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Blizzard Is Too Busy for BlizzCon This Year, Opts to Skip it Until 2013

You'll have to wait another year to grumpily complain about how all your friends are going to BlizzCon and you're not because you're too busy/broke/both.

Not unlike the hardworking parent who regrettably has to break the news to their adoring children that this year, with so many important things going on at work, they won't be able to take the kids to Disneyland like they'd done every year prior, Blizzard today tried to very gently break it to the company's most enthusiastic fans that no, there won't be a BlizzCon in 2012.

This guy is about to be one saaaaad Pandaren.
This guy is about to be one saaaaad Pandaren.

The reason? It's apparently as simple as there just being too much stuff going on with the company these days. In addition to the (eventual) releases of Diablo III, the World of Warcraft expansion Mists of Pandaria, and Starcraft II expansion Heart of the Swarm in 2012, the company also announced that it plans to hold a competitive gaming event it calls the 2012 Battle.net World Championship, an event that it describes as "a major global eSports event featuring some of the best pro-gaming competition in the world" that will feature competition in both Starcraft II (naturally) and World of Warcraft's Arena battles. That event will take place somewhere in the rather large continent of Asia in 2012. For those taking bets on where, put me down for a sawbuck on South Korea.

Amusingly, most of Blizzard's announcement focused on the Battle.net World Championship and the many, many titles Blizzard plans to release this year, as if to try and soften the blow to any die-hard fans who were eagerly anticipating the opportunity to finally have that ridiculous Pandaren costume they've been trotting around for the last few years really mean something. It's like the aforementioned parent trying to salve the wounds of their heartbroken brood by telling them they'll get a couple of extra presents once their birthday rolls around, and maybe they'll take them to a baseball game one of these days...in Asia.

Blizzard plans to release more info on both the Battle.net World Championships and the 2013 rendition of BlizzCon "in the months ahead."

Alex Navarro on Google+

64 Comments

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Kiri90

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Edited By Kiri90

@Winternet said:

The level of fuckness I give about this is very close to zero.

This was fucktastic, sir!

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Dark

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Edited By Dark

Pfft, its just a sign that the WoW expansion and Diablo 3 will most likely be out before the time Blizcon would be happening. Once those 2 titles are out the door they have almost nothing to talk about at the convention bar Titan which obviously they aren't ready to talk about yet, I wasn't expecting an important one this year anyway.

You all should look up, that means Diablo 3 is getting REALLY close.

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dvorak

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Edited By dvorak

I watched the official streams they had this year and it was really entertaining, either because they were showing cool stuff off, or something really awesome/awful was happening.

Pretty much everything they would be promoting is going to come out before the end of October though, so it makes sense that they would hold off.

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Shinjitsu

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Edited By Shinjitsu

@Klei said:

Ahahahah, oh you Blizzard you. You may have great games, but you're still one of those companies I really, really dislike, along with Activision. Last time I've waited for one of your games, it was like, twelve years ago. Now I just don't care. I'll play D3, but I certainly am not expecting it at all, that is, whenever you guys stop being funded to extend those absurdly long projects of yours.

Yeah, it sure sucks when game companies put out quality products.

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superaven

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Edited By superaven

As someone that attended BlizzCon this past year, I can say Blizzard was "Too Busy for BlizzCon" then as well. I for one thank them for skipping 2012 and preventing there fan base from blindly giving them a shit load of cash for registration. Though I guess we'll just blow that on Diablo III and WOW anyways.

Sidenote: Blizzard needs to move the BlizzCon out of the Anaheim Convention Center. Having open air sessions in a packed convention center made for some shitty sessions.

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ShadowConqueror

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Edited By ShadowConqueror

They didn't have ANYTHING to show off to justify making all that money from tickets? Really?

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CJduke

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Edited By CJduke
@ShadowConqueror said:

They didn't have ANYTHING to show off to justify making all that money from tickets? Really?

They easily could have shown a bunch of nothing and made a ton of money, but this just shows how Blizzard is more focused on putting out well polished, quality games then just ripping people off. For them to put off Blizzcon for an entire year to make sure they have time to work on their games and make them good just further proves that they (along with Valve) are the best developers.
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gamer_152

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Edited By gamer_152  Moderator

I'm sure there'll be a lot of upset fans, but looking at how busy Blizzard is going to be it's understandable.

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poisonjam7

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Edited By poisonjam7

As long as they get Diablo 3 out this year, they can cancel every Blizzcon from now until doomsday if they want.

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NekuCTR

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Edited By NekuCTR

Blizzard sets better and better precedents for being an actual company every year. They are certainly not a joke as far as how the rest of the world does business, and is expected to do business.

Honestly this by itself doesn't bother me that much, as it is just an event they do for the fans. But seriously, it's just another exemplar of their completely detached, tunnel vision philosophies.

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Mnemoidian

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Edited By Mnemoidian

Couple 3 "games" potentially releasing with the shitstorm they caused during the closing ceremony of last year's event. Probably a good idea to take a break for a year anyway, refocus, figure out what they did wrong.

'Cos that was some raw, uncomfortable business.

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ThePhantomStranger

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I know nothing of Blizzcon but thought the title meant that Blizzard as a company wasn't going to attend their own con...instead of the con not happening...

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aquaviva

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Edited By aquaviva
@Mr_Skeleton let them just get d3 done thx