Blizzard posts

StarCraft II is known for its great sci-fi RTS gameplay, its deep campaign, its Battle.net multiplayer, and its CGI cut-scenes. But now it's going to be known for irs rock-and-roll cover tunes. This week developer Blizzard announced that Revolution Overdrive, an album of songs featured in StarCraft II, is now available to purchase and download via iTunes.

In addition to original songs such as Zerg, Shotgun, and You and Terran Up the Night the album also featured a cover of Sweet Home Alabama as featured in the game's Hyperion bar jukebox. The full album is now available on iTunes for $9.99.

Is Activision Blizzard getting ready to reveal plans for a paid online multiplayer service for games like StarCraft II and Call of Duty: Black Ops? That's what Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter continues to believe. IndustryGamers reports that Pachter stated today, "We expect the company to announce plans to monetize online multiplayer content in Black Ops, StarCraft II and other games before year-end"

Pachter made similar predictions over the summer but so far Activision Blizzard has made no indication that such a plan is in the works. However Pachter stated in an interview with IndustryGamers earlier this week, "I truly think the biggest surprise will be the launch of a premium service offering multiplayer online gaming. The publishers all are looking at this, and I think one of them will be bold enough to announce such a service by year-end. I'll be surprised if the price is low, and equally surprised if gamers accept it without complaint."

As promised last weekend at BlizzCon 2010, Blizzard is now accepting pre-orders for the digital download version of World of Warcraft Cataclysm, the upcoming third commercial expansion pack for the hit MMO game. People who don't want to fool with going to a brick-and-mortar store to pick up a boxed copy can pre-order the game on Blizzard's web site.

After that happens you can also pre-load most of the Cataclysm expansion simply by logging into your World of Warcraft account and downloading the data in the background while you play. The expansion will unlock at 12:01 am Pacific time (3:01 am Eastern time) on December 7. By the way this is just for the regular edition of the expansion pack. If you want the new World of Warcraft pet and other items in the Collector's Edition of Cataclysm you will have to buy the physical boxed copy of the game.

While players in the US can purchase Blizzard's sci-fi RTS game StarCraft II and play online via Battle.net for no additional fees, that business model is getting some alternate pricing deals in several Asian countries. Starting on November 18, people in Hong Kong/Macau, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand will have the option of a number of ways to purchase and play the game.

While gamers in all those countries can still purchase the full game and play online, they will also be able to buy game cards that will give them online access to play StarCraft II over several different time periods on the cheap. There will be three, seven and 30 day game cards sold in those territories. Players can also purchase a physical DVD to install the game client that also comes with access to play online for seven days. Blizzard has not announced plans to bring this kind of business model to the US.

There are very few games that we can honestly say excite us as much as Diablo 3. At the latest Blizzcon, the newest title in the venerable hack-'n-slash series was one of the belles of the ball, and a ton of info was released on a new hero: the Demon Hunter. Resembling the Rogue in a lot of ways, and the Sorcerer in others, the Demon Hunter is a throwback to the original Diablo series.

This trailer for the Demon Hunter shows off plenty of gameplay footage and almost no cinematics or scripted events. While there is a lack of UI that the player would normally be using, there's still plenty of information. The Demon hunter appears to primarily use fire and shadow as its elemental types, and can wield almost any ranged weapon, from bows to arrows. It can also dash around to reposition or avoid conflict, which makes it great for those that like to play keepaway with monsters. It does have a few close-range moves, such as the Fan Of Knives move from the Warcraft 3 Warden hero. There's also a few shots of quest acquisition and completion, breaking apart various physics objects, and new environments. The trailer is almost 19 minutes in length, but totally worth your time.

There was a bit of a controversy earlier this month when some people complained that Blizzard banned them from playing the sci-fi RTS gameStarCraft II because those players used single player "trainer" programs. Blizzard sent out a response that said "players who opt to use any type of 3rd party hacks do so at their own risk."

However, it looks like Blizzard could go after some players that use cheats and hacks for other StarCraft II-related features in the future. In a interview with Shacknews conducted during BlizzCon 2010 this weekend, Blizzard's lead producer Chris Sigaty stated, " ... it is possible that we can identify people that use some cheat to get 100 achievements in a matter of seconds. We have the ability to go and look at that data and say that person is going to be banned or we'll take away all of their achievements." He added that players should beware of using any trainer program, saying, "The people releasing these hacks might be including keyloggers and other sorts of hacks on your system."

It's all over until, hopefully, next year. BlizzCon 2010 is history but the biggest fan devoted to one game developer will stick with the over 20,000 attendees and the approximately 100,000 people who bought and watched the streaming internet-DirecTV video coverage.

Of course the only place to go for all your BlizzCon 2010 World of WarCraft coverage was over at our sister site WoW Insider. You can head over there now to check out Blizzard'scurrent and future plans for the MMO, including more info on December's upcoming release of the Cataclysm expansion pack. Meanwhile our mothership Joystiq reports on all the Diablo III and StarCraft II action at BlizzCon, including some hands-on time with Diablo III's new Demon Hunter class, the game's PvP arena battles and StarCraft II's upcoming and unique custom maps.

World of Warcraft players have about a month and a half before the third retail expansion for the MMO, Cataclysm, is released in stores and via download. But developer Blizzard, as one might expect, is already working on the fourth (so far untitled) expansion to the mega-popular PC game.

Game Informer chatted wih the game's senior producer John Lagrave at BlizzCon 2010 to ask about Blizzard's plans for the fourth expansion. He stated, "The thing we're trying to do in the next expansion is pretty f'ing awesome." Details are not yet being revealed of course, but Lagrave added, "We've now got a central idea [for the next expansion] that makes me happy and gets me excited, and it makes everyone else happy and excited." While that unnamed idea might or might not actually happen, he did say, "Will it top Cataclysm? I think it's pretty freakin' awesome. I'm really hopeful."

Blizzard will have two retail games released in 2010; StarCraft II and the upcoming World of WarCraft Cataclysm. But it looks likely like Blizzard might not release any games at all in 2011. Without stating a date for Diablo III at BlizzCon 2010 this weekend, it looks like that game won't make it out the door next year. Now IGN reports that the same can be said of the next StarCraft II release.

IGN.com reports that the Zerg-centric StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm won't likely be released until after 2011, according to comments at BlizzCon from Blizzard's Chris Sigaty. He's quoted as saying, "We will be very hard pressed to bring it out next year. I don't have a date, but it's more ambitious." In the meantime you can check out some concept artwork for Heart of the Swarm over at IGN.

At last year's BlizzCon (held in August 2009) the release of StarCraft II was just under a year away. At BlizzCon 2010 this weekend the release date of Blizzard's next full game, the action-RPG Diablo III, is less clear. VG247.com quotes the game's director Jay Wilson as saying that Diablo III is "way over half-way done."

However he added that the game is still not yet feature complete and Wilson stated, "We're not really close until you're playing it." So it sounds like the game is not likely to be released in 2011. Also G4TV.com confirmed that there will be a beta test for the game at some point but that Diablo III won't have any official mod support.