Earlier today, the
Blizzard Worldwide Invitational 2008 was announced:
The fourth Blizzard Entertainment Worldwide Invitational is coming to Europe! The event will be held at the Porte de Versailles Exposition Center, Paris, France, over the 28th and 29th of June 2008.
What is the 2008 Blizzard Entertainment Worldwide Invitational?
The 2008 Blizzard Entertainment Worldwide Invitational is a two-day event bringing together the company and gamers in a convention atmosphere, featuring Q&A panels with Blizzard Entertainment developers and hands-on opportunities with the company's latest games. The Blizzard Entertainment Worldwide Invitational also showcases the skills of top eSports gamers from around the world as they compete in invitational StarCraft, Warcraft III and World of Warcraft Arena tournaments.
When and where is the 2008 Blizzard Entertainment Worldwide Invitational?
The event will take place on Saturday the 28th and Sunday the 29th of June, in Hall 5 of the Porte de Versailles Exposition Center in Paris, France.
The invitational will be similar to BlizzCon in structure. There will be opportunities to play both StarCraft II and World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, as well as a selection of
Blizzard employee panels. However, the main feature is the World Wide Invitational tournament itself. This is the fourth such tournament, pitting the best names in both the Korean and foreign scenes against each other, such as: defending champion Bisu[Shield], SlayerS_Boxer, Nal_rA and Stork. Considering the popularity of the tournament,
Blizzard has announced that they will be providing live coverage throughout the weekend. With luck, popular shoutcaster
Nick "Tasteless" Plott will cover the tournament.
Last year, the event was especially important to StarCraft fans as the announcement of StarCraft II was expected and, thankfully, delivered. This year, in an interesting parallel, it is possible that the Zerg will be released at the tournament. While it would be nice to think that this information will be given sooner than that, what with
recent reports that it is
Blizzard's current focus, the habit of only doing these announcements at major events may continue. If
Blizzard plans on releasing the Zerg within the next few months, the WWI is arguably the last point at which it could possibly occur. Most likely, the information will be released earlier than this in a different format, such as in magazines or on fansites, and then Zerg will be playable at the event.
Source:Blizzard Entertainment's World Wide Invitational 2008 Page
