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Happy Valentine's Day from WoW Insider
Just in time for Valentine's Day, Ataraxaven and Alastriona of Azuremyst sent us this picture of their "soulbound" wedding rings -- just like the other wedding rings we've posted before, the couple says that "soulbound" works well for them. It has a nice gamer reference (they're both WoW players, obviously, and they've been playing together for two years now), and even people who've never picked up a BoP item at least get the meaning.Very cool. Being as it is Valentine's Day today, don't forget to check out our guide to the Love Fool achievements, and be sure to get your sweetie something nice, ingame and/or out. Happy Valentine's Day to Ataraxaven and Alastriona and all of the lovers out there this weekend, hope you have a good one. Love is in the Air and on WoW Insider. Check out our continuing coverage of the event and our guide to earning the achievement. And you better hurry; the holiday only lasts five days!
Back to School: Malkinware Reference Tracker 1.0 for Mac OS X
TUAW's going Back to School! We'll be bringing you tips and reviews for students, parents and teachers right up until the bell rings in September. Read on for college-level help.If you're a college researcher, grad student, or undergrad, Malkinware's new Reference Tracker 1.0 for Mac OS X might be just the tool to help you with your academic research. Just in time for Back to School, Malkinware is even offering a 35% discount off of the $44.95 list price through September 30, 2008.Reference Tracker creates documents that store citations and references used in books, research projects, or essays, and creates Harvard or APA formatted reference lists on demand. You can also: Create Full References in a single step Reference Web Pages and Emails with a single click Easily import existing Reference Lists Integration with Microsoft Word and Apple's Pages Easily Organize References Export formatted lists to anywhere Add Sticky Notes to References There's no need to type out the details of a referenced book. You type in the book's ISBN, and Reference Tracker gathers the details from the internet automatically. When creating Web page or email references, Reference Tracker can pull the details from Safari, Firefox, or Mail with one click.A fully-functional 21-day trial is available from the Malkinware Web site. For info about other Mac research tools, read Brett's excellent Back to School post.
Dungeons & Desktops: The history of RPGs
In a recent article at Crispy Gamer, the topic is Matt Barton's book Dungeon & Desktops: The History of Computer Role-Playing Games. Crispy Gamer's prognosis for this book is not good, and it's their opinion that it is "a victim of poor editing, poor organization, and a frustrating inconsistency, as the book veers from true history to trite encyclopedia, as if Barton isn't quite sure what kind of book he is writing." According to this review, the MMO chapter is also lacking greatly, with Ultima Online and EverQuest not getting enough time in the spotlight. This might sound harsh, but they go on to talk about the good parts of the book eventually. The review acknowledges the fact that there was a real need for an offline encyclopedia for role-playing games, and this book delivers in that regard. After all of this, it seems to us that a book focused entirely on the history of the MMOG is what we need, instead of the topic cohabitating in a chapter here and there across general gaming books.
Hands-on with Qualcomm's Snapdragon-powered "Anchorage"
We sat down with one of Qualcomm's fancy new reference designs today, the Anchorage QWERTY slider phone. Let's be perfectly clear -- the Inventec-crafted device won't ever see the light of day in this exact form, Qualcomm just needed some eye candy with which to demonstrate its new Snapdragon platform. The chipset features a highly specialized and customized ARM-based core and graphics from ATI -- both actually licensed this time around, we're told -- and tries to take advantage of as many technologies that Snapdragon offers as possible: MediaFLO support, blazing clock speeds (1GHz to be exact), high resolutions (SVGA here), and the list goes on. Snapdragon-powered devices should hit retail from HTC and Samsung by the end of the year. Click on for pics, just don't get too attached since this is as close as you'll ever get to it, alright?%Gallery-13243%
Patch 2.3 and you: pre-60 dungeons
Leveling is getting a boost. Along with some new content in Dustwallow Marsh, patch 2.3 (going live tomorrow!) will bring across-the-board changes for characters between levels 20 and 60. The XP required for each level is being reduced by 20%, quest XP is getting buffed, and the so-called "leveling" dungeons are getting some major changes. Here is what the patch notes have to say at the moment: Elite mobs outside of pre-Burning Crusade dungeons have been changed to non-elite. The level ranges of pre-Burning Crusade dungeons have been adjusted to a narrower range. Meeting stone level requirements, the Looking for Group system, and quests have been adjusted to match the new dungeon level ranges. All old world dungeon bosses have had their loot revisited. Players will now find that the loot dropped inside instances will be of Superior (blue) quality. Well, that's vague enough, isn't it? Level ranges adjusted to "a narrower range"? We can't have that. So I went through to all the old-world dungeons on my trusty 70 rogue and checked the level ranges of the mobs there. I'll also show you a sample of a new or improved item for each dungeon; new items are on the left, and old items on the right for comparison. That means a lot of pictures, so dial-up users beware, I guess. TL;DR version: minimum level stays the same, maximum level nerfed down to somewhere between 3 and 5 more than the minimum level. If you want all the fun details, let's get to it!
New WoW Insider directory page
New to WoW Insider and want to know what's in our back catalogue? Looking for our more reference-oriented posts? We know stories and features drop off the front page all too quickly and search isn't always the best way to find something, so we're always looking for ways to give you access to some of our older content that's still informative. We've started a new WoW Insider directory page to help you find some of our best guides, resources and original features. Is there a guide we haven't done yet that you'd like to see? Let us know what you want to know in the comments! WoW Insider directory
DS Daily: Common usage
It'd be cool to live in Japan, we've always said. The food, the culture, the fact that by 2011, 89% of the Japanese will own a DS ... wait, what?That's insane. Ridiculous. Incomprehensible. We're quite sure that not even close to 89% of Americans have a web-connected computer (2003 U.S. census figures showed 55%), and it's almost assumed in today's society that you've got access to the internet at home.With such a ubiquitous, portable, and interactive device, it's amazing that the Japanese haven't truly capitalized on its potential. They've got English dictionaries and day planners and all that, but everyone's got one! Why not introduce eBooks, or DS-enabled fast food drive-thrus, or ...! Well, we're maybe not so good at this. What would you guys do with that ridiculous penetration rate?
Level 70 Combat ratings values updated and listed here
With that great explanation of stats this morning, how fitting that this afternoon, we have Drysc's update on what the various combat ratings mean for each of your character's combat values.The combat ratings system was implemented when the expansion came around-- it used to be that instead of a "dodge rating" on a piece of armor, you just got a "+2% chance to dodge." But Blizzard noticed that in order to scale that gear up ten levels, they'd have to push up percentages, and eventually everyone would just be walking around with crazy high percentages-- adding enough armor up to a 100% chance to dodge would obviously break the game.So they developed the rating system, with each armor piece giving a plus to "rating" that then translated into different percentages at different levels-- an item with 18.9 dodge rating on it actually gives +1% dodge at level 70, but more than that at level 60 (about %1.5, actually). That way, Blizzard can scale the rating with level, and gear can get better without breaking the game. Much more on this, I'm sure, when Elizabeth continues her WoW Rookie feature on stats. And don't forget that RatingBuster can give you all this automatically ingame-- from what I understand, it has been updated with these numbers.But in the meantime, after the jump, I've posted what Drysc says all the ratings will give you at level 70. Feel free to bookmark this post for quick reference when comparing gear.
Bug-hunting game looks like edutainment done right
Insects are huge in Japan. We don't mean in the Mothra kaiju sense, but in that they're very popular. Kids like to collect and battle stag beetles (sound like another popular Japanese form of entertainment?) Therefore, a bug reference guide on the DS seems like a pretty good decision.Quiz & Touch Kensaku Mushi Sukan (Quiz & Touch Insect Encyclopedia) is our kind of non-game: not only does it provide visual and sound information about many species of bugs, but it also has quizzes and minigames about the bugs, including games based on identifying particular insects by sound and color. Librarians and those training to be librarians will probably agree: more reference books should have games in them.%Gallery-3479%
Panasonic's new 1080p plasmas priced & dated - now in 42-inch size
Panasonic has finally announced pricing and availability for its 2007 plasma HDTV lineup, including new 1080p models in 50- and 58-inch sizes. Bulking up the current PZ700U line is the PZ750U series, which adds a new "Studio Reference Mode" (to provide consumers with the exact same color reproduction used on reference monitors in film editing studios), a pro setting mode (to even further calibrate the set), 3 HDMI jacks, and a 'special' black chrome look. All that 1080p beauty will cost however, with the top of the line TH-58PZ750U carrying an MSRP of $5,499.95 when it hits with limited availability in June. If missing out on the reference quality color is acceptable to you, the TH-58PZ700U (pictured above) is due next month for a mere $4,799.95 Check after the break for a more complete list of models and prices -- but if you're Mark Cuban then don't bother, because the 103-inch TH-103PZ600U has not been updated for 2007, so no need to upgrade yet. Update: Looking for Panasonic's missing 42-inch 1080p plasma? Apparently so were they, the company has issued an updated press release, noting that the TH-42PZ700U will bring 2-million+ pixels this June for $2,499.95.
Pardon me, but do you speak Darnassian?
Ishnu-dal-dieb, dear readers. But I am here to offer you the chance of a lifetime to learn the language of the Night Elves in the form of this phrase guide. Being the geek that I am, I can only wish it were more comprehensive -- nothing's more entertaining than insulting your foes in a language they can't quite comprehend. However, this guide is just a small part of a larger effort by Blizzard to create a comprehensive Warcraft Encyclopedia chronicling the lore of Azeroth. It is only a work in progress thus far, and hardly comprehensive -- focusing mainly on the various Elven races of Azeroth. It's a good compilation of resources so far, and I imagine it will only grow -- so take a look and learn more on the lore of Azeroth.
"I Hate You, E3," declares Escapist writer
Okay, so maybe not hate completely.The eye-catching title of an essay from the latest installment of The Escapist puts the emphasis on the negative aspect of the love-hate relationship many industry vets have with E3, but there's surprisingly a lot of love for the trade show here, even if you don't subscribe to the hardened "I hate E3 because I love it" theory of convention devotion.While the Joystiq staff hasn't been to quite as many E3s as the founder of the International Game Journalists Association (IGJA), we can certainly empathize with the world-weariness that might accumulate after years of weeklong death- press-marches and working in overcrowded, sensory-overloaded spaces. We just hope our love of the game(s) will stay with us as it has for Mr. Thomas, whether we're watching from home or working the show floor in person in post-apocalyptic L.A. The parties will be sure to be awesome.See also: Joystiq at E3 2006 mega-site The Escapist's big E3 issue this week, with references within to Joystiq's Paris Hilton story and some E3 party pics orig. from Joystiq The Game of Journalism -- the IGJA's official web site
