Jar Of Eyeballs

Once again, the holiday for gamers by gamers has begun! If you have no idea what the hell I’m talking about, head over to Ctrl-Alt-Delete and read the entire archive. That’s right, EVERYTHING!

Okay, done? Great! So, here are my plans for Wintereenmas. One of my WoW characters is about to enter Outland and I want to celebrate Wintereenmas by kicking ass in Hellfire Ramparts. Also, I hope to get some more work on my upcoming game done so I can finally post an announcement next weekend. So everybody have fun and game on!

This is just too crazy for words. Anti-gaming douchebag Jack Thompson has returned and is sueing Facebook for 120 million. The reason? Facebook hasn’t removed content mocking him. If you don’t know who this retard is, Jack Thompson is a former lawyer (more on the “former” part later) who blames everything that goes wrong in society on video games. All youth crime and violence is to blame on games, even if the criminal never played video games.

The guy is also a flaming retard. He sued Take 2, the developer of Grand Theft Auto, for a fucking ping pong game! And he’s a popular target of ridicule in several gaming-related webcomics, such as the magnificent Penny Arcade. He even ran into trouble with the creators of Penny Arcade after they humiliated him bigtime. A few years ago, Jack Thompson promised to give $10000 to a charity if someone made a game about someone taking revenge on the gaming industry. Such a game was made, but Thompson refused to cough up the money, claiming his offer was satirical. Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik, the creators of Penny Arcade, then donated the money instead, with the comment “For Jack Thompson, because Jack Thompson won’t”. This resulted in a lawsuit (again), with Thompson claiming Holkins and Krahulik were harassing him.

In 2007, he was disbarred for acting like a jackass. The court even wanted his mental health examined, though you don’t really need a psychiatrist to tell he’s nuts, of course. Being the idiot he is, he plans to continue his job as if he never was disbarred, though. And now he’s sueing Facebook. There are quite a lot of groups on Facebook ridiculing and mocking him. There’s even a few that threaten him, but those usually get removed. Thompson, however, wants everything criticizing him removed. He sent several faxes to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg demanding the content to be removed. That’s like sending a fax to the president to complain about an annoying neighbour!

So apparently, Jack Thompson doesn’t like freedom of speech. Okay, you shouldn’t say stuff like “Kill Jack Thompson”. Encouraging violence isn’t free speech. But saying he’s a douchebag, retard, moron, jackass, imbecile or motherfucker is. So go ahead, Jack Thompson, sue me! Oh, wait, you can’t, because I’m in Belgium and you’re in the USA. And guess what, you’re as unpopular here as you are there!

If there’s only one sitcom every self-respecting geek has to watch it’s The IT Crowd. As you can guess by the name, it’s about a group of IT people. They spend most of the day in the basement of their office building, in their incredibly messy office (wich, when watched closely, contains all sorts of references to geek and pop culture). So far, three seasons have been made. The third season was a bit of a disappointment. During season 2, the CEO of Reynholm Industries, the employer of the IT guys, commits suicide when asked about irregularities in the pension fund. During the funeral, his long-lost son turns up and inherits everything, making him a main character on the show. Unfortunately, his character is annoying and embarrasing rather than funny.

The best episode ever in the third season was episode four. Jen, the boss of the IT guys (who knows nothing about computers and got the job by lying), has to give a speech to the shareholders. Afraid to make a fool of herself, she asks the guys to write a good speech for her. They come up with the idea of giving her a box wich they claim contains the entire internet, and will cause the end of the world when dropped. Unfortunately, the shareholders are as dumb as Jen and believe the story. When the box is accidentially dropped and destroyed, panic breaks out (Oh my god, we’re all gonna diiieeeeee!) and the geeks get the chaos they wanted after all.

Rumours about a fourth season already emerged a while ago, and now it has been confirmed. It will air somewhere next year, but a Christmas special might also be on the way. I hope they will bring Richmond back. A character from the first two seasons, Richmond was a goth who was locked in the basement because of his annoying behaviour. He wasn’t in season three because Noel Fielding, the actor playing Richmond, had other things scheduled. Let’s hope we’ll see him back!

Rumors abot this have been circulating for a while and now it’s official: the next World of Warcraft expansion will be titled “Cataclysm“. The title suggested it would have something to do with the Great Sundering and the destruction of Kalimdor, splitting it into two continents. Some people said Blizzard was gonna open the Emerald Dream (and perhaps activating the portals in Bough Shadow, Twilight Grove and various other places).

Here’s what Blizzard now announced. Azeroth will be devastated by a huge disaster, entirely reshaping Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms. This will happen no matter what, even if you don’t buy the expansion. The Barrens will split in two, and a new region, Uldum, will be uncovered. Hyal Summit will also be opened as a neutral region. Two new races will be introduced: the Worgen for the Alliance and the Goblins for the Horde (wich seems kinda odd since the Goblins have always been a neutral race until now). A new secondary skill, Archeology, will allow you to digg up artifacts.

The level cap will be raised by only five levels (unlike the previous expansions, wich added ten levels), making the highest level 85. No new classes will be introduced, but there will be new class/race combinations. There will also be a new Wintergrasp-like PVP zone, new dungeons and raids, and some old dungeons will get a heroic version (including the Deadmines). Another new feature will be the “Path of the Titans” character advancement, and (finally!) the possibility to use flying mounts everywhere, including Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms.

With the Lich King (probably) defeated, you might wonder who the new über-badguy is gonna be. I’m not gonna tell, just watch this trailer to find out:

No word on a release date yet, but it will probably still be a while. After all, there’s still a lot of content to be unlocked in Wrath Of The Lich King!