Make Love, Not Warcraft

Plot

A griefer repeatedly kills the characters of Cartman, Kyle, Stan, and Kenny in World of Warcraft. Stan's father Randy becomes interested but is quickly killed. The griefer is revealed to be a middle-aged obese man whom Blizzard employees deem has "no life".

The boys phone Blizzard, but the company cannot remove the griefer because his high level blocks their ability. Cartman rallies classmates; Butters claims he plays Hello Kitty Island Adventure instead. The kids log in simultaneously to attack the griefer but are overpowered by giant scorpions. Everyone loses hope except Cartman, who convinces Stan, Kyle, and Kenny to keep playing.

He calculates the time needed to match the griefer's experience points. For two months, the boys play 21 hours daily, killing low-level boars, becoming lazy, obese, and acne-ridden. Their characters gain experience so quickly that Blizzard executives notice and believe they might have a chance.

Production

The episode relies heavily on machinima to mimic the game's look. Originally set to be the 145th episode, it was pushed back because creating that machinima proved tricky. Trey Parker and Matt Stone worked with Blizzard Entertainment on it, and they were genuinely surprised the company said yes. The machinima blended actual in-game footage with character models rebuilt in Maya, using Blizzard's own character assets and computers for testing.

Blizzard also let them film on the alpha server for the expansion World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. Blizzard co-founder Michael Morhaime put out a statement saying they were thrilled to help and looked forward to sharing the result with employees and players. The griefer's look came from Blizzard cinematics artist Joeyray Hall.

Some Season 10 DVD sets of South Park include a 14-day free trial for World of Warcraft. The fictional Sword of a Thousand Truths later showed up in the Burning Crusade beta as an arena prize, though it didn't work like it did on the show. Planning and data collection started on September 1, 2006, but the actual machinima shoot took five days: the first on September 20 lasting three to five hours, the last on October 3, the day before it aired. The regular South Park animation ran in parallel, as non-machinima episodes typically wrap up within twelve hours of broadcast.

Reception

IGN rated the episode 9.3, calling it "one of the funniest episodes ever produced". The original airing drew 3.4 million viewers, most aged 18–49, making it Comedy Central's highest-rated midseason premiere since 2000. The episode won the 2007 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program. Fans voted it first place in a major 2011 South Park voting held under the "Year of the Fan" iTunes promotion.

Did You Know?

• Trey Parker and Matt Stone listed this episode as their third-favorite of the series in 2015.
• The episode's title is a play on the 1960s counterculture slogan "Make love, not war".