World of Warcraft Television Appearances

I've been seeing World of Warcraft popping up as a "guest star" in several television series lately. (Perhaps it needs an "episode list" on imdb.)

WoW Insider recently posted about a reference on Judge Judy. And we all remember the "Make Love not Warcraft" episode of South Park.

Now this Fall's television season has added two more shows to the growing cache of WoW television exposure. Perhaps a long writer's strike won't just send viewers to their PCs to play WoW, but the writers as well. When they come back we may see this list grow.

How I Met Your Mother (Season 3, Episode 5):


Big Bang Theory:
#1 - (at 0:31)


#2 - 1:41

(Updated 11/20/07 to fix sound alignment.)


Older Appearances:

Stargate Atlantis:
#1 - 1:26


#2 - 0:48


Jeopardy: 0:14

Make Love Not Warcraft - The DVD

You remember Make Love, Not Warcraft, right? Well now you can own it on DVD via the South Park Season 10 DVD, which includes a 14 day World of Warcraft Trial.

Target's Special Version:
I was at Target and noticed they have two versions:

Their special version has Lenticular packaging and a free episode of the Sarah Silverman show. You are also eligible for a $5 gift card at check out.

This pic shows the alternate image on the special packaging:


For more coverage of the South Park and WoW - WoW Insider has a good collection of posts tagged "South Park."

From Amazon:

Magazine Updates Fall 2006

New "Massive" Magazine
About two weeks ago I went to the local super sized Barnes & Noble to see if I could get another copy of Becket's Massive Online Gamer. I didn't find that but I found a new magazine called "Massive." Got a "first" issue. :)

Computer Gaming World's Last Issue
I also got my last issue of Computer Gaming World (last one on my subscription actually) before they switch over to Games for Windows. Perhaps by now we can go back and get a first issue of the new magazine.



Previous Post On These Magazines

South Park and WoW Show Bits

Blizzard and Comedy Central released a joint press release advertising the fact that World of Warcraft would be featured in a South Park episode. Here's the premise (from the Press Release):

In this episode, the boys come into contact with a gamer who doesn't play by the rules. Even the creative people behind World of Warcraft don't know how to stop the renegade. They are forced to put all of their hope into the hands of the kids of South Park. The boys dedicate their lives to defeating the mad gamer and saving the game for all.

Youtube has some snippets, one is the same montage (but with video) featured on the World of Warcraft website.


This is another snippet that shows a little about the premise of tonight's show:


It's set to air tonight (10/4/06) on Comedy Central at 10pm.

Update 10/6/06:
Well I thought it was hysterical. Although there's about 5 seconds I'd cut if I could (gross!). Here are some commentaries from across the web:

WoW Forums Thread

Sword of 1,000 Truths

World of Warcraft Addict's Blog

IGN.com says 9.3 out of 10.

This livejournal poster says prepare for the influx of South Park newbs

Update 10/15/06: I just noticed today that you can download this on itunes at $1.99 for anyone who missed it. Right now it's the only episode of SP available. But for future reference it's the first episode of Season 10B: "Make Love, Not Warcraft."

Two Magazine Updates

There are two updates to the Magazine world:

Computer Gaming World (Previous Introduction) Update: Big News CGW is transitioning to a new magazine this fall - "Games for Windows"

Becket's Massive Online Gamer Magazine (Previous Introduction) Update: Ouch! A review of the magazine from mmognation. I believe the words "Utter Crap" were used.

MMO Magazine

One thing I found in Sprawl's Scrawl was a link to Beckett's MMO Magazine. I have previously mentioned some magazines that were useful in keeping up with WoW. This one is new. It's published bi-monthly so it would likely still suffer from a time lag as far as currency of information, but because the genre is narrower the frequency of WoW related posts might be greater. Plus it might provide useful when we are looking for another MMO to migrate to.

If you want to see more, here is their website with a sneak preview of what's inside the magazine and subscription instructions ($14.99 for 6 issues).

Crossing the Streams #4 - Internet

Crossing the Streams - Part 4 of 4: Internet

The internet is definitely the fastest way to get up to date information about World of Warcraft.

There are several sources you might try:

Type	Content	Examples
Player Blogs	Player Experiences	You are here.
Databases	Information/Data/News	Thottbot.com
Community Sites	Player Experiences	livejournal.com
Official Sites	Information/Data/News	worldofwarcraft.com

Find more Player Blogs in the sidebar under the list "WoW Blogs". Databases and other sites are also listed under "WoW Reference."

Crossing the Streams #3 - Podcasts

Crossing the Streams - Part 3 of 4: Sound

I just recently began exploring the world of Podcasts by focusing on World of Warcraft content. But you don't need an iPod to listen to them; any MP3 player (or even Media Player or Quicktime) will do.

There are a lot of podcasts out there but these are two that I've listened to that I thought were worth the time. (Trust me there are those that are not worth your time.)

Recommended:

• Taverncast


• The Instance

In fact, I highly recommend Taverncast. I'm addicted to it now. I've been listening to the shows on my way in to work for the past few weeks. I started at episode one and now I'm up to about 15. A couple of players get together and discuss the game over a pint. Or two. The discussion is usually pretty intelligent and I've learned quite a number of play tactics from listening. On occasion they go off topic but usually it's pretty funny. One reason I may gravitate toward them is a) they aren't big into Raids 24/7/365; b) they're over the age of 18; and c) they reference pop culture the way I do.

Crossing the Streams #2 - Magazines

Crossing the Streams - Part 2 of 4: Print

Next up is Print. It's much more current than television. The World of Warcraft content I've seen is not necessarily tip based, but more peripheral - what's coming (great articles on the Burning Crusade), who's playing, etc... There are two PC Game magazines that I often read that regularly feature World of Warcraft. They are:

Computer Gaming World	PC Gamer

Computer Gaming World (CGW) partners with 1up.com and you can find one of what I consider their "flagship" articles online here: Wage Slaves about Gold Farming in MMOs (with a lot of discussion on WoW). (A truly meaty article including interviews with farmers.)

PC Gamer (pcgamer.com) is interesting because they've decided not to accept any ads from gold farmers. I don't know CGW's stance on that. Also, there's a Burning Crusade article they published in February that I keep hanging around to remind me of what's coming.

The other benefits of reading these magazines include articles about video cards, gaming PCs, etc... Plus I can take a look at all those games I'm telling myself that I am or am not missing (depending on the day) while I'm playing WoW.

Crossing the Streams #1 - Gamer TV

Crossing the Streams - Part 1 of 4: Television (good ol' television).

You can get information about World of Warcraft through television, however, the information has generally shown to be the most stale of the media available.

Determine if you get G4 TV from your cable or satellite service. It's a gamers network. Yup, a whole network all about Gaming.

With shows such as X-Play (reviews), Cinematech (game cut scenes or game play videos) or Cheat! (self explanatory) occasionally you'll see World of Warcraft or your other favorite games featured.

According to my DirecTV schedule on April 14th (10:30 am ET) they'll run the Cheat! Episode they first aired in 2005. I reaaaallly wish they would update this. For such a popular game you would think that there would be more programming or at least up to date programming.