The Best Wow News, Reviews, Features, and Forums | MaximumPC - All of the Best Software and Hardware Reviews

Posted 07/15/08 at 02:31:49 PM by Chris Moody

Blizzard has won a summary judgment against the World of Warcraft bot maker MDY (the folks that brought you WowGlider, now MMOGlider) based on copyright grounds. The judge also decided that liability for contributory copyright infringement and tortious interference is off the table and won’t go to the jury at trial. This is a victory for Blizzard and a setback for MDY, which brought the action.

Botting has been common in MMO games from almost the beginning and developers have tried varying amounts of pressure to stop the practice. It causes headaches to developers trying to manage an ‘economy’ within their games and discourages players who want to play within the game's frame work and rules. Players have used it as a method to get ahead in MMOs and even turned it into real money by selling virtual items and characters made in this fashion for real money.

This is starting to sound bad for MDY. Who do you think is in the right? MDY, or Blizzard? The final ruling could have an effect felt across many MMOs.

Comments: 5
TAGS: news, world of warcraft, blizzard, wow, law, Bot, MDY, MMOGlider

NewsGurgle, Garlge! Talking Plush Murloc to Be This Year's Tickle Me Elmo (for Gamers)

Posted 07/08/08 at 01:51:18 PM by Paul Lilly

Come September 30th, neglected significant others will have another item to add to their geek gift list for that special WoW-obsessed someone in their life: A talking plus Murloc. The doll will be sold through Play.com for £25, or roughly 31.5 Euros (almost $50) after shipping for U.S. gamers, and you can already put in your pre-order. Exactly what the amphibious, fish-like humanoid bipedal will spurt out isn't yet known, nor will it ever be known as he gurgles out phrases in Nerglish.

If you really want to go for the double-whammy this holiday shopping season, compliment the gift wrapped Murloc by stuffing a Blizzard Authenticator Dongle into his stocking. Hey, it's better than the alternative.

Update (8/20/08)

Credit goes to gaming enthusiast Bamatick for "inventing" the plush Murloc, who has released his design to the public free of charge.The legality of selling plush Murlocs remains very much in question, a point which Bamatick acknowledges and warns against doing:

"I would love to spend 16 hours hand-sewing each plush murloc for the 100,000 or so of you who expressed a desire to have such, the cost would be prohibitive. Especially considering that I can't sell them, even at no profit. So, I have decided to go the GNU/Linux route and offer my pattern up for open 'source.'[...]I wanted to use this project as a positive for the gaming community."

You can grab the open source pattern here.

Comments: 0
TAGS: games, gaming, world of warcraft, wow, consumer electronics, plush, murloc, elmo, toys

NewsBlizzard Offers Additional Layer of Security with Authenticator Dongle

Posted 07/02/08 at 05:59:42 PM by Paul Lilly

With over a trillion-quantillion subscribers, World of Warcraft players are finding themselves increasingly popular targets for hackers, and nothing stings worse than logging in to Azeroth only to find your character standing in nothing but his scivvies and all his belongs wiped out. All that time spent acquiring digital doodads and neglecting your family, friends, pets, hygiene, job, and other real-life obligations down the drain.

Such scenarios are becoming far too common, and Blizzards offering WoW residents another way to beat back the bad guys, and it won't cost you any mana. Instead, for $6.50 (that's USD, a form of paper and coin currency used in non-virtual landscapes) you can protect your account with Blizzard's Authenticator dongle. Once linked to your account, the dongle generates a one-time six-digit passcode at the press of button to supplement your regular account password. And because the dongle stays separate from your PC, it's impervious to keyloggers and other similar malware.

Anyone plan on picking one of these up?