World of Warcraft Battle.net Conversion Announced

Blizzard Entertainment has announced that current World of Warcraft players are required to migrate their existing account over to Battle.net by November 11th in order to take advantage of their newly revised community portal.

A few months ago, we unveiled the Battle.net account, our new way for players to log in to World of Warcraft and future Blizzard games, sign up for upcoming beta tests, shop the online Blizzard Store, and more with just one username and password. This was just the first step in the rollout of the brand-new Battle.net; in the future, players will be able to use Battle.net to participate in cross-realm chat in World of Warcraft, create real-life friends lists, communicate across different games, and a whole lot more.

In preparation for the launch of these new features, on November 11, 2009, all current World of Warcraft players will be required to merge their World of Warcraft accounts with a Battle.net account in order to log in to the game. As our way to say “thanks” for taking a moment to go through the process, existing World of Warcraft accounts that upgrade to Battle.net (including those that have already switched over) will receive a brand-new penguin in-game pet — check for him in your in-game mailbox later this week. Starting on November 11, all World of Warcraft players will need to log in to the game using a Battle.net username and password, and anyone who wishes to create a new World of Warcraft account will need to start with a Battle.net account.

Creating a Battle.net account is simple and free. To merge your existing account with a Battle.net account, go here. For more info, check out the Battle.net site or read the FAQ.

Get in on the action now and you can even score a penguin pet:

Q: Why do I now need to merge my World of Warcraft account with a Battle.net account in order to continue to log in to the game?

A: We’re getting ready to launch the new version of Battle.net, which will include a number of new communication and community features designed to enhance World of Warcraft play, such as cross-realm World of Warcraft chat, cross-game chat (with the launch of StarCraft II), real-life friends lists, and more. We’re asking World of Warcraft players to become a part of Battle.net now as part of our preparation to launch these new tools. You can find out more information on the features we have planned for Battle.net at http://www.blizzard.com/blizzcon/recaps/battlenet-panel.xml. In addition, as our way of saying thanks for taking the time to go through this process, existing players that merge their World of Warcraft account with a Battle.net account will receive a new World of Warcraft in-game penguin pet.