155 – The Instance: Everyone Loves Raimi

We’re Getting Sam!
Blizzard Entertainment and Legendary Pictures announced this week that Sam Raimi has signed on to direct the motion picture based on Blizzard Entertainment’s Warcraft universe. Video game/comic book /movie geeks around the world buzzed like a honey farm, and are still buzzing. For the three of you who don’t know who Sam Raimi is:
 * He is best known for directing cult horror films like the Evil Dead series and Drag Me To Hell as well as the blockbuster Spider-Man films.
 * Raimi got a tiny cult following way back in 1981. That’s the year he directed and produced The Evil Dead, starring Bruce Campbell.
 * Since then, Bruce Campbell has appeared in practically everything Raimi has ever made, including the Xena: Warrior Princess television series.
 * According to the Blizzard press release, Raimi will be joined by producer Charles Roven, who spearheaded The Dark Knight, Batman Begins and the sci-fi classic 12 Monkeys. Roven will be joined by Alex Gartner, who will be joined by Legendary Pictures CEO Thomas Tull, Legendary’s Chief Creative Officer Jon Jashni, and Raimi’s producing partner Joshua Donen. Raimi’s other partner, Robert Tapert, will be an Executive Producer and Blizzard Entertainment’s Senior Vice President of Creative Development, Chris Metzen, a Co-Producer.
 * Who are all these people?

WoWHead Premium
Almost everyone’s favorite WoW database website announced a pay service this week. Here’s what Wowhead Premium gets you: New Costume Contest Rules For Blizzcon
 * No ads (also makes the pages wider for better viewing!
 * No captcha (the little “enter the code in the box” thing)
 * Custom forum avatars
 * A free pass to the front of the Armory queue whenever you request Profiler resyncs
 * Increased character limits for comments and forum posts
 * A special Premium border for your forum avatar
 * A special Premium badge for your user page
 * Access to a special Premium e-mail address for input on site features and direction
 * Premium access to ZAM.com, Allakhazam and WoWInterface and all the features found there

Blizzard CM Bashiok posted the following this week in the official forums: “We’re in the process of updating the legal agreement from last year to also include the following rules for entry into the Costume Contest. These are not final. In addition to last year’s rules, costumes won’t: While we want people to be able to create and show off something as grandiose as the turtle mount from last year, and we’ll make every attempt to accommodate them to make sure they make it on stage, we want the judging and prizes to remain based on the essence of the contest – which is the costumes themselves.”
 * Exceed a 10′ dimension limit (no wider, deeper, taller than 10 feet)
 * Include liquids or messy substances
 * Be judged on items that are not worn or held

Shrinks In WoW?
According to an article in the Daily Mail Online, doctors treating children hooked on Internet fantasy games are logging on as players in a last ditch attempt to spend ‘face-to-face’ time with the addicted youngsters. The therapists are disguising themselves as wizards, warriors and dwarves on games like World of Warcraft, which some teens play for hours on end and has been branded as potent as crack cocaine. A leading London doctor is launching the online therapy. Medical staff will create their own ‘avatars’ in the online world in an effort to get to children who spend every available moment playing the games. Doctors fear so many of the gaming addicts have lost touch with the real world and that this is the only way to get to them.

Town Cryer
Briddge/Briand from Moonrunner writes: We have a tank in our guild who is firmly convinced that a Death Knight tank must still reach a Defense Rating of 689 in order to reach Crit Immunity even though he is using Rune of the Stoneskin Gargoyle. I and a few others have been trying to convince him that this is not so. He quotes sites that list Crit Immunity as being “Defense Skill 540(DR689)” and claims that this proves that, even though your Defense Skill might be 540 because of the Rune, you STILL need a Defense Rating of 689. I have used the results of be.imba.hu, shown him the script you can enter from the page on Defense at wowwiki.com as well as tried to present the argument from various angles, but nothing seems to convince him. I am hoping that you guys might be able to discuss this and I could point him to the podcast in question as further evidence, even if it is anecdotal.

We Love You And Want You To Go To Blizzcon
We’ve been hearing for weeks from people who want to go to Blizzcon on August 21st and 22nd – that’s only three and a half weeks away – but people don’t have tickets and all of the listings for tickets on eBay are now scams, people. Don’t get robbed. So we decided to put together a listing with links out to sites where there are bonafide Blizzcon ticket giveaways going on, in the hopes that one of our listeners might win the tickets you so badly want. Those are: -Alienware, who is only requiring your e-mail address, and contest closes July 31. -nVidia, where you have to buy a qualifying video card and obtain a promotion code to enter. But if you’re already shopping for one of their cards… -Razer, where you have to go on a virtual quest, but can also win some pretty cool Razer products. -Kingston, where you have to fill out a simple form and answer the question “what Memory are you currently using in your computer?”