While the 2008 World of Warcraft Trading Card Game World Championship may be over, there's plenty of time to begin preparing for next year's season.

Miss out on the 2008 World Championship party and want to be there next year? You’ll have to fight it out like everyone else by starting in Regionals, then battling your way through your National or Continental Championships before landing yourself an invite to the biggest event of the year!

Regionals will take place from May 16, 2009 to August 9, 2009. Championships will take place internationally from Aug. 15 through Sept. 13. The North American Continental Championship will be held from Aug. 14-16 in Indianapolis, Ind., and the World Championship will take place from Oct. 8-11 in Austin, Texas.

A full list of the "Road to Worlds" stops can be found here. There's more than $250,000 in cash and prizes at stake.

Malgayne from Wowhead just dropped me a note about their newest feature - an animated 3D viewer!

That's right, we've made an upgrade to the 3D modelviewer ! In addition to being able to see all of your favorite items and NPCs in three dimensions, now the high-quality Java version of the modelviewer is fully animated !

This works on NPCs as well as on character models. Try it for yourself, and see your favorite creatures from a new perspective!

For example...

• The Lich King himself !
• A death knight in full regalia !
• The most horrifying creature Blizzard has ever conceived !

This is awesome! Good job guys!

SK Gaming EU has won the WoW PvP Arena tournament in the Intel Extreme Masters Global Challenge, which was held in Montreal, Canada, over the weekend.

They beat Gravitas Gaming, of the United States, to take home $15,000. the Gravitas players walked away with $6,000, but not before teammate Celex smashed his laptop and part of the backdrop in the players' area in a "nerd rage" after losing the final match. Lucky for us, the whole embarassing ordeal is on YouTube.

For full coverage of the final match, check out this article on SK Gaming's Web site. Both teams were comprised of a rogue, mage and priest.

Our very own Wordaen is currently at BlizzCon absorbing all the information the event has to offer. For his first panel, Wordaen attended a discussion regarding Blizzard's intentions for each class in World of Warcraft.

Check out our BlizzCon wiki to read Wordaen's article on the class discussion. He covers everything from a complete overhaul of the hunter pet system to the changes in all three talent trees for warriors. Of course, Wordaen outlines the death knight class in depth, as well.

Classes weren't the only topic of conversation at the panel. Blizzard also discussed major changes in buffs/debuffs in groups and raids. While they didn't talk much about dual specs, they did have this to say:

Dual Specs are going to be designed more for flexibility and "on the fly" swapping (such as in a raid setting) but they are not going to be something as viable for a hardcore raider as they will for a more casual playstyle.

Once you've read Wordaen's article, discuss it in our forum.

If you haven't heard yet, The Guild is attending BlizzCon!

The whole cast of The Guild will be attending Blizzcon Friday and Saturday! There will be a Guild panel from 1:30 - 2:30pm on Saturday where we will preview Season 2 as well as answer questions about Season 1 and anything else the audience would like to hear!

Also, thanks to the kindness of Blizzard, we will have a booth set up where we will be selling DVDs and an Official Cast Photo, debuting at the con! All 6 main cast members will be hanging out, but will be specifically signing DVDs and Photos at the following times in the booth:
Friday 11am-1pm
Saturday 3-5pm

Please stop by and say hi, or catch us around Blizzcon!

Our faithful Tamat, wandering the halls of BlizzCon apparently caught up with some of the folks from The Guild, (pics or it didn't happen! ) inspiring our resident wiki guru, Bludwyng, to cry! But while others were discussing the awesome WoW inspired show in IRC it turns out two of our resident WoW admins are unaware of the greatnes of The Guild! Tyrandor and fewyn are hearby banned to the depths of Darqflame's dungeon until they've watched at least season one! Which is on sale now in DvD format for only $20, or can be viewed online!

If you're sitting at home mashing your refresh button on our coverage wiki instead of attending BlizzCon '08, here's a chance to get in on the action!  The official BlizzCon page has this offer :

Here's your chance to participate in BlizzCon even if you aren't able to be there in person. We're now asking folks to submit their burning questions related to the Warcraft, StarCraft, or Diablo game universes. We'll sort through them all and pick the best questions to be answered live during DIRECTV's pay-per-view broadcast of BlizzCon 2008. If your question is selected, you'll also receive an ATI graphics card and some exclusive BlizzCon merchandise. For submission information, contest rules, and a list of prizes, visit our contest page.

Good luck!  And let's hope we hear something regarding Duel Speccing soon!

BlizzCon 2008 is here! In what is considered to be a gamer's spiritual journey, more than 16,000 attendees have gathered in Anaheim, Calif., to learn more about their favorite Blizzard Entertainment titles.

Lucky for us, those 16,000 attendees just happen to include dedicated members of the ZAM Network staff, including some familiar faces (like Tamat and Wordaen ) from our own Allakhazam family, so you can expect to see tons of exclusive coverage that only this site will be able to provide. It will all be posted on our BlizzCon wiki.

The ZAM staff is comprised of hardcore gamers, and their excitement is already shining through in their coverage of the event. Yesterday afternoon was primarily just registration and the pre-show, but you can already find a wealth of exclusive information on our wiki. The opening ceremony hasn't even started yet, but you can check out a photo gallery, a recap of some upcoming WoW projects as told by Lead Designer Jeff Kaplan (dance studio, anyone?), an editorial by Editor-in-Chief Andrew "Tamat" Beegle on the unlucky fans who were unable to get tickets, and an interview with our very own WoW Senior Content Manager Brian "Wordaen" Kincaid on attending his first BlizzCon.

Keep checking our BlizzCon wiki for continuous updates throughout the weekend and keep reading below for more in-depth information.

According to Blizzard, the streaming trial client will be temporary unavailable while they prepare the upcoming "Echoes of Doom" content update.

Interested players can still try out WoW for free by downloading the full trial client here: PC, MAC. The streaming trial client will be up and running again a few days after the launch of the patch.

My guess is that most of you have full accounts (or maybe even two or three), but this is still good to know. The full Blizzard post from the WoW official site can be found below.

With Halloween just around the corner, there's a good chance you're already thinking of buying pumpkins to carve. Well, if you're still thinking of artistic ideas, why not carve a Blizzard-themed pumpkin for a chance to win a Logitech G51 Surround Sound Speaker System ?

Blizzard is hosting its sixth annual pumpkin-carving contest until Oct. 28. The pumpkins must be related to World of Warcraft or another Blizzard Entertainment title. Since it would be difficult to mail the carved pumpkin to the judges, you'll have to take a picture, so make sure the lighting showacases your work.

In addition to the speakers, winners will have their creations posted on the World of Warcraft and Blizzard Web sites. For the full rules and submission tips, check the contest page or keep reading below.

Recently I decided to take out my Gnokon Deluxe camera and visit all the wonderful goblin run barber shops that will be populating the major cities of the Horde and Alliance soon. While on my trek I visited shops of both the sides and found willing volunteers who would like to pose for me and after many hours of pasting together I put them in one central location! Our wiki! Feel free to browse the many selections of new and old hairstyles here or come discuss it with us here !