Can you believe it’s been five years since World of Warcraft was released? I’ve been playing since back in those wholesome vanilla days, and while I was in the beta I waited a bit before I picked up the game proper…not too long though, maybe a couple of months-so I could play with my then-roommates, and I’ve been playing ever since. A lot of people I know have come and gone in that time period, and tons more people have signed up to play with the release of Burning Crusade and Wrath of the Lich King, but Blizzard is about to celebrate World of Warcraft’s 5 year anniversary with a massive sweepstakes event in which just about every WoW player is entered.

So what do you have to do to enter? Nothing, as long as you have an active account that’s in good standing – you’re automatically in!

And what do you win? Every week Blizzard will give away some prizes to a few lucky players. Check out the prize listings below.

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A while ago I mentioned the Azeroth United Hearts, Hands, and Voices for Child’s Play Charity. On November 1, Azeroth United officially launched their HHV Charity Giveaway to start ramping up donations for Child’s Play!

To donate, head over to AzerothUnited.com or directly to the Hearts, Hands, and Voices for Child’s Play Charity page and click on the “Chip In!” widget to donate! The goal is $5000, and all of that cash goes directly to the Child’s Play charity, which donates the gift of video games to terminally and chronically ill children.

As part of the giveaway, every donation of $10 or more to the HHV campaign has a chance to be one of ten lucky winners and score some of the following gear in the Filled Hearts Giveaway, presented by sponsors of the charity event:

* Curse Networks – Get your hands on one of these great items: mouse pad, USB flash card that are super slim and fit in your wallet they are the size of a business card! OR a Premium Curse Subscription for 12 months
* Azeroth United – Snag one of many assorted WoW TCG Loot Cards
* Geek Girl Diva of Entertainment Earth: $25 Gift Certificate
* J!NX Clothing Company – $10 Gift Card and J!NX Keychain

Every donation of $20 or more to the HHV campaign is entered into the Exclusive Helping Hands Giveaway where one lucky winner will walk away with some of these fantastic prizes:

* Rawrcast: World of Warcraft Podcast – 60-day World of Warcraft Game Card
* Sideshow and Syrana – 30-day World of Warcraft Game Card and 2009 Blizzcon Authenticator
* Unbearably Hot – Custom, one of a kind, handmade bracelet themed after the Hearts, Hands, and Voices charity event. Sure to be a Blizzcon conversation starter!
* 3point.com: Warcraft Stein – Artwork by amazing World of Warcraft illustrator James Zhang.
* Raid Warning Podcast: Steel Series World of Warcraft Gaming Mouse
* SwagDog: 3ea. $100 Gift Certificates and Weekly 25% Off Codes for all contributors. You can get your code from your favorite Azeroth United Unity Member.
* J!NX Clothing Company – $25 Gift Card, Talking Murloc Plush Toy, and J!NX Keychain

There are some awesome prizes in the mix, and of course, donating money to an amazing charity that does a lot of good work. Head on over and chip in today!

If you thought FigurePrints were awesome, you’ll love Print Warcraft – a site where you can log in, create custom artwork using your World of Warcraft characters, and then have it printed out in poster or print form.

Don’t get too excited though – the site is a great idea, but it essentially lets you take your character based on screenshots and imports of what your character looks like and put them in front of a group of standard backgrounds or other screenshots, all in the WoW in-game art style. Don’t expect any of the beautiful imagery we’ve come to expect from any of the WoW comics, the loading screens, or even the WoW trading card game.

The idea is solid – you can get posters and prints of your character with their name superimposed on a logo plate and the horde or alliance emblems on it, and for a pretty reasonable price at that – a 12×18 print will run you just shy of $18 USD, and a massive 40×27 wide poster will cost you about $30 USD. The pricing is good, although I can’t speak for the quality of the product. In any case though, they make for great custom posters that you can hang anywhere in the house.

That being said though, I personally would take a different approach. Many of us, myself included, love our World of Warcraft characters, and wouldn’t mind a poster or a small print of them hanging on the wall near our computers – in the past though, I’ve turned to the massive WoW fan art community of webcomic artists and players who love the game just as much as I do to help me out. Find yourself a Webcomic or a fan artist you know who’s done World of Warcraft related art in the past, and ask nicely if they’re taking commissions.

That way you get art that’s not only truly personal and likely one of a kind, but even if you pay more for it you get something really unique and special for you and your character – something you won’t have a hard time framing. And, with any luck, you’ll make friends with an artist who may very well be happy to take your commission fee and your support.

Don’t get me wrong though – I’m not dissing Print Warcraft at all, but I am advocating the huge WoW fan art community, of which many of its members are really talented, exceptional artists – my friend Cadistra being one of them (although she’s so busy I doubt she has time for commissions, but maybe someday!) – there are tons of artists out there willing to make you something really special and unique that’s real art you can hang on your walls, instead of a high-rez screenshot. If you’re looking for something you wouldn’t be afraid to hang on your wall in your college dorm room or that you wouldn’t be heartbroken if it got beat up a bit though, Print Warcraft all the way!

Icedragon, of the blog Druid Main, has a little problem. See, she can’t draw.

So she’s looking for a little help filling in the gaps on her site with some artwork, and she’s holding an art contest to draw in some submissions and reward the artists who take their time to support her and enter the contest! She says:

All of my images are done via Photoshop and using digital models from the WoW Model Viewer, but they’re not as high-grade as they could be in terms of digital/artistic quality. Most of my work is for banners, logos, emblems, etc but no “artsy” pieces. Seriously, I cannot draw anything for myself other than stick figures, and stick figures just aren’t good enough for this post (see right)! So I’m turning to my readers and any artistic folks that want to get their creativity groove on.

Artists of all types and stripes are invited to enter, and the full rules are over at the contest announcement at Druid Main. All of the winners will find their artwork posted on her site, but Icedragon promises that of all of those entries she’ll choose a grand prize winner, an Arch-druid winner, if you will, who will be the lucky recipient of a 60 day World of Warcraft gamecard she happens to have and is willing to get rid of!

And yes, frankly – I can’t draw either, but if I could, I’d probably enter myself and keep this quiet so I’d increase my odds of winning. But alas.

So if you’re an artist, love or play World of Warcraft, or a WoW-related artist, head on over and enter the contest! The deadline for entries is November 5th!

So the word broke yesterday that Robert Rodat, the man who wrote such screenplays as Saving Private Ryan and The Patriot, will be the man behind the script of the upcoming Warcraft-based movie.

I said in a previous post that I was more interested in the writer of the script than the director, Sam Raimi, and now we know who’ll be penning the story behind the movie.

We still don’t have any details at all about the story, and as WoW.com reports, he hasn’t said much about the movie, but I’m sure more details will emerge soon.

Listen. I’m a huge fan of drinking, and I’m a huge fan of WoW. If I can combine the two in any possible way, I’m all about it. (please drink responsibly, if you drink at all!) That’s why I was thrilled when the Brewfest Tankard O’ Terror arrived at Warcraft Steins (shown above in the center – a replica of the actual Tankard O’ Terror item from the game, but also why I’m even more excited to hear that the new Charge of the Great Dragonflights stein has also landed:

The stein has a wrap-around panoramic image of all five of the dragonflights, beautifully created by artist James Zhang. The stein made an appearance at Blizzcon to rave reviews, and should be shipping in mid-October.

In addition to the Charge of the Great Dragonflights stein, you can also pick up the Tankard O’ Terror (shown above) for $39.99, a Horde or Alliance stein for $89.99, a Rise of the Lich King stein for $89.99, or go epic with the Legenday Collection version of the Rise of the Lich King stein for $174.99.

The Charge of the Great Dragonflights stein however, can be yours for $89.99 plus shipping, although at those prices you may be a bit wary about drinking from them and instead wind up putting it in a collector’s case!

If you haven’t heard about Azeroth United, you should head over there and read up! Azeroth United is a World of Warcraft fan site hub, complete with bloggers, podcasters, guilds, video bloggers, webcomics, machinima creators – anyone who loves World of Warcraft and shares their fandom with the world can join and take part. Together the community will work to raise awareness for charity and collaborate on other events!

So if you couldn’t tell, the Azeroth Metblogs is happy to be a blog united with Azeroth United, and the first charity event launches on November 1 – the Hearts, Hands, and Voices for Child’s Play charity event! Stay tuned for more information, or head over to Azeroth United for more details and how you can help get the word out using your own site, guild, blog, podcast, whatever!

This has got to be one of the best WoW-videos I’ve ever seen ever, ever, ever.

Warning – it’s a Parody of “I’m On A Boat,” so the language is downright filthy – not at all safe for work.

Clear? Now that that’s out of the way, click play, full-screen, and enjoy the lens flares. Or head over here at YouTube to watch it in it’s natural habitat. (thanks to WoW.com, without whom I would never have seen this!)

I’m drinkin’ noggenfogger’lix cause it’s CLASSIC.

Another find on the forums from WoW.com that’s simply too good not to share: Garrosh is Not Well Liked.

So you’ve all probably heard the rumor that in the events leading to World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, Cairne Bloodhoof is framed for some wrongdoing and is subsequently killed, Thrall becomes the Guardian of Trisfal and has to leave his position as Warchief of the Horde. Stepping in for him? Garrosh Hellscream, the violent, petulent, warmongering orc that follows Thrall everywhere and complains about how everything is the Alliance’s fault.

Garrosh…is no one’s first choice, apparently. He’s certainly not my first choice, but some fine folks on the official forums have put together a list of 50 Warchiefs better than Garrosh, which has subsequently expanded to be almost 200 in game characters, models, or objects that would leave the horde better than Garrosh ever could.

Some of the superstars on the list? Sicky Gazelle. Hogger. Egbert. Lost Barrens Kodo. High-Oracle Soo-Say. The list goes on, in incredible hilarity. Oh, and as shown above, “The Login Dragon” is indeed a candidate.

Click the jump to see the rest of the top 50 list, and head over to the forums to see the entire 200 in all their glory. Do you have any favorite NPCs that would be better leaders of the Horde than Garrosh? Let us know in the comments!

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I picked this one up thanks to WoW.com, who highlighted it in a recent Moviewatch segment. The video, which is the first part in a trilogy (the other two parts haven’t been released yet) is incredibly well done: the only dialogue in the video is voicework from World of Warcraft set to music and sequences from Ulduar.

Backing up a bit, the premise of Ulduar: Defiance is that a Paladin, after suffering nightmares of fighting the scourge as they attack Lorderon, sees visions and hears voices beckoning her to Ulduar in her dreams. She collects her friends and fellow champions and together they march on the city, intent on fulfilling their destiny. The video is incredibly dramatic, and scene by scene we’re taken through Ulduar as she and her friends go forth and tear up some bosses.

The music is incredible and fantastically timed to the video, and I can’t emphasize how wonderful it is that the video creators allowed the characters and the in-game video they took to show emotion and expression all by itself – they didn’t dub over horribly mixed audio to create dialogue, and the only voices you hear are ones already in the game, professionally done, that sound fabulous. Head over to YouTube to watch Ulduar: Defiance in all it’s glory if the above isn’t enough for you.