Ghostcrawler: The Glenn Beck of the World of Warcraft?

[Killadrix]

While traveling today, I turned my car radio to the Patriot channel on SiriusXM to listen to Glenn Beck, and I couldn’t believe the striking similarities between he and our Dear Leader, Greg “Ghostcrawler” Street.

In this Age of Empires, both men are world class trolls who rule their subscription based services with an iron fist from high atop thrones constructed from the broken hopes and discarded dreams of their subscribers; Glenn Beck at The Blaze News, and Greg Street at Activision Blizzard.

Beck, not being satisfied with the standard model of earning income through advertising on his news channels, chose to bend over his viewers and listeners for a monthly fee like a prison shower scene.

Ghostcrawler wasn’t satisfied with a monthly fee, so he has decided to gouge his customers with a cash shop where World of Warcraft players can spend real life money on goods and services which give them an advantage over other players who either too poor, too stupid, or too stubborn to min/max their characters.

Each of these men work tirelessly to leverage the fame of their platform to pedal their own brand of conservative justice with their belief that the only avenue to success should be through hard work, dedication and excruciatingly long hours, and not by giving everyone an equal opportunity.

In Ghostcrawler’s case, this is evidenced by him forcing his PVE Encounter Design team to focus on creating increasingly, and often times exceedingly difficult encounters in order to meet the rigorous demands of WoW’s most hardcore players.

He does this all while unabashedly dismissing and neglecting the wants and needs of the casual players who often times find themselves out in the cold despite the fact they pay the same subscription fee as those to whom are consistently and systematically catered.

Both men also appear to be staunch pro-life supporters. When Ghostcrawler penned Thrall’s back story, he was a little heavy handed with the standard pro-life talking points which were expertly woven into the rags-to-riches story.

For those of you who aren’t a lore junkie like myself, you might be interested to know that as a baby, Thrall was found lying amongst the bodies of his dead parents by Aedelas Blackmoore, and instead of aborting the unwanted child on the spot, Blackmoore took him prisoner, named him “Thrall” (meaning “slave” – racist, much?), and raised him in a broken, abusive household.

As Thrall’s story progresses, the young Orc rises to power as the Warchief of the Horde.

What this story attempts to teach us is that for every million unwanted children whom are born into abusive homes or orphanages or are raised in internment camps, and/or are forced to compete in gladitorial combat every day, one of them might actually grow up to make something of themselves, so we had better not kill any of them no matter how much sense it makes.

When it comes to the environment, both Beck and Street seem to value capitalism and corporations over clean air, clean water and a sustainable future on the planet of Azeroth.

This is evidenced in WoW by Ghostcrawler’s glamorization of the industrial and anarcho-capitalist Goblin faction who have endlessly polluted the Lost Isles, Orgimmar, and The Barrens.

Street has also failed to address the effects that global warming has played on the flooding of Darkshore, the drought in Durotar, the giant, sweaty asscrack that separates the Northern and Southern Barrens, or the massive maelstrom puckerhole separating Northern and Southern Stranglethorn Vale.

To make matters worse, I believe that the Burning Crusade storyline of Thrall traveling to Nagrand to commune with the elements is nothing short of clever satire and the tongue-in-cheek lampooning of Barack Obama’s Presidential campaign claims to “heal the Earth”.

Good one, GC – but you’re busted.

Both Beck and Street also have a history of sensationalizing tragedies. How could anyone forget his smug “TO THE GROUND!” quote which he made when previewing pre-Wrath Ret Pallies nerfs? Or the way he cherishes reporting unwanted, unneeded and unnecessary nerfs like the ones which Mages, Hunters and Feral Druids will be receiving in Patch 5.4?

Street also seems to remain in lockstep with conservative values in his apparent support for the death penalty. Every expansion pack, the quest and encounter teams do nothing but task us with hunting down and executing thousands of villains and evil-doers, often times in the comfort of the their own homes, with no due process of law.

The only perp we ever successfully brought to justice was Hogger, but that was only a brief reprieve, as only a few levels later we were ordered to break into the Stockades and murder him in cold blood.

At the end of the day, Greg “Ghostcrawler” Street has us all by the short and curlies and he knows it.

It only takes a few seconds of browsing his Twitter feed to see him skewering wide-eyed, hopeful and passionate players who have done nothing but ask legitimate questions, with his short, curt and snarky replies.

[Therougetitan]

Uh... Ghostcrawler sounds more like the scapegoat. You're blaming him for things he has not done.

He did not choose cosmetic shop, that was probably the lead content designer or the higher ups of Blizzard. Ghostcrawler is not the lead content designer.

He did not write Thrall. That was Metzen, and Christie Golden who wrote his backstory in Lord of the clans. He was not part of the team in BC was he? Why are you blaming things he's not even in charge of. Ghostcrawler is not on the creative development team.

Is this a troll post? I feel like I took the bait

[Tydrane]

/violent eye roll

[Aeluron Lightsong]

You make a very dramatic case don't you.

[Deja Thoris]

Christ, do you live in a different dimension?

I find most of the stuff you wrote false.

[Notos]

TL;DR

The difference between them is Glenn Beck lives in a fantasy world and GC controls a fantasy world.

[Deleted]

Well if Ghostcrawler=entire of Blizzard WoW, you might had made a point. Seeing as he isn't point dissolves.

[Darsithis]

This is outright ridiculous.

[Theiea]

I dont even know what to say...

Maybe you should step outside for a bit.

[Xeraxis]

This is outright ridiculous.

You're only enabling him Dars by keeping it open. Do us all a favor and help him take the first step to recovery.

[Mormolyce]

Really hope this is satire.

/violent eye roll

Tell me about it. My left one popped out.

[MoanaLisa]

Ghostcrawler wasn’t satisfied with a monthly fee, so he has decided to gouge his customers with a cash shop where World of Warcraft players can spend real life money on goods and services which give them an advantage over other players who either too poor, too stupid, or too stubborn to min/max their characters.

I imagine he ran it by Morhaime and some of the other founders first although I doubt if this was his idea at all. Likely he was told the decision was made and told to set it up since that's what he does. The problem is this calls the whole rest of your post into question as you don't seem to have a solid grasp of what he does. The Age of Empires reference was nice though if irrelevant.

Both men also appear to be staunch pro-life supporters. When Ghostcrawler penned Thrall’s back story, he was a little heavy handed with the standard pro-life talking points which were expertly woven into the rags-to-riches story.

I suppose when he had that idea as well as all of the other story stuff in your post he had to run it by Metzen since Metzen--you know--writes the story.

I'll play along for a while though.

Everyone else play nice.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

But...what if I don't want to play nice?

[Skroe]

What the hell did I just read.... I don't even...


You just wrote a thousand word rant. Your life could have been better spent doing pretty much anything else.

[Annarion]

I think the first giveaway is how he puts on Glenn Beck. As if anyone would ever willingly listen to Glenn Beck, not to mention pay for the channel, unless they were a staunch supporter, of which Killadrix clearly isn't, judging by the way he judges the so-called pundit.

[Teriz]

You got to be kidding dude.

Ghostcrawler is just doing his job. Leave him alone, sheesh!

[Celista]

Ghostcrawler ≠ everyone at Blizzard. He is in charge of systems design. He may be in charge of class balance and design, but he not in charge of bad lore. Or the Blizzard shop.

You can blame someone else for that.

[KrazyK923]

The word you're looking for is scapegoat.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Ghostcrawler ≠ everyone at Blizzard. He is in charge of systems design. He may be in charge of class balance and design, but he not in charge of bad lore.

You can blame someone else for that.

BUT MOM!!!!!!

In all seriousness bad lore is probably more for Metzen,Kosak and...other names that escape me.

[Celista]

Street also seems to remain in lockstep with conservative values in his apparent support for the death penalty. Every expansion pack, the quest and encounter teams do nothing but task us with hunting down and executing thousands of villains and evil-doers, often times in the comfort of the their own homes, with no due process of law.

I think this part was my favorite part.

BUT MOM!!!!!!

In all seriousness bad lore is probably more for Metzen,Kosak and...other names that escape me.

Yeah. Don't get me wrong, WoW lore has its...issues...but I highly doubt GC has any part of it.