cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/44360161

The Digital Plague: When World of Warcraft Accidentally Simulated a Pandemic (my article!)

In 2005, a bug in World of Warcraft turned Azeroth into a virtual pandemic, and gave scientists a rare glimpse into human behavior during an outbreak.

So recently I started a page in a notebook where I jotted down article ideas. Older games with interesting stories to them. Just as a part of a series of retrospectives I've been writing. So far I have done:

• Seaman
• GoldenEye 007
• Star Fox 2
• EarthBound
• Dune II
• Uniracers

...and now, obviously, World of Warcraft. This one is a bit more brief than the others, but the story is fascinating to me. An unexpected bug caused so much drama, and it ended up being studied. It came back to focus when Covid hit, it was covered by regular 'big' news services, the whole thing is such an odd story to me.

Anyway, I had a great time writing this up, maybe you were ther when it happened? I'd love to hear a comment if so!

https://gardinerbryant.com/the-digital-plague-when-world-of-warcraft-accidentally-simulated-a-pandemic/

I am so bummed right now. I loved it. I just want to play my game with my friends once a week. I ran a casual guild that allied wiht a more serious one. I am so bummed and it was so difficult to finally admit this to myself and everyone.

The State of Azeroth has now concluded, but you can follow along with our recap, as Executive Producer Holly Longdale and Game Director Ion Hazzikostas give us a glimpse into the future of Warcraft!

No mention of cool down manager or buff bars or ui or add-ons that I saw. Which are my interests .

Open Discord, play WoW for at least 15 minutes (ez), and unlock the Portable Bakery Backpiece 🥖

In the Discord App, click Direct Messages (top-left), go to Quests, and accept the World of Warcraft: Housing Quest to begin.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/57846433

Side note - anyone have a good video rehost other than catbox?

Fundamentally the same, but execution is different a little. I play prot pally and bm monk.

Sorry for the bellular link, I know his rep.

Eh. Seems OK. I'm a systems person so this is decent nothing great.

What are hero talents doing?

Hype.

Interesting art direction but ok.

Spoilers!

From the official channel

So I was wondering why ALT+Z to remove UI was no longer working, I had to change the hotkey but ive been using that hotkey since 2004 and it felt bad to do so I investigated and found out that AMD's software has a hotkey system that unless you disable it will mess up wows hotkeys for whatever reason. Disabling this fixed it!

FTA

So far in our series of articles, we’ve shared information on our philosophy, decorating, and rewards for Housing in World of Warcraft, but it’s time to bring you into the Neighborhood. Briefly mentioned in our first post on Housing, it’s time to get into the nitty-gritty of what Neighborhoods are and what you can expect from them.

Endeavors was a surprise to me. Looks fun.

https://bsky.app/profile/therealnzoth.bsky.social/post/3ltko7alcms2g

After the recent DDoS Attacks and therefore the death of hardcore characters, Blizzard will revive these characters which have died during these attacks.

This will not mean that they will generally revive hardcore characters, but they will take into credit that server issues are not something players should be punished further with.

Greetings,

Recently, we have experienced unprecedented distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks that impacted many Blizzard game services, including Hardcore realms, with the singular goal of disrupting players’ experiences. As we continue our work to further strengthen the resilience of WoW realms and our rapid response time, we’re taking steps to resurrect player-characters that were lost as a result of these attacks. Unlike the many other ways characters can die in Hardcore, DDoS attacks are an intentionally malicious effort made by third-party bad actors, and we believe the severity and results of DDoS attacks specifically warrant a different response.

In the future, Blizzard may elect – at our sole discretion – to revive Hardcore characters that perish in a mass event which we deem inconsistent with the integrity of the game, such as a DDoS attack.

Our broader stance on character restorations or death appeals has not changed. To be clear, we do not intend to revive characters which have died due to server disconnects, lag spikes, gameplay bugs, or any other reasons. Blizzard Customer Support cannot assist with issues related to characters who have died on Hardcore realms.

Thank you, as always, for your feedback.

Clay Stone Associate Production Director, WoW Classic