emails before, perhaps they'll be just as responsive to a feature request.

Speaking of features, it looks like they have a feature planned that would allow uploading, emailing, or Bonjour transfers of your talent builds to other WoWTalent users. They also promise speed improvements which I have no doubt they will deliver on. So stay tuned for more to come, but in the meantime, go download the latest version now.