WoT New Map Province

Finally got the other map here are some shot of it.

WoT Patch 7.2 Notes

Here is a complete list of all changes that have made it into the game for patch 7.2. You are warned it is quite lengthy.

Content

• Added new maps: Province (a small Italian map) and Live Oaks (first American map).
• Added American tank destroyers with turning turrets: M8A1, T49, M18, T25-2, and T28 prototype.
• The Т34 is rebalanced and moved to premium vehicles; it is removed from American Tech Tree. M103 substitutes T34 as an American tier 9 heavy tank.
• The Т30 is rebalanced; it becomes becomes an American tier 9 tank destroyer with a turning turret. T110E5 substitutes T30 as an American tier 10 heavy tank.
• Added one camouflage for each nation.
• Added 22 new crew skills and perks (details can be viewed in a crew member's Personal File). You can learn more about new skills and perks here.
• Added two premium vehicles for testing: tier 2 SPG 10.5сm leFH18 B2 and tier 3 TD FCM 36 Pak 40. Please note that these vehicles will be available only for players partaking in supertest.
• Added display of records of experience earned on a certain vehicle (the so called qualification badges). You can learn more about qualification badges here.
• Added a tutorial for newcomers, which teaches basic principles of garage interface (availalble only for new accounts, i.e. for players who enter the game for the first time).
• Added name Ilya for Russian crew members.

Tank models

• Fixed or reworked visual tank models of : IS, IS-7, T34, Panther II, А-20, Т-127, IS-3, ISU-152, AMX 40, B1, M3 Stuart, VK 1602, AMX 13 90, JagdTiger, JagdPanther.
• The following vehicles are resized to historical dimensions: IS-3, IS-4, IS-7, ISU-152, Object 704, S-51, T-54, Type 59, Tiger II.
• Changed visual model of the second turret of Т32.

Fixed or reworked damaged models of the following vehicles:

• USSR: IS, IS-3, IS-4, IS-7, Object  704, Т-50-2, SU-5, Т-26, SU-100, KV-1S, SU-85, А-32, BT-2, ISU-152.
• Germany: VK 3601H, Hetzer, PzKpfw V Panther, Grille, Marder II, PanzerJager I, PzKpfw VI Tiger (P), PzKpfw IV, PzKpfw 38NA, PzKpfw V/IV, StuG III, PzKpfw II Luchs, VK3001H, VK 4502A, PzKpfw VI Tiger, PzKpfw 38H735(F).
• US: M3 Stuart, M3 Lee, T20, M4A2E4, T95.
• France: B1.

Game mechanics

• The following parameters revised for most vehicles: profitability, cost, cost of research, cost of repair, cost of modules, cost of module research. The detailed changes can be found here.
• All crew skills, trained prior to 7.2 update release, have been reset; all experience, spent on training, is given as "free experience", which can be used for training either new or old skills.
• Added an option of a crew member's skills reset, purchased for gold (100% experience saved), for credits (90% experience saved) and for free (80% experience saved).
• Parameters of all tanks renormed (reduced) to fit 100% trained crew, without matters increasing crew skills (Commander's skills, consumables and etc.). Real game parameters of tanks remain the same.
• Now spaced armor reduces damage from HE shell according to its thickness and position (in 7.1 version spaced armor just moved farther the shell explosion point and did not reduce damage caused with it).
• Armor absorption (blocking) of HE shell damage reduced by 20%.
• Т-50-2 top turret front armor reduced from 60 to 45 mm.
• FuG37 radio action range changed: now it comprises 290 meters (was 360 meters).
• Match-making level reduced by 1 for KV-220, Т14 and Churchill.
• Distance to a gun marker is always displayed in a howitzer’s reticle.
• Changed format of replay recording. Replays from version 7.1 update won’t be reproduced in version 7.2.
• Upgraded the mechanism of automatical choice of cluster at log in.
• Added cooldown for sending the fast messages with buttons ‘F4’ (‘Follow me!’) and ‘F7’ (Help!), if they were used frequently.
• Added the display of information about enemy Team Kill for ‘Fog of War’ feature in Clan Wars.
• Changed the flag color on bases. Now the flag color will be always green for allied base and red for the enemy base.
• Changed elevation angles for the following guns of French tanks:

Renault FT:
 - first turrent turning speed reduced by 1.375 degrees/sec;
 - second turret turning speed reduced by 1 degree/sec;
 - first turret view range increased by 13.75 m.
Hotchkiss H35:
 - turrent turning speed increased by 0.5 degrees/sec;
 - view range increased by 2.5 m;
 - gun elevation angle changed from 16 to 20 degrees upwards and from 10 to 13 degrees downwards.
D1:
 - durability with first turret on increased by 5 points;
 - first turret turning speed increased by 1 degree/sec;
 - second turret turning speed increased by 0.25 degrees/sec;
 - second turret view range increased by 2.5 m;
 - gun 37mm APX SA18 reload time in second turret reduced by 0.21 sec.
D2:
 - first turret turning speed reduced by 1.5 degrees/sec;
 - first turret view range reduced by 2.5 m;
 - second turret turning speed reduced by 1.25 degrees/sec;
 - second turret view range increased by 5 m.
B1:
 - durability with first turret on increased by 10 points;
 - turning speed increased by 2 degrees/sec;
 - dispersion from motion and turning reduced by 10%;
 - first turret turning speed increased by 1.5 degrees/sec;
 - second turret turning speed increased by 1 degree/sec;
 - first turret view range reduced by 15 m;
 - second turret view range reduced by 12.5 m;
 - gun elevation angle changed from 10 to 18 degrees downwards;
 - reload time of gun 47mm SA34 in first turret reduced by 0.21 sec;
 - reload time of gun 47mm SA35 in first turret reduced by 0.21 sec;
 - reload time of gun 47mm SA34 in the second turret reduced by 0.08 sec;
 - reload time of gun 47mm SA35 in the second turret reduced by 0.08 sec;
 - reload time of gun 47mm SA37 in the second turret reduced by 0.21 sec.
BDR G1B:
 - durability with first turret on increased by 20 points;
 - durability with second turret on increased by 10 points;
 - reduced durability of mid-suspension;
 - first turret view range reduced by 6.25 m;
 - second turret view range reduced by 3.75 m;
 - second turret turning speed increased by 0.25 degrees/sec;
 - reload time of gun 75mm SA32 in the first turret reduced by 0.08 sec;
 - reload time of gun 75mm Long 44 in the first turret reduced by 0.08 sec;
 - reload time of gun 90mm canon DCA 30 in the second turret reduced by 0.21 sec;
 - aiming time of gun 90mm canon DCA 30 in the second turret reduced by 0.35 sec.
ARL 44:
 - first turret turning speed reduced by 1 degree/sec;
 - first turret view range increased by 5 m;
 - second turret turning speed reduced by 0.75 degrees/sec;
 - second turret view range reduced by 2.5 m.
AMX M4 1945:
 - turning speed increased by 2 degrees/sec;
 - durability of mid-suspension reduced;
 - first turret turning speed increased by 0.5 degrees/sec;
 - second turret turning speed increased by 0.25 degrees/sec;
 - first turret view range increased by 2.5 m;
 - second turret view range increased by 1.25 m.
AMX 50 100:
 - tank durability reduced by 50 points;
 - turning speed reduced by 2 degrees/sec;
 - dispersion from motion and turning increased by 10%;
 - turret turning speed increased by 0.5 degrees/sec;
 - view range increased by 12.5 m;
 - reload time of gun 90mm F3 increased by 0.7 sec;
 - aiming time for gun 90mm F3 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 90mm F3 reduced by 10%;
 - reload time of gun 90mm canon DCA 45 increased by 0.7 sec;
 - aiming time for gun 90mm canon DCA 45 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 90mm canon DCA 45 reduced by 10%;
 - reload time of gun 100mm SA 47 increased by 0.85 sec;
 - aiming time for gun 100mm SA 47 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 100mm SA 47 reduced by 10%.
AMX 50 120:
 - tank durability reduced by 50 points;
 - turning speed reduced by 2 degrees/sec;
 - dispersion from motion and turning increased by 10%;
 - turret turning speed increased by 0.5 degrees/sec;
 - view range increased by 15 m;
 - guns elevation angle changed from 7 to 6 degrees downwards;
 - reload time of gun 90mm canon DCA 45 increased by 2.6 sec;
 - aiming time for gun 90mm canon DCA 45 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 90mm canon DCA 45 reduced by 10%;
 - reload time of gun 100mm SA 47 reduced by 1.4 sec;
 - aiming time for gun 100mm SA 47 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 100mm SA 47 reduced by 10%;
 - reload time of gun 120mm SA 46 increased by 0.7 sec;
 - aiming time for gun 120mm SA 46 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 120mm SA 46 reduced by 10%.
AMX 50B:
 - tank durability reduced by 100 points;
 - dispersion from motion and turning increased by 10%;
 - turret turning speed increased by 0.5 degrees/sec;
 - view range reduced by 2.5 m;
 - guns elevation angles changed from 8 to 6 degrees downwards;
 - reload time of gun increased by 1.4 sec;
 - aiming time increased by 0.14 sec;
 - firing rate in the autoloader reduced by 10%.
AMX 38:
 - turret turning speed reduced by 0.25 degrees/sec;
 - view range increased by 5 m;
 - reload time of gun 37mm SA38 increased by 0.12 sec;
 - reload time of gun 25mm Canon Raccourci Mle.1934 increased by 0.09 sec;
 - reload time of gun 47mm SA34 reduced by 0.35 sec;
 - reload time of gun 47mm SA35 increased by 0.12 сек.
AMX 40:
 - first turret turning speed increased by 0.5 degrees/sec;
 - first turret view range increased by 5 m;
 - second turret turning speed reduced by 0.25 degrees/sec;
 - second turret view range increased by 25 m.
AMX 12t:
 - tank durability reduced by 10 points;
 - turret turning speed increased by 0.25 degrees/sec;
 - view range reduced by 7.5 m;
 - guns elevation angles changed from 4 to 12 degrees upwards;
 - reload time of all gun reduced by 0.28 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for all guns reduced by 10%;
 - aiming time for all guns increased by 0.22 sec.
AMX 13 75:
 - tank durability reduced by 30 points;
 - turret turning speed increased by 0.25 degrees/sec;
 - view range reduced by 5 m;
 - guns elevation angles changed from 6 to 9 degrees upwards and from 8 to 6 degrees downwards;
 - reload time of gun 75mm SA49 L48 reduced by 0.7 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 75mm SA49 L48 reduced by 9%;
 - aiming time for gun 75mm SA49 L48 increased by 0.22 sec;
 - reload time of gun 75mm SA50 increased by 1 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 75mm SA50 reduced by 10%;
 - aiming time for gun 75mm SA50 increased by 0.22 sec.
AMX 13 90:
 - tank durability reduced by 50 points;
 - durability of mid-suspension reduced;
 - dispersion from motion and turning for top suspension increased by 5%;
 - turret turning speed increased by 0.25 degrees/sec;
 - view range reduced by 2.5 m;
 - guns elevation angle changed from 8 to 9 degrees upwards and from 9 to 6 degrees downwards;
 - reload time of gun 75mm SA50 increased by 1.7 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 75mm SA50 reduced by 10%;
 - splash for gun 75mm SA50 caused by turret turning increased by 25%;
 - aiming time for gun 75mm SA50 increased by 0.22 sec;
 - reload time of gun 90mm F3 increased by 0.9 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 90mm F3 reduced by 10%;
 - splash for gun 90mm F3 caused by turret turning increased by 25%;
 - aiming time of gun 90mm F3 increased by 0.15 sec.
Lorraine 40t:
 - tank durability reduced by 50 points;
 - turning speed reduced by 4 degrees/sec;
 - dispersion from motion and turning on first suspension increased by 5%;
 - dispersion from motion and turning on second suspension increased by 15%;
 - turret turning speed reduced by 1 degree/sec;
 - view range reduced by 2.5 m;
 - reload time of gun 90mm F3 increased by 2.3 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 90mm F3 reduced by 10%;
 - aiming time for gun 90mm F3 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - reload time of gun 90mm canon DCA 45 increased by 2.3 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 90mm canon DCA 45 reduced by 10%;
 - aiming time for gun 90mm canon DCA 45 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - reload time of gun 100mm SA 47 increased by 0.6 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 100mm SA 47 reduced by 15%;
 - aiming time of gun 100mm SA 47 increased by 0.14 sec.
Bat Chatillon 25t:
 - tank durability reduced by 100;
 - dispersion from motion and turning on first suspension increased by 5%;
 - dispersion from motion and turning on second suspension increased by 20%;
 - turret turning speed reduced by 0.5 degrees/sec;
 - view range reduced by 2.5 m;
 - guns elevation angles changed from 9 to 6 degrees downwards;
 - reload time of gun 90mm F3 increased by 2.6 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 90mm F3 reduced by 10%;
 - aiming time for gun 90mm F3 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - reload time of gun 90mm canon DCA 45 increased by 2.6 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 90mm canon DCA 45 reduced by 10%;
 - aiming time for gun 90mm canon DCA 45 increased by 0.14 sec;
 - reload time of gun 100mm SA 47 increased by 3.4 sec;
 - firing speed in the autoloader for gun 100mm SA 47 reduced by 10%;
 - aiming time for gun 100mm SA 47 increased by 0.14 sec.

Interface

• Added an icon (triangle) to a crew member's image, which denotes what crew member will get experience for a battle at accelerated training.
• Reworked the design of “tank band” in garage. Changed filter buttons of tanks display in the “band”.
• Added advanced tooltips for tanks when mousing over them in the garage carousel.
• Added platoon markers and clan tags to “wide” team view mode.
• Team list width in “wide” view mode matches the longest nickname on the list (team list width used to remain maximal).
• In-battle team list background is made more transparent.
• Added animation to changing from “wide” to “narrow” team lists appearing at a battle start.
• Added new display of teams in battle list: [Frags scored] [Vehicle name] [Tank icon].
• Added extended pop-up hints for tanks in the “band”. Now it covers minimap.
• Added extended tank marker adjustment in main and extended modes (at pressing “Alt” key).
• Added extended adjustment of reticle in sniper mode.
• Added indicator of shells remaining in rotating drum (cassette/cartridge) to reticle.
• Produced small changes to the reticle adjustment.
• When you press “TAB”, a “wide” team view mode is displayed instead of a team list table.
• Added an option of moving all the crew in the tank to the barracks in the context menu. 
• Now the players counter denoted number of players in the whole region, not just on a cluster.
• Buttons of equipment “mount/demount” are moved to the equipment item slots.
• Removed the display of unnecessary messages and tank markers in the mode with turned-off userinterface (key ‘V’ per default) .
• Changed premium account purchase window design.
• Added ‘Help’ button in the battle menu, which will show the help page with controls after pressing.
• Renamed ‘Statistics’ garage menu tab to ‘Achievements’.
• Reworked the minimap frame.
• Changed the format of message about battle results during Specials (for example, after receiving the x5 XP).
• Increased the place for text messages over Minimap to avoid the display of them with players nicknames in 3 and more lines.

Graphics

• Reworked some effect of hitting the ground with a shell.
• Improved effects of fire on the vehicles.
• Improved ‘wave’ effects while vehicle moves in water.
• Reworked special effects for shells hitting snow and sand.
• Added different levels of graphics, based on the distance, for some special effects.
• Added birds for some old maps.
• Removed HE shell penetration marker rendering when the vehicle is not damaged.

Fixes

• Fixed incorrect display of ISU-152 armor parameters in interface.
• Fixed shooting effects and sounds of guns of several tanks.
• Fixed partial tank non-penetration at gun hit after spaced armor penetration (mantlet or gun armor).
• Fixed “detection” of a tank in a destroyed tank’s after-battle statistics window.
• Reworked colours and geometry of several German camouflages for a better conformity to actual historical camouflages.
• "Demountable" equipment renamed to "Complex" in all interface elements.
• Fixed ‘twitching’ during the battle replay.
• Fixed mistiming of the reticle , when the replay is on ‘Paused’.
• Fixed the message, when removing equipment for gold.
• Fixed the work of ‘Postmortem mode’ post-effect on Low Quality setting of graphics.
• Fixed view marker sticking on minimap.
• Fixed the activation of Camouflage net and Binocular Telescope icons before and after the battle.
• Fixed collisions of tanks with buildings and some other objects.
• Fixed the error of the standard ammunition load during the purchase and with the tick enabled in the checkbox for the vehicles with the auto-loader device.
• Fixed the display of the message for recruiting new crew members.
• Fixed the option of tank selling, with equipment demounting with gold when there is no gold on account.
• Fixed the bug when a crew member received preferments at skills reset and retrain.
• Fixed the not matching of the sum of battles played on all vehicles and the common result in the ‘Battle’ tabs, if player participated in non-finished battles (for example, battles, which were interrupted by the unscheduled server maintenance).
• Cancelled the option of retraining Chinese crew members for non-existing tanks.
• Removed modules of several premium and top tanks from store.
• Fixed the opportunity to select notation text in dialogue windows.
• Fixed small interface errors in the camouflages window.
• Fixed the error of the text display ‘Last battle’ with the year 1970 in the player profile, if he has no battles played.
• Fixed the description of ‘Sharpshooter’, ‘Master Gunner’, ‘Confederate’, ‘Reaper’, ‘Invader’, ‘Kamikaze’, ‘Survivor’, ‘Invincible’ achievements.
• Fixed the description of Billotte’s Medal, Burda’s Medal, and Halonen's Medal.
• Fixed errors in the system message about camouflage expiring.
• Fixed text descriptions of several camouflages.
• Removed notifications about zero cost for shells or consumables resupply.
• Fixed incorrect message and equipment demounting from a damaged vehicle.
• Fixed several incorrect text notifications appearing during equipment managing.
• Tuned the volume for the destruction sound of some objects.
• At critical hit the voice notification says just "Penetration".
• Removed the de-tracking sound reproduction while switching on the de-tracked vehicle in ‘Postmortem Mode’.
• Fixed rare issue with incorrect display (moved horizontally and vertically) of vehicle on long distance.
• Fixed inability to repeatedly change anisotropic filtration in graphics settings.
• Fixed some errors in dynamic shadows algorithm. 
• Fixed some points of in-battle help page (button ‘F1’ per default).
• Fixed rare game client failure occuring due to archiving implemented with 7.1.1 update.
• Fixed an occasional bug when a vehicle did not enter battle (hang up during the map loading).
• Fixed a rare bug with client failure at entering garage.

Incomplete issues

• On some computers (when a PC is more than 8 years) the game client might face partial issues with graphics. Works on the fix are being held at the moment.

---

WoT New Map Live Oaks

So far I have been playing for over an hour since patch 7.2 has come out and I have only seen Live oaks once and haven't seen Province at all. As soon as I do I will post some screen shots of it. Until then here are a few shots of Live Oaks for those who haven't gotten on to it yet.

Also added a shot of one of the new log on screens, so far Ive seen 2.

SWTOR's Missing Eyes

Of all the glitches and bugs you can find in SWTOR, I find the missing eyes one to be the most annoying. I understand that this is minor in the grand scheme of playing the game, but for some reason it is really getting on my nerves. Characters interacting in a pivotal story line suddenly lose their eyes and are replaced by either a non colored version or an empty eye socket. This happens quite frequently in the game and can become distracting if you are engrossed in the story line. When looking at the two screen shots I have added you can really get an understanding of how much this effects the story portion of the game. Without the eyes the character loses a lot of his life like appeal.

 

Although I know the devs have much more pressing business to attend to, I would still like to see this problem fixed. In a game that uses story as a key component in its playing, the eye issue can be a major immersion breaker. I can relate this to playing a first person shooter game in which my Avatar keeps losing his gun while firing. Yes I know they are just eyes, but damn it I want my eyes back.

World of Tanks Latest Video

Wargamming has released another video highlighting some of the upcoming changes in WoT. Featured in this video is the new American Tank Destroyers and tech tree. Also they discuss some of the advantages and disadvantages associated with TD's having turrets. Most revealing is the new tech tree for the American line, as the T30 is being turned into a tier 9 TD and losing much of its speed and armor. Also the T32 and T34 are being removed from the game all together. I also like the idea of the Hellcats top speed of 72kph, a TD with that much speed could prove deadly and could change many strategies in the game. 

Also mentioned is the upcoming changes in the games physics as tanks are now able to go over rocks and fall of cliffs or even become submerged in water. These changes will greatly change the game play and will alter every known strategy out there. You can check out the video below.

P.S. My favorite Russian spokes person is doing quite well in her English, gratz to her.

Poka Poka

World of warplanes

I am so excited that words just cant express....check out here for news from the team. Summer cant get here fast enough!

June 5th release date speculated!

Check out the video of the interview below:

 

SWTOR Patch 1.2 Video

So apparently while I was out of town for the last couple days, a new patch 1.2 video was released in conjunction with the Guild Summit BioWare held.
There are some very nice additions in this patch, namely the legacy system upgrades, UI customization and promises of improved guild control. All things I am looking forward to. Check out the video below in case you haven't see it yet.

W.o.T. - This is an Improvement?

WOA, hit the damn breaks for a minute...

The Dev team at world of tanks has announced an improvement. Here is a link to that original text. Now I'm not one to throw my toys at change, but this has my oil clogging the pistons up a little.

I am totally cool with all the tier 5 and below changes. these in my opinion are skill building levels anyway.

I mostly play Tank Destroyers as I enjoy the idea of being able to mangle, blow up and outright murder a vehicle that by design intent is indestructible! My grind through the low and medium levels has for the most part have been enjoyable. Across my three accounts, I have a total of 5 TD"s, yes some I keep at low levels just for the fun! I currently have a T-6 JagdpzIV, T-7 T25 AT and a T-7 SU-152.

Enter my Jagdpz IV....I have hit Tier 6 hell. Now this tank does very well against tier 7 and below machines, Tier 8, I battle with and any tier 9 or higher, I may as well just go to the bar! On an average battle, I loose 1 to 3K credits depending on if I get murdered by a T-59, Lowe, KV-5 or some gold ammo wielding player. If I can get 2 to 3 kills or more and a victory, its hog heaven, now I'm talking 15-18K credits (every 6 or 8 games apart).

So here is my issues with the latest "improvement":

First - "Tank Destroyers have progressed a bit slower than most vehicles in the game to this point due to higher credit and experience costs for their guns than other same-tier vehicles. in version 7.2 we will be removing this disparity, resulting in similar costs to their counterparts."

My T-6 JagdIV is so close to T-7, The reason it is not tier-7 is not due to the experience gap (64,400xp to hit t-7), that I can deal with! the issue is that for every step closer I get in credits, I take five steps back from a few losses. I have even gone the way of a premium account on a trial basis and this does little to reduce the operating cost for this class of tank. Thanks Dev team for the thought but this don't cut the iron-hide here!

Secondly - "due to the re-balancing of the tank destroyer progression, we will be reducing the income of all tank destroyers by somewhere between 3%-8%, depending on the vehicle. This of course excludes tiers two through four, which will see credit income increases."

So now on top of the MM always putting me in T-9 fights, I get to loose even more credits on a per battle basis.

I guess I will be rolling in my Heavies or SPG's from here on out, bye bye Jagdpazer IV...

Please leave your thoughts and comments....

Doc

WoT battle of Kharkov Special

Commanders!

World of Tanks team is glad to announce Battle of Kharkov Special, the second special of spring, which is dedicated to the series of offensive operations on the Eastern Front of World War II, undertaken by the German Army Group South against the Red Army, around the city of Kharkov

Starting on March 8, 2012 at 11:30 UTC (3:30AM PST) and ending on March 12, 2012 at 11:00 UTC (3:00AM PST) the following discounts will be active. Curious what time this is in your region? Use this handy Time Zone Converter to help you out!

We welcome all players to try the following offers within the period stated above:

50% discount on following vehicles:

• KV
• T-34
• SU-85
• PzKpfw III
• PzKpfw IV
• StuG III
• M4 Sherman
• M3 Lee

And x3 experince for the first victory of the day!

Please note that selling the above-mentioned vehicles during this special will result in receiving credits equal to half of the sale price.

Be sure to take advantage of these discounts while they last! The above-mentioned items will return to normal price on March 12, 2012.

The Battle for My Gaming Time

Never before in the history of gaming has the competition been so fierce among so many different games. Back in what many still call the golden age of MMOs, late 90’s to 2005 a player had a mere handful of titles to choose from. The clear winner of that era is World of Warcraft and it is still the industry leader today. However times are getting tough for the once unstoppable gorilla of gaming as Blizzard has recently seen their subscription numbers dive significantly for the first time. Many will blame the direction the game has taken for this, but I believe it has more to do with choices available than anything Blizzard is doing wrong. To prove it I submit to you my email inbox.

Over the past several months I have received no less than 40 emails from games I used to play. By far the biggest two contributors to this total are World of Warcraft and Star trek Online. A former player of both titles, I have received emails requesting my imminent return and many olive branches of goodies have been propped up to entice me back. STO flaunted their new Free-to-Play format and then sent subsequent emails describing all of the new and wonderful features they have added since I left. World of Warcraft has equally been throwing the deals my way as they have now offered me four separate free time periods for my return. When I heard about the buffs they enacted for the Scroll of Resurrection feature, that allows players to bring back former players, I was surprised at the steps Blizzard was taking to recover their player base. Things like free Cataclysm expansions, instant level 80 for one character and free character transfers are perks this game would never have given out in the past. 

Several other games have sent me emails in the hopes that I will return to their games and most curiously I also received an email from Battlestar Galactica Online that urged me to log back in and report for duty. The only problem here is I don’t ever remember playing this game or even signing up to play, but they seem to remember me from somewhere so maybe it’s just my faulty memory rearing its ugly head again. 

Well the point of all this rambling is to convey to you, my readers, the urgency that gaming companies are feeling to grab as much of the gaming community as they can. New titles are being announced all the time and the number of games available to play is staggering. When even a gaming Goliath like blizzard enters an almost panicky mode of player retention, one has to wonder if things are getting a little TOO crowded. Many will contest that this is good for gamers and for the most part it is. More titles means more choices, but there comes a time when a market can reach an over saturation point, where supply outweighs demand. When this happens, many suppliers of our gaming needs will find it hard to stay open without enough paying customers.

Contraction of game makers is almost inevitable at this point, the only question left to be asked is which ones will stay and which ones will go. I just hope that it isn’t one of my preferred titles that gets the ax, but then again by that time I’ll probably be playing something else.

1 Year Later

March marks the one year anniversary of this little endeavor I started to write a meaningful and entertaining blog about PC online gaming. This year has been anything but easy for me and yet I am still here writing one year later. Although many of the goals I had set for myself, More blogs posts and Frequency of blogging, have been no where near where I wanted them to be at this point, I am still very determined to this blog and look forward to another year full of opportunities. For those of you that visit me regularly I say thank you and can only promise to provide more entertaining and more frequent updates to this site.

WoT Discounts the Big Boys

World of tanks has announced there latest special taking place from March 1st to the 5th. All nations are represented in this special and are in the Tier6 and 7 level. Here is the full post below.

The first special of March is here, and this one is called “Heavyweight Clash” to commemorate the first IS and Tiger encounter during World War II.

Since we know that you enjoy more than just those two vehicles, we’re discounting a wide variety of Heavy tanks – allowing you to choose which you’ll take to the battlefields this weekend!

Starting on March 1, 2012 at 11:30 UTC (3:30AM PST) and ending on March 5, 2012 at 11:00 UTC (3:00AM PST) the following discounts will be active. Curious what time this is in your region? Use this handy Time Zone Converter to help you out!

• Up to 58% discount on premium shells
• 50% off the following vehicles:
  • KV-3 - 539,100 (normally 1,078,200)
  • IS - 712,000 (normally 1,424,000)
  • PzKpfw VI Tiger - 628,350 (normally 1,256,700)
  • PzKpfw VI Tiger (P) - 638,250 (normally 1,276,500)
  • M6 - 320,150 (normally 640,300)
  • T29 - 725,100 (normally 1,450,300)
  • ARL 44 - 381,500 (normally 763,000)
  • AMX M4 (1945) - 647,750 (normally 1,295,500)
  • Churchill - 750 (normally 1,500)

Please note that selling the above-mentioned vehicles during this special will result in receiving credits equal to half of the sale price.

Be sure to take advantage of these discounts while they last! The above-mentioned items will return to normal price on March 5, 2012.