Mr. T, Shatner shill World of Warcraft

If World of Warcraft is notable for anything, it's the ridiculous success the massively multiplayer online role-playing game has achieved. If it's notable for two things, it's that success and the clever and unusual ways it has been marketed and tied into pop culture.

World of Warcraft has been featured on credit cards, an episode of South Park, in Dave Chappelle's stand-up act, and on SAT preparation study guides. Previous WOW ads include a TV spot that inserted the game into the seminal comedy Office Space and a series of offbeat Korean-language segments widely circulated on the Internet.

Blizzard knows the 2004 PC release still has some legs--it currently boasts over 9 million subscribers worldwide--and it's looking to get the most of them with a new line of World of Warcraft commercials featuring celebrity testimonials. The new ad campaign features Mr. T (Rocky III, The Toughest Man in the World), William Shatner (Star Trek, TekWar), and Verne Troyer (Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, Pinocchio's Revenge) in a series of spots explaining what characters they play in World of Warcraft before asking the audience, "What's Your Game?"

The first two spots are currently up on Blizzard's official site. Shatner plays a Shaman, while Mr. T plays a Night Elf Mohawk and thoroughly pities the fool who points out that there is no such character class in the game.