Universal City (CA) - On an insanely cold night, at least by Southern California standards, thousands of World of Warcraft fans waited to buy the Burning Crusade expansion pack. Several EB Games stores in the area opened at midnight January 16th to sell the game and we were there at one of the biggest stores at the Universal Citywalk in Los Angeles. Even though it was cold, fans - some waiting almost 18 hours - traded stories and even danced for some cool prizes.

Michelle from Van Nuys was the first person in line and had been waiting since 6:30 AM Monday morning. At a few years older than the 20-somethings in the crowd, she didn't seem to fit the profile of your average World of Warcraft player. However, Michelle has been playing World of Warcraft since the beginning and has beta-tested many Blizzard games. "My hats off to Blizzard for making such a game. The animation and lore is amazing," said Michelle.

Just behind Michelle, were a group of players from the Cenarion Circle server. They had also been waiting for several hours and were even passing the time by playing World of Warcraft on their laptops in line. One guy told us he was taking a week off from work and wanted to be one of the first to level 70. He added, "I've got five full bank slots of elixers and potions. I'm not sleeping for three days."

In a testament to how popular World of Warcraft has become, one of the security guards told us that he plays World of Warcraft. "I have a level 60 mage," said the guard. He even won a few trading cards by quickly answering trivia questions about professions and dungeons.

The line stretched around the Hard Rock Café all the way to the Quicksilver store. At the stroke of midnight, EB Games employees used a bullhorn to announce that the store was now open for business. Groups of 10 to 15 fans were let in to buy the game and then have them signed by Blizzard World of Warcraft developers.

Not all the fans will be installing the expansion as soon as they get home. Demonstrating some sanity, Michelle told us, "I'm going to bed after this. Afterall, I've waiting in line all day."

can only happen in the US. In Malaysia, don't think there are many that crazy to do such a thing. Hohoho even play WOW on a laptop while waiting in line.

Yeah, if you open a laptop in the street, some mat rempit on a motorcycle will ride by and snatch it. bye bye laptop.

OMG HAHAHAHA SO DAMN TROOOOOOOOOOOO!!

but seriously though...it's so sad that the scenario described by limsk can quite likely happen.

I would line up to if I can have my copy signed by Blizzard WoW developers. Unfortunately, I don't live in LA.

If in Malaysia, store such as Software Boutique has this kinda event, with even a few Blizzard employees ... I dun mind line up for the whole day to get my CE and signed.

Yep I don't mind Q-ing for signatures but I probably wouldn't take 1 week off work just to lv up unless I have a lot of annual leave in excess which I don't even know what to do with (yeah right!).

Personally, I prefer to enjoy the whole experience of the game, including questing, instancing, and pugging. YES, I LOVE PUGGING!! Occassionally I would bring my priest and pug for BRD, Strat, Scholo eventhough I don't really need anything from there.

woot! woot! hi-five! and UBRS too!

I just love to see magister's drop and other mages having it. We would like get in a group and then I would receive tells whether I need any pieces of magister's. I just love to say no! 8/8 Magister's Set those were the goddamn days when its still treasured.

Well, I even go pugging just for the heck of it even in full epics and the lovely Benediction. It was really nice when the Trindlehaven (or whatever spelling) staff dropped in LBRS and they still asked whether I want it or not. But people tend to "..............." when I won the roll for a it eventhough I was using my Benediction. Of course I never really went and loot it la!

My server has a pugging tradition since it's one of the first batch of servers in WoW and back then, you'd have to pug to get anywhere. Sigh...remember the good old days when you think linen bags are wonderful and you can't even afford to send a 30c mail? Those were the days!! When you can even charge people for cooking low lvl meat!

Yeah, I also PUG in epic. I've lots of gold so I don't mind dying. There are still times I just leave the group if it wipes more than 5x in the same room. I still have those Tier 0 and yes the Trindlehaven Staff in my bank.

My account has been hacked and deleted and I'm waiting for Blizzard to fix up my character. Hopefully all is well though I've my doubts that I can recover all my gold.

Ah that sux man! I heard that they can only recover up til the last time they "saved"..a bit like MS auto-save. So if the last time they saved was like couple of months back, you wouldn't get anything that you have within 2 months ago and now.

Say you got Hand of Rag during that time. I would @#$#@($@#&%$#@ and quit forever.