Cataclysm - Closed Beta (Starts next Friday)

[Ualaa]

My roommates co-worker has a "Family & Friends" warcraft account.
Closed beta for Cataclysm starts on Friday the 15th.

Not sure how long closed beta runs.
But Blizzard usually follows this with an open beta.

I'd guess Cataclysm will be late 2nd or early 3rd quarter of this year.
But that is purely a guess.

[Starbuck_Jones]

I remember way back in the day a co worker at dell got one of the bliz developers on the phone for some problem and got us all in the friends and family closed beta for wow before it ever launched. This was before I moved to Round Rock for a few years so late 2003 or early 2004 as I was part of the XPS gaming group for Dell at the time. Only race you could play at the time was the Undead. It was also kinda a hastle as you had to print out an NDA, sign it as well as fax copies of your drivers licence to them and you would randomly get emails saying the server is up for 4 hours for testing!

Still it was a cool thing to get to be a part of looking back now.

[defster]

The Friends and Family thing is an Alpha test, not beta. Just nitpicking though. Closed beta comes much later, which is when we, the players, can sign up and have a tiny chance to get an invite. I dont remember if WOTLK ever had open beta.

[alcattle]

Wouldn't Open Beta be the same as the PTR? I sort of remember a few guildie looking for keys to the Beta, I think the GL got one and helped us get going in Wotlk.

[Ualaa]

Ok.. I stand corrected, on the beta terminology.

[Svpernova09]

No, alpha / beta are NOT the same as PTRs, PTRs are much more stable.


LOL @ Icecrown phasing crashing the entire beta servers during Wrath Closed beta.
LOL @ WG hosing a server while it's in battle.....wait they never fixed that >.<


Please keep any ZOMGCATACLYSMRELEASE stuff here, we don't need 5 million threads of speculation.

[wonz]

Once again protected by an NDA, i would guess.

[kadaan]

My roommates co-worker has a "Family & Friends" warcraft account.
Closed beta for Cataclysm starts on Friday the 15th.

Skeptical... :P


Not sure how long closed beta runs.
But Blizzard usually follows this with an open beta.

There was an open beta for Classic WoW that lasted a couple weeks, maybe a month tops. There was NO open beta for BC nor Wrath :P.

[Knytestorme]

I thought there was like a 1 month open beta after Blizzcon for LK Kadaan, though my memory may be hazy from time and will defer to your memory if need be :)

[kadaan]

I thought there was like a 1 month open beta after Blizzcon for LK Kadaan, though my memory may be hazy from time and will defer to your memory if need be :)

http://www.wowwiki.com/Open_beta

Classic:
"After the Closed Beta Trial and Beta Stress Test ended, Blizzard started a short (about 3 weeks) Open Beta Test which probably served as a final stress test and polishing period before official retail release."

BC:
"There are no plans for an Open Beta Trial of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade

Wrath:
"Before the Wrath of the Lich King expansion was released, there was a beta opt-in program, where players could add their name to a pool and might get randomly selected to be a beta tester."


So 3-weeks open beta for classic, 0 for BC and Wrath.

[Ualaa]

So the question is...

a) How long was the closed beta early stage, with only employees.
b) How long was the closed beta later stage, with friends and family too.
c) How long was the closed beta last stage, with stress testing and the massive beta invites.

Stage b, assuming that is the order, is starting basically now.
Or this week anyway.

[Redbeard]

My guess is still for a pre-summer/early summer release.

[MiRai]

Quoted from comments on WoW.com's article. Not my post.
I would believe that since Cataclysm is such a huge overhaul of existing content that the beta will be longer than his estimated 68 days.


Below is a post I made on Jan 7. Seems like I'm spot on so far.

BC Alpha Aug 23-06 (63 days later)
BC Beta Oct 25-06 (41 days later)
Patch 2.0 Dec 5-06 (42 days later)
BC Release Jan 16-07 (126 days later)
Patch 2.1 May 22-07 (175 days later)
Patch 2.3 Nov 13-07 (133 days later)
Patch 2.4 Mar 25-08 (16 days later)

Wrath Alpha Apr 10-08 (98 days later)
Wrath Beta Jul 17-08 (89 days later)
Patch 3.0 Oct 14-08 (30 days later)
Wrath Release Nov 13-08 (152 days later)
Patch 3.1 Apr 14-09 (112 days later)
Patch 3.2 Aug 4-09 (126 days later)
Patch 3.3 Dec 8-09 (35 days later)

Cata Alpha *Jan 12-10 (79 days later)
Cata Beta *Apr 1-10 (68 days later)
Patch 4.0 *Jun 8-10 (36 days later)
Cata Release *Jul 16-10

*Estimates

Based on the average amount of time it took them to release content for previous expansions, these are my best guesses as to when Cataclysm content will release. I'm pretty sure I've at least got it nailed to within 30 days or so baring no unexpected set backs. With your estimate of Nov it would take them roughly 4 months longer to make Cata than BC or Wrath.

If they are keeping pace with previous releases then we should expect news of Cata Alpha very soon(TM).

EDIT:
MMO-Champion Cataclysm Alpha Update (http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/cataclysm-alpha-putricide-hotfixes-blue-posts/)

[rfuilrez]

I was in on that open beta for Vanilla WoW. Good times. We raided Crossroads. About 30 level 15-30 Nelves. Haha.

[falsfire3401]

I was in on that open beta for Vanilla WoW. Good times. We raided Crossroads. About 30 level 15-30 Nelves. Haha.

Had fun then I guess with the L60 elite Sergra Darkthorn NPC in Xroads :)