2nd Starcraft

The continuing advances in graphics technology, platform gaming infrastructure, processor technology and innovations in design will see more aggressive developments in computer games this 2006.

Gaming has traveled a long way today from the baby steps of the video games about thirty years ago. The square and jagged edged figures that used to dominate and entertain gamers on the screen is now more video-movie like if not life like that people today finds computer games more challenging and exciting.

The constant improvements made in computer technology exceeded expectations in the sales of computer games soft ware and has turned it into one big business in a very short span of time. The biggest impact on these games coming form the role playing games and the first person shooters.

The development of broadband had contributed very substantially to online gaming that in countries like South Korea, online gaming (Starcraft Gozu) has gathered a lot of followers dubbing the game fondly as its national sport. Online gaming has gained a popularity never seen before (or possible before), that international tournament are waged and battled online. Always trying to outwit and outplay the competition, world wide, online gaming has become very challenging and intense.

Where computer game designs used to be a simpler affair, today teams of artists, musicians, producers and gaming industries are working together to make the best and offer their best to the public that has patronized the games very well. The industry however has not, in marketing parlance, reached the peak. In my opinion, it is nowhere near it. The constant innovations that are shaping the computer games industry is so vast varied exciting and rewarding, enough material to motivate the designers and gamers to move on, that who knows what surprises are in store for the gaming public in the future.

What make computer games very popular are the regular releases of good computer game software. If you have not yet tried out the following, find a demo and find out for yourself.

1) Backyard Baseball 2005
2) Battlefield 2
3) Civilization IV
4) Dance Dance Revolution ULTRAMIX3
5) FEAR
6) Fifa 06
7) Food Fight!
Grand Theft Auto
9) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
10) Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap
11) Mario Kant DS
12) Need for Speed
13) Ninja Gaiden Black
14) Peter Jackson’s King Kong
15) Resident Evil 4
16) Sid Meier’s Pirates!
17) Sly 3: Honor Amongst Thieves
18) The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe
19) The Incredibles: Rise of the Underminer
20) We Love Katamari

Console Gaming
The technology race in the computer games category will be heavily participated by Microsoft with their Xbox 360 – powered by a multi core processing unit, Sony’s Playstation 3 by a cell processor technology, and Revolution by Nintendo will allow player interaction through a wireless motion sensing controller.

The popularity of the computer and video games has been a big business that it has surpassed the revenues of the film industry excluding the films ancillary revenues. However additional business for the computer games also comes in the form of trading cards, T-shirt prints of popular characters in video games and game titles and television shows that features reviews and gaming competitions. Judging from continuing developments and innovations in the game designs and computer technology, the year 2006 will even be more exciting.

Netease The new take over the ” World of Warcraft World “for a free closed beta so far has been three weeks, but because the content related to violence, and NetEase’s joint venture with snow storms network covert operations involved The game is also a time rampant rumors, so far the formal approval of Warcraft is still distant indefinitely. Although there rumors, NetEase had already commissioned its Proxy Provided for the “World of Warcraft” for websites and games built-in Advertisement The investment activities, and more news, “World of Warcraft” entity point card has started channel distribution in place around the end of this month is likely to start charging, but there are signs that changes are put in place in the content, the NetEase to the Press and Publication Administration Blizzard introduced a joint venture with the file and passed examination before the approval of Warcraft will not be approved.

On “World of Warcraft,” the contents of the amendments, before the game of Press and Publication Department is responsible for the introduction of technology import and Digital Publishing Division Network Publishing Management Service, Endeavor, said in an interview in the “World of Warcraft,” the contents of the review, the experts found that the introduction of new applications for “World of Warcraft” game in violence, terrorism and so on. Shanghai is not as easy to net the game’s source code, complete the changes needed to complete the U.S. company’s programmers, it is not possible overnight.

“Game with the thought, is fraught with ideology. Completely Westernized things can not directly take over, must be modified.” Endeavor said.

If the content changes to how big the problem does not exist, violence network joint venture is a document submitted to the key. It is reported that Blizzard back in the ninth city to discuss with his former agent “World of Warcraft” renewal issue, the joint venture the two sides had made the request, but warned Erzao Ninetowns government declined, the differences between this generated. The Blizzard has had on the “Warcraft”, “StarCraft” and the desperate battle network joint venture of NetEase is received on the situation of “World of Warcraft.”

Although violence in the joint venture network joint venture Blizzard and NetEase condition is not known, but the disclosure of information relevant documents NetEase and other indications to violence network joint venture to operate the game, but Blizzard ultimately operate independently “World of Warcraft,” the strategic plan of the foreplay.

On violent net set up to operate the game or just to provide technical combat, PW, plug and other support, Blizzard respect the explanation given is the latter.

But it is understood Ninetowns “World of Warcraft,” an informed source operating conditions, Ninetowns agent of Warcraft during the fight, PW, plug-in has been provided in the use of Blizzard’s technology, only 5 employees in the sector.

The storm net current number of employees has reached hundreds of people.

Learned that early in April this year, “World of Warcraft” prior to the transfer agency, Blizzard will have Ninetowns Warcraft proposed operation involving all the computers, Server Telecommunications I DC Contracts are all transferred to the violence network, if the violence is only to provide technical support network, obviously do not need these hardware and telecommunications contracts.

Reporter learned from multiple sources was removed, Blizzard had with Ninetowns on the “World of Warcraft,” when the contract negotiations, both sides had set up a joint venture to conduct various contractual arrangements, including Ninetowns should Hong Kong and Shanghai within an agreed period registered a new company, the warrants issued to Blizzard, and Blizzard signed a number of offshore stock pledge agreement and other constraints. With Hong Kong’s new warrants issued by companies, Blizzard will be able to meet certain agreed conditions, the exercise of the Hong Kong 50% of the new company’s new shares.

When conditions are ripe to pick the most important game of the independent disk operations, heavy snow area with Ninetowns various contractual arrangements agreed by the sea, wholly owned subsidiary of Hong Kong companies will be available in the future as the natural person to exercise the right to decide on all matters, including decided to hand over to Which the future will operate in China Cooperation Partners, and the number of restrictions can not at any time require all or part of the exercise of subscription rights, until all of the shares received.

Obviously, such arrangements are put aside for future operations Ninetowns own “World of Warcraft” embedded in the hint.

Blizzard of joint venture negotiations with Ninetowns case, the Company’s situation and how? According to informed sources, Blizzard and NetEase negotiations on other several games earlier, and Ninetowns on the “World of Warcraft,” the continued After some negotiations, the conditions to be followed Ninetowns with NetEase has been agreed conditions, the joint venture and other issues, the broad framework and logic should be consistent. Because of this important business cooperation agreement will involve dozens of copies of thousands of pages, Blizzard at the same time negotiations with the agent before and after the two-term situation, can not come up with two different programs of cooperation.

In NetEase net set up in Hong Kong and Shanghai violent storms Network (also known as the upper hand) who, the guess more or less been confirmed.

To All Current and Future Members of YPOWP,

We wanted to personally write a letter to everyone explaining our reasoning for creating YPOWP and why we aim to help the WoW community as a whole.  We also want to get rid of any doubts people might have about us being scammers.   

To start out both MIlos and I have been playing Blizzard® games for over 10 years.  Starcraft®, Diablo®/Diablo® 2, Warcraft® 1, 2, 3, World of Warcraft™ (WoW) all seem to have two things in common, they are all unbelievably addictive games and they all have had problems with online game play.  There was lag and maphack with Starcraft, lag and duped items with Diablo and Warcraft 3 was simply too slow.  Now with WoW, an almost perfect MMORPG game, we have horrible waiting times and far too many realm issues for a game we are all paying $15 dollars a month for.   There have always been a large group of people in the WoW community that shouted angrily for the bad service (we among them) but they were greatly outnumber by the people willing to stand for the lag and outages. 

Last year we were just brain storming and we came out with the idea of compensating people for downtime.  We didn’t know exactly how to go about doing it so we first started gathering data and then we came up with the idea of charging a fee for compensation.  We came up with a formula that calculated how to charge a fee based on the realm and characters level and then came up with another formula that calculated how much compensation will be.   We decided to go with that plan thinking eventually we’d move to ad based revenue so that fees are no longer necessary.   Well our first week of opening we generated a ton of press about our site but unfortunately a lot of it was bad press; many sites called us an “insurance” company, scammers and data fishers.  Although we had an interview with Wowinsider trying to explain our position it was unsuccessful.  So we decided to take down the site and start over. 

We wanted to keep the core of the site intact which was to compensate players for downtime but we wanted to get the thought of us being an “insurance” company out of people’s heads and also we needed a way to make sure people won’t think of us as scammers.  We felt the only way to do those things was to offer our service of compensating for downtime for free as well as informing players not to use their WoW account password when registering with YPOWP.  We accelerated our plan of becoming an ad based revenue site so that we are able to use the money collected to compensate.   That is where YPOWP is today, a free service for all WoW players. 

Our concept is very simple, whatever we collect we give back to the community and the only money we take is what is needed to keep the site running.  We have a counter on the front page showing how much we collected and based on that we estimate the number of compensation spots (how many players we can compensate based on the realms average down times) for the following month.   The compensation spots will be open on the first of every month and is based on a first come first serve concept.  After the compensation spots are filled, players will have to wait until the next month to sign up.  We have implemented a contest system for players that didn’t get compensation spots and a portion of the revenue we collect every month will go to contest only. 

We are introducing something that has never been done before and to be honest we don\’t know how far we will get, but we will try our best in providing our service. We feel with a free compensating service for Wow players will ensure more players join or stick with WoW.  News of our site has spread worldwide from the US to Germany Russia, France, UK, and China and we hope it continues to spread.  If you\’re interested in more information, please check out our FAQ page and our Forum.

We wish you the best online gaming experience!

Sincerely, George and Milos

No, this isn’t an article about what you might do if you suddenly logged in one morning and all your WoW gold achievements, and those epic mounts, were gone, or worse, if there wasn’t a launcher to log in to. Rather, this is a speculative article about how the industry and MMO genre might be different had Blizzard chosen not to develop World of Warcraft.

At just over half a decade old, there are few records Blizzard’s behemoth hasn’t cracked. It brings in over a billion dollars a year in revenue, and is actively played by over ten million loyal and and active fans, who cough up $15 a month to wander the world of Azeroth. But what if it never was? What if, instead of pursuing the creation of World of Wacraft, Blizzard had decided against entering the MMO space?

What it would have meant for Blizzard:

Diablo III, and StarCraft II would be out by now.

You can bet that one, or both of these would have been the next game on Blizzard’s slate after Warcraft III. The ongoing revenues enjoyed from the wild success of World of Warcraft and its various expansions has meant that Blizzard really hasn’t had to worry too much about where the cash for the next meal is coming from. The lack of a cash cow like WoW could, or rather would have meant that Blizzard would have to follow a more traditional development model.

Hard to believe, but it’s been  ten years since Diablo II, and a whopping twelve years since StarCraft, despite the fact that both franchises have a rabid and vocal fanbase, and StarCraft in particular is still played on the tournament circuit. You can bet that without World of Warcraft, we would have seen at least one sequel to one or both games.

Would the Activision merger have happened?

This is a tough one. The reason Blizzard was such an attractive partner for Activision was the strength of the World of Warcraft brand, and the vice like grip Blizzard had on the lucrative market. While Blizzard would still likely have been a strong developer, it’s unlikely that it would be in the kind of position it finds itself thanks to the success of the game.

That said, Blizzard, like Valve, are a canny group of individuals, and you can only imagine they would have found a way to make the most of the lack of WoW, perhaps we would have seen the birth of a fourth pillar to be added to the Warcraft, StarCraft, Diablo triumvirate? And no, a new Lost Viking’s game doesn’t count.

What it would have meant for their competition, and the genre:

In 1995, when World of Warcraft burst on the scene to change the face of the MMO-scape, and redefine what was expected of a game in the genre, a certain Sony Online Entertainment was on the verge of rolling out the sequel to a game that was, at the time, the absolute zenith of achievement in the MMO genre.

EverQuest II, the sequel to the popular EverQuest, promised eye poppingly futuristic visuals, voice acting, and more questing raiding and eqII plat than you could shake a big stick at. A year prior, SOE had also launched the highly anticipated Star Wars: Galaxies, it was believed by many that this one two punch would easily be more than enough to tie up the MMO genre for years to come. Oh, but for the advent of World of Warcraft.

One of the major incidences that’s often cited in “ruining” SOE’s then-improving Star Wars: Galaxies, was the sweeping changes made to the game, geared towards making it more user friendly… like World of Warcraft. Consider for a moment, that had WoW not been around to put such high pressure on SWG, it’s likely the game would have continued to improve and evolve at a natural pace, without SOE being panicked into a knee jerk reaction that essentially alienated the player base and drove fans away.

Consider also, that without one game dominating the genre in the manner that WoW has, the genre might also have enjoyed increased diversity, rather than a massive 70% of the pie being owned by Blizzard, and the rest fighting over scraps, games like Age of Conan and Warhammer Online might have had a more even share.

On the flip side, we’re seeing the benefits of increased competition, as publishers like Turbine look to other ways of keeping, and expanding their market share, in the case of Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons and Dragons Online, by exploring the Free-to-Play model, a model that the likes of SOE are also exploring with Free Realms and the upcoming Star Wars: The Clone Wars Adventures.

What it would have meant for all of us:

We’ve already established that we’d probably have more healthy subscriber numbers in our various MMO’s, but it’s also likely that one MMO would have jumped to the fore to, if not fill World of Warcraft’s place, then at least provide some sort of stand in, and like WoW has done over the past few years, provide a template, or strong examples that other developers would have followed as the blueprint for success. Would it have been Galaxies? EQII? Planetside? WAR? AOC? Who can tell, but it would likely have defined what we know of as the archetypal MMO.

It can’t be argued that Blizzard’s development philosophy with WoW, deliberately making it easier to get into and more accessible, has rubbed off on the MMO’s that have been developed subsequently, it’s hard to imagine how different things might have been otherwise.

So, what would it have meant for us, the gamer? Well, can you really imagine a world without Brew-fest? Yeah. Think about that for a moment.