Well technically they got king of the hill taken away by a completely free to play game that you don't even have to buy. League of legends soared past them in active monthly users last November and they haven't slowed down. There was an article on forbes about this time last year where LoL had double the amount of monthly gameplay hours. I think WoW is finally dying.>> ^RFlagg:

If WoW would just adopt the Buy to Play model like Guild Wars 2 I would come back (if they kept the price low, say $30...$40 tops for this expansion as I've got the ones before it). With Guild Wars 2, Planetside 2, trying learn DOTA 2 and LoL and the host of Free to Play stuff, it is getting harder to justify the monthly fee. I liked Cataclysm, and I would be all over this, but money is too tight to waste when there are high quality titles out there that are buy to play or free to play. I predict an uptick in subscribers for a few months then the continual bleed of subscribers to other titles... though they'll still be king of the hill as even if they drop to 6 or 8 million by this time next year, they'll still be ahead of everyone else... I'll wager around 7 million left, around 5 or 6 million they might start thinking of making the move to another business model to test it out for Titan and get the bugs of the model worked out. I think Blizard's high quality justifies a Buy to Play over the Free to Play model...
As to the movie. Sam Raimi was slated to direct it, and may still be producing a part of it... last I heard Charles Leavitt was taking over the script and then they were going to call for a new director.

If WoW would just adopt the Buy to Play model like Guild Wars 2 I would come back (if they kept the price low, say $30...$40 tops for this expansion as I've got the ones before it). With Guild Wars 2, Planetside 2, trying learn DOTA 2 and LoL and the host of Free to Play stuff, it is getting harder to justify the monthly fee. I liked Cataclysm, and I would be all over this, but money is too tight to waste when there are high quality titles out there that are buy to play or free to play. I predict an uptick in subscribers for a few months then the continual bleed of subscribers to other titles... though they'll still be king of the hill as even if they drop to 6 or 8 million by this time next year, they'll still be ahead of everyone else... I'll wager around 7 million left, around 5 or 6 million they might start thinking of making the move to another business model to test it out for Titan and get the bugs of the model worked out. I think Blizard's high quality justifies a Buy to Play over the Free to Play model...

As to the movie. Sam Raimi was slated to direct it, and may still be producing a part of it... last I heard Charles Leavitt was taking over the script and then they were going to call for a new director.

I had no idea this was directed by Sam Raimi. I am now interested.

I like this less whiney and pathetic Peter Parker than the Sam Raimi movie's Peter

Regardless of whether the actual film sucks or not, this trailer has unforgivably bad music mixing going on. Zero punch whatsoever. The E.S. Posthumus mix from the original Sam Raimi film's first big trailer makes this sound like a kindergarten kazoopalooza.

Actually, the kindergarten kazoopalooza would have sounded better. It would at least have scored points for bravery.

And exactly who is supposed to fill the enormous galoshes left by J K Simmons as J Jonah Jameson? Probably a very hard-working, well-intentioned actor with no shortage of talent, but I feel for him, whoever he may be, without even having seen his face or heard his voice. Clearly the studio saw fit not to include him in this trailer.

I want to believe this won't be a bad film. It will be a very long time before a real-life President lives up to the fictional model created by Martin Sheen. I have zero beef with Denis Leary as Captain Stacey, nor with Rhys Ifans as Curt Connors, even as badly as I wanted to see Dylan Baker do it under Raimi's skilled hand. I want to give people a fair shot at doing good work. But the leadup to this film ain't making it easy.

[EDIT] -- Just to prove the point, it's a poor quality link, but THIS is how you mix a trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFtYmWb9FQA

I miss Sam Raimi mixing with Marvel, but I have reasonably high hopes for Joss Whedon.

My pleasure! And yes hopefully it's good.

In reply to this comment by dingens:
Thanks, and very good for Alvarez!

In reply to this comment by Duckman33:
*promote

Story behind this film:

An unknown filmmaker from Uruguay has been given $30m by Hollywood studio bosses - to turn his $500 YouTube video of a giant robot invasion into a movie. Would-be director Federico Alvarez, who runs a post-production visual effects house in Uruguay, filmed 'Panic Attack' with a budget of just $500 in his free time. The five minute clip - which he then uploaded to YouTube - shows an invasion of Montevideo by giant robots and had special effects which could rival many big budget movies.

Once online it got the attention of thousands of movie fans… and (not surprisingly) studio bosses who wanted to meet with Alvarez to talk about his movie. The 30-year-old was whisked to LA where he was offered a $1 million directors fee and up to £30 million to make the film, by Mandate Pictures. The plans for the movie are said to have a "compelling original story" beyond big robots blowing stuff up. Alvarez has also been put up in a new apartment, given a new car and will work with "Spider-Man" director Sam Raimi on developing the film.

Thanks, and very good for Alvarez!

In reply to this comment by Duckman33:
*promote

Story behind this film:

An unknown filmmaker from Uruguay has been given $30m by Hollywood studio bosses - to turn his $500 YouTube video of a giant robot invasion into a movie. Would-be director Federico Alvarez, who runs a post-production visual effects house in Uruguay, filmed 'Panic Attack' with a budget of just $500 in his free time. The five minute clip - which he then uploaded to YouTube - shows an invasion of Montevideo by giant robots and had special effects which could rival many big budget movies.

Once online it got the attention of thousands of movie fans… and (not surprisingly) studio bosses who wanted to meet with Alvarez to talk about his movie. The 30-year-old was whisked to LA where he was offered a $1 million directors fee and up to £30 million to make the film, by Mandate Pictures. The plans for the movie are said to have a "compelling original story" beyond big robots blowing stuff up. Alvarez has also been put up in a new apartment, given a new car and will work with "Spider-Man" director Sam Raimi on developing the film.

*promote

Story behind this film:

An unknown filmmaker from Uruguay has been given $30m by Hollywood studio bosses - to turn his $500 YouTube video of a giant robot invasion into a movie. Would-be director Federico Alvarez, who runs a post-production visual effects house in Uruguay, filmed 'Panic Attack' with a budget of just $500 in his free time. The five minute clip - which he then uploaded to YouTube - shows an invasion of Montevideo by giant robots and had special effects which could rival many big budget movies.

Once online it got the attention of thousands of movie fans… and (not surprisingly) studio bosses who wanted to meet with Alvarez to talk about his movie. The 30-year-old was whisked to LA where he was offered a $1 million directors fee and up to £30 million to make the film, by Mandate Pictures. The plans for the movie are said to have a "compelling original story" beyond big robots blowing stuff up. Alvarez has also been put up in a new apartment, given a new car and will work with "Spider-Man" director Sam Raimi on developing the film.

Did Sam Raimi direct this masterpiece ??!?!?

I think this was Sam Raimi's first project. Where's Bruce?

Lolygons! Sam Raimi inspired gush!

I saw some episodes (installments?) from these series several years ago... they play in Ann Arbor on one of the international channels that is part of the expanded cable package I no longer get. They air in Chinese, with English subtitles (sometimes), and are shown during the day like a soap opera.

As I am familiar with some of the historical novels this genre is based on, like Monkey King, and the Warrior Hero tales from the Warring States Period, I thought they were kind of fun, and not too terribly dissimilar from Sam Raimi's Hercules or Xenia Warrior Princess, although lacking in the self deprecating camp humor that popularized those two shows, the LOCH and ROCH episodes were kind of cool in the same way that they took old old old stories, and reinvented them in a serialized fashion for modern audiences. I can see getting addicted to them if I had the time.

^good point, I hadn't accounted for the actual cost and effort that goes into getting the cheese to come out of the can... so I guess as an analogy that is a little off for a Sam Raimi flick... mostly, I was thinking about the taste.

uhhh... why is Sam Raimi's Within The Woods in the sift talk if it has been killed?

Was the movie any good? I'm not crazy about any of Sam Raimi's films that don't have the words 'Evil', 'Dead' and 'II' in the title.