WoW’s new toys support esports!

As announced some time ago, popular MMO World of Warcraft is currently holding an event – for a limited time, all purchases of two specific toys are going to contribute to this year’s final LAN competition. Specifically, the prize pool for the Arena World Championship or AWC and the Mythic Dungeon International aka the MDI is currently set at half a million American dollars, with 250k for each event. That is going to be supplemented by 25% of the money made on those two toys.

The first of them is the Transmorpher Beacon – it allows you to spread confusion and chaos on the battlefield – at least that’s the official description from Blizzard – and it lets you summon an Ethereal Transmorpher that lets you transform yourself and your allies into some of the most fearsome enemies Azeroth has ever seen – if nothing else, that sounds like a fun time! You can change your appearance for 20 minutes before going through a 1-hour cooldown before you can use your toy again. There are dozens of character you can transform into – anything from Master Snowdrift or Taran Zhu to Darkweaver Syth or Prince Valanar – various Raid or Dungeon bosses are randomly selected and displayed instead of your character model.

© Blizzard Entertainment

The other toy is perhaps a little flashier – Lion’s Pride and Horde’s Mighty fireworks let you light up the sky with impressive fireworks displays. As the name implies, one has a big lion’s head show up among the stars in a yellow/gold colour, while the other displays the symbol of the Horde in red.  If you don’t like either of those options, there are other combinations – instead of either option, you can also display a helmet or axe unique to each side. Why not go ahead and plant an explosive on the freshly felled corpse of an enemy and illuminate the sky above them.

© Blizzard Entertainment

The fireworks are reusable, and you’ll be able to send an undeniable signal to the other faction – you’re not only better but you ALSO have way more style! Either toy is for sale in the shop for $10. Now if you want to contribute to the WoW esports prize pool, you have your chance to do so until the 15^th of October this year – that’s the cut-off for the contributions to the prize pool.

Fan responses have been divided – while some players think that it’s a great way for the community to actively contribute and support the esports side of their favourite MMO, however the majority does not – countless fans are saying that surely a company like Blizzard doesn’t need the support from the community in order to finance a tournament, and at the same time, others are saying that 25% of the purchase isn’t enough and that it should be considerably more – some even say all profits should go towards the pool.

With reactions to the 25% contribution being split, the toys themselves got relatively good reviews, and they are quite popular, though fans aren’t too happy that earning the toys through gameplay itself isn’t exactly feasible.