EPTBlizzCon 2008 will take place October 10 to 11, 2008 at the Anaheim Convention center, located at 800 West Katella Avenue, Anaheim, CA 92802. The hours of operation are 10am to 10pm PST. Tickets will go on sale on August 11, 2008. Buy your tickets right away as they get sold out very quickly!
Panels included are: Diablo III Class Design, Diablo III Game Design, Diablo III Lore and Art, StarCraft II Gameplay, StarCraft Lore, StarCraft II Art, World of Warcraft Class Design, World of Warcraft PvP, World of Warcraft Art, World of Warcraft PvP, World of Warcraft Art, World of Warcraft Dungeons & Raids, World of Warcraft UI and Mods, Blizzard Cinematics, and Blizzard Sound and Music.
Tournaments mentioned on the website include the 2008 Warcraft III and World of Warcraft Arena Tournaments as well as the third BlizzCon StarCraft Invitational where top players of the world are invited to compete. There will also be multiple contests during the event including the famous costume contest, diorama contest, original song contest, movie contest, motivational poster contest, dance contest, and even a silly joke contest.
The website gives us a sneak peek at a few items that would be included in the BlizzCon goody bag which is notorious for having items that later end up having huge demand, especially on Ebay. The only information we have from the site right now though is that half of the bags will have a 16" inflatable divine shield ball and the other half will have a 48" inflatable Frostmourne. There will also be small Blizzard giveaways such as Diablo health and mana stress balls, pandaren brewmaster bottle openers, zerg creep, and more.
Check out the site here: http://www.blizzard.com/blizzcon/
http://www.mymym.com/en/news/14276.html
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Teamliquid Forum Post:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=71247
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My Thoughts:
I got a press pass to BlizzCon and MYM is sending me there so I'm excited that I could go! I do plan on wearing my teamliquid tank top at the event =P. I've been to all the past BlizzCons and even though it is so busy and chaotic when I'm trying to cover news while trying to enjoy the event while meeting up with people I know and trying to interview players (I will no longer fangirl it up!), it is still such a great event and I have a lot of fun.
The goodie bag always had worthy items in there among all the little unnecessary items that Blizzard throws in. It's crazy how much the murloc in game pet went for in the first year 2005. Everyone went crazy for the game beta key and murloc in game costume in 2007. I hope Blizzard has something good up their sleeves for this year's goodie bag! Right now though, I'm not setting my expectations too high as the items they have listed right now don't seem all that great. =x
Besides the goodie bag, I always look forward to watching the tournament and hanging out with the progamers. The highlight of BlizzCon 2007 was Nal_Ra. He was so awesome hanging out with Teamliquid at Nick's hotel room. He had such a great personality and was very friendly. I was also very glad to meet lilsusie through Nal_Ra (or was it Nal_Ra through lilsusie?) Most progamers are hard to get through to as they are too young and jaded and tend to shut down among people and say the usual "all I do is play 10 hours a day". They have a hard time letting loose and having fun. Nal_Ra broke through that stereotype and opened himself to experiencing a sense of camaraderie with the Liquidians.
It's also great hanging out with Teamliquid people. Its funny how even though I have never met or talked to some of these people, it just seems to make sense and feel right hanging out since we already share the same interest and passion in just being a TL forum member at BlizzCon.
In 2005, I hung out with collegebored and the SC Invitational players, Assem, Testie and Legionnaire. That year, I was also a ridiculous fangirl for Yellow, screaming at the top of my lungs and rooting for him to win. I am embarrassed to even think about that side of me coming out.
In 2007, I attempted to organize everyone at BJs. There was such a humongous TL group that I was quite overwhelmed. I didn't get much time to hang out with people as Gameriot worked me hard that year. I never got the whole how many bills joke they were trying to pull on me. -_-a. I met XaI)CyRiC at the event and he witnessed my ridiculous fangirliness when I tried to talk to Yellow and get an interview. It was difficult to interview Yellow in between games as he was always all over the place. In the end, I ditched Yellow because I couldn't find him and I was in a hurry (had my flight back soon after the tournament). I ended up interviewing Nal_Ra much thanks to lilsusie hooking me up with an interview with him and doing the translation. My fandom with Yellow ends here. I support Nal_Ra 100%. I will no longer squeal for Hong Jin Ho but I still hope the best for him and his zerginess.
It has always been good times and I hope to enjoy it once again this year. =)
Here are my past galleries:
BlizzCon 2005 - http://calbearmnm.smugmug.com/StarCraft/291174
BlizzCon 2007 - http://calbearmnm.smugmug.com/StarCraft/359104
My embarassing first ever on camera interview with Nal_Ra (with lilsusie translating):
