Rise of the Lich King - and Microsoft CodePlex too

David M Williams
Monday, 14 December 2009 07:03

Business IT - Open Source

What does Microsoft's community open source software repository CodePlex have in common with massive multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs)? Answer: they both have an enormous surge of activity, traffic and popularity the day a new World of Warcraft (WoW) patch hits the Internet.

This unexpected connection exists because the most popular program hosted on CodePlex is Rawr, which describes itself as “helpful in finding better combinations of gear, and what gear to obtain.”

Specifically, this “gear” is weapons, trinkets and armour as used by virtual characters in the World of Warcraft.

Characters in World of Warcraft must rise up through 80 levels, gaining experience, skills, talents and better equipment as they progress.

However, once level 80 has been hit the game takes on an entirely new dimension. Players must band together like never before to raid immense, sprawling dungeons filled with resilient and powerful monsters.

One key factor to success in beating such raids is the quality of a character’s “gear.” In fact, having the wrong gear can even mean the difference between being permitted to raid with a group or being mocked instead.

It is thus an obsessive pastime for many a player to forecast how their gear rating could improve if only they had the bejewelled hat of the silky sorcerer instead of the wizened cap of the old crone, for instance.

Here is where Rawr and CodePlex come in. Rawr is a freely available open source program which helps players run the numbers. It has been coded in C#.NET and is hosted on CodePlex. Consequently when World of Warcraft receives a surge of popularity – such as after a new update – so too does CodePlex.

In fact, CodePlex Program Manager Sara Ford told iTWire they can always tell when something new has happened in WoW because suddenly CodePlex’s downloads take off.

Last week patch 3.3 for the popular game went live, “Fall of the Lich King” where players can finally confront the fallen hero Arthas. Just this last Saturday Rawr itself updated to include the new loot players can aim for.