World of Warcraft Official Magazine "Ending Its Run"

Earnest Cavalli

New member
Jun 19, 2008
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World of Warcraft Official Magazine "Ending Its Run"



Come September 30, the official World of Warcraft magazine will be closing its metaphorical doors.

The mag, a joint creation of Blizzard Entertainment and Future Publishing, had seen a rough life. Launched in 2010, it struggled to find an audience, even among World of Warcraft's die-hard devotees, both as a result of its perceived high price and the publication's propensity for missing scheduled release dates. In total, the magazine only produced five issues.

That said, it was almost universally agreed that the publication itself was of extremely high quality.

Unfortunately, Future has decided to pull the plug. The publishing giant recently issued an email to subscribers informing them of their options.

In part, it reads:

The World of Warcraft Official Magazine is ending its run, and the current issue, #5, will be the last one.

This has been a difficult decision to come to. Although both Blizzard Entertainment and Future US are very proud of the magazines that we have created together, we have each decided to focus our efforts on other areas.

We really appreciate your support for the magazine and would like to offer you a premium based on your remaining subscription term, or, if you prefer, a full refund of your remaining balance instead.

Anyone still subscribed to the magazine can either request a refund of their money or put the funds toward other products such as a handful of World of Warcraft's in-game pets, a subscription to PC Gamer magazine or a plush doll with a $75 price tag.

According to WoW Insider [http://wow.joystiq.com/2011/09/16/wow-magazine-ending-with-issue-5/], those wishing to simply get their money back have to request a reimbursement in writing by September 30.

Say what you will about the wisdom of launching a hyper-niche print publication in the era of blogs and LOLcats, but you can't fault the ambition behind this experiment. Sure it failed, but the idea that an online community might actually warrant an aesthetically gorgeous magazine devoted to their collective virtual existence was something that warranted exploration.

If it can work for Cat Fancy, why not World of Warcraft?

Source: WoW Vault [http://wowvault.ign.com/fullstory.php?id=61082]

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KeyMaster45

Gone Gonzo
Jun 16, 2008
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It was a ridiculous idea in the first place and the content held within was always horribly out of date or could easily be found with a quick WoWhead or google search. I'm sad to say I had a year's subscription to it, but that's only because I happened to be at Blizzcon in 2009 and I am a fiend for murloc plushies. In case you're wondering I did not renew, and by the sounds of it neither did anyone else after issue 4.

Yes the magazine was pretty, I'll give them that, but their guides were useless and the internet had already done all of them 100 times better for free. I can't stress that enough, the entire premise of the magazine was based on delivering information to readers that they already had access to, save a scant few interviews with the big names at Blizzard. They were trying to fill a void that had been filled years ago by online communities and that was already being exploited for cash by Curse.

The moral of the story? Stick to making games Blizzard, your legions of fans will handle the rest.
 

Brutal Peanut

This is so freakin aweso-BLARGH!
Oct 15, 2010
1,770
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All the magazine had going for it - were the posters that came with it.

So really, you were just paying for posters. Really nice artwork, useless magazine.
 

robert01

New member
Jul 22, 2011
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I knew that magazine wouldn't last that long, when it first came out I was look cool, I'll get that. Than I saw the price tag, and quickly thought, NO. FUCKING. WAY. I think a lot of people had the same idea. The price tag was too high, and I am sure most of the information put into the magazine was trivial, useless, and could easily be found instead on any of the free WoW related site.

It is good to see that hey are offering a refund.
 

weirdee

Swamp Weather Balloon Gas
Apr 11, 2011
2,634
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Should have just released an artbook.

Wait, we have those too.

Damn.