Out of all of the video game movies that have been rumored to come out, one of the one that seems the most likely to actually make it to the big screen is the one based on World of Warcraft.

When the movie was first conceived it was listed as just Warcraft however, a recent update to the title’s IMDB listing let us know that it will officially be called Warcraft: The Rise of the Lich King. This leads us to believe that either they scrapped the original idea and went for a more Lich King approach or just had this story from the beginning.

Either or, you’re sure to be hearing more about this movie as its release date grows closer, whenever that may be.

via thatvideogameblog

This news was made known after it was noted that Paul Sims and his family (wife and 3 kids) have been listed as part-owners of the Pittsburg Steelers. Sure, this news may not have much relevance to the video game industry but perhaps we can expect to see the Steelers appearing in Cataclysm? Then again, maybe not.

via kotaku

The keynote will focus on “The Universe of World of Warcraft.” A bit redundant, don’t you think? One can only assume that it will outline what it takes to maintain and develop for such a large MMORPG. Maybe even a few words on the upcoming expansion, or more improbably, a look at the Warcraft movie.

This year’s GDC will be held at Austin, Texas from September 15th through 18th.

Read (GDC Austin)

Ever since Realtime Worlds announced All Points Bulletin it has been a highly sought after game with it’s GTA-like gameplay and MMO genre.

Well the developer has again stepped forward to speak of the game and this time about the subscription fees, a topic that has been under discussion for some time. David Jones of Realtime Worlds was quoted to have said the following:

“Basically, you have to buy the client. It’s a traditional game that you buy…We’re not going the normal ‘you have to subscribe to play the game every month’ route. What we haven’t said is which route we are going, and in some respects we’re still looking.”

Let’s hope that they really come up with something unique if you told World of Warcraft players they would have to pay an additional $15 a month to play APB, I don’t think they would be down.

via Kotaku

Goblins are a neutral race in the game, meaning they don’t hold allegiance to either the Horde or Alliance, so it’s possible that they can be the very first multi-faction race. As for Worgens, one can only assume that they will be Alliance exclusive, or also be another multi-faction race.

Remember though, it’s all speculation, so don’t get your Warcraft undies in a bunch. Hopefully more information will be revealed in this year’s BlizzCon.

Read (MMO-Champion)

Just in case you haven’t already spent enough time on World of Warcraft, Blizzard has recently launched the WoW Mobile Armory iPhone app effectively giving players their WoW fix on the go.

If you’re familiar with the World of Warcraft Armory currently available online, you’ll be familiar with this as it incorporates all of said online application’s features into a handheld package. This means you’ll be able to check up on character, guild and arena data along with check your guild’s calender.

Additionally you’ll be able to find out everything you need to know about items, zones and dungeons featured in the game. Best of all, it’s free!

via Kotaku

It’s no surprise that Germany’s recent banning of games such as World of Warcraft and Counterstrike would cause an uproar in the gaming community — It seems that a group of German gamers have banded together to form a formal protest against the government’s recent decision.

Said group formed a march 400 strong who paraded through Karlsurhe to show their hatred towards the government’s “war on videogames”. But that’s not all, Destructoid reports that 3 more protests are planned to happen simultaneously on July 25th.

Furthermore, there is an online petition that has formed that hopes to reach 5,000 signatures because if it does, officials are required by law to rethink their banning of such games. Will this be enough? Let’s hope so because I mean honestly, how can you ban Counterstrike?

Want to help out? The online petition is located here.

Didn’t get a ticket to BlizzCon? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Luckily, Blizzard, RayV and DirecTV are offering over 16 hours of the event live for $39.95.

Below is what will be included during the live stream:

Exclusive interviews and commentary

Main stage presentations including opening ceremony

Tournament coverage and team highlights

Additionally, you will be given the exclusive BlizzCon 2009 WoW in-game pet; Grunty the Murloc Marine.

Read (RayV)

It seems Germany is at it again, this time setting their eyes upon Valve’s extremely popular Counter-Strike series. Legislation was recently passed that now makes it illegal to play Counter-Strike in public.

This has led to the cancelation of Germany’s Convention-X-Treme LAN event which is sure to discourage the mass of German gamers. Furthermore, Destructoid is reporting that World of Warcraft has also been banned from public play.

What’s next, Germany, Halo?

Don’t get your hopes too high, though, as Chilton only states that he “thinks” it’s possible to implement such a model in the game, but that it is “really too hard to say at this point.”

It’s unlikely that Blizzard will go for such a model while the monolithic MMO is still bringing in truckloads of money for them. Maybe sometime in the distant future when WoW is replaced by some other Blizzard MMO and forgotten.

A new program called TweetCraft has been released, offering WoW gamers a fully featured Twitter client that allows you to send and receive messages in-game. Heck, it also allows you to schedule your Tweet messages and even send in-game screenshots. Feel like boasting? It also auto tweets whenever you get an achievement!

While both are like drugs on steroids, you simply cannot deny the fun of being able to send pointless little messages to strangers while pretending to slay monsters and whatnot.

To all of the World of Warcraft players out there which side are you, Alliance or Horde? Regardless, have you ever felt the urge to switch sides but haven’t been able to?

Well, according to an official Blizzard forum poster by the name of Nethaera, you will soon be able to do that:

“There’s still much work to do and many details to iron out, but the basic idea is that players will be able to use the service to transform an existing character into a roughly equivalent character of the opposing faction on the same realm. Players who ended up creating and leveling up characters on the opposite factions from their friends have been asking for this type of functionality for some time, and we’re pleased to be getting closer to being able to deliver it.”

There’s no telling when this patch is set to drop but when it does there is sure to be a bit of chaos in the World of Warcraft.

Rob Pardo told the site that development on the sequel had begun in 2003 and that there had been a playable build since 2005. However, it was held up due to the appearance of World of Warcraft which saw a fair amount of the design team moving to MMO project to help finish the game.

Apparently, these people had lots of great experience and had knowledge and know-how to fix map editor problems, as well as dealing with balancing.

Now you know who to hate for holding up StarCraft 2. The original was released back in 1998. It’s been eleven years since then.

The study also showed that people who reported their gaming interfered with their sleep got 1.6 hours less shut-eye than everyone else and those who reported being addicted to gaming slept an hour less on weekdays. Only a third of those who reported being addicted felt that it interfered with their sleep.

While it’s easy to blame this on escapist, socially inept stereotypes, it’s quite easy to get caught up in games. Sandbox games can be particularly time-obliterating since there’s no obvious landmarks to call your attention to how long you’ve been playing. Bizarrely, the easiest I’ve ever been drawn into a game without concern for time was Viva Pinata. I haven’t played it since out of fear of losing entire days to its colorful world.

Step aside Master Chief, this time Mountain Dew has teamed up with Blizzard to release not one but two versions of World of Warcarft Game Fuel; Alliance Blue and Horde Red.

Of course, gamers will be able to get an exclusive in-game pet, known as a Battle-bot, upon purchasing the new Dew but that’s just the beginning of it. Game Fuel drinkers will also get a chance to win prizes from companies like Alienware, Razer and Jinx.

Fans of the Halo 3 Game Fuel need not be discouraged as the Horde Red Game Fuel is actually a rebranded version of the original recipe. Be on the lookout for Game Fuel everywhere you would normally purchase soda.

Now don’t get your hopes up too high because unfortunately we weren’t able to secure any Blizzcon tickets to give away to you guys, the readers. Fortunately, there is a slew of websites that were more fortunate than us and were able to get their hands on some Bilzzcon tickets to give away.

Below is a compiled list of all known fan sites holding Blizzcon ticket giveways, courtesy of Starcraft Wire:

StarcraftWire.net – Giveaway 1 – Giveaway 2

BlizzPlanet

Diii.net – (coming soon)

Diablo-Source

StarCraft-Source

inStarCraft

StarCraft II Australia

StarCraft 2 Source

TankSpot

World of Raids

WoW Interface

So, you won’t be getting a Blizzcon ticket from us but at least you still have the opportunity to get your hands on one while Blizzard prepares to put some more up for sale.

You can read more about Blizzard’s annual convention, Blizzcon, here.

Blizzard has recently announced that the 3.1.2 patch for World of Warcraft has left the public test realms and entered the live realms today.

Featured in said patch is everything you would expect, class changes, bug fixes, the like. However, the big thing that Blizzard introduced with this patch is the Equipment Manager which they describe as:

When enabled from the Interface Options menu, this feature will allow players to store sets of equipment, easily swap between saved sets using hotkeys, and pull items directly from backpacks or bank slots (must be at the bank to equip inventory from the bank).

This will ease the pain when you have to switch from your PvP set to your PvE set.

Full list of changes after the break.

World of Warcraft Client Patch 3.1.2 – (2009-05-19)

The latest patch notes can always be found at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/

General

• Equipment Manager
  • When enabled from the Interface Options menu, this feature will allow players to store sets of equipment, easily swap between saved sets using hotkeys, and pull items directly from backpacks or bank slots (must be at the bank to equip inventory from the bank).
• New art textures have been added for Argent Tournament mounts. Any mounts already purchased from the Argent Tournament vendors will be updated automatically. Argent Tournament mounts with the old textures will still be available for purchase from the Argent Tournament vendors for a small Champion’s Seal and gold cost (standard faction requirements apply).

PVP

• Vehicle health and damage output in Strand of the Ancients and Wintergrasp now scale with the item level of the operator’s gear. Power scaling is now 1% damage and 1% health per average item level.
• All Wintergrasp daily quests have been changed to a weekly format. The honor and Stone Keeper’s Shards rewarded for completing these quests have been increased to compensate.
• The bonus honor for winning the battle in Wintergrasp and controlling/destroying towers has been reduced.

Death Knights

• Improved Death Strike: This talent now also increases the healing from Death Strike by 25/50% and the tooltip has been adjusted to reflect the actual functionality after the hotfix in 3.1.0.
• Ghoul Frenzy: Now has a 10-second cooldown.

Druids

• Innervate: This ability has been redesigned to grant 450% of the casting Druid’s base mana pool to the target over 20 seconds.
• Improved Moonkin Form: Now grants 10/20/30% of spirit as spell power.

Hunters

• Disengage: Cooldown reduced by 5 seconds.

Mages

• Mirror Images: The images summoned by this spell will now target the creature that most hates the Mage, and should no longer cast Fire Blast or Frostbolt on targets that are affected by crowd control debuffs that break immediately on damage unless they are already casting these spells when crowd control is applied.

Paladins

• Blessing of Wisdom and Greater Blessing of Wisdom: Now grant 92 mana per 5 seconds to prevent being overwritten by Mana Spring Totem.
• Exorcism: Can no longer be used on player-controlled creatures.

Priests

• Divine Hymn: Healing and healing scaling reduced by 30%. Buff on affected players changed from 15% to 10%.
• Renewed Hope: Effect can no longer be dispelled.
• Soul Warding: Mana cost reduction is now 15% down from 30%.

Warlocks

• Conflagrate updated: Consumes an Immolate or Shadowflame effect on the enemy target to instantly deal damage equal to 12 seconds of your Immolate, or 8 seconds of your Shadowflame.
• Fire and Brimstone: Now increases the damage done by your Incinerate and Chaos Bolt by 3/6/9/12/15% on targets afflicted by Immolate, and increases the critical strike chance of your Conflagrate by 5/10/15/20/25%. In addition, the increased critical strike chance of Conflagrate provided by this talent no longer requires the Immolate effect to have 5 seconds or fewer remaining on the target.
• Nether Protection reduced to 30% damage reduction, down from 60%.
• Sacrifice (Voidwalker) redesigned: Sacrifices a portion of the Voidwalker’s health, giving its master a shield that will absorb X damage for 30 seconds. While the shield holds, spell casting will not be interrupted by damage. 1-minute cooldown.
• Shadow and Flame: Now also includes Shadowburn.

Warriors

• Juggernaut: Critical strike chance bonus reduced to 25%, down from 100%.

Items

• Arena weapons with an item level of 239 have had their rating requirements increased to 2350.
• Darkruned Battlegear 2-Piece Set Bonus: The bonus critical strike chance for Frost Strike and Death Coil has been increased from 5% to 8%.
• Furious Gladiator’s Staff and Furious Gladiator’s Greatstaff: The agility values on these two items were too high. They have been reduced by 50%.
• Glyphs
  • Glyph of Innervate: Has been adjusted to grant the Druid 90% of his or her base mana pool over 20 seconds.
  • Glyph of Mass Dispel: Now only decreases Mass Dispel cost by 35%.
  • Glyph of Rapid Charge: Reduced to 7%, down from 20% cooldown reduction to Charge.
• Guise of the Midgard Serpent: The base attack power on this item has been lowered to balance it against items of a similar quality.
• Increased the health and mana restored from Northrend food and drinks.
• Most scopes now have a level requirement and will bind the item to which they are applied.
• Nightsong Garb 4-Piece Set Bonus: Chance for Insect Swarm to trigger an instant Starfire changed to 15%.
• Scourgeborne Battlegear 4-Piece Set Bonus: The runic power gain has been reduced to 5 runic power from 10 runic power.
• Ulduar 10-player hard mode weapons have been updated to item level 232.

Professions

• Fishing
  • Jewel of the Sewers: You can now fish in all parts of the Dalaran sewers for this quest.
  • Phantom Ghostfish: Can now be caught from Nettlefish schools in Sholazar Basin.

Bug Fixes

• Death Knights
  • Anti-magic Shell: Tooltip error corrected.
  • Blood Boil: If no target is available for Blood Boil to hit, the spell will now cast and consume a blood rune but generate no runic power.
• Druids
  • Maim: Rank 2 of this ability is properly considered a stun and can be escaped by Blink.
• Hunters
  • Go For The Throat: Explosive Shot critical strikes now trigger this talent.
  • Lock and Load: The tooltip has been corrected to display its actual chance to occur.
  • Rabid: This Hunter pet talent no longer lists a percentage chance to be triggered, as that chance varies by the attack speed of the pet.
• Paladins
  • Divine Sacrifice: Damage done to the Paladin while this is active will no longer cause the effect to break early, and if it is dispelled or cancelled early, the damage counter will reset correctly the next time the spell is cast.
• Rogues
  • Shadow Dance: Issues with action bars and ability use arising from using Stealth while Shadow Dance is active have been fixed.
  • Tricks of the Trade: To prevent exploits, this ability can no longer be cast on non-player targets.
• Warlocks
  • Demonic Sacrifice: This spell will no longer appear in any Warlock’s spellbook.
• Professions
  • Tailoring
    • Swordguard Embroidery: Now correctly increases ranged attack power.
• Dungeons and Raids
  • Ulduar
    • Hodir should now reset in a timely manner if a group fails to kill him.
    • 10-player bosses that drop Runed Orbs will also sometimes drop the recipes that use those orbs.
    • The Spark of Imagination: Characters that release in part of the boss room will no longer be ported to Westfall or The Barrens.

Those hoping for World of Warcraft 2 or World of Starcraft to be Blizzard’s new MMO are met with a sad day — Zarhym, Blizzard community manager, has recently confirmed via the official World of Warcraft forums that the new MMO will be based on a “brand new franchise”.

That’s all we have to go by for now but Joystiq is reporting that the game is being developed using the World of Warcraft engine for the time being. Whatever the new franchise is, Blizzard is sure to be rollin’ in the dough by the time it rolls around.

Now here’s a funny story — A World of Warcraft user by the name of KarateChop recently was found to have been blowing through some of the game’s hardest instances without even breaking a sweat, even one-shotting the boss of Ulduar. But how?

Well, as the story goes, KarateChop logged on one day only to find a peculiar item (pictured above) sitting in his mailbox. Low and behold, the item was the Martin Fury, a developer only item that was accidently mailed to KarateChop.

Once Blizzard got wind of this they quickly proceeded to ban the offender’s entire guild; even guildies who weren’t present during Mr. Chop’s escapades. So a word of wisdom, if you find an item in your mailbox that gives you the possibility to take over the World of Warcraft, contact a GM.

Read (WoWInsider)

You thought that World of Warcraft was addicting enough in its current state? Try this on for size — It was recently announced that PopCap, creator of popular games like Bejeweled, has released an official Peggle add-on for Blizzard’s World of Warcraft.

Yep, you heard me right; Peggle in World of Warcraft, 2 of the arguably most addicting games combined into 1 convenient package.

You’ll apparently be able to face off in Peggle against other World of Warcraft players and use the outcome to determine who can claim loot drops. Don’t worry though, the regular game is there except the stages are based on locations from World of Warcraft.

You can snag the download here.

Read (WoW Insider)