Newslist For MMOValue

In a short (but not necessarily sweet) announcement, Zarhym announced on the official forums that the recently opened Blizzard pet store are now regional. This means that pets purchased from, say, the European store can only be redeemed on European World of Warcraft accounts. He doesn’t go into detail other than to say that pets that have already been purchased from one region and redeemed in another region are not affected by this change.

While it’s a curious move on the surface, it effectively restricts players from Europe purchasing their Pandaren Monk and Lil’ K.T. from the US store where the pets are cheaper at $10 compared to €10 or £10 in the EU (roughly $15). Interestingly enough, the pets are priced at ₩12,000 in the Korean version of the store, which is about the same price as in the US ($10.3). It’s unclear why the European version of the pets — along with a few other Blizzard store items — are more expensive, a fact that makes Turpster huff and puff and blow Azerothian houses down.

Obvious business reasons aside, it also creates a minor inconvenience for people who would like to give the pets as gifts to players in other regions. However, considering that many vanity pet codes have been regional in the past, such as those given away during Blizzard special events, it’s not a surprising move. Then again, this whole foray into microtransactions was a bit of a surprise, so we’ve learned to never underestimate those folks from Irvine.

MMOvalue World of Warcraft Blizzard, europe

A little while ago, 2 am Paris time, servers went down in the EU for emergency maintenance. More specifically, “emergency database maintenance.” They’re estimated to be down until 4 am Paris time, which by my estimate is another hour or so. Should that maintenance be extended any further, we’ll be sure to let you know right here on WoW.com.

Many thanks to our followers on Twitter for alerting us of this downtime, because our European staff members are apparently off doing silly things like sleeping. Thanks a lot, guys. Because of that, I’m now inflicting cultural stereotypes on you all in the form of the picture at the top of this post.

Catelet World of Warcraft europe, Realm Status

It’s entirely possible that my French is failing me (it’s been a while since I studied it, and it might be getting rusty), but as far as I can make out, this blue post on the French customer support forums claims that patch 3.2 is coming “next Wednesday.”

This is in the course of answering a routine question about where to get patch files and so forth – a surprising place for a patch release date confirmation, but I’ll take my info where I can get it.

I’m not sure whether “next Wednesday” (“mercredi prochain” in the French) means August 5 (in which case the North American realms would get the patch tomorrow), or whether it means August 12 (in which case we’d get it the 11th), but I’d lean towards the former. So get your ducks in a row, faithful readers, and get ready for the Call of the Crusade.

Castille MMOPRG News, World of Warcraft europe, patches

It’s the middle of the week again and once more unto the breach, my friends. Yes, tomorrow is maintenance Wednesday for European players. Fortunately, we told you this morning how EU Blue Wryxian had spilled the beans on the reason for all the recent rolling restarts and weeks of extended maintenance for a few select realms. I always find it’s easier to exercise more patience once someone proffers a reason.

So, this week it’s time for some rolling restarts. These will take place on all realms between 5:00am and 7:00am CEST, with the usual fifteen minute warning. The following realms (the same will be undergoing an extended maintenance from 3:00am until 11:00 am CEST.

Balnazzar, Bloodfeather, Darksorrow, Defias Brotherhood, Earthen Ring, Frostwhisper, Genjuros, Haomarush, Hellscream, Laughing Skull, Lightning’s Blade, Magtheridon, Neptulon, Nordrassil, Quel’Thalas, Ragnaros, Ravencrest, Runetotem, Shadowsong, Shattered Hand, Silvermoon, Skullcrusher, Spinebreaker, Stormrage, Stormreaver, Stormscale, Sylvanas, Terenas, The Maelstrom, The Venture Co., Thunderhorn, Turalyon, Twisting Nether and Vashj.

As usual, I intend to sleep right on through the rolling restarts. My cats probably have other ideas though. If you’re bored and looking for something to do, don’t forget to check out Daniel W’s helpful post collecting up all the important news from the last week.

Catherine World of Warcraft Blizzard, europe

Over the past couple of weeks, European players have been receiving plain text emails (like the one above) from Blizzard. I know what you’re thinking … scam alert but for once you’d be wrong. It might not be full of the usual sparkly Blizzard graphics but it’s no less legit – and a quick call to Blizzard Europe confirmed it.

From April 14th (that’s this Tuesday), Blizzard Entertainment Inc. (USA) will no longer publishing the game in Europe. Pause for dramatic effect. Rather that will be done by a new European arm of the company, Blizzard S.A.S. (France). The email itself is basically a courtesy — after all, you wouldn’t actually cancel your account just for an admin change, would you?

Personally I think this a great move, it means that we, the European players of World of Warcraft, are finally being recognised as the legion we are. We’re a separate territory (as should be obvious from Blizzard’s European job site) and proud of it, it’s just nice for it all to be official.

Castres World of Warcraft Blizzard, europe, france, publishers