Xfire to broadcast WoW's Sunwell Plateau raid live
by Samuel Axon 
Jun 23rd 2008 at 8:00PM
Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Video, Events, real-world, Endgame, News items
This Wednesday at noon (EDT), Xfire will run a live broadcast of a raid in World of Warcraft's top instance -- the Sunwell Plateau. The raid will be performed by famous uberguild Nihilum, and the broadcast will run on the Dyyno technology.
This is the second raid broadcast by Xfire, but this time around advances in technology enable a higher number of viewers and better quality. Up to 4,000 people may tune in. Four different points of view will be provided -- those of a Warrior, a Hunter, a Druid, and a Warlock. The raid is expected to last between three and four hours. To watch, you'll have to head over to Xfire's website and install both the Xfire client and the Dyyno plugin.
What do you think, readers? Pro-level raiding as a spectator sport? Is that something you're actually intrigued by, or does it sound like a terrible waste of time? We're skeptical, but maybe we're just not as l33t as j00.
This is the second raid broadcast by Xfire, but this time around advances in technology enable a higher number of viewers and better quality. Up to 4,000 people may tune in. Four different points of view will be provided -- those of a Warrior, a Hunter, a Druid, and a Warlock. The raid is expected to last between three and four hours. To watch, you'll have to head over to Xfire's website and install both the Xfire client and the Dyyno plugin.
What do you think, readers? Pro-level raiding as a spectator sport? Is that something you're actually intrigued by, or does it sound like a terrible waste of time? We're skeptical, but maybe we're just not as l33t as j00.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Calarius said on 8:54PM 6-23-2008
Might be the only chance some of us get to see it. I might just have to look in.
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Ghen said on 7:13AM 6-24-2008
Totally right, I've never seen past the first boss in AQ40 and I've never seen Naxx beyond the first group of mobs... and there's plenty of people who didn't even get that far.
Ghen said on 7:14AM 6-24-2008
oops, 2nd boss in AQ40 hehe been a while =)
Colin Brennan said on 5:47PM 9-17-2008
I'm in with you guys on this... this might be one of the few chances I'll have to see Sunwell Plateau in a form that isn't screenshots. Sure, it may not be the same as actually doing it, but better to live vicariously than not at all.
Kanthalos said on 9:28PM 6-23-2008
I'm definitely going to check this out. While I think PvP has more of a spectator appeal to it than PvE (AoC's sieges for instance), I do think that this could get bigger in the future and I'm pretty excited to see how this turns out.
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Arabica said on 12:28AM 6-24-2008
Laugh if you must but I enjoy watching other people do stuff that I simply can't do. Saying that all these people do is hit buttons is like saying all Alex Rodriguez does it hit a ball. They know their class better than I could ever want to know it and they know how to squeeze out the last bit of dps, healing, or mitigation as if they truly could draw blood from a stone.
Yes, a lot of that is gear but having played WoW and having my head screwed on straight while doing it I realized that some people were truly just much better at it than me. THOSE are the people I wouldn't mind watching on a Saturday/Sunday morning in the same way that I would hop on the couch to watch a baseball game or golf tournament.
I don't care how many hours they spent getting to where they are, they are better at this stuff than I am and it would be interesting to watch on many levels.
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Kaantu said on 8:57AM 6-24-2008
Just stating my own opinions here, but I question how this could possibly be at all exciting.
Top guild in the world as far as downing bosses go...
Geared to the absolute max...
All homework done for just the right set of chants/gems/pots/specs...
And finally, a well-tuned script of "you stand here, you stand here, you stand over there, you do this at this point, you start swinging at this point, you stop healing at this point and start again at this other point, you do this then, etc, etc, etc, etc......
Boss down...
I seriously doubt there will be any total party wipes during this broadcast run, so the outcome has already been decided.
Would anyone bother watching a sporting event if you knew what the final score was going to be each and every time?
The only way this could possibly be exciting (and I feel the same way about every boss fight in the game, which is why I don't raid), is if boss fights were NOT scripted. If every single run were totally and completely different, making you really be on top of what abilities you have and knowing when to use them, then it might be impressive. It would then be very similar to watching sports, where you don't know what's going to happen from moment to moment and either your team comes out victorious or it doesn't.
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