WRUP: Glassware Stair Ax, the MMO with something for everyone edition
Yes, it's time for a hard pivot to cover the amazing Glassware Stair Ax, the MMO with something for everyone! Not something anyone involved will want. Here is what we have for every player type we could think of: Roleplayers: A piece of moldy bread we found in the garbage. Crafters: A piece of moldier […]
The Daily Grind: If you could give advice to a developer that would actually be taken, what would it be?
While developers have an insider's knowledge of the make-up of their games and access to information and demographics that we do not, it doesn't mean that gamers' observations, opinions, and advice is null and void. Having "massively multiplayer" communities creates the opportunity for a whole lot of insights that developers might well have missed — […]
Mike Morhaime to female Blizzard workers: 'I am extremely sorry that I failed you'
In response to the situation surrounding the explosive California state lawsuit alleging systemic sexual harassment and discrimination at Activision-Blizzard, former president Mike Morhaime posted a letter to the industry and specifically to his former Blizzard colleagues overnight. In sharp contrast to the combative, deflective memo issued in private at Activision and the Gloria-Steinem-namedrop memo leaked […]
Betawatch: New World kicks off its closed beta
At long last, the New World closed beta has arrived! It's a beta for the game that seems to have gone through more philosophical shifts than you would expect for any given game, but now it's here and playable! And as with any beta, it involved the usual weirdness like bricking GPUs and bannings over […]
Jump into a mech and blast some 'bots in Galahad 3093's open beta
Fans of MechWarrior and BattleTech should have Galahad 3093 on their radar, especially since the upcoming online shooter is launching a one-week open beta starting today and wrapping up on August 1st. The beta is taking place over five of the game's maps, including two that are brand-new to this round of testing. Additionally, developer […]
Wild Terra 2 adds horses and healing with its next update arriving July 29
If you're quietly gathering from a tree and see a small squirrel run up to you yelling and chittering in rage, is your first thought, "I could befriend this animal"? Then Wild Terra 2's next update is for you, as one of the changes being added is the chance for small angry animals to spawn […]
The Stream Team: Join Star Trek Online's Risa beach party with devs and win!
You know who needs a nice vacation? Massively OP's MJ! And The ultimate vacation spot in Star Trek Online is Risa. It just so happens the Lohlunat Festival summer event is in full swing, with plenty of party activities to participate in. Players even have had the chance to earn a T6 Risian Luxury Cruiser. […]
Old School RuneScape talks about combat achievements, RuneScape announces the Nodon Front
Chasing achievements is a thing that many gamers seem to love, so players of Old School RuneScape who are cut from the same cloth were likely looking forward to the addition of combat achievements this past Wednesday, which introduced six tiers of achievement carrots to chase related to combat. Apparently, the update needs a bit […]
Pokémon Unite, a monster-battling MOBA, is live now
The overall Pokémon franchise has never shied away from finding new and creative ways to let these animals hurt one another in violent confrontation, which makes the fact that it's taken this long for a MOBA to happen almost odd. Weren't these a big deal, like, five years ago? Hasn't the moment passed by now? […]
Swords 'n Magic and Stuff patched in new region, crafting, and farming in the Farm 'n Forge update
The game is called Swords 'n Magic and Stuff, but as of this week's update, you can also add Farming 'n Smithing and Cooking an' Tailoring to the mix thanks to the Farm 'n Forge update. This new update, which went live on July 22nd, allows players to hop on to a ferry and visit […]
Pokemon Go reneges on rewards after Russian players achieve company's goal
As readers may notice in our Pokemon Go coverage, we frequently ask PR for clarity on various announcements. While we can all appreciate not wanting too many spoilers, many of the requests are to clarify news and contest rules that can affect the community in ways Niantic hasn't clearly communicated. However, a recent Russian promotion […]
Dauntless brings back the Thunderdeep Drask, adds new rumors, and hints at the next new Behemoth
It's a bit of the new and a bit of the upcoming in Dauntless news today. In terms of new things, the game has put out its latest patch, which brings back the Thunderdeep Drask with some new moves to learn and new armor to craft. The patch has also kicked off the Umbral Heroic […]
A new 'Treasure Bugan' event spices up LOTRO's dungeon runs
Lord of the Rings Online is filled to the brim with instances, but weirdly enough, not as many players use the instance finder as might be the case in other MMOs. SSG is hoping to incentivize dungeon running with a brand-new event that stars a mischievous goblin that's running around with a sack of treasure. […]
Lost Ark KR offers a preview video of the Abrelshud raid ahead of its July 28 launch
We're appreciative that Lost Ark is headed to our side of the globe, and we're not going to look the gift horse of the class previews in the mouth, but we also have to admit that the stuff Korean players of the game are getting is a whole lot more intriguing. For example, take this […]
Star Wars: The Old Republic shares the secrets of the game's lead cinematic designer
Yes, the Star Wars: The Old Republic team deliberately worked to ensure that a quest ended with a "Cool Guys Don't Look At Explosions" moment on Quesh. There are other takeaways from a new dispatch from lead cinematic designer Ashley Ruhl celebrating a decade in operation, but you have to admire that all of the […]
GDC 2021: Star Wars Galaxies was a complex game of corporate greed and fan love
It was an MMO built in about three years, with a miserable launch, a depressing churn rate, and the most infamous patch in all gaming history… and also an MMO people loved so much they've kept it alive and thriving even in death. Yes, GDC 2021 has given us another Star Wars Galaxies postmortem from Raph […]
Crowfall suddenly changes course and announces a Dregs campaign for Australian players
Last week and this past Tuesday we reported on Crowfall's lack of a Dregs campaign for Oceania players while NA and EU players got one, with ArtCraft noting that the player population in the region needed "thousands" of players to launch such a campaign. "We're still building our audience in the Brazilian and Australian markets […]
WoW Factor: No king rules forever
World of Warcraft patch 9.1 has been out for less than a month, and it is a bad time to be a fan of Blizzard and the game. This column was already half-written on Tuesday and had to be completely rewritten when it turned out that Blizzard was going to be taken to task for […]
J Allen Brack addresses Blizzard staff over sexism scandal, Activision doubles down on deflection
Faced with a massive sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuit, Blizzard addressed the studio workers in a memo leaked last night. President J. Allen Brack doesn't admit fault or comment on the specifics of the case, but he vows no retaliation for victims, namedrops Gloria Steinem, and blasts "bro culture."
MassivelyOP interview: Talking ship design with Star Trek Online's Donny Versiga
If you play Star Trek Online, you know that ship collecting is one of the major pastimes of captains all over the Federation and beyond. As such, Donny Versiga, Staff Starship Artist for STO, has a very important job. He's a lifelong Star Trek fan, as evidenced by his impressive Starfleet cosplays you can check […]
Path of Exile details release timing and download sizes for the Expedition update
It won't be long now before the Expedition League and its myriad changes – which were thoroughly defended by GGG's Chris Wilson – are live with Path of Exile's Expedition expansion, which means that players have some things to do to prepare. Grinding Gear Games has once again gone to microscopic detailed lengths to outline […]
Enter to win a New World closed beta key from Amazon and MassivelyOP
If you've been watching the hype meter for New World slowly tick up and up this week but you aren't confident enough to preorder just yet, then today's giveaway is for you. Amazon has kindly granted us a small stack of keys for our readers, which we're going to dispatch in a quick-turnaround raffle today […]
The Daily Grind: Which MMO has the best weapon animations?
I remember back when World of Warcraft was just plain vanilla and there was plenty of time to observe things during the countless fights. I remember looking at the same two attack animations being played out over and over again and thinking, "It'd be really cool if they added more animations in future patches as […]
Massively Overthinking: Load-bearing playerbases in MMORPGs
Game developer Damion Schubert is known to MMO players for his work on everything from Ultima Online to SWTOR, but as it turns out, he's a controversial Twitter follow all 'round. He recently dropped some truths on the platform that I want us to discuss in this week's Massively Overthinking. "Making raid content for an […]
'We do not serve Activision Blizzard': Furious WoW players stage protest against Blizzard
Following yesterday's revelation that the state of California is suing Activision-Blizzard in a 29-page complaint that alleges a serious pattern of sexual harassment and discrimination that led to the death of a Blizzard staffer (among many other things), you might be wondering what you can do about it. If you've been reading our comments, you […]
Zenith offers a preview of a new zone arriving with its next alpha build
All systems appear to be go this time around for the VR MMO Zenith's upcoming alpha test this Saturday, July 24th, and the devs at Ramen VR are eager to once more show off what players can look forward to in the latest test build. For example, a new zone to explore. This new zone […]
Starbase details release timing and pricing for early access, updates its roadmap, and details next major content releases
Starbase is entering early access for really reals this time. How can we be sure? Because the devs have outlined very specific release timing and prices for said early access release. The building-centric spaceship sandbox will be live on Thursday, July 29th, at 11:00 a.m. EDT. The game will set you back $35 but will […]
TitanReach is going free-to-play until its closed alpha
If the high price on TitanReach's early access – originally $70 and since reduced to $38 – seemed like too much for a fledgling MMO to ask, then you might be mollified by Square Root Studios' latest revelation: that it's going free-to-play with its early access after all, at least until the closed alpha begins […]
Guild Wars 2 on how it's upgrading the Canthan language from Factions to End of Dragons
ArenaNet apparently isn't waiting for next week to start the hype for Guild Wars 2's End of Dragons reveal, as today it released a dev blog on the written language of Cantha. Cantha, of course, is the continent we'll be visiting in the expansion as we trek over to the land that classic Guild Wars: […]
Fallout 76 opens its test servers for Fallout Worlds
Come with me and you'll be In a world of game rule variations Take a look on the test servers Into world manipulation Fallout 76 tests out All its worlds of full player creation And official worlds of rule alterations If you want test the next update, Simply log right on and do it, Try […]
GDC 2021: Are VR and AR companies liable for gamer content creation?
One thing I love about a good GDC presentation is when devs bring up those issues that many of us get a funny feeling about and show us how right or wrong we are. During a panel at this year's GDC 2021, David Hoppe of Managing Partner Gamma Law brought up some issues near and […]
Swords of Legends Online launches a summer event and battle pass, previews its first raid in a livestream
The summer season has officially arrived to Swords of Legends Online, bringing along some new activities and a new battle pass full of cosmetics. The summer event runs between now and September 2nd, with a changing schedule of events at the Dragon Turtle Beach Party location involving watermelons, running through cooling balls, and finding buried […]
GDC 2021: How smarter AI could build characters and decks to help new MMO players
There's a bit of a theme at GDC 2021 concerning online card games, especially TCGs, and smart tech/deep learning AI. At a panel this week, NetEase's Yiheng Zhou noted that bots in general have a long history of use in games. Behavior trees combined with turn-based games lend themselves quite well to the realm of […]
Ubisoft's sexual harassment and racism scandal extended to Skull & Bones studio in Singapore
We realize that Activision-Blizzard's horrifying sexual misconduct and discrimination lawsuit stole all the headlines last night and will probably dominate the news cycle for a while, but it's just not the only video game company beleaguered by damning allegations of abuse right now. The Ubisoft sexual harassment scandal has been brewing since 2020, leading to […]
Warcraft III: Reforged was sabotaged internally by low budget and shifting priorities
If you're still waiting for Warcraft III: Reforged to deliver on the basic functionality that the game's prior version had 18 months after launch… don't be silly, the game still doesn't even support custom campaign functionality. What the heck happened? According to a new piece from Bloomberg, the short version is that the game required […]
GGG's Chris Wilson says Path of Exile reached a 'breaking point with power creep' that Expedition will help fix
Yesterday, we noted how Path of Exile players were responding with dismay to the proposed Expedition expansion and league changes, under the belief that the expansion was being designed to nerf what fun is left in the game. The game's subreddit, for example, was a solid wall of disgruntled memes, dejection, and attempts to get […]
Players sound the alarm over faction balance in World of Warcraft: Classic
Well, World of Warcraft might be struggling right now, but at least everything's going peachy over on WoW Classic, right? Not so much, really. If the same-faction battlegrounds didn't tip you off, the game is suffering from a pretty serious problem in the form of a faction imbalance that appears to be getting worse rather […]
Star Citizen addresses alpha 3.13, stability, delays, bugs, and communication
As is tradition with CIG, the devs are looking back at the release of alpha 3.13 and the Invictus Launch Week event of Star Citizen and offering some thoughts on updates that worked, things that fell short, and lessons learned with each feature's release. The post offers some acknowledgment of missteps such as problems with […]
Lost Ark shares breakdowns of advanced mage and warrior classes
While potential players of Lost Ark already know that the game will have five classes at launch that branch out into different classes, it might not be immediately obvious just what some of those advanced classes actually are. Luckily for us, the game has pushed out a couple of dev blogs to get us acquainted […]
NCsoft prepares 'solo-friendly' edition of Lineage 2 for an August release
Come August 11th, Lineage II will boast not one, not two, but three separate versions of the game. In addition to the regular Lineage II and the legacy Lineage II Classic, NCsoft is preparing to launch something called Lineage II Aden, which — despite first impressions — is not a '90s R&B group. Lineage II […]
Guild Wars 2 will showcase End of Dragons' story, elite specs, beta info, and trailer next week
So we already knew that ArenaNet is taking the wraps off Guild Wars 2's End of Dragons next week – that's on July 27th, in spite of the fact that the expansion itself has been scooted out of 2021 and into 2022. But what we didn't have before is a time and a description of […]
The Daily Grind: What little touches make you happy in an MMO?
Completing a duty in Final Fantasy XIV plays the traditional series victory fanfare. It's such a little thing, it doesn't need to be in there, it doesn't do anything or make the game good or anything like that. But to a long-time series fan who really loves that fanfare, it means a lot to hear […]
California sues Activision-Blizzard over discrimination and sexist, toxic work culture
Activision-Blizzard has had an abysmal couple of years, and it's about to get much worse, as the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing has filed a civil rights and equal pay lawsuit against Activision and Blizzard on behalf of their victimized employees. As first reported by Bloomberg Law, the DFEH alleges that its multi-year […]
New World has capped menu screen framerates to prevent video card fatalities
Earlier today, we covered the emerging news that users of some video cards, particularly EVGA RTX 3090 graphics cards, were having serious problems with Amazon's New World beta – to the point that the cards were being bricked. As the story developed over the day, it became more clear that even more cards are affected […]
Dual Universe details the tracking, mining, and fighting to be done for asteroids
Asteroids in Dual Universe! You know how to play this; you just rotate your ship a little bit and shoot at the asteroids while they come closer, but you have to – oh, wait, that's not how asteroids work here. No, instead they're resource-rich balls of rock floating through space, designed to be spontaneous hotspots […]
Overwatch launches 2021 Summer Games, the WoW Wrath of the Lich King pandemic boardgame is really happening
As the first Tokyo Olympics events begin today, Overwatch has opened the gates for its own Summer Games, running this year through August 10th. Expect the return of Lucioball and Lucioball Remix as well as the traditional lootboxes and cosmetics. "erve up some summer sweets as Sprinkles Mei, kick back with a chilly cocktail as […]
Blade and Soul 2 will be getting a South Korean launch this August
Up to this point, the mobile MMO prequel Blade and Soul 2 has only had the nebulous launch date of sometime this year, but a new press release from NCSoft confirms that the South Korean version of the game has moved from a release year to a release month: the month of August, to be […]
PlanetSide 2 adjusts infantry weapons, tweaks Javelins, and squashes bugs in today's update
Now that the NSO faction has been retooled, it stands to reason that PlanetSide 2 would need to adjust things a bit post-patch. That's just what this latest hotfix looks to do, offering some unremarkable but otherwise necessary tweaks to a few things in the PC version of the shooter. This patch buffs up the […]
Path of Exile posts the complete patch notes for the Expedition expansion
While the Expedition League for Path of Exile still has a couple of days to go before it officially launches on July 23rd, players are being granted a headstart on hoovering up all of the details of the update thanks to a set of fully available patch notes. Considering these notes are for an expansion-sized […]
GDC 2021: Navigating player behaviors and cheating in online video games
GDC 2021 has now offered several panels on player behavior and cheating that are aimed at devs but still provide some good information for regular players. Riot Games specifically was out in force, and Head of Player Dynamics, Weszt Hart, helped curb expectations, while Andrew Hogan, CMO and Co-Founder of Intorqa, drove home how rampant […]
