This week in the WoW Factor we look at two new player character models and get our first look at Curse of Naxxramas: A Hearthstone Adventure!
New WoW Models
In two back-to-back Artcraft posts on the official World of Warcraft website, Blizzard’s art team showed off two new player models, the female Draenei and the male Tauren. Here are what the two new models look like:
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The original model is on the far left while the others represent the updated form.
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The updated male Tauren model.
The male tauren preview also included several short videos demonstrating the animation fidelity of the new models. Here’s one of them:
As I’ve said on numerous occasions, the animation is what really knocks these new models out of the park and hopefully with the above video you can see why. Check out more on the official site here.
Get to da Choppa!
Blizzard and Paul Jr. of former American Chopper will be teaming up to create two new choppers, one Alliance and one Horde themed. Over the course of eight webisodes you’ll be able to follow the design and fabrication process of both bikes and when they’re finally revealed, the WoW community will vote on which one will appear in WoW as an in-game mount! Unfortunately, it seems like the show will follow a traditional reality TV structure instead of trying something a little more fresh. Check out the teaser for the webseries below:
To watch each episode as they are released head to the official site.
Hearthstone iOS Release
Last Wednesday Hearthstone received its global release on iPad. The following iPad models are currently supported: iPad Air, iPad 4th generation, iPad 3rd generation, iPad 2 and both versions of the iPad mini. If you’ve already been playing on PC or Mac, you’ll be able to log in with your Battle.net info and your cards and decks will be immediatly accesable. It’s also worth checking out because your first play on an iPad will award a free pack! I’ve been able to play on both an iPad 3rd generation and iPad mini and so far it seems to perform fairly well with only minor slow down when first entering your collection screen and when there’s a ton of effects happening on screen but it’s far from unplayable. I’ve been told it runs near flawlessly on the iPad Air but I can’t confirm that as of this writing. It certainly feels good to be able to easily take Hearthstone on the road now, that’s for sure!
Adventure Time
At PAX East Blizzard announced many details about the single player Adventure Mode that was first discussed many months ago as a way to introduce smaller expansions into the game. The first adventure, Curse of Naxxramas, will hit this summer and usher in 30 new cards comprised of both class cards and neutral cards. Here’s a peek at some of the new cards:
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The adventure, like the raid in World of Warcraft, will have five wings: the Arachnid Quarter, the Plague Quarter, the Military Quarter, the Construct quarter and Frostwyrm Lair. Each wing will open over the course of five weeks and cards will unlock as you progress through them by defeating a series of bosses. Completing an entire wing will also grant you a guaranteed new Legendary card! Each boss will have their own unique cards and hero abilities as well. For example, Heigan the Unclean:
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Also being introduced are Class Challenges. These are challenges for each class in which an encounter from Curse of Naxxramas is tuned to take on a specific class and upon defeat will unlock new class specific cards. The catch is you’ll need to play with a provided preconstructed class deck for each of these challenges.
The first wing, the Plague Quarter, will be available to all players for free while the other four wings will cost either gold or real money. No price point has been announced at this time but it’s good to know this new content will be purchasable entirely with in-game money. If you’re primarily an Arena player there’s no need to worry - all the cards obtainable in a given wing will become accessible Arena picks as each wing becomes available, even if you don’t purchase that specific wing.
Lastly, the new adventure will introduce a new board in which to play on. It’s not clear if this board will only be used in the adventure or be available in regular play modes as well.
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What do you think about Hearthstones first adventure? What do you think is a fair price for this new content expansion? Let us know in the comments below!
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Reza Lackey / Reza is a giant nerd who loves video games, board games, film and way too many other things. Works in the film industry, on some startups and thinks science is cool. Also launches rockets.
