WoW Players Raise $800k for Make-A-Wish

John Funk

U.N. Owen Was Him?
Dec 20, 2005
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WoW Players Raise $800k for Make-A-Wish

World of Warcraft developer Blizzard announced that its players had raised more than $800,000 to help sick kids make their wishes come true.

There are many worthwhile charities in the world, but one that always seems especially heartwarming is the creating their own game with the help of casual giant PopCap [http://wish.org/].

For World Wish Day on April 26th, WoW maker Blizzard invited ten Make-a-Wish kids and their families behind the gates of its studio in Irvine, California for a "day of fun and games." Two of those children were there specifically for their wishes, and were given a special behind-the-scenes look at how the immensely popular MMORPG is created. One wonders what the other eight were there for if not that, but really, that's just quibbling at this point.

Blizzard also handed out a check to the Make-A-Wish Foundation worth $800,000, collected from the sales of the Moonkin Hatchling in-game pet [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/105717-World-of-Warcrafts-Charitable-Moonkin-Pet-Now-Available]. Every sale was worth $5 for the foundation, which means that over 1.6 million 160,000 WoW players shelled out money for their very own mini owl-bear-laserchicken. If there's one thing that WoW players know well, it's that lots of little contributions eventually add up.

This sort of thing warms my heart, and I always love seeing developers like PopCap and Blizzard help sick children have a good time and live out their wishes. There's no word on whether any of the children were able to design their own WoW quest a la Ezra Chatterton [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/72055-Blizzard-Teams-With-Make-A-Wish-Foundation], but having been to the Blizzard campus several times now I'm tempted to say that it doesn't matter. Seriously, that place is geek heaven, and I'm sure those kids had the time of their lives.

Bravo on you, guys - and you too, PopCap. Let's hope that more studios follow their example in helping Make-A-Wish kids live out their dreams.

Edit: Math fail, whoops.

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TheSkaAssassin

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Oct 12, 2009
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The math is wrong.
$800,000 divided by $5 is 16 thousand, not 1.6 million.

EDIT: make that 160 thousand
 

iLikeHippos

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Jan 19, 2010
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Video jerks a tear from me. But I suppose it was designed to do so, otherwise It would've failed.

Good job you guys.
 

Bags159

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Mar 11, 2011
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It's nice to see people "donate" but I wonder how many players would have donated if they didn't get anything in return.

Kudos to Blizzard regardless. Always good to read something positive instead of the usual doom and gloom of Sony over the last week.
 

Charli

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Nov 23, 2008
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I got myself a owl-bear-laserchicken. o/

I gotta admit it's become my favorite pet to have, being able to randomly /dance with it, and have it plant flowers around the raid is pretty funny. And it flies now too so watching it wave it's stubby little wings trying to catch up with my Proto-drake is pretty hilarious.
 

Micalas

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Mar 5, 2011
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John Funk said:
TheSkaAssassin said:
The math is wrong. $800,000 divided by $5 is 16,000. Not 1.6 million.
Whoops. Fixing now.
It would have made WoW players pretty impressive if they did buy 1.6 million pets. That's 8 million dollars, mang.

CAPTCHA: CUniche fit

Edit:
Bags159 said:
It's nice to see people "donate" but I wonder how many players would have donated if they didn't get anything in return.

Kudos to Blizzard regardless. Always good to read something positive instead of the usual doom and gloom of Sony over the last week.
They pretty much did get nothing in return :p
 

Bags159

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Mar 11, 2011
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Micalas said:
John Funk said:
TheSkaAssassin said:
The math is wrong. $800,000 divided by $5 is 16,000. Not 1.6 million.
Whoops. Fixing now.
It would have made WoW players pretty impressive if they did buy 1.6 million pets. That's 8 million dollars, mang.

CAPTCHA: CUniche fit

Edit:
Bags159 said:
It's nice to see people "donate" but I wonder how many players would have donated if they didn't get anything in return.

Kudos to Blizzard regardless. Always good to read something positive instead of the usual doom and gloom of Sony over the last week.
They pretty much did get nothing in return :p
They got a pet; it's insignificant but it's still something in return. I guess I'm just annoyed that people need to be bribed into "donating". For example, on my college campus The Red Cross has daily blood drives and they're always giving away restaurant gift cards in exchange. I guess it's better they get the blood than not but people shouldn't expect something in return for donating or giving blood.

Oh well, I'm rambling and taking away from the goodness of this story. Nitpicking aside this is still pretty heart warming.
 

Sharalon

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Jan 19, 2011
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Blizzard you clever bastards! Helping people with one hand and destroying their lives with the other...

Nah, really great job blizzard. Maybe I should play some Starcraft 2... Ahhh! I see what you're trying to do!
 

Ranorak

Tamer of the Coffee mug!
Feb 17, 2010
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Yo, this made me somewhat proud to be part of those 160,000.
I also bought the new Cenarion Hatchling pet the other day, and I don't even play WoW anymore.
Though that one was for Japan.
 

Cipher1

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Feb 28, 2011
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Nice work to the 160k that helped make all that money for the make a wish foundation.
 

Cgull

Behind You
Oct 31, 2009
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Fair play to the guys at Blizzard (as wll as the players that donated of course), it's always nice to see something like this appear on the site, re-affirms my faith in humanity a little bit.

I also feel I should ask, is 'check' the Americanised version of 'cheque' or is it mis-spelled? (I'm not trying to cast any aspersions over Lord Funk's spelling, merely curious)