The Darkmoon Faire is one of the events that a lot of World of Warcraft gamers would really like to go to. It seems that they had a lot of fun over there with the TCG tournament, chatting with Blizzard Entertainment Community Representatives, and demos of both the card game and the online game.

With an event this good, how can one make it better? It appears that the guys in the WoW Forums had one major suggestion that everyone agreed with. The Faire should have a cannon. We'll leave the rest to your imagination. Needless to say quite a few have "volunteered" to be cannon fodder. All kidding aside though, they had quite a discussion on the choice of name for the said event.

Unfortunately, we couldn't extract the pictures of the event but you can find them via our read link. It'll take you straight to the official coverage of the Darkmoon Faire. Before we go, here's some good news for those based in or around Milan, Italy. Contrary to our early report that it would be headed to Birmingham, the Faire's headed your way... hopefully with a cannon in tow. Blizzard has changed their visit to Birmingham to as yet undecided date.

The virtual world of Linden Lab's Second Life extends its grasp on the real world through its growing real estate industry. The newly-opened Gabetti Island is actually being handled by The Bright Five, the real estate team responsible for the Second Life account. Basically then, Gabetti is in the business of buying, selling, acquiring and developing virtual land and buildings.

How real are they as to this virtual real estate business? Pretty real, we can assure you. With five stay-home agents, Gabetti, in real world, is actually one of the more prominent real estate firms in Italy. And the investment they have entered in Second Life is definitely as real as it gets, with about € 100,000 (US$ 130,000) in the bank for the project.

The Bright Five team is planning to sell lands and houses in SL for an average of € 100 (US$ 130). Says Project Manager Matteo Quadrifoglio, "We will have return on investment, absolutely. We expect to break even at the end of 2007."

Being new to the virtual industry, it is thus expected that they will only be learning the ropes now. The only marketing tool they have for now would be their short promotional movie, that is up on the sim's headquarters office. Continues Quadrifoglio, "We do not transfer our Real Life business model to Second Life. We are starting small, we have to learn. Competition [in real estate] is tough, so we bring Real Life expertise to the really big world of Second Life."

Starting today, those who'd like to play Dungeons and Dragons Online without a credit card will be able to use Click&Buy. This service allows people to make transactions online with multiple payment methods, including direct debit and online bank transfers - including ELV for German gamers. The Click&Buy service is available to DDO fans in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Sweden, UK and US.

Click&Buy offers secure payments which can be made monthly, and provides overviews of open transactions, current subscriptions and invoices as well as customer service 24/7. There is a one-time sign-up fee, after which subscribers are billed according to their selected plans.

Codemasters Online Gaming, publisher of DDO, will also continue to offer the option of credit card and Pay-Pal payments. More information about payment options are available at Codemaster's website.

Texas game developer Cornered Rat Software has announced its "Welcome Back, Soldier" promotion for World War II Online, a first-person shooter MMO that recreates the battlefields of Western Europe between 1940-1942. (Historical notes: most ground fighting by U.S. and British forces outside the Pacific was confined to North Africa until the invasion of Italy in 1943, and the fiercest ground fighting during the period of the game was between German and Soviet forces, culminating in the Battle of Stalingrad during the winter of 1941-42. Poland, France and the Czechoslovakia fell rather quickly during 1939 and 1940, while the Battle of Britain was primarily an air war. Outside of those, I'm not exactly sure which battlefields they're referring to...)

The WBS promotion starts on 22 June, at which point 300,000 accounts will be re-activated over a two-week period. The  original game was released in 2001 as World War II Online: Blitzkrieg. Later, the game was updated and released in Europe as Battlefield Europe.

"Its been a roller-coaster ride beginning with one of the earliest MMOG launches to growing and supporting a fiercely-loyal player community all the while trying to continue the innovative and unique approach to development that's seen WWII Online stand alone as the ultimate PvP MMOG available",  says Al Corey, Executive Producer for publisher Playnet. "We're so proud to stand up and say that we're still here and thriving after 5 years. This promo is just a small way for us to say thank you to the thousands of players, past and present, who helped make it possible."