Earlier this week, Blizzard finally announced a release date for World of Warcraft Classic, a barebones re-release of World of Warcraft long before it was filled with countless expansions. WoW Classic promises a pure, vanilla experience, one that a portion of the World of Warcraft playerbase has been chasing through unsanctioned vanilla servers stripped of various expansions. The game releases on August 27, which, while still a few months away, is still somewhat exciting, seeing as now most fans have an actual date to look forward to.
However, that’s not the full extent of Blizzard’s announcement. The developer behind World of Warcraft Classic has also announced that it will release a closed beta test for chosen (note this word) players to participate in. The closed beta is meant to test Blizzard’s servers, which I’m guessing will be pretty full once the game actually releases. Blizzard hopes that this beta can prepare them for a smooth launch, since this is pretty big for World of Warcraft players.
That said, in some people’s excitement, they have glossed over some very important facts about the beta release. While this is understandable as tensions and overall hype is pretty high, it’s still important to be level-headed, as reminded by a recent post by community manager Kaivax on the Blizzard forums.
With regards to supposed ‘beta keys’ for World of Warcraft Classic, Kaivax said that this closed beta is “a good time to remind all testers and potential testers that there are no such things at ‘Beta Keys’ for WoW Classic, and there is no way to transfer access to the WoW Classic Beta Test.”
Let this also be a public server announcement that the only way to get into the beta is to do the following:
- Browse the Battle.net ‘Beta Profile Settings Page’ on your Battle.net account.
- Find and select ‘World of Warcraft Classic under ‘Beta Tests I’m Interested in.’
- Click the ‘Update Preferences’ button.
The system is automated, meaning that once slots are available, beta testers will be chosen, without any beta key to speak of. Kaivax then goes to stress the importance of your account security, stating that, “any third-party e-mail messages, websites, or in-game whispers that offer beta keys or access to the WoW Classic Beta should be considered illegitimate and ignored or reported.”
If you’ve been messaged with any of these, Blizzard has released a nifty article on what to do, which can be found here.
As always, it’s important to remember that we can be hyped about things, but not to the extent that we let ourselves be vulnerable to possible malicious acts in the process. Keep your accounts safe at all times and happy playing!
