Blizzard Creates Horadric Apps, Kinect StarCraft for April Fools 2011

Vitor Goncalves

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Mar 22, 2010
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aeric90 said:
The idea of a pitch black dungeon where you can only see as far as your light source lets you sounds pretty damn cool actually if it was designed properly.
Usually some blizzard April pranks are very good ideas.
 

BrassButtons

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I love the disclaimers for the Horadric Cube app:

1. Blizzard Entertainment shall not be held responsible for any damages resulting from improper use of the Horadric Cube application ("the app") including, but not limited to, headaches, sleeplessness, rashes, hauntings, curses, dismemberment, disembowelment, evisceration, conflagration, immolation, insanity, demonic possession, or athlete's foot, nor shall Blizzard Entertainment be held responsible for any loss of souls or property damage caused by monsters, the undead, demons, or any other type of Lesser or Prime Evil. Contact Blizzard Entertainment support in case of unholy auras, ghostly visitations, or other paranormal phenomena.

2. LEMARCHAND CONFIGURATION: In case the app was placed within itself, step through the resulting portal with your phone, proceed to the Hellforge, and use the Hellforge Hammer to destroy your phone (Hellforge Hammer sold separately).
 

FoolKiller

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Personally I think MS did April Fool's right. They had a crazy sale on XBLA for people who actually looked. I spent 600 points on two games that normally would have been 2000. That is a win in my books.
 

FoolKiller

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Personally I think MS did April Fool's right. They had a crazy sale on XBLA for people who actually looked. I spent 600 points on two games that normally would have been 2000. That is a win in my books.

EDIT: It double posted... oh well.
 

SenseOfTumour

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I think next year, the ideal move for blizzard, is to have three or four ideas like this, but one of them is real :)

After all, people nearly always really like one of the ideas!
 

Prof. Monkeypox

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I didn't think it was that funny. Kind of funny, but whatever.

OT: If I could thought control my forces in Starcraft, I might actually stand a chance against those Korean players.
 

Nostalgia

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The only thing I really liked were Crabby and the Horadric Cube from the big ones.

The fake patch notes trump them all though.
Always do.
 

SelectivelyEvil13

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WaaghPowa said:
Now we all know that Blizz is great when it comes to April fools jokes, but did anyone else get the feeling that this was also a shot at the kinect and motion games looking stupid in general?
Just my personal experience from viewing, but I think it definitely was, and it was damn good, too!

It was a nice visual representation as to what would happen if Microsoft's dream for Kinect were to be actualized for PC games: complicated actions would likely end up overly complex (requiring relearning how to do everything) and absolutely silly looking to accomplish. But this applies a lot to motion controls in general, as well, because even with a controller (Wii or Move), one is still limited by actions and accuracy.
 

GoGo_Boy

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WaaghPowa said:
Now we all know that Blizz is great when it comes to April fools jokes, but did anyone else get the feeling that this was also a shot at the kinect and motion games looking stupid in general?
Nah it's rather in regards to those people who really expect Starcraft II could work with Kinect or something alike.
Which is fucking ridiculous and out of question but some people keep considering it... just look at this thread ha ;P
 

Davey Woo

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I don't get why there's always so much attention towards Blizzard's April Fool's jokes each year, when so many other companies do it too, and in some cases, better.

Xbox had "Dragon Rally" this year, which was quite frankly hilarious, and Guild Wars have been pulling April Fool's pranks every year I've been playing, I'm sure there must be others as well, but it only ever appears to be Blizzard that get's a back-slap from the Escapist.

=( sad face
 

Chunko

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The kinect one actually looked legitimately fun. I bet it would be really frustrating though.
 

Alphakirby

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WaaghPowa said:
Now we all know that Blizz is great when it comes to April fools jokes, but did anyone else get the feeling that this was also a shot at the kinect and motion games looking stupid in general?
No because Kinect and motion games do look stupid in general,any game that has you flailing about in front of a camera or with a remote will do that. (the only exception may be the gladiator battles on Sports Champions at least if it looked like you had a sword instead of a remote with a giant glowing ball on top)
 

llyrnion

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aeric90 said:
The idea of a pitch black dungeon where you can only see as far as your light source lets you sounds pretty damn cool actually if it was designed properly.
DDO has something similar, a quest called "Rainbow in the Dark": http://ddowiki.com/page/Rainbow_in_the_Dark. Plenty of vids on youtube, if anyone wants to take a peek.

Not exactly pitch dark, but one character has a sceptre that illuminates a short area around him, and the rest of the party has to keep close. Especially on the parts where the floor collapses, it's important to see where you're stepping. There's this part where you have to jump your way across a chasm using a few columns/platforms, and the bottom is heavily trapped (deadly on elite).

It's actually a very fun quest.
 

AmayaOnnaOtaku

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Mar 11, 2010
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The wow 4.1.11 patch notes had me laughing so hard it hurt/
Random Guild Finder

As the popularity of the Guild Advancement system continues to rise, we realize an increasing number of players feel that the experience of finding an adequate guild continues to be daunting. To address this, we?re introducing an all-new Random Guild Finder! Players may use this new feature to queue for automatic guild placement. You?ll be placed with a random guild at the click of a button, allowing you to partake in whatever content they may or may not be doing. After being placed, you?ll receive a cooldown which will not allow you to leave the guild, or for them to remove you from the guild, for fourteen days. Get to know your new friends! We?re sure they?ll enjoy getting to know you. If the guild you?re automatically placed in does not exist on your current realm you?ll be automatically charged for a paid realm transfer and moved there.

Appearance Tab

Acknowledging the continued requests of our players, an Appearance tab has been added to the game! The Appearance tab will finally, at long last, allow players to customize the look of their non-combat pets. Simply summon a non-combat pet and use the Appearance tab to change its look to that of any of the other non-combat pets you own. Summon, customize, and play!

General
Character armory profiles will now display current guild status: Solo, In a Guild, Looking for Guild, G-kicked, and It?s Complicated. In addition, character portraits now have the option to be displayed as a self-taken cellphone picture from in front of a bathroom mirror.

To ensure The Burning Crusade starting zones remain consistent with the rest of Azeroth, it is once again no longer possible to fly in Azeroth.

Dance Studio has been removed from the game due to lack of use.

Vashj?ir is now 20% more disorienting.

Players in capital cities will receive a 2-hour debuff ?Homebody? that increases damage taken and reduces damage and healing given by 10% for every 10 minutes they?re within city limits. We hope this encourages something.

The mouse can now no longer be used to turn player characters. In many cases, this gave certain players a slight advantage over those that used their keys to turn.


Classes: General
Talents are now automatically chosen for a player based on the main specialization chosen.

Due to player feedback regarding night elf, blood elf, and worgen ?flippy? jumps, player characters can no longer jump.


Death Knights
Hero Class improvements

Death knights now earn slightly more experience and gold than other character classes.

When using the Need Before Greed looting system, other players may not roll on loot until the Hero Class has chosen to pass.

Whenever a player takes a screenshot of a boss kill or similar accomplishment, all death knight characters will appear slightly more prominent in the image.

Death knight customer support tickets will always be handled before those of other players.

Death knights are now required to murder an innocent seven times per week or suffer the ?Going Soft? debuff, which reduces damage dealt by 15%.

Death knights can now increase their damage by yelling KIAI into their microphone. Damage is increased by 10% for every 10dB.


Druids
Druid forms are now considered vehicles, allowing one player to ride on the druid?s back while in any form, even their humanoid form.

Scratching Post (legendary Feral staff), introduced in a recent patch, was created accidentally and has been removed.

Different models have been added for male and female versions of Bear Form. The difference is subtle unless you know where to look.

Druids no longer talk to Innkeepers to set their Hearthstone. They are instead now required to talk to Stable Masters.

Aquatic and Travel Form were causing too much of a performance hit and have been replaced with lower poly models.

Druids now perform an area-of-effect knockback when harvesting herbs, looting, or skinning (does not remove Flight Form).


Hunters
Hunters now earn Valor Points when they are effectively Vote Kicked from a Dungeon Finder group.

Chimera Shot, Kill Command, and Explosive Shot have been redesigned as Chimera Trap, Kill Command Trap, and Explosiver Shot, respectively.

Pets: regardless of what pet is actually tamed, these creatures will appear as either a wolf (Horde) or cat (Alliance) when in combat. In addition, we have implemented an exciting new cross-breeding system where players can mix pets of various families with unpredictable results. Be the first on your server to show off a Mothmonkey, Crocoliskchimera or Warp Crab (these will still appear as either a wolf/cat when in combat).

Ettin?s Grip (new talent) allows the hunter to equip two ranged weapons simultaneously.


Mages
In addition to their current spells, mage Mirror Images now can randomly cast Frost Nova, Ring of Frost, Portal: Dalaran, and Mirror Image. Mirror Images summoned by Mirror Images can also cast Mirror Image. Mirror Images summoned by Mirror Images that are summoned by Mirror Images can also cast Mirror Images. Mirror Images that are summoned by Mirror Images that are summoned by Mirror Images that are summoned by Mirror Images?

The coefficients of all mage cast time spells have been tweaked to be 15% more jaw-dropping.

All Frost mages now receive a complementary personal Arena rating of 2200 upon reaching level 85.

Frost mages have been given one additional snare effect, so that they will be brought up to the level of other classes (combined).

All mage spells that deal Fire damage now appear green.


Paladins
Judgement has been removed from the game.

Judgment (new ability) unleashes the energy of a Seal for Holy damage.

All talents and glyphs which referred to Judgement now correctly affect Judgment.

The sound of most Retribution abilities has been redesigned to produce a more audible clunk when used. The rotation should now feel clunkier overall.

Paladins are now required to tithe 10% of their gold income to their church.

Paladin chat and whispers now appear with sparkles.

Some paladin abilities did not contain the words Sanctity, Divine, or Justice. This has been corrected.

The duration and cooldown of Divine Shield have been changed to 15 seconds.

Divine Shield no longer causes Forbearance.


Priests
Members of this class must now make a vow of chastity.

The Shadow priest talent tree has been redesigned to give them access to most of the cooler abilities of Affliction warlocks.

Lightwell.

Four new reactive shields have been added to the Discipline tree. These new spells are called Heal, Greater Heal, Flash Heal, and Prayer of Healing.

Evangelism now has a 2% chance to convert all surrounding party members to the priest class.

Leap of Faith?s cooldown is now reset if cast on a tank that has targeted an enemy but is not yet in combat.

Discipline priests we heard you like shields that heal, so we put shield in your shield so you can heal while you heal.

All Shadow priest spells that deal Fire damage now appear green.


Rogues
Due to continual misspellings of the ?rogue? class, we have officially changed the name to the easier to type ?rouge.?

Pick Pocket now works on friendly players, bankers and auctioneer NPCs.

Vanish now has an additional 5% chance to fail for no discernable reason.

Rouges equipping helms that resemble eye patches now suffer a 2% hit penalty from lack of depth perception.

All archways, portals, portholes, and doorways now contain locked doors which require a rouge?s Pick Lock skill to open.

Sleight of Hand now allows rouges to roll a perfect 100 on boss drops.

Cheap Shot has a new more anatomically appropriate animation.

Rouges are now required to pick up all of their blades after casting Fan of Knives before it can be used again.

Rouges may now cast Stealth while Stealthed, entering the state of Double Stealth, which is not only stealthier than Stealth, but also causes the word stealth to cease to make sense to your brain. Stealth.


Shaman
A healing tree has been added for shaman.

Flame Shock, Earth Shock, Dot Shock and Frost Shock have all been combined into a new spell called Bus Shock. This ability is less exciting, less powerful and harder to use than equivalents of comparable classes, but it has a new icon.

Maelstrom Weapon, Unleash Elements, and Spiritwalker?s Grace have been redesigned as Maelstrom Totem, Unleashed Totem, and Spiritwalker?s Totem, respectively.

The Elemental tree is now the Elementary tree, and allows use of new abilities Eat Paste, Nap Time, and the Macaroni and Glitter Totem.

The shaman now have a Totem Belt, allowing them to carry their totems with them at all times.

All totem ranges reduced to 1 yard.


Warlocks
Female warlocks are now correctly called witches.

Warlocks and witches now take additional damage when fighting in direct sunlight.

Demons now have a new resource system called Happiness. Torturing, mistreating or speaking harshly to a demon pet will reduce its happiness. The Succubus is an exception to this rule.

Whenever 2 or more warlocks or witches appear in a raid together, the damage dealt by any mages in the raid decreases by 5%. This effect stacks up to 5 times.

In addition to their current talent trees, warlocks and witches can now spend points in any mage talent tree as well.

To make the Demonology tree feel more 'demony' warlocks and witches not specced into this tree will be unable to summon demon companions.


Warriors
The Arms and Fury warrior hybrid tax is now slightly taxier than other hybrid taxes.

A bug was discovered that prevented warriors from popping Enrage as intended. This has been fixed.

Charge has been removed from the game.

Warrior?s base movement speed has been increased by 300%.

In addition to Throwdown?s knock down and stun effects, it will also inflict a horror effect.

To improve the success rate of Heroic Leap, its range has been reduced to 3 yards.

Quantum Leap (new ability) propels the warrior through time and space, allowing the warrior to take over the identity of an unknown character in an attempt to improve their life or prevent disaster. Cooldown 5 minutes.


Dungeons & Raids
Firelands

An attunement quest for Firelands is now available! In order to be eligible for the upcoming raid, players must first encounter Deathwing while he is randomly attacking a zone and collect his leavings. Epic quest lines will also need to be completed to collect the leavings from the other Aspects to combine them into the Patty of the Five Flights ? the key to unlock the Elemental Plane of fire in the upcoming 4.2 patch.

Invisible walls have been added around all harmful ground effects.

All dungeon & raid bosses now have legs. If they already had legs, they got more legs.

In order to make the Cataclysm expansion appeal to all players? sense of nostalgia, shaman, druids and paladins may now only queue as healers when using the Dungeon Finder.

Tank Stimulus: Successfully completing 25 Dungeon Finder runs as a tank will grant you a $400 Federal tax credit. (Requires Form 8863)

To help ensure players are only using the Vote Kick feature for the greater good of the group, anyone who initiates a Vote Kick will be kicked themselves regardless if the vote passes or not.

Ever a player favorite, the level-80 10- and 25-player raid of Icecrown Citadel is being reintroduced as a level-85 Heroic 5-player dungeon.

Ever a player favorite, the level-85 10- and 25-player raid of The Bastion of Twilight is being reintroduced as a level-85 Heroic 5-player dungeon.

Ever a player favorite, the level-85 10- and 25-player raid of Firelands is being reintroduced as a level-85 Heroic 5-player dungeon.

Ever a player favorite, the level-85 Heroic 5-player dungeon of Deadmines is being reintroduced as a level-85 Heroic 5-player dungeon.


Items
All items have had a 65-100% reduction in Fun.


Professions
Cooking

A new recipe has been added to Cooking which can be very rarely found inside Deathwing?s leavings. [Recipe: Epic Meal Time] ? Use: Set out an epic meal to feed your entire raid or party! Restores 192,000 health and 192,000 mana over 11 seconds. If you spend at least 10 seconds eating you will become sick and ?refund? all gained health and mana.


PvP
All Arena teams must now contain the word ?cleave? somewhere in their name.

Resilience has been made more literal. Players with high resilience no longer take less damage in PvP, but now bounce when dropped.

Azshara Crater is now no longer mentioned so players will stop asking about it.

New Battleground brackets! To further promote fair play Battlegrounds are now bracketed for every single level. 10-10, 11-11, 12-12, ? 77-77, 78-78, etc.


Quests & Creatures
To ensure Orgrimmar and Stormwind are the premiere cities for Cataclysm, NPC?s have been removed from all other cities.

All NPC?s now have a 25% chance to Dodge right-clicks.

Due to the popularity of the ?Save the Wee Animals? quest in Hyjal, all quests now include an element that requires you to pick up fleeing animals.


Races
The Worgen ?sniff? sound has been replaced by Rebecca Black?s hit single, Friday. The song will play in its entirety. Every time.

The name of the draenei race has been adjusted to have 20% more vowels.

Draeneie - The male draeneie laugh has been tweaked to be 7% more irritating.

The tauren race may no longer choose the paladin class, because? come on. Really?

The dwarf race?s passive wenching bonus now works correctly.

Female worgen have been cured of their curse and now have only a human form.


User Interface
All spells and spell macros now have added RP-immersive elements built in that will transmit to all players automatically every time a spell is cast. These cannot be changed or disabled. Examples:

Flash Heal: ?%n raises her hands skyward and calls forth a beam of bright white light that penetrates deeply into the souls of her comrades, healing their wounds and urging them forth in battle!?

Kick: ?%n casually approaches you and dons a monocle before engaging you in a casual discussion concerning local politics and refined beverages. Eventually, the discussion grows heated, and he abruptly tosses his pipe at your feet.?

The UI addon system has been converted from LUA to Scaleform. All addons will need to be recoded.

Show/Hide pants has been added to the Interface Options menu.

A slider has been added to allow scaling of shoulder armor size.

To toughen players up for their encounters with dragons and demons, the in-game emote ?/hug? has been removed from the game
 

Chibz

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Metalhandkerchief said:
They also had a crampy dumb reference to other MMO's in development, especially The Secret World, through their stupid little "Crabby the dungeon helper" site thing.

Not only do they frequently rip off other companies before their games are out, they also show their fear of competition through things like this.
But Blizzard's business model has ALWAYS been to rip off companies with far more talented employees. How is this any different?