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Want to play Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft before its official release? We have 500 beta keys to give away!
If you've checked out our preview of Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft (and you better have, or I'm going to be very disappointed in you), you're probably frantically searching for how you can obtain an early access beta key. Fear not, dear reader, because instead of signing up on the Blizzard website and waiting for your name to be drawn (whenever that might be), you can score your very own invitation to the world of Hearthstone in our beta key giveaway! We have a whopping 500 keys to share with you, and the entry period ends on Friday, November 1 at 11:59PM ET. Winners will be drawn at random and keys will be distributed the week following the end of the giveaway. Be sure to use a valid email address, or you won't be able to receive your key! Click here to tweet the giveaway to your friends -- and follow @TUAW while you're at it -- because Hearthstone is best played with a pal! Here are the rules for the giveaway: To enter, fill out the form below completely and click or tap the Submit button. The entry must be made before November 1, 2013 11:59PM Eastern Daylight Time. You may enter only once. 500 winners will be selected and each will receive a beta key for Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft. Click Here for complete Official Rules. Entries are closed, we will be notifying the winners via email. Thanks for participating!
Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft Preview: Welcome to your new addiction
When it comes to creating addictive gaming experiences, Blizzard -- the diabolical geniuses behind the most popular MMO on the planet, World of Warcraft, among other titles -- are certainly masters. Its latest digital drug, which also happens to carry the Warcraft brand, is a virtual strategy card game called Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, and it's currently in closed beta testing. But despite not being officially "finished," the game is an utter treat to play, and it just might be your new addiction. Collectable card games are seldom easy to understand, with hundreds of different cards, each with their own powers, offensive and defensive effects, etc., but Hearthstone makes the system so easy to grasp that it's impossible to get lost. The simplicity starts with the main battle screen, which features just the decks of both players, a central area where your cards face off and an image of each player's "hero" character. It's instantly accessible, even if you've never touched a card game in your life. Each of the nine hero characters specialize in a specific play style, be it the Warrior's reliance on weapons or the Hunter's ability to command beasts and fight from a distance. Once you've given each class a try in the tutorial mode, you'll likely have a favorite that you can begin to focus on. Each card costs a specific amount of mana to be played, and your mana bar goes up with each successive turn. You draw a single card (or more, if you play a card that prompts you to draw again) at the beginning of each round. This means that battles start out tamely, but quickly become massive shows of force on both sides. In the first, second or third rounds, you may only play one card, but by the 10th round, you can drop several at once. This battle style gives even novice players a chance to slowly wade into each skirmish without feeling immediately outmatched. Of course, as easy as it is for newbies to feel comfortable, besting your opponent often takes a great deal of strategy. Playing specific cards at the right time is crucial, and as with all card games of this type, good players can make a little luck go a long way. If you win -- which is accomplished by taking down the opposing player's hero -- it's extremely gratifying, but if you lose, you'll likely know exactly where you went wrong. Hearthstone is free to play, but just like a physical card game, it makes its money by selling booster packs. You are given the base set of cards for free when you start the game for the first time and, to be fair, you could conceivably play the game forever with just these cards, but temptation will soon get the better of you. When it does, you'll find yourself buying booster packs containing new and exciting cards, with the (small) chance to score super rare, game-changing cards that can turn the tide of a battle. Again, buying cards is entirely optional, and I personally played the game for weeks without ever dropping a single cent. Eventually though, your curiosity will likely get the better of you and you'll want to further customize your deck with additional cards. The good news is that the card packs aren't very expensive, and you are guaranteed to score at least one mildly rare card in each pack. Right now you can play Hearthstone on OS X and Windows, but the company has confirmed that an iPad version is on the way as well, which spells bad news for tablet owners with weak wills and fat bank accounts. If you get a chance to play it (and if you're a TUAW fan, you have a really good chance right now), don't pass it up.
Blizzard's favorite Hearthstone cards
Blizzard Community Manager Zeriyah has posted a great blog today over on the official Hearthstone site where she has hounded the devs on Team Five to cough up their favorite cards to complement her own selection. Zeriyah had a harder time with some of the devs than the others, as she reports on Twitter: I asked @bdbrode what his favorite Hearthstone card was, and he just yelled, "JARAXXUS, LORD JARAXXUS." "What about Jaraxxus?" "JARAXXUS!!!" - Zeriyah (@CM_Zeriyah) July 19, 2013 But several of the others were more forthcoming, and Eric Dodds selection of the Crazed Alchemist seemed the most exciting of all the cards chosen. He explains his choice as follows.
Live Hearthstone Stream
Update: The livestream is now over, but you can check out the Video on Demand above! The final game is very much worth sticking around for, really captures the excitement of Hearthstone. We hope to see more of these in future! If you're as excited about Hearthstone as we are here at WoW Insider, you'll want to check out the above stream, as Hearthstone Fireside Duels go live on Twitch.tv. Lead Designer Eric Dodds and designer and Shoutcaster Ben Brode, who is fast becoming the voice of Hearthstone, are sitting down to several duels, as well as answering viewer questions on Twitch and Twitter. The duels so far have shown off the mage, shaman, warrior, paladin, warlock and druid, but it's possible that we'll get to see some of the other heroes in action today, as well as the minion cards. It's also a great chance to get more into the game's mechanics, and develop more understanding, thanks to the live nature of the duels, and the Q&A. Community Manager Phenteo is also on hand in the Twitch chatroom to field viewer questions. The one question they don't seem that keen to answer just yet is this: does this mean a beta is impending? It seems fairly certain that Hearthstone will be at Blizzcon, at the latest, but who knows, it seems quite likely that there might even be a beta at Gamescom, given that Blizzard unveiled the Mists trailer there last year. What do you think?
First impressions of Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft
Yesterday at PAX East 2013, Blizzard unveiled their first free-to-play game, Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft. The upcoming title is a digital, collectible card game akin to Magic: The Gathering Online, but designed to be easy to learn and accessible to a larger audience. The game is currently being demonstrated on the showroom floor at PAX, and I was able to play it a couple of times. When starting my first game, I expected to find Hearthstone confusing because I've never played Magic: The Gathering or any other strategy card game (e.g. Pokémon TCG, Yu-Gi-Oh!) before. I am familiar with some of the terminology of MTG, having spent most of my life around hardcore players, but I don't really know the rules or how the game is played. This unfamiliarity didn't seem to get in the way of Hearthstone, though. Within two turns I understood my resource system, and how to play and use cards. By the fifth turn I felt like I understood all the basic mechanics of combat. Then, by the time my seventh turn came around, I was cursing paladins for being overpowered and itching to play another game.
