Vivendi: Lich King due this year News

15 May, 2008

In its latest round of financial results, Blizzard owner and future Activision mergee Vivendi Games has said that Wrath of the Lich King is "scheduled to be released in the second half of 2008".

However, when contacted for comment, a Blizzard spokesperson told Eurogamer that the company had not announced a release date for the second World of Warcraft expansion, and would neither confirm nor deny Vivendi's statement.

Having played it last week, we agree with Vivendi: Lich King is in better shape than previous expansion The Burning Crusade was at a similar time, and we expect it to come out before the end of the year.

However, with Blizzard's famous perfectionism and "ready when it's ready" attitude, anything is possible. Burning Crusade eventually launched in January 2007, and missing Christmas didn't do its sales any harm at all.

A 24 percent slump in Vivendi's first-quarter earnings for 2008, announced in this round of financial results, was blamed on the unfavourable comparison with the Burning Crusade launch. So, in promising a 2008 release for Lich King, the French publisher may just be hoping to make investors feel better.

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M83J01P97

15/05/08 @ 11:09

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While a huge expansion pack with hours of game play is always nice... I do kind of feel Blizzard should possibly consider switching to a smaller but more regular stream of new content patches after this expansion.

By the time Lich King comes out, there is going to be a lot more viable competition (conan is getting some very positive early reviews and warhammer is shaping up to be very good indeed if the closed public beta is to be believed) so it's now getting to the point where year plus waits between major new content in WoW could potentially hurt the game.

JonFE

15/05/08 @ 11:10

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I'm sure many more care for WoW, but what about StarCraft 2?

Rayn

15/05/08 @ 11:13

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I'm pretty sure Burning Crusade was released on Feb. 16th, not in January as the article states.

M83J01P97

15/05/08 @ 11:16

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No, TBC was Jan 16th: http://www.wowwiki.com/The_burning_crusade

anomagnus

15/05/08 @ 11:17

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TBC was Jan 16th

They're ariming to launch it when their biggest threat comes out, Warhammer Online, in the hope of destablisling that launch

pretty shitty, but at least i'll have choice, if war doesnt work out (which i hope to god it does) i'll go back to wow

MightyMouse

15/05/08 @ 11:19

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Whilst I agree with the first comment that these long breaks between expansions could hurt WoW, the whole idea of paying for expansions would be in trouble assuming a constant rate of production of new material. The level cap would have to be kept the same and there would be even more problems with comparative gear of new and veteran players. It's a tough decision to make.

Drpwnage

15/05/08 @ 11:40

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I really don't see Warhammer being a serious threat to WoW. WoW is now mass market where as the Warhammer brand is very niche and your average WoW player is probaby totally unaware of it.

Blizzard will lose some players to Warhammer, which I hope is successful. The main issue for Blizzard is WoW will leak players due to boredom (I cancelled my sub within 6 months of BC launch) - Warhammer may mop up a few players. BC was launched in Jan last year and the game really needs WoTLK to hold and grow subscriber numbers.

M83J01P97

15/05/08 @ 11:45

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Lich King won't be growing any subscriber numbers for WoW though, it's exclusively high level content unlike TBC which featured new starting races and in order to unlock the Death Knight class you need to have a level 55+ character.

Canyarion

15/05/08 @ 11:52

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Everybody knows it will be out when Warhammer Online and Conan are out.

CunningLinguist

15/05/08 @ 12:08

#10

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WoW was good for the first 2 years. It actually was "all that". Today the game is just living off the huge buzz it created. Every time I feel like going back I just go to the class forums, read a few threads, and all my urges subside. Let it die...

RamblinSydRumpo

15/05/08 @ 12:25

#11

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"Everybody knows it will be out when Warhammer Online and Conan are out."

Err....Conan's early access starts Saturday. It's out next week. Can't see Lich King by then somehow.

Kropotkin

15/05/08 @ 13:11

#12

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Speaking as someone who only quit playing WoW 3 months ago after playing it since the US Beta in November 2004 I can safely say this expansion will not draw me back based my experience with Burning Crusade add on. There I spent 3 weeks levelling up from 60 to 70 and then spent the rest of the time grinding faction and doing heroic runs and/or raiding for gear.

WoW is an excellent MMO and deserves its top spot. I'm just someone who has moved on from it.

M83J01P97

15/05/08 @ 13:12

#13

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Blizzard have an expo in Paris in June, and we already know they are going to make at least one big announcement there. I can't see them announcing a new game until Lich King and SC2 are released, so I hope they are just going to give us release dates for both or at least one of the games.

shikz

15/05/08 @ 15:05

#14

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Hours !!!!

friking DAYS of gameplay man :) TBC was massive and people are still getting thru the End Raids from alot of prep work etc so everything goes smooth...

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