Windows 7  is a lot less restrictive than Windows Vista. It doesn’t take a genuis to spot that. But even so, there’s a way to gain access of even more goodness in Windows 7, with the so called “God Mode” folder. What this folder does, is give you something more similar to a second Control Panel, with 270+ functions to play around with. Nothing for the average Windows user, but definetely something to look in to if you know what you’re doing.

So, how do you activate this “God Mode” you ask? It’s quite simple actually. Create a new folder anywhere on the hard drive, it doesn’t really mater. Name this drive “GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}.”. Now, watch the magic happen.

Alright, I know that it’s not the “GodMode” part of the name that does the trick. In reality, you could call it “Chocolate.stringname” and it would still give you access to the same folder. It’s the string after that does everything. But God Mode sounds a lot better, no?

This trick supposedly works in Windows Vista 32-bit aswell, although I can not promise anything, as I have not tried this myself.

EDIT: I just had a friend test this in Windows Vista, and it works just fine. So yes, it’s confirmed, this will help you Vista users aswell!

21.08
23:26 – Update: More info added after watching the Cataclysm Panel.
02:26 – Update: Received more info from the Classes and Tradeskills Panel.

22.08
20:30 – Update: A few updates from the Open Q&A panel that was just held.

24.08
08:25 – Update: The last of the information from the Cataclysm panels has been released.

Plot:

Deathwing, having become insanely powerful and equally crazy, broke through the Elemental Plane, and caused the Cataclysm on Azeroth, leaving Azeroth being forever changed. Several zones have been added, in adition to the old content in Azeroth that has been revamped.

The World.

Mount Hyjal.
Mount Hyjal will be one of the new leveling zones in the 78-82 area. Darkwhisper Gorge in Winterspring will now be a part of the Hyjal zone, and quite possibly be the entrance.
Ragnaros and his cronies are now assaulting the World Tree, and Ragnaros is bigger, badder and seriously pissed off. You will be able to quest your way through the zone, to find out what is going on, and eventually face the evil in the end.

Twilight Highlands.
When Deathwing broke out of the Elemental Plane, and caused the cataclysm on Azeroth, he headed straight for Grim Batol. As he entered, he kind of just ran straight through the city, causing it to be split in half. You will quest through the scar Deathwing left, eventually reaching the core city, and unlocking the lore behind Deathwing and his Twilight Dragonflight which he has ben working on for a while (read Night of the Dragon by Richard A. Knaak and see what I mean).

Deepholm.
Deepholm isn’t exactly a part of Azeroth, but a part of the Elemental Plane. This is where Deathwing were resting to be able to break through and wreck Azeroth completely. You will actually be able to enter through the rift Deathwing created, and see Deepholm in it’s glory. It’ll be a subterranean zone, with lots of cavern systems and underground quest hubs. You will still be able to fly here of course. Also, Deepholm will serve as a hub for all the other zones, with protals to Hyjal, Twilight Highlands etc, and back. Also, it will be the final zone for quest to hit level 85.

Uldum.
The zone we’ve all been waiting for. Uldum has been protected by a Titan device which locked the entrance to Uldum and hid it from the rest of the world. As Deathwing ruined Azeroth, so too did he ruin one of the devices, causing Uldum to be availible to everyone. This zone will be very much like Egypt, with lush oasis areas and huge deserts, with temples and Titan buildings. A race of Titans, the Tol’Vir, will also have their home here. It will also house a dungeon with a raid and a normal dungeon. The raid has been revealed to be the Halls of Origination. Be on the lookout for Brann  Bronzebeard!

Sunken City of Vashj’ir.
As the Cataclysm was happening, so did the Maelstrom churn, and life in the long-lost city of Ashara sprung to life on the bottom of the ocean. Now known as Vashj’ir, it will actually serve as an underwater area, with quest hubs located in domes. You will of course be given underwater mounts with speeds akin to that of flying mounts, and Metzen promised it would not be troublesome to work underwater. The zone will be very colorful and lush, but it will also hold a portal to the Abyssal Maw. Expect to find Azshara herself here.

Gilneas.
Ah, the kingdom of Gilneas. The humans of Gilneas have been protected for all these years behind their stout Greymane Wall. Well, they are protected no longer. The Cataclysm broke down the doors, and let the worgen in. The inhabitants of Gilneas have all been turned into Worgen, but will actually side with the Alliance in the battle against Deathwing. The lore here wasn’t very specific, but be sure to read more about it tomorrow. It will be a level 1 – 15 zone, and will be heavily phased. This zone will also host a battleground, where players will fight for the control of certain city districts, but they were very vague on this.

The Lost Islands.
When Deathwing (yes, him again) wrought his wrath on Azeroth, Kezan was hit hard, and a band of goblins were forced to flee. They landed on the shores of the Lost Isles, and had to battle the inhabitants currently there. In the process, they made friends with Thrall and the Horde, and will be introduced as the new playable race to the Horde. The lore here seems brilliant, but expect to learn more about this later on. Just like Gilneas, it will be a 1 – 15 zone. Geographically, the Isles will be a bit off the coast of Azshara, north of Durotar, so the location is perfect.

Old Azeroth.
Old Azeroth has also been very revamped. Deathwing apparently rampaged through most of the land, leaving huge scars here and there, resulting in major changes. Desolace has had its shorelines ruined, letting water pour into Desolace giving birth to plant life. Looks very sweet. The Barrens have been split in two, with a Northern and Southern barrens. Norlax apparently succeeded in making the Wailing Caverns more lush, and the Southern Barrens is flowing with life. Auberdeen in Darkshore was ravaged, and the Alliance were forced to set up camp further north in Darkshore. The Horde camp on the Zoram Strand has been seriously fortified, and been given a harbour. Of course, there are several other changes, but writing them all would require several pages. Most important though, is that all of Azeroth is now flying mount accessable. Yep, that’s right, you can fly anywhere. Nothing were announced about you needing to buy a new flying skill, but expect Tome of Cataclysmic Flying for 2500 gold from some demonic vendor.

Phasing.
After the Wrathgate event and the Death Knight start zone, it seems Blizzard really took their liking to the phasing technology. And who can blame them? Content can now be added and removed with phasing as you progress through the story of the Cataclysm, and will make the game seem more dynamic. Also, the Goblin and Worgen starting zones will be heavily phased, and apparently a lot cooler than the Death Knight start area (which was awesome enough already). I am looking forward to this feature.

PvP and PvE.

PvP.
Blizzard talked briefly about the PvP part of the Cataclysm, naming at least three new battlegrounds to be ready for launch. One of them will be the aforementioned Gilneas battleground. Also, they’re introducing rated Battleground play, so you can grab a Premade group and go ravage in Battlegrounds, getting rating and arena points so you can be able to get PvP rewards like normal Arena goers. They will be introducing several new arena maps, although no number was given. A new zone like Wintergrasp will be introduced aswell; Tol Barad. It holds a prison, and the Alliance and the Horde will battle for the prison. Once you capture it, your side will be given a huge daily quest hub with, apparently, “very profitable rewards”. Also, you will be granted access to a raid wing with a/several boss(es).

Raids and dungeons.
Several new dungeons and raids will be introduced, although only a few have been named. The Firelands is one of them, which will let you face off a bigger and badder and meaner version of Ragnaros, in his lair in Sulfuron’s Keep. In Uldum, you’ll find the Lost city of Tol’Vir, and a new Titan dungeoin a’la Ulduar, the Halls of Origination. Twilight Highlands will contain a leveling dungeon, and a raid dungeon (quite possibly Deathwing’s Lair or at least his Twilight Flight). The Skywall, which is the elemental plain of Air, will hold a leveling dungeon and a raid dungeon. Deadmines and Shadowfang Keep (yes, it’s true) will have level 85 heroic modes availible. And last, but not least, the Blackrock Caverns is a new dugeon found in the Blackrock Spire, with completely new content, bossfights, artwork and so forth.

A new instance has been announced; Blackwing Descent. You will actually fly back to Nefarian’s old room to access a teleporter, and Nefarian himself will be back to defend it! This raid is inspired by Blackwing Lair, and has new art, new loot, and new creatures.

Onyxia.
As most of you already know, Onyxia will be introduced as a level 80 raid encounter in a future patch. She will drop new gear, bags and even a mount modeled after herself. What this means though, is that you won’t be able to kill a level 60 version of her anymore. So no more easy gold, or farming your old tier sets.

Cross-server LFG.
This feature is supposedly coming already in patch 3.3, but we’ll see. In any case, this feature will let you search for people across servers, and create a group. Supposedly it’ll help a lot for PUG groups. Also, there’ll be a reward system aswell. If you’re a leader for a PUG, say a 10-man raid, and you complete it, you’ll be rewarded.

Game features.

Level cap.
The level cap has been raised to 85, and you’ll as usual get one talent point per level. There will be no new talents however, at least not like in the other two expansion. Instead, you will have Masteries, and the Path of the Titans.

Masteries.
Your talent trees will be re-done quite a bit. Talents that give you stuff like 5% more crit chance, or 25% more bonus damage will be gone. Instead these talents will be passive bonuses for your trees. So let’s say you have a hunter that you’ll spec beast mastery. As you put talents in that tree, you will for example be granted passive crit and bonus damage. Or if you spec marksmanship, you will get passive armor penetration. And the more talent points you put in one tree, the higher the bonuses will be. This way, you can focus on talents you find fun or interesting, instead of mandatory because they give you more damage. Expect some diminishing returns though, so putting 76 talent points in one tree won’t be as worth it as you first thought.

Path of the Titans.
Part of the problem with endgame in World of Warcraft since TBC, is that when you hit max level, character progression slows down a great deal. You’re not improving your character a lot concidering the time put into it. This is something they’re addressing with the Path of the Titan.

As you play the game, you’ll unlock different paths you can choose, and as you progress you’ll unlock special glyph sockets for your characters. These glyphs are unlocked via the Archeology secondary profession by finding and trading in artifacts, and are in no way related to inscription. So far, there’s 6 named paths you can choose.

• Path of Aman’Thul, the High Father
• Path of Eonar, the Lifebinder
• Path of Norgannon, the Dreamweaver
• Path of Khaz’Goroth, the Shaper
• Path of Aggramar, the Avenger
• Path of Golganneth, the Thunderer

Each path will have 2 or 3 choices per rank, and if you want to try a new path, you can respec later on.
You’ll unlock glyphs by doing the things you’ve been doing for the last few years, like raiding, Pvp’ing, leveling your trade skill and so on, and as you go you’ll unlock these ancient glyphs that will improve your character a lot. There’ll most likely be a weekly cap on how much you can progress in a week.

The Path of the Titans will be availible to all players who reach 85, and players will eventually be able to unlock new ranks for their glyphs. Also, it’s a possibility that Blizzard will patch in completely new paths in the future.

Profession – Archeology.
The new profession will actually be a secondary profession, making it the first profession ever since the release of Retail to be a secondary profession. This profession will have you gather information about ruins and artifacts that have surfaced after Deathwing sundered Azeroth.  As you progress in Archeology, you will unlock random fun stuff like pets, titles, tabards and so forth. Looks like a welcome addition. Also, this profession will be closely tied in with the Path of the Titans, allowing you more flexibility when selecting your path.

Profession changes.
Certain professions will be given the possibility to have mutli-gains. For example, a blacksmith will be given the option to make 5 uncommon quality bracers, or one rare quality breastplate. The bracers will give 1 skill points each, and the breastplate 5 skill points. This will let players decide if they want to level and maybe even earn some money from items, or go the standard route.

Fishing and engineering will both receive some changes. Engineering will most likely continue to receive fun and helpful stuff like it does now, like Jeeves or Wormhole Generators. No specific details were given on fishing, other than that it’s going to get some big changes and that it’s going to be more fun and exciting.

Gathering professions will also get a little revamp, and be more fun to level. And you might even be able to customize the bonus you get, like if you’re a miner you won’t have to be stuck with your health bonus.

Guild Leveling.
One of the new cool features to be introduced in Cataclysm, is guild leveling. You will earn experience to the guild by raiding, leveling your profession, doing PvP, doing daily quests and so on. Your guild will have 20 levels to go on, and each level grants a talent point. As you level up, you can spend these in several talents that benefit your guild. Some of these include:

• Decreased repair costs.
• Slower durability loss.
• Remove reagent cost from spells.
• Allow a percentage of gold drops from raid bosses and mobs to be transfered to the guild bank.
• Mass Resurrection.
• Mass Teleport.

When your guild reaches level 20, the experience you get will be converted to guild currency, which can be spent on stuff like profession patterns, potions, guild banners and mounts with your guild’s insignia on it, reagents and respecs for your guild talent tree.

As you buy recipes for patterns, people in the guild with the appropriate profession can learn it and create items for the guild. This includes heirloom items. If the do decide to leave the guild however, any pattern learned will be unlearned, and heirloom items will be returned to the guild bank.

Guild Interface.
Another thing to be introduced is guild achievements. Guilds will now have their own achievements, and will have a new tab in your Achievement window. Some achievements currently in-game might be converted to guild achievements, but several new ones will be introduced. Some of these achievements might include creating a legendary item, having max level of all the different professions, reaching exalted with all factions and more.

There will also be added a Guild News Feed. This will show you stuff like what bosses have been downed, items that dropped, and other useful information. It will also have a filter, so you can filter out what content you want.

You can also now browse through the professions of your guild members, to see if they can create a spesific item.

Another added feature is the possibility to invite other guilds to your guild calendar event. For example, you have two guilds wanting to raid the same instance, but both need more people. Now, you can actually invite the other guild via your calendar, and the event will show in both guilds, making it easier to make collaborative efforts.

Reforging.
Reforging will be a new way for you to customize your gear. This ability will be given to blacksmiths, leatherworkers, jewelcrafters, tailors and engineers. Each profession will be able to reforge different items, although no list has been confirmed yet. It will be quite cheap, and the way it works is that you can reduce one stat on the item and replace it with another. It won’t let you increase a stat already present though, but it can for example reduce your hit rating and replace it for more intellect or crit rating. A fine addition if you’re hit capped and receive a fantastic new item with hit, for example.

Classes and races.

New races.
Worgen:
Worgen is the new alliance race, will start in Gilneas, and can be any class except Paladins or Shamans. Worgen will be given Darkflight, which increases your movement speed for 70% for 6 seconds. They are given a 1% increase in damage, 15% reduced damage from curses and diseases, and +15 to skinning, and you won’t even need a skinning knife!

In combat, you will automatically turn in to a worgen, but out of combat you may choose to wolf out, or stay human. And don’t worry, the worgen form is purely cosmetical.

Goblin:
The Goblins (or a renegade faction of goblins) is the new Horde race. It will start on the Lost Islands, and can be any class except Paladins or Druids. The Goblins will be given a rocket belt, which lets them either jump 20 yards ahead, or fire a barrage of rockets at their target. This shares cooldown. Also, they get the highest faction discount regardless of reputation, a 1% increase in attack and casting speed, +15 to alchemy skill and increased potion effect and a pack hobgoblin that seves as a bank, with a 30 minute cooldown.. Also, the Goblin mounts will be crappy engineering vehicles, sweet.

Racials.
All current racials will be updated to match the ones Goblins and Worgen are being treated in Cataclysm. Expect them to be in the veins of the Goblin and Worgen ones. This desicion is quite understandable, as the new racials are quite good.

Warlock.
Complete revamp of the shard system for warlocks. No more physical soul shards! That’s right, they’re gone. They will only be showed as a part of the UI. You will be given three shards, which will replenish when out of combat, and is used for one spell and one spell only: Soul Burn.
The Soul Burn spell will empower your next spell(s) cast, and can affect the spells in very different ways:

• Empowered Searing Pain : Next 3 Searing Pains will critical strike.
• Empowered Summon Demon : Instant Cast, much like Fel Domination.
• Empowered Soulfire : Instant Cast. PoM Pyro power!
• Empowered Fear : Instant Cast, like a single target Psychic horror.
• Empowered Death Coil : Longer Horror effect, more healing received.

The Soul Burn spell will have a 30 second cooldown, and be off the global cooldown. Most spells will have an empowered effect, not all.

Hunters.
Hunters will find themselves quite manaless in Cataclysm. The mana system will be completely gone, replaced by Focus. Focus will work much like energy, with a small twist: It regens 6 focus a second with normal attacks, but with Steady Shot it will regen 12 focus a second. So intellect and mana regen are now out the window. Aspect of the Viper will either be redesigned or removed. The cooldown on their abilities will be lowered, in some cases removed, and shots may cost anything from 10 to 30 focus, maybe even more. Ammo will also become an item, and not a consumable.

Pets.
This is actually already coming in 3.3, but I’ll still post it here.
In patch 3.3, pets will now scale with every stat you have, and also they’ll be affected by buffs from specific raid encounters. In addition, pets will no longer take damage from AoE spells done in PvE, but can still be damaged and die from AoE spells in PvP.
Eventually, it seems pets might get a “go to location” kind of ability, and also have a long cooldown spell which will allow you to teleport them to you. Apparently, this is because the pet AI will never bee good enough. I second that.

Items and itemization.

Stat changes.
Attack power? Gone. Mana per 5? Gone. Armor Penetration? You guessed right. Gone! Blizzard decided to revamp a lot of the stats, removing armor penetration, spell power, attack power, and mana per 5 seconds. Instead, strength will give 2 AP to plate users, agility will give 2 AP to mail and leather users, spirit will be directly related with mana regeneration, and intellect will increase your spell power. Defense rating is also gone, and tanks can become defense capped via talents. Since all these stats have been removed, all classes will get a lot of stamina, to be on pair with plate wearers. Haste has also been changed, so it now increases the rate you gain energy, focus, runic power and rage instead of increasing attack speed.

Armor penetration will actually be removed from gear, but not completely from the game, according to Blizzard. You will still be able to get armor penetration via talents, and most likely other places aswell, to be able to take down those tanks.

New legendary item!
This seems to be concerning Icecrown Citadel, and not the Cataclysm expansion, but here it is! The next legendary item to be released is….. (drumroll) …. Shadowmourne. Sorry you Frostmourne and Ashbringer hopers. Also, it seems the Corrupted Ashbringer will stay corrupted for now. You will not be able to get Frostmourne, because the sword would control you.  Just think of what it did with Arthas, that’s what it would do to you. Also, the next legendary to be introduced to World of Warcraft is a caster item.

This is it for now. More will be added as more panels will be held later.

Stay tuned for more information about The Cataclysm. You can also head over to MMO-Champion to find more in-depth coverage of the expansion.

DotA-based games seem to be the new thing everyone is throwing themselves at these days. I can’t blame them, DotA is widely popular, and also a fantastic modification. Last week, I wrote about Demigod, one of the new games based on the DotA concept. This week, I’m actually writing about a similar game, which is also based on the DotA concept. This game however, is actually as close to DotA as you can possibly come.

Heroes of Newerth (or HoN, for short) is more of a re-imagining of the DotA modification, and it seems S2 Games really put their hearts into making the most genuine DotA experience you’ve had in a while.

Before I go anymore into detail, I need to tell you that this game is still in a very early closed beta, so I can’t give you screen shots, videos, or give up big game secrets. With that being said, I’ll have to give S2 a round of applause for their work. After spending weeks playing DotA, i was quite excited about HoN, and was very curious as of how similar it was. And let me tell you, if you’re a big fan of DotA, you’re not going to be dissappointed.

First off, the game looks very good. Since S2 is not limited by the Warcraft 3 enginge (which is quite good in itself, don’t get me wrong), they’ve been able to give DotA a proper graphical makeover. And it’s been done properly aswell. You can still see that the game is very inspired by the models used in Warcraft 3, just better. The heroes look better, the landscape is smoother, and the spells and abilities are just awesome.

Speaking of heroes, this game is already packed with them. I think I managed to count at least 40 heroes already included, and since this game is still in beta, you can expect more heroes being added as the game draws closer to a final release.  Also, the heroes are very similar to the original heroes included in DotA. You’ll find heroes like the Omni-Knight, Faceless Void, Axe, Moon Priestess and more, only under new names. And of course, there are quite a few original ones, but I’ll stop there.

One of the maps I’ve been able to play is also the very same map included in DotA, only with a little make-over aswell. New names for creeps, redesigned bases, and a completely new way of shopping are just some of the things they’ve done with it.

Finding and playing games is also quite easy here. You entere the lobby, and can immediately customize your search to fit your playstyle. You have “Noobs only”, “Noobs allowed” and “Pros only”, in addition to more game mechanic specific stuff like “random heroes”, “easy mode” and so on. After that, refresh the game list, and you should be up and running in no-time.

I have a lot more to say about this game, but there’s unfortunately not much more I can say at the moment. But know this; if you can get a spot in the beta, make sure to get that spot. Play the game, see for yourself. This is a brilliant game, and I can’t wait for it to be released.

Stay tuned for a proper article on the game when it’s out.

Ever since that Defence of the Ancients (or DotA for short) modification was released for Warcraft 3, it has had a steady stream of players coming to play the newest release of the map. Tournaments are being held, prizes are being handed out, and gamers are having a lot of fun. It has been the influence for many things, including a Basshunter song. Most importantly though, it was the inspiration for one of the most entertaining games I’ve played in a while.

Demigod is a so-called Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (or MOBA) video game, a term that I believe was coined by League of Legends developers Riot Games. At first, it looks like a very simple game, with not much to do besides a skirmish here and a online battle there. Don’t be fooled however, as this game has a lot to offer for those who want to play it online.

The game has several game modes, and your objective varies based on which of these modes that were selected during game creation. You have the classic Conquest, in which you are to destroy your opponent’s Citadel. There’s a Capture the Flag mode, where you run around capping flags and holding them for a set amount of time. Another mode lets you destroy your opponents forts, which serves as Citadel defense, and the last mode is a Team Deathmatch, where the first team to reach a set amount of kills wins.

(Click the image for a larger version)

When selecting a demigod, you are offered eight different demigods to choose from. They are divided in to two groups; the Assassins and the Generals. The Assassins are mostly focused on doing damage quickly, with no minion control whatsoever. Two of the Asassins are ranged, the other two are close combat oriented. The Generals are quite different however, and are more focused on minion control and survivability, and less raw damage output. So whatever your playstyle is, you will most likely find a demigod most suited for you.

At the very beginning of any given game mode, you will be given one skill point to put into a skill of your choice, and the option to buy a starter item with something called “Favour points”. At first, you won’t have much to spend, so your items will be very basic, but as you win or lose games, you will stack up  “Favour Points”, and will be allowed to buy stronger items. Once you buy an item, you won’t have to buy it again though, so you will have access to stronger items very fast.

(Click the image for a larger version)

As you kill minions and demigods during battle, you will be granted experience  points (XP for short) and gold. When you accumulate enough XP, you will gain a new level and a new skill point to spend in whatever skill you wish. Most talent builds will be effective, but the trick is to find one that suits you as a player, and building the right talent build can give you a good start boost.
The gold you earn can be spent on two different things; items for your demigod, or upgrades for your Citadel. If you’re looking to make your demigod a destructive force to be reckoned with, spend your gold on items and artifacts. These can have passive bonuses, use bonuses, and both. You can also spend your gold to upgrade the Citadels forces, which will make things easier in general for your whole team, or even things like increasing the XP you gain, or reducing the respawn time when you die.

(Click the image for a larger version)

I’ve been playing this game for a couple of weeks now, and rarely have I been so entertained by a game as I’ve been by Demigod. The gameplay is just extremely addicting, and I can’t stop trying to find new strategies to defeat my enemies, or finding the perfect talent build with any of my favourite demigods. Even just playing against bots is great, as the games can last long and the AI isn’t completely retarded. The game looks stunning as well, and the level and character design is fantastic. Add some great sound effects and good music, and you have yourself a great game.

It’s not without faults though. The game’s only got 8 maps so far, which is fine in the beginning, but after playing for a while you’ll probably end up with one favourite map you play over and over. Hopefully, a future patch will add more maps. You also only have 8 different heroes to choose from, which is just enough to keep the game interesting. Again, more might be added in a future expansion or content patch.

Also, it has slight stability problems when playing online sometimes. It’s not as bad as some game websites will have you believe, and certainly not enough to downrank the game completely, but just enough so that sometimes you will feel very annoyed with this. Luckily, this is being worked on constantly, and will probably be fixed sometime in the near future.

Overall, the game is great. It’s actually fantastic. I’d say it’s more than worth the 40$ they’ll charge you for the digital download on their website. If you’re looking to buy one great game this summer, and you like the blend of RPG and RTS, I wouldn’t be afraid to put some money into this game. It’s certainly worth it.

This is close to old news about now, but here it is. A guild from China has finally managed to kill Yogg-Saron with absolutely no assistance from any guardians!

After some drama earlier about a bugged first kill, Stars now managed to get a legit world first kill, which netted them a few achievements: Heroic: Alone in the Darkness and Realm First! Death’s Demise, the latter of which gives them a neat title. Yes, the title is “Death’s Demise”.

In addition to some bragging rights, they also get Mimiron’s Head, probably the coolest and rarest flying mount in-game.

Congratulations goes out to Stars for their remarkable feat!

This might not be news to some of you, but to others it might be quite the piece of bad news.

Last.fm will start charging you money for streaming music from their website. The reason, supposedly, is that it’s just too darn expensive to run such a service without having a steady income from the users.

Any user living outside of the United States, the United Kingdom or Germany will have to pay a monthly fee of €3 to be able to stream music. Shocker. According to their blog post, any user will be given 30 songs for free before they will have to start paying for the service.

Other functions like scrobbling, playlists, reccomendations, artist biographies, events and videos is going to stay free to use however, which is great. And to be honest, it’s the only thing I’m using Last.fm for, so to me this change isn’t so bad. Others out there might not be as happy though.

Ever since I installed Windows 7 back in January, I’ve had some problems with the Devices and Printers window. It would just load and load, with no apparent progression. This, naturally, drove me crazy.

I’ve browsed forums and web pages for weeks now, and without any luck. But today, I found a post made by slappydog on the W7Forums. And his solution worked perfectly!

Apparently, there’s a bug with the Bluetooth service in Windows 7. After you install your bluetooth drivers, one or more of the services will be set to Manual startup. This will cause the Devices and Printers window to hang. To fix it, go to the Start menu, write “services.msc” in the search field, and press enter. From there, browse to any Bluetooth-related service, double click it, and set the startup type to Automatic on any that is set on manual. Now, try opening your Devices and Printers window. Lovely, isn’t it?

Have you ever installed a set of updates on a Windows Vista-based computer, only to see it go on in a continous loop of reboots and startup repairs? Well, you’re not a lone. Apparently this problem is very well known, and luckily, there’s an easy solution out there to fix it.

It kind of reuqires you to have the original setup disk for your Windows Vista version (or any version for that matter, as long as it’s a Vista install disk). If you don’t, this might not be as easy for you, so try to find one before reading this guide.

1. Pop the install disk in, and boot from it. When booted, select language options, keyboard options et cetera, and continue.
2. Select “Repair your computer”, and select your Windows Vista installation.
3. At this point, your computer might or might not start automatically repairing. In any case, whenever you can, choose “System Restore”.
4. Select a restore point prior to installing the faulty updates, and continue. When it finishes and boots into Windows, don’t install any updates.
5. Head on over to this Microsoft webpage. Select the language that applies to your version of Vista, and download it.
6. Install the patch, and reboot. Then, install remaining updates, and reboot again.
7. ???????
8. Profit.

Note: If the update refuses to install on your system, it means you already have it installed, or you might even need some previous updates before you’re able to install it. In any case, your system should be up and running again by the time you’re about to apply the update, so you can completely ignore any Windows Updates if that makes you happy. It’s completely up to you.

Back when 3.1 was released, Blizzard had promised us an equipment manager to go with the nifty dual talent specialization. This, however, did not appear, as apparently it was harder to implement than first imagined.

Today though, it was released through the newest patch, and has roughly the same functionality as addons we’ve been using for years (ClosetGnome and ItemRack, for example). It will let you store profiles for item sets, and let you quickly switch between sets, granted you have the items in your backback (or in the bank as long as you have the bank window open).

Just having this possibility is nice without having to rely on more addons, but it’s kind of a shame that they keep making this easy game even easier.

If you want to read the full patch notes, head over to WoWhead and check it out.

I guess you’re about as surprised as I am, but Ensidia has earned another world first.
About a month or so after the launch of Ulduar, Ensidia has completed a sufficient amount of Ulduar achievements to earn Glory of the Ulduar Raider. This achievement rewards them with a nifty mount, the Rusted Proto-Drake, one of the better looking mounts in the game at the moment.

Note that this is the 10 man version of this achievement. Heroic: Glory of the Ulduar Raider has still not been beaten, and I suspect that it will take some time before anyone will earn that one. Though, do not be surprised if it’s unlocked within a couple of weeks, you never know with the kind of progress certain guilds have in Ulduar these days.

As usual, head over to MMO-Champion for the latest and greatest World of Warcraft news and updates.