Gamescom Hearthstone rumours

[BenBos]

So after seeing on their Facebook page that they will invite a few hundred US beta testers per week through Facebook, I just asked straight away a German CM who is attending GamesCom in Koln.

And he confirmed what I already feared.

No beta until mid (probably end) of Sep for us EU Blizzard fans.

Cold shower.

Oh yeah, the new announcement this afternoon is all about Diablo 3 and a more sandbox experience.

Pfff. I am gonna play Heavy Rain on my new PS3.

[Byrogan]

So after seeing on their Facebook page that they will invite a few hundred US beta testers per week through Facebook

Huh? Got a link for that?

[Deleted]

From someone else at games con: http://imgur.com/ODqb8Qf

"i asked a Dev about 2 Minutes ago, he said the Beta should be going live within the next 24 - 48 hours."

"they will hand out Beta Keys yes! - i got mine 5 Minutes ago, and the Dev said: "There you go. You´re a nice Person, have fun!""

Source: http://www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/...from_gamescom/

[BenBos]

From someone else at games con: http://imgur.com/ODqb8Qf

"i asked a Dev about 2 Minutes ago, he said the Beta should be going live within the next 24 - 48 hours."

"they will hand out Beta Keys yes! - i got mine 5 Minutes ago, and the Dev said: "There you go. You´re a nice Person, have fun!""

Source: http://www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/...from_gamescom/

Well then, we will see in 24 hours who is right, the nameless Dev or the German CM.

[Deleted]

I think you got trolled by the german CM, there is no way that they will wait up to 30 days to start the eu beta.

[Deleted]

Seems like you may be right

http://www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/...a_at_gamescom/

But if the hearthstone beta is coming out at the end of september for EU... idk what ill do

[xskarma]

Changed the title to not give people a heart attack. All we have is rumours so far. What the OP said may be true, or what the reddit commentor has said might be true, we won't know till BLizzard confirms things in more reliable channels then this.

I hope of course that the 24-48 hour Beta is true, but I've asked around and not heard anything positive that it's true. For one thing there is no actual HS dev at Gamescom. The only HS team 5 member at Gamescom is the lead artist.

Rumours like this will keep swirling around untill EU beta actually hits, so take anything you hear outside of official channels with a grain of salt to prevent being very disappointed, repeatedly.

[Deleted]

While these are only rumor's and confirmed to be untrue on Twitter it's likely that they would have denied it even if they were true (as many other companies would do).
Either way you can always participate in all the giveaways and create an account with location set as US - if key is attached to such account you would be able to download the game and play it whether your located in states or not.

[Deleted]

The official presentation at gamescon is tomorrow. It REALLY would't make any sense if they didn't release a first wave after that

[PolarVargen]

Why would they delay it though for EU? Does it have something to do with the in-game shop? (buying packfor irl money)

[Deleted]

Why would they delay it though for EU? Does it have something to do with the in-game shop? (buying packfor irl money)

Possibly wanting to tout the demo at Gamescom, If everyone had it already then HS wouldn't get as good a reception possibly? Not sure, just guessing to be honest.

[xskarma]

Why would they delay it though for EU?

No idea. I have no clue what happens behind the scenes in programming land.

I do know that Blizzard has a stake in releasing it since there was a blue post about a technical issue that stated they'd need to test the fix when other stores went online. Since there's mostly only the EU store that's not been launched they have a reason to want that launched to test this particular fix.

It's not unlikely that Blizz have a very good reason to be timely with theri release of EU servers and beta so they can test other possible bugs that they need tested/fixed.

[Imnick]

It's already the end of August, Mid-September really isn't that much of a wait honestly.

[Deleted]

It's already the end of August, Mid-September really isn't that much of a wait honestly.

yes it is.
I dont have access to the beta cause iam EU and i am already tired of the game cause of all the stuff i read and streams i watch..
Also i know beta has a purpose, to test stuff, but considering they don´t have to worry about packing the games, shipping, distributing etc they could hurry the fuck up about it with the beta, mid septemember for EU beta is preposterous.. that means we will only get to play live in 65/70 days give or take..that is brutal

[Bluesftw]

oh c'mon now , gimmie either 5.4 or hs beta, bored of tot already...

[Imnick]

I also don't have access to the beta because I'm in the EU.
But... it's a Beta, not a Launch. I am not entitled to early access to a game that isn't finished. They don't need EU players to test their game at all even, and setting up EU accessible servers costs them money that they don't actually need to spend except to make me happy, so I can wait three or four weeks if I have to.
And... that's how long it is until mid-September. Three to four weeks. That really, really isn't a long time, when talking about software.

Please stop being so impatient.

[BenBos]

I also don't have access to the beta because I'm in the EU.
But... it's a Beta, not a Launch. I am not entitled to early access to a game that isn't finished. They don't need EU players to test their game at all even, and setting up EU accessible servers costs them money that they don't actually need to spend except to make me happy, so I can wait three or four weeks if I have to.
And... that's how long it is until mid-September. Three to four weeks. That really, really isn't a long time, when talking about software.

Please stop being so impatient.

oh really...

Look this is a CARD game. There is abolutely no technical reason why EU is excluded from this testing fase.

On the contrary ... a Yankee living in Poland... CAN take part in the sweepstakes, a New Yorker in Italy CAN too !

So it is clearly a question of bad planning on Blizzard's part and it appears the CM guy I was talking to was right: only US BattleNet gets in.

The rest - for whatever lousy reason - is blocked.

The sad fact is that apart from this CM guy speaking, Blizzard is not telling why OR when the first of our anxious EU players MAY get in.

Is it the end of the world ? Nope, but there is nothing more frustrating than be handled as second rate customers.

So the beta planner in this case is an idiot.

... And it can even get worse ... the ABSENCE of any other Blizzard source is not very promising... In my view they already realised they made a mistake by excluding EU ... but they don't have a plan B to solve it.

[Deleted]

Even though I agree that the way they treat us EU players really sucks, I'd say lets wait for an offcial Blizz response on the matter, before we jump to conclusions.

[Imnick]

There is a technical reason not to allow EU players, EU players would get bad latency on US servers and their presence would clog US servers with a much higher player count.
The hardware is not yet in place for EU Hearthstone servers and setting it up costs them money without really much benefit on their end than stopping us from whining.

[Fengas]

There is a technical reason not to allow EU players, EU players would get bad latency on US servers and their presence would clog US servers with a much higher player count.
The hardware is not yet in place for EU Hearthstone servers and setting it up costs them money without really much benefit on their end than stopping us from whining.

That makes no sense since when the game launches we will still have to have our own servers then.