It’s moments like these that make one fear for the well-being of Blizzard’s product quality.

I receive a lot of flak for defending the company’s business practices, but sans a few awesome individuals, I’ve never been keen on their community relations.  That’s not going to continue today.

If you’re unfamiliar with the Battle.net forums, it is one of the greatest video games of all-time.  It’s the bastard child of Final Fantasy VI, a world where ninety percent of the characters assumed Kefka’s personality disorder.  The goal of the game is to make people HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE you.

Over the last two weeks, a regular poster on the Starcraft II General Discussion Forum insisted a Blizzard employee was spilling the Starcraft II release cycle on his Twitter page.  But without a Twitter page from one “Joe Lowland”, this proved difficult to corroborate.  So naturally, another member of the forum filled in the blanks and carved out the newest member of my blogroll.

Hilarity ensued.  In the same way that Michael Jordan matured to trust his teammates, the S2GDF gathered to debate the Battle Report that currently doesn’t exist.  Thanks to their efforts, the greater Starcraft community came together to debate the veracity of Joe Lowland’s Twitter.

Naturally, Blizzard would need to address this misinformation.  They were responsible for this.  During BlizzCon, some asshole at Blizzard constructed a dam in the flow of information.  It was up to Karune (whose name is now interchangable with “The people who tell Karune what to post”) help ease the community and its sentiments.

Do you now understand why Blizzard’s community relations team launches customers into rage?  I understand corporate cultures are dictated by “the book”.  In this “the book”, everything must be done by “the book”.  In some twisted manner, “the book” indicated the best way to respond to a well-conceived troll is to justify it.

Instead of paying me seven dollars an hour to kick the crap out of the Battle.net forums, I’ll continue to laugh at the embarassments your company concocts.  For free.

Come on, you weren’t expecting Karune to remain silent on this, were you?

Thanks a ton, Karune!  With the stress of a job like that, you can only wonder how the guy makes it through the day.

Things are not good in Battle.net Forum Land.  Its citizens demand: “Where is the Starcraft II beta?”  Over the weekend, Dustin Browder surfaced a status report.  Surprisingly, it was not titled “Get Lives and/or Laid’”.  Even more surprising was a second update on the status of our beloved Starcraft II.

Thanks Dustin Browder, lead designer for Guitar Hero: Birthday Sex!

After weeks of work-free work, Karune returns to his job!  It’s been thirty-eight months since new information was revealed about Starcraft II, a game that was announced as part of a deal to end the Iranian Hostage Crisis.  But fear not!  You will no longer have to go years without an official update!  Karune spills a bombshell on the game’s status!

Starcraft II Q&A batch is an ongoing series where Blizzard Community Manager Karune dodges questions about Starcraft II.  With a month passed since Q&A Batch 49, “Karune” has finally issued an historic Q&A Batch 50!

Thanks, Karune!  Your wisdom enlightens us all.