World of Warcraft : contest

Olympic Pose Contest Winners

Kody — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 05:15:37 GMT

We're very excited to announce the 20 winners for the Curse Olympic Pose contest held from August 11th, 2008 to August 25th, 2008. We had a staggering number of entries in the contest -- close to 1,800 -- and it was incredibly difficult whittling those down to only 20. Suffice to say, there would be many more winners if we had access to more than 20 WWI cards. Everyone did a great job with their screenshots, and we hope it added a new form of fun to World of Warcraft, if only for a while.

The winners were chosen based on a number of criteria. Anything from creative use of the game's content and landscapes, the theme of the screenshot being based on the Olympics, or just a breathtaking capture of the amazing art Blizzard has created while showing off how proud of your character you are. It was great to see so many creative submissions, and it leaves all of us here at Curse with a feeling of anticipation for the next contest we can cook up. Needless to say, this won't be our last contest.

And the winners are (in no particular order; everyone is a winner here)...

thejester220 for Jenalee Posing for Olympics
ifandonlyif for The Hardest Part
JSN723 for Gnomeregan wins the Bronze!
Hosed69 for Mara Swim Team
Zirekyle for Belly of the Beast
thegreatpostulio for Iseult poses...in front of the Olympic Rings!
vetten1952 for Olympic Rings Pose
Therapy for Conquest in Azshara
LordSandro for Glory
Elpazoo for Meeting with the fans.
Xular for Olympic Dreams
Anadjet for Elven Olympiad
Fyffes for ShowMeWhatYouGot
Lumee23 for Country Pride
Multipass for No glory without pain and without making a few enemies along the way.
Ninjawerks for Sherbet's Moment of Honor, Glory, and Victory!
shdwsnake for Dire Maul /Flex to Victory!
Beady50 for Tushnar
bearju1ce for Olympic sun sets, but the champion rises
Murassa for Aj Murassa

And of course, thumbnail versions of each of the winning screenshots. If you'd like to check out all of the more than 1,700 submissions for the contest, head over to the Olympic Pose contest category.

We want to again thank everyone for participating in the contest, and we hope to have you take part in future contests as well!

NOTE: If you're listed as a winner, but have not received a confirmation email at this point, please send a message to Kody to let us know and we'll get the details to you.

Reminder: Olympic Pose Contest

Kody — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 23:31:41 GMT

We wanted to remind everyone that today is the last day of our Olympic Pose Contest. We've had an incredible number of submissions -- over 1,600 screenshots so far -- and wanted to encourage everyone to get theirs in before 11:59PM tonight to qualify.

This is your chance to win a Worldwide Invitational Goodie Bag card, so to find out how to enter, head over to the contest article and read more! We'll be releasing a list of the winners once they've been contacted, so keep an eye out for that!

We want to thank everyone who has submitted screenshots so far; there are some incredible submissions and it's going to be very difficult to select the 20 winners! If you want to check out all of the screenshots submitted so far, you can do so in our Olympic Pose Contest category.

Curse Olympic Pose Contest -- WWI Card Prizes!

Kody — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 23:49:26 GMT

Have you ever dreamed of competing in the Olympics, but you just couldn't make the cut? Well worry not; with our Olympic Pose Contest -- running from Monday, August 11th, 2008 through Monday, August 25th, 2008 -- you can show off your competitive prowess while also entering to win one of 20 Worldwide Invitational Goodie Bag cards! These are the very cards given out in Paris, France at this year's Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, where Diablo III was announced!

Not only will each of the lucky 20 winners receive entry into the Wrath of the Lich King Beta Test, but they'll also get their very own mini Tyrael from the Diablo franchise thanks to Tyrael's Hilt! Both of these fantastic prizes come on the coveted WWI '08 card, and entering to win one is easy -- read on for the rules!

UPDATE: As we've receieved a few questions regarding this, we'd like to mention that Wrath of the Lich King areas do not count for this contest.

How To Enter

The first thing you'll want to do is register here on Curse.com if you haven't, so you're ready to go through the rest of the submission process. It's free, easy, and has a number of advantages beyond this contest. To learn more about Curse.com and the entire Curse Network, head over to the Curse Network page.
Next up you'll need to be in the competitive spirit. To do this, login to World of Warcraft and participate in the Spirit of Competition event and obtain a competitor's tabard. To do this, simply join a battleground and stay for the entire duration. Once the battleground has ended and you've received your Marks of Honor, you should be eligible for the tabard and have it sent to you via in-game mail.
Now that you have your tabard, you'll need to show it off. We want to see just how proud you are, so find the coolest place you can either on Azeroth or Outland (Northrend / Wrath of the Lich King Areas excluded) where you can take a screenshot. Once you've found your perfect location, be sure to disable your UI; we wouldn't want it messing up the screenshot! You can do this by pressing Alt + Z (default keybinding to disable the UI).
After getting rid of the UI clutter, the only thing left to do is show off. We want you to do this by emoting with the /flex slash command. Capture that perfect /flex pose in your screenshot and you're set!
Upload the Screenshot here on Curse in the special Screenshots / Olympic Pose Contest category; it's important to make sure you upload it here as all other categories will not be counted in the contest!
Once all that is done, it's time to wait it out and cross your fingers.

Rules

Only one entry per user. Multiple entries may disqualify all entries from that account and any future contests on Curse.com.
- If you decide at a later date you've found a better location to screenshot, delete your other entry prior to uploading the new entry. Entries are allowed until Monday, August 25th, 2008.
Any UI elements present in screenshot will automatically disqualify that specific screenshot. The User Interface must be hidden by using the Alt + Z keybinding.
The screenshot must clearly display the Competitor's Tabard handed out by participating in the Spirit of Competition event running in World of Warcraft.
/flex is the only valid emote for entry into the contest, and must be clearly visible in the screenshot.
Images must be submitted in .jpg format.
A valid email address must be used to create your Curse.com account. Winners will be contacted via this email address.
Entries must be submitted on or before 11:59 P.M. PST (Pacific Standard Time) Monday, August 25th, 2008 to qualify.
Curse, Inc. employees and network affiliates are not eligible for entry into the contest.

Tips

Capturing that perfect flex can be challenging -- timing is of the essence -- so here are a few quick tips!

Before hiding your UI, create a /flex macro and bind this to an easily accessible key.
Once you've hidden your UI, do a few test flexes to make sure the scenery behind your character looks good, and when to best time your screenshot.
When you're ready to take your screenshot, hit your /flex macro and wait 1-2 seconds; this will allow the animation to reach its peak where you'll want to capture the screenshot.
Hit your screenshot key (default Print Screen) and you're done! Now head to your World of Warcraft\Screenshots\ folder and locate the Olympic Pose screenshot and convert it to .jpg if needed.
Make sure no one is running behind you as you take your screenshot; this is your 15 minutes of fame!

As mentioned above, this contest will be running from Monday, August 11th, 2008 through Monday, August 25th, 2008 so get your entries in fast! Good luck to all entrants; we look forward to seeing your best pose!

Blues, Wallpaper, Comic Contest Honorable Mentions

Zyuu — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 16:26:58 GMT

Naxxramas in Wrath of the Lich King

Naxxramas is planned to be more of an entry level raid dungeon in Wrath of the Lich King and not the hardest dungeon in the game, so things will be a little different this time around. We have not made a final decision on an attunement yet, we like having special quest lines available and such, but we also like having content be more available to players.

[source]

Item Design Information

Contrary to popular belief (?) designing a new item set does take a while. We usually use color shifts on the same designs to save time, the exception to that would be the arena sets where we want the items to specifically match the PvE counterparts. The choice to color shift is usually when an item isn't something that would benefit from having a unique model, usually a leveling item. In the case of the badge rewards I can see the reasoning to use color shifts for the level of investment taken to acquire them. Is buying an item with badges the same as clearing Black Temple? No, no not really. So, it isn't so horrible if a shift is used.

What I find odd is that in this particular case we seem to have gone against what would normally be shifted, which is the matching dungeon items, and instead shifted from a previous dungeon's/quest items. My only guess is that those shifts were already done, or the artists preferred them to the new design.

Now that the entirety of the art department's is focused completely on Lich King I don't find it surprising that their time spent invested on the badge items were color shifts. The level of quality of the environments, items, textures, models, etc. in the next expansion are far and above better than anything in the game thus far, so I definitely understand the desire to focus as much time of their time on them as possible.

[source]

New Wallpaper

This wallpaper features some amazing artwork from the World of Warcraft Trading Card Game. Head over to the Upper Deck Entertainment website now to learn more about the game, see more art, or even download some demo decks.

Comic Contest Honorable Mentions

Win an Alienware Laptop!

Kody — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 02:40:19 GMT

Curse, BlueOrb -- the creators of Switchblade, a piece of software that allows you to play several hot PC games with an XBOX 360 controller, including World of Warcraft -- and Alienware have teamed up to give Curse users an exciting opportunity.

This isn't some "Win a T-shirt" contest; BlueOrb is giving away a hot new Alienware Area-51 m15x gaming laptop.

NOTE: Contest ends soon -- sign up now!

Demand Only The Best Graphics

The Area-51® m15x contains the world’s most powerful mobile graphics card. Alienware has always set the standard for graphics capabilities and, with an NVIDIA® GeForce™ 8800M GTX with 512MB of dedicated graphics memory, the tradition continues. Alienware stands alone as the first and only manufacturer to bring this advanced GPU to market in a 15.4-inch notebook.

Powerful Core 2 Extreme Processor

Alienware is the leader in high-performance computers. By utilizing Intel® Core™ 2 Extreme processors, the Area-51 m15x achieves benchmarks unsurpassed by any other notebook in its class. HD video and audio editing, 3D animation and high-end PC gaming suddenly don’t seem as resource intensive as before. Increased processor efficiency means you can work away from your power cable worry-free.

Enter the Contest NOW! -- Sponsored by SwitchBlade

To enter the contest, hit up the contest page. If you're curious about Switchblade, head over and download it to check it out; it's entirely free to download, and will no doubt change the way you play World of Warcraft!

Win an Alienware Gaming Laptop!

Kody — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 03:34:24 GMT

This isn't some "Win a T-shirt" contest; BlueOrb is giving away a hot new Alienware Area-51 m15x gaming laptop.