We’ve seen the various commercials with celebrities describing their characters on World of Warcraft, the hit massive multiplayer online roleplaying game from Blizzard Entertainment, released in 2004.
One can’t help but wonder if these celebrity endorsements are for real. Yes, it would be cool to run into somebody famous while undertaking a quest, but with the hectic schedule these stars have to maintain, more than likely they do not have the time for such frivolities. (Unless, of course, they are taking a break from said schedules.)
William Shatner, the famed Captain Kirk of the starship Enterprise, introduces himself as a shaman, a conduit for the ancient forces of nature.
Mr. T, introduces us to his night elf Mohawk, the Mohawk class does not exist, as the director points out while he interrupts the imposing actor. Then Mr T verbally blasts the director, saying maybe he hacked into the game and created the class and that he’s handy with computers.
Verne Troyer, Mini-Me of Austin Powers fame, talks about his mage, a master of the arcane. He goes on to inform the viewing audience that there are over nine million players in World of Warcraft and that the game is huge, like his mage, pun intended.
Jean Claude Van Damme, talks of his mage in the French language. I don’t know if there is an American version of the commercial, but threw it in anyways.
The newest commercial has Ozzy Osbourne declaring that he is the Prince of darkness, then ensues to argue with the director that he has been the Prince of darkness since 1979. The commercial switches to the Lich King claiming that there can only be one prince of darkness and attacks Ozzy’s character in the game.
All of the commercials are ended with each of the celebrities asking the question: What’s your game?
As stated above, the experience of meeting a famous person in World of Warcraft would be sweet, but highly unlikely. Even if you did have such an encounter, there’s really no way to tell whether it is really a celebrity or not, even with the Ventrilo technology, which some players employ to converse with their fellow gamers in the WoW gaming universe.
So, what it all boils down to is this: if you play the game in the hopes of having such an encounter, then you’re not fully enjoying the game itself and given the vast expanse of the World of Warcraft game, you’d be missing out on a lot and that would be a shame.