Home Gaming Blizzard offer compensation for troubled Warlords of Draenor launch

Blizzard offer compensation for troubled Warlords of Draenor launch

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Blizzard are sorry

World of Warcraft has been around for a decade or so now (believe it or not), and the game shows no real sign of slowing down. Blizzard have kept it fresh with regular updates and frequent expansions, meaning there are still millions of regular subscribers.  Many of these gamers experienced all manner of issues with the launch of the latest expansion, Warlords of Draenor. As if busy servers weren’t enough of a headache, a recent DDOS attack made matters worse. It all seems to have been fixed for the most part, and Blizzard have since said sorry. They are also offering some free game-time as compensation.

The Executive Producer, J. Allen Brack, offered his apology on the WoW forums (via PC Gamer)

I know how much everyone was looking forward to this expansion, and once you were able to get in and start having fun, all the comments I’ve seen indicate that this is one of our best yet. But the quality of the content does not excuse the subpar launch experience we delivered, and I apologize for that.

I guess there really is little excuse for the initial teething problems with the launch, as there has been millions of subscribers for many years. The DDOS attack on the other hand is just a completely unnecessary setback that nobody can really plan for. Regardless, Blizzard want to kiss and make up with their fanbase, and what better way to do it then with improved queues and an extension of subscriptions?

To help address this, we’ve expanded the new instancing tech we used to improve queues on Saturday and we’re continuing the process of applying that to raise the capacity of all realms again. This will result in approximately double the prelaunch capacity on each realm, which should greatly reduce queue times for most realms if not eliminate queues altogether.

In recognition of the difficulties so many of you ran into when trying to play over the first few days, we’re adding five days’ worth of extra time to every subscription in the Americas, Oceania, and Europe that was active as of Friday, November 14. Things are already in a much better place than they were going into the weekend, so I hope you’ll now be able to focus on having a ton of fun with this expansion.

I think that’s rather nice of them. Even if it was the right thing to do, they could’ve easily brushed it off and ignored the issue.

Are you playing the new expansion, and have you experienced any issues? Are you happy to accept Blizzard’s apology as well as extra game-time? Leave your comments below.

(Header Source)

Last Updated: November 19, 2014

23 Comments

  1. Good on ya Blizzard

    Reply

  2. Norm (@e3zype3zy)

    November 19, 2014 at 14:49

    How about giving the people whose subscriptions have lapsed some free game time 😛

    Reply

    • ReaperOfSquirrels

      November 19, 2014 at 14:54

      They did… 7 days of game time… just before the expansion

      Reply

      • Norm (@e3zype3zy)

        November 19, 2014 at 14:55

        I hear not everyone was offered that, I never got an email of anything :<

        Reply

        • ReaperOfSquirrels

          November 19, 2014 at 14:58

          Eish, that sucks, I got one and so did my wife… she used about 4 hours, and I didn’t even activate mine XD

          Reply

          • Norm (@e3zype3zy)

            November 19, 2014 at 15:02

            Nice!
            I haven’t played since MoP started and have serious withdrawls.

          • ToshZA

            November 19, 2014 at 15:06

            I haven’t played since beating Ragnaros in Firelands. No withdrawals here though.

          • ReaperOfSquirrels

            November 19, 2014 at 15:19

            I haven’t played on a live server since about a year ago, but beta tested WoD. I’ll stick to Diablo 3 though.

          • Gerhard Davids

            November 19, 2014 at 15:20

            I really disliked MoP. Made max level and stopped playing. WoD is not only the best WoW xpac I’ve played but also just an all round worth while game to play. They are doing so much right this time it’s ridiculous.

  3. ReaperOfSquirrels

    November 19, 2014 at 14:53

    Eh, it’s something.

    Reply

  4. Valshen

    November 19, 2014 at 14:53

    GOOD GUY BLIZZARD IS A GOOD GUY!

    Reply

    • ReaperOfSquirrels

      November 19, 2014 at 14:56

      You’re just happy that you get 5 moar days of game time.

      Reply

  5. ToshZA

    November 19, 2014 at 14:57

    Hey Ubisoft, Activision (I’m aware of the irony), and Drive Club guys – this is how it’s done.

    Reply

  6. Wyzak

    November 19, 2014 at 15:19

    5 days of game time, wow talk about breaking the bank 😛

    Reply

    • Galbedir

      November 19, 2014 at 17:12

      R150 pm.

      R150 / 31 = R4.83 per day
      R4.83 x5 =R24.15
      R24 x 3 million users = R72 000 000

      I’m sure there are more then 3 mil users, but i’m just guessing to make a point. 😛
      Not sure if my Maths is correct, been awhile -_-

      Reply

      • Wyzak

        November 19, 2014 at 20:27

        There are about 7 million subscribers atm,of which most paid about R500 for the expansion alone. So R24 back from R500…

        Reply

  7. Skyfer

    November 19, 2014 at 15:33

    IMHO the best expansion since BC. Garrison side game is great.

    Reply

  8. loftie

    November 19, 2014 at 15:37

    5 days! wtf! I wanted a free 90 boost lol 😛

    Reply

  9. PsyChoPanthis

    November 19, 2014 at 15:43

    So i bought the expansion and figured I’d wait till this queues dropped before buying time.. Looks like i made a good decision 😀 And I get 5 more days before i have to buy my GF more game time 😀

    Reply

  10. SmurFyZA

    November 19, 2014 at 15:45

    I literally lost 5 days of gametime so this is great news for me. As to queues, I hope I can log in tonight. Last night was the first night I was able to play since the launch on Thursday. GG Blizzard

    Reply

  11. Glingfram

    November 19, 2014 at 18:27

    Played from launch and suffered through the queues and lags and frustrating flag clicking and it is way worth it. Proper storyline (didn’t enjoy MoP), great visuals and you can smell the effort that’s gone into making this a great experience so far.

    Reply

  12. Kromas, Guardian of Cenarius

    November 19, 2014 at 21:16

    Who wants a CE?!

    Reply

  13. Brenz

    November 20, 2014 at 07:59

    Ive been playing since launch.
    Yes there have been issues with lag, rolling restarts, unexpected maintenance, annoying bugs, etc
    Even with the annoyances, I’m loving it, really the most Ive enjoyed the game since TBC.
    Unfortunately, there are class imbalances, my frost mage specifically is broken at the moment, horrid dps, making leveling quite challenging, which isn’t a bad thing, I like a challenge, but I also like to deal some decent damage lol.
    Its a nice gesture from Blizzard to offer game time, they could have ignored the public, but I like them as a company, and they have given me years of fun with WoW.
    This expansion has pretty much guaranteed I will carry on playing for the foreseeable future.

    Reply

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