Blizzard has issued a deadline for World of Warcraft players to migrate their logins to Battle.net. Ho-hum you might think, especially if you don't play the game. However games site IncGamers has a theory - one we think is valid - that the deadline may also cue something big: the launch of the StarCraft II beta shortly after this deadline lifts.
However we'd like to go one step further and suggest
this development may be behind the delayed PC version of Modern Warfare 2 (if it actually IS delayed, that is).
First, here's the notice for any WoW slackers who aren't already on B.net:
BREAKING NEWS
October 12, 2009 12:00PM PST
Required Battle.net Account Conversions
In 30 days, on November 11, 2009, all accounts must be converted into a Battle.net account to login to World of Warcraft. Any existing account that upgrades to the Battle.net platform, including ones that were upgraded in the past, will receive a brand new in-game penguin pet starting later this week.
Please visit http://www.battle.net to convert your existing account into a Battle.net account or visit the forums for more information.
The reason why some may believe StarCraft II's beta will follow this deadline is the common belief that it's Battle.net which is dragging the chain with SCII now, not the game itself. Indeed, in our first hands-on session with the game parts of the presentation were amended because Battle.net wasn't up to the team's satisfaction. A ready-for-initial-inspection Battle.net therefore means Blizzard could commence the estimated six month beta period for StarCraft II and therefore avoid pushing the game's release into the same half-year as the WoW Cataclysm expansion.
So: let's play the idle speculator and operate on the (hope?) that StarCraft II's beta will surface mid-November. Suddenly, you've taken a whole whack of PC gamers out of circulation as they get their hands on the shiny new beta.
Not the environment you want to release your biggest PC gun of the year - Modern Warfare 2 - into.
So perhaps - now really stretching the speculation - you decide shunting the PC version of Modern Warfare 2 back a couple of weeks on PC will give time for the initial frenzy over StarCraft II's beta to subside, and the less devoted PC gamers to warm up their wallet for MW2.We'd suggest it makes corporate sense to release SCII's beta into a market (initially) uncluttered by MW2
Pure speculation of course. For all we know Activision could release Modern Warfare 2 on PC at the same time as console, and the StarCraft II beta could go off in December.
StarCraft II beta imminent? [IncGamers]
