It sucks to be an adult. For the uninitiated among us, let me explain that there is this whole cycle of activities we grown-ups do in a typical week. In exchange for money to purchase food that fuels my survivability, I have to agree to spend Monday to Friday (sometimes, weekends too) producing something useful for other people. The only ways to escape this is to convince the government to mark down more public holidays, apply for annual leave, catch infectious diseases for medical leave, and if I am still working out some way to give birth to a child myself so I get entitlement for maternity leave. Suffice to say, on a typical work day, the only stretch of time that I can play World of Warcraft : The Burning Crusade are the hours between my dinner and bed.
Seasoned players of this MMORPG know that isn't exactly a very long span, and given the usual waiting time just to form a proper group, dungeon attempts are but limited to once. Some times I do stretch it, way into the wee hours of the morning to run two instances. And such was a night when I was finishing up with my rogue in Sethekk Halls, at 2AM, lo and behold, Talon King Ikiss dropped Shoulderpads of Assassination and Terokk's Nightmace. Being the only rogue there I naturally won the shoulderpads, and by some mistake (but that is beyond the scope of this topic) on my part I also won the mace.
Exhausted and eager to sleep, I dropped out of the group to get an auto-teleport back to Shattrah City. Only there did I discover to my horror the shoulderpads were no where to be found in my bags. Tracing back the event logs it recorded that I won the shoulderpads first but never received it, while the mace was won and received later. There was no way to return to the instance I disassociated with, so the only other option I had was to issue an in-game support ticket and head straight to bed.
I already half knew what was going to be the result.
Game Master Department:Thank you for contacting the World of Warcraft Game Master Department.
Unfortunately, we are unable to fulfill your request at this time. Though our goal is to attend to each and every petition we receive, certain actions are beyond the scope of the Game Master Department. We regret any inconvenience you may have been caused.
Should you require further assistance, please submit another help request the next time you are online. We hope you continue to enjoy your experience in World of Warcraft!
And I had extreme difficulty believing the support folks were anywhere near sincerity with the words they wrote. How they would have expected me to enjoy this case is quite beyond me. Here we are, having encountered a bug in the game that fails to assign an item I rightfully won, and the people who have to ability to rectify the situation refusing to do anything about it. I made a complaint following this to voice my dissatisfaction on how this case has been handled. But of course, it falls on deaf ears.
This happens because Blizzard has failed to realise one thing:
World of Warcraft is not just a mere product, it is a software/entertainment service.
Do not think "software as a service" is only applicable to Microsoft. Anything out there on the Internet that delivers something of use for others to consume is a service provider. And mind you, this is a paid service. Like cable TV, I pay the (recurring) bills to get delivery of TV programmes and media content. If there is a drop in service levels, I can pick up the phone and demand action to bring things back to satisfactory levels. Because I am a customer.
Blizzard doesn't get the idea though, and in effect told me to shove it and left me at a stand-still in character development, when for well over two weeks I continually run Sethekk; I ran so many newbies through that dungeon and with immaculate combat instructions and "safety first" briefings that my character is now been recognised as The Official Sethekk Halls Tour Guide; complete with uniform, scarf, hat, and microphone.
You make great games, Blizzard. But you still have a long way to learning true meanings of "service" and "support". Thank you for making me waste my time.