MMO Roundup: Last week on Massively
by Shawn Schuster 
Jul 14th 2009 at 11:00AM
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Blogger compares Aion to WoW and WAR Keen has two blog posts up discussing the similarities and differences between Aion and World of Warcraft and Warhammer Online. The first thing you should bear in mind is that he has not played Aion all the way through to the end game, even though he has "finished" both other MMOs. The second thing of note is that these points of comparison were requested by his readers. |
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More server consolidations in WAR? Less than three weeks after launching Land of the Dead, the Warhammer Online Herald is reporting another round of free transfers from several source servers to a few destination servers. Members of Ironfist, Vortex, Monolith, Magnus, and Skull Throne have been urged to transfer to more populated servers. Players on all servers are being rewarded with an extra 20% experience and renown bonus to mark the occasion. |
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Emergent behavior to be produced in Trion's Heroes of Telara Emergence is one of the aspects that many MMOs aspired to, only to drop in favor of static storytelling. The problem with emergence is that simple decisions would have a compounding impact on the world. Heroes would solve problems, only to perhaps create further problems with their implemented solutions. Most game architecture can't handle decision making of that nature, as it would need developers to constantly code in the new events that would occur. |
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George Lucas involved with The Old Republic This may not come as much of a surprise to Star Wars fans but according to BioWare's own Ray Muzyka, George Lucas is keeping an eye on Star Wars: The Old Republic. Of course, Lucas tends to keep an eye on generally everything LucasArts does, so this isn't so much a revelation as it is confirmation. Although it's important to point out that Muzyka has never personally shown anything to Lucas, not even that awesome CG trailer from E3, apparently. |
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The reason why you hate Second Life and a few ways to fix that Second Life gets a really bad rap from the MMO community that's largely undeserved. I get to hear all of these slams like it's a usless waste of data, there's nothing to do, it's a bunch of sex sims, and how I should work on my "first life" before my Second Life. Har, har, har. |
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All Points Bulletin video podcast shows off some ink All Points Bulletin is one of those upcoming games that tends to defy easy categorization. It's an urban crime game that has persistence, quests (missions), and fantastic customization options. It's not an MMO as we'd typically define it, and APB developer Realtime Worlds has also hinted that it may eventually become something of a virtual world. Maybe this is part of why we're interested in this game, it seems to be breaking new ground in online games. |
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Peer into the bowels of SWTOR's voice production So you've heard that Star Wars: The Old Republic is going to be completely voice acted. All player characters and non-player characters will have a professional voiced track for every bit of dialog. We're certain that you, much like ourselves, have imagined this project to be a huge undertaking. BioWare's pretty sure most of us are underestimating this, and their latest developer diary makes sure we truly understand the depth and range of the project. |
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Reentering the Age of Conan So here we are, coming back to the digital realm of Hyboria just past a year since everyone first ventured into its lush and deadly landscapes. What will I find? What will I think? These are just a few of the many questions that go through my mind as I boot up the game for the first time in a while. |
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Global Agenda entering phase one of closed beta July 24th Okay, so this one is slightly confusing. Hi-Rez Studios, creators of the upcoming Global Agenda, have said that on July 24th they'll be entering the first phase of closed beta. Now that's exciting news, to be sure, but this isn't your standard beta process. |
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, News items, Features
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
snowleopard233 Jul 14th 2009 11:08AM
More info on the games that are getting their butts whooped by WoW!
Myria Jul 14th 2009 11:21AM
To be honest Massively could use some serious work. A mix of copypasta press release reprints. mostly terrible original writing, and some of the most obvious and rabid fanboyism around, does not an interesting or entertaining site make.
Tridus Jul 14th 2009 12:23PM
Lucas is involved? Oh well, it could have been a good game.
Eric Jul 16th 2009 5:27PM
I love how everyone assumes that when the blogs and newssites says "Mythic helping bioware on TOR blablabla..." "Lucas involved in the making of TOR blabla" as if bioware isn't the company making this game anymore and won't go the way they want.
The_E Jul 14th 2009 1:55PM
Ahh yes, the website with editorials done by 12 year olds. Carry on.