Blizzard Entertainment has announced the arrival of the Cenarion Hatchling with 100% of the sales proceeds going directly to relief organizations working in Japan to assist those devastated by the recent earthquake and tsunami. The Cenarion Hatchling retails for $10.00.

Introducing the latest World of Warcraft companion up for adoption in the online Pet Store: the wild and noble Cenarion Hatchling! This little critter is the twin of the rare Hippogryph Hatchling pet players could randomly encounter in the first World of Warcraft Trading Card Game set, Heroes of Azeroth -- and he's emerged from the forests of Azeroth to lend a helping talon to some friends in need. For every Cenarion Hatchling purchased between now and July 31, 100% of the $10 USD adoption fee will be donated to the American Red Cross's Japan Earthquake and Pacific Tsunami relief efforts. This support will enable the Red Cross to provide shelter, food, emotional support, and other assistance to victims of this disaster.

Read more about the World of Warcraft Cenarion Hatchling.

100% of the proceeds are donated... It's nice that they decided to actually not be greedy this time around.

 Not to kick a gift horse in the mouth or anything.. but a bit late to the party don't you think?

 I'm sure they still need more donations of course, but why suddenly decide to kick in now and not sooner? It just seems odd is all, not that it matters though :P

It's funny, because people were asking for a pet to buy to donate money last month, and they said they wouldn't do it. I'm not knocking them because anything to help get people to donate is great, but it seems like they just realized that it's good PR to do so (maybe they're having issues with player retention recently and need a PR boost O.o).

But I've found it interesting that you have companies like Sony, Nintendo, Capcom, NCsoft and others donating money. Straight up. Here's your cash. But Blizzard (which arguably has as much, if not greater net profit than many of the companies that donated money) haven't done anything of the sort. They apparently matched their employees contributions, but that's it.

Ya, like 'just2duh' said.. although I'm sure it will bring in some money, probably would have been more effective closer to when the incident happened and it was on peoples mind. I'm sure it didn't take months to create a little companion pet.

Originally posted by Ceridith

100% of the proceeds are donated... It's nice that they decided to actually not be greedy this time around.

Its so easy to be so judgemental about the subject but in the end what it comes down to is Japan is getting help and thats all i care about. I think its great whether or not Blizzards "late" to it or just using it as a publicity thing.

People ACTUALLY pay real money for a virtual "pet" that looks like a Crayon took a crap & it was born?

*Mind Blown*

no..they'd buy it to help out Japan.

Originally posted by Fadedbomb

People ACTUALLY pay real money for a virtual "pet" that looks like a Crayon took a crap & it was born?

 

 

*Mind Blown*

lol Most of their pets are usually pretty cool but yeah theres plenty of bad ones.

I agree this one looks like crap but id still buy it just to put money towards helping Japan. I dont play WoW anymore tho.

To all the nay sayers who claim this should have been done sooner.... Clean ups from natural disasters dont happen over night.. nor does rebuilding.... EVERYTHING Helps... And like the old saying Better late then never... who knows, the money blizzard raises may save some ones life...wether its a community of folks...or 1 persons life...in my opinion... thats more than you.. the average gamer has done...

Ive contributed to japan threw many video-games... Eve-online, League of Legends and World of Warcraft.... ide rather give my money go to these folks and know its going to be distributed to the japanese... than donate  to some Holywood Celebrity like that haitian incident...

Just remember... mother nature can act within an instant...who knows.. maybe 20 years down the road  you'll be one of the poor saps who loses his entire family and his house... then someone like blizzard comes along and provides a helping hand... i bet you'll feel like an ass then for your belittling here..

lmao at people thinking that it's too late for donations, especially for a large scale natural disaster. Are people seriously this dumb?

The saddest thing is that the non-charity $25 rainbow space unicorn mount will probably have made more money than this in the end. That has much more of a virtual bling than this does. MMO players care desperately about virtual bling and showing off stupid crap.

While I find it good to launch such a donation project I must also ask myself why it took blizzard so long to come up with it. They now start to care 4 weeks after it happened? I must say it feels like a poor excuse to say "Yeah we did something too". Probably a marketing director said "Hey look, this and that company already donated millions, so I guess we should squeeze our millions of players now so we can pretend WE donated something when in fact the community did". 

Honestly Blizzard Activision should be ashamed. One of the biggest gaming companies needs to suck their customers out to be able to donate money to Japan? I find that very very sad.

Originally posted by mnemic666

It's funny, because people were asking for a pet to buy to donate money last month, and they said they wouldn't do it. I'm not knocking them because anything to help get people to donate is great, but it seems like they just realized that it's good PR to do so (maybe they're having issues with player retention recently and need a PR boost O.o).

 

But I've found it interesting that you have companies like Sony, Nintendo, Capcom, NCsoft and others donating money. Straight up. Here's your cash. But Blizzard (which arguably has as much, if not greater net profit than many of the companies that donated money) haven't done anything of the sort. They apparently matched their employees contributions, but that's it.

 Most likely Blizzard does not make a direct donation because they are part of a larger company. 

Originally posted by XanXanni

While I find it good to launch such a donation project I must also ask myself why it took blizzard so long to come up with it. They now start to care 4 weeks after it happened? I must say it feels like a poor excuse to say "Yeah we did something too". Probably a marketing director said "Hey look, this and that company already donated millions, so I guess we should squeeze our millions of players now so we can pretend WE donated something when in fact the community did". 

Honestly Blizzard Activision should be ashamed. One of the biggest gaming companies needs to suck their customers out to be able to donate money to Japan? I find that very very sad.

   You should really do some investigating before opening up on something you (apparently) know nothing about.  While I can't speak for Activision - since I didn't check there, you DO know that Blizzard has been matching employee donations on a dollar for dollar basis since the disaster, right?  Even that was not publiscized - it was released in a normal thread that it was happening.

  Try again?

as others have said that thing looks terrible,looks alot like that Toucan Sam guy on my fruitloops box.

Originally posted by Eliandal

Originally posted by XanXanni

While I find it good to launch such a donation project I must also ask myself why it took blizzard so long to come up with it. They now start to care 4 weeks after it happened? I must say it feels like a poor excuse to say "Yeah we did something too". Probably a marketing director said "Hey look, this and that company already donated millions, so I guess we should squeeze our millions of players now so we can pretend WE donated something when in fact the community did". 

Honestly Blizzard Activision should be ashamed. One of the biggest gaming companies needs to suck their customers out to be able to donate money to Japan? I find that very very sad.

   You should really do some investigating before opening up on something you (apparently) know nothing about.  While I can't speak for Activision - since I didn't check there, you DO know that Blizzard has been matching employee donations on a dollar for dollar basis since the disaster, right?  Even that was not publiscized - it was released in a normal thread that it was happening.

 

  Try again?

Im not trying to bash Blizzard here but do you really think a company that makes the kind of money that Blizzard does every month couldn't do a little better than matching employee donations? Seriously matching dollar for dollar is kind of a joke when you think about it. Better than nothing I suppose.

Originally posted by GreenHell

Originally posted by Eliandal

Originally posted by XanXanni

While I find it good to launch such a donation project I must also ask myself why it took blizzard so long to come up with it. They now start to care 4 weeks after it happened? I must say it feels like a poor excuse to say "Yeah we did something too". Probably a marketing director said "Hey look, this and that company already donated millions, so I guess we should squeeze our millions of players now so we can pretend WE donated something when in fact the community did". 

Honestly Blizzard Activision should be ashamed. One of the biggest gaming companies needs to suck their customers out to be able to donate money to Japan? I find that very very sad.

   You should really do some investigating before opening up on something you (apparently) know nothing about.  While I can't speak for Activision - since I didn't check there, you DO know that Blizzard has been matching employee donations on a dollar for dollar basis since the disaster, right?  Even that was not publiscized - it was released in a normal thread that it was happening.

 

  Try again?

Im not trying to bash Blizzard here but do you really think a company that makes the kind of money that Blizzard does every month couldn't do a little better than matching employee donations? Seriously matching dollar for dollar is kind of a joke when you think about it. Better than nothing I suppose.

 Depends on what their liquid cash looks like.  What obligations they have to pay every month...loans, rents, taxes.   How much of their cash is tired up in projects.  While we say they are making so much money they are also paying out a lot and they are a public company so shareholders demand performance.  It is not as easy as a single family shelling out some cash for donations.  They have to balance image, obligations, future growth, and sharesholders faith.

Originally posted by GreenHell

Originally posted by Eliandal

Originally posted by XanXanni

While I find it good to launch such a donation project I must also ask myself why it took blizzard so long to come up with it. They now start to care 4 weeks after it happened? I must say it feels like a poor excuse to say "Yeah we did something too". Probably a marketing director said "Hey look, this and that company already donated millions, so I guess we should squeeze our millions of players now so we can pretend WE donated something when in fact the community did". 

Honestly Blizzard Activision should be ashamed. One of the biggest gaming companies needs to suck their customers out to be able to donate money to Japan? I find that very very sad.

   You should really do some investigating before opening up on something you (apparently) know nothing about.  While I can't speak for Activision - since I didn't check there, you DO know that Blizzard has been matching employee donations on a dollar for dollar basis since the disaster, right?  Even that was not publiscized - it was released in a normal thread that it was happening.

 

  Try again?

Im not trying to bash Blizzard here but do you really think a company that makes the kind of money that Blizzard does every month couldn't do a little better than matching employee donations? Seriously matching dollar for dollar is kind of a joke when you think about it. Better than nothing I suppose.

 

It sure is easy to ask someone to donate money that isn't yours.

I bought one. No regrets.