Crowfall makes plans for cross-server campaigns and handshake sieges
It sure doesn't feel as if Crowfall launched six weeks ago, but this summer has felt like three minutes and also three years, so maybe that makes sense. ArtCraft has posted a new dev blog at this month-and-a-half mark, noting that The Shadow's initial campaigns have now closed. "Our next major update at the end […]
Daybreak breaks up with the Wandering Monster studio trademark
Sorry, brain-hungry zombies, it's not going to work out. Just know that it's not you; it's Daybreak Game Company. Last year we noted that Daybreak filed yet another trademark for a possible subsidiary under the name of Wandering Monster Games. Good money was placed in the MassivelyOP office that this was in regard to the […]
Swords of Legends Online asks you to become an unpaid QA tester
It's so hard not to throw shade at MMO studios that try to outsource paid positions to players — or even worse, to charge them for the "privilege" of testing early content. And yet it's so depressingly widespread in this genre that when Gameforge and Swords of Legends Online beckons players to become a de […]
The Daily Grind: Which MMO is the worst when it comes to invisible walls?
Woo boy. If you want to get my dander up out of nowhere when I'm playing your MMO, then just toss in an invisible wall so that I can smack into it like a goose flying into a glass door at 40 miles per hour. There are few petty, insignificant video game design elements that […]
Grab a free key for Elyon's second closed beta, launching August 18
Elyon, the MMO we've been watching every since it first entered our radar as Ascent: Infinite Realm, is launching its second closed beta test here in the west tomorrow – and we're gonna get you in. Kakao has granted Massively OP a stack of keys for the test, which kicks off on August 18th and […]
Cutesy MMO Fioresia Online is now Cinderstone Online, launches closed beta test
Let's recap things a bit here: At the beginning of the year, we cast a spotlight on Fioresia Online, an adorable looking 2.5-D open world MMORPG that had cute little bulb-headed adventurers doing big people adventuring things like housing, farming, castle management and sieges, and questing. The game sounded like it was well on its […]
Fortnite brings back Wild Weeks mods, adds new 'Impostors' mode that looks… familiar
Are you ready to get wild in Fortnite? Then you're ready for the return of Wild Weeks, which are making a comeback starting with the battle royale shooter's latest update. This week is Sneak Week, with every Epic+ Pistol, Epic+ Assault Rifle, and all Bolt-Action Sniper Rifles getting replaced with their stealthy variants, and more […]
The Elder Scrolls Online invites players to hop in and play for free through August 30
As The Elder Scrolls Online is showing off its latest piece of DLC, it wants to entice you to start playing. Doesn't it look like fun? Don't you just want to give it a little try? Because you absolutely can try it during the free play event running through August 30th, offering everyone a chance […]
Massively OP Podcast Episode 335: Farewell Astellia
Justin and Bree discuss Astellia Online, Guild Wars 2, Blizzard, and No Man's Sly, with adventures in LOTRO and FFXIV, plus mailbag topics on Diablo's sudden spotlight and the fate of the Blizzard name.
Mortal Online 2 patches in mail, spells, and a city ahead of September stress test
Mortal Online 2's latest beta patch has landed this week, promising a new round of character content. StarVault says that the 0.1.5.9 update has added new Spiritism spells, AI support, pet equipment crafting, workbench learning, UI improvements, an early version of the mail system, horse and player idles, armor penalty scaling, better taming behaviors, better death […]
Kingfall is proudly advertising itself as a casual fantasy MMORPG with NFTs attached
Reading the announcement pinned tweet from Kingfall is a journey. The game is coming soon. All right. It's a casual fantasy MMORPG. Hmm, that could be interesting. It's playable globally in multiple regions. That's a good thing. Early investors get a share of revenue for life… wait a second, that seems odd. And then it […]
Bless Unleashed PC says it's cracking down on illicit RMT with 30-day bans
Bless Unleashed is riding the high of its PC launch, which yesterday reported over a million downloads since the release. But now, Round 8 Studio is turning back to the business of explaining what's next. The studio says that this week's priest patch is getting a patch of its own to rebalance the Shield of […]
Book of Travels team discusses socializing in-game and why you should play
A lot of the news coming out of tiny multiplayer online RPG (TMORPG) Book of Travels is about how it's different from other MMO titles. From a lack of questing to text free communication to its handling of combat, developer Might and Delight has been banging the drum of its game's unique approaches. That refrain […]
Choose My Adventure: Back to the basic joys of dungeon running in Trove
This is way more like it. The bare bones, basic, simple delight of Trove continues to be running around the open world, heading to whatever little dungeons are sprinkled around the biome that I'm at, and running in trying to figure out just where I'm supposed to be going. Honestly, some of these dungeon designs […]
Guild Wars 2's first beta event for End of Dragons' elite specs is live today
If you're anxious to get your hands on the first three Guild Wars 2 End of Dragons elite specs, then today is your day to play, as the first beta event is set to launch this afternoon. Everyone – even free-to-play players with no expansions – can log in and tool around with the Mesmer, […]
First impressions: Exploring Neverwinter's leveling revamp and bard class
It's funny: The last time I paid a visit to Neverwinter, it was to check out a revamp of the new player experience. Here we are again, with a much more extensive overhaul of the game's leveling courtesy of the Jewel of the North update. This time there's also a new class in the form […]
Elyon gives a look at its six different classes in latest video
The video content continues to pour out of Elyon, with the game's latest video showcasing its six different classes. The video provides a general breakdown of each class' playstyle and different abilities, as well as highlights each one's Tab skill, which provides quick boons that are unique to each class like an AoE that increases […]
MUD creator Richard Bartle's seminal book on designing MMOs is now free
When MMORPG players encounter the name "Bartle," they think less malt liquor and more a man who helped to pioneer the massively multiplayer online space with his work on MUD1 that eventually spawned the gamer type test that bears his name. But Dr. Richard Bartle knows MMORPGs from the inside-out, which is why he wrote […]
California DFEH moves to protect Riot workers from retaliation for cooperating in state investigation
Blizzard isn't the only gaming studio under fire by regulators in California: We've been covering a similar situation within League of Legends company Riot Games since 2018, when Kotaku's expose of workplace conditions was followed by an employee walkout, multiple lawsuits, and that eternal story about the company VP who repeatedly grabbed subordinates' balls was […]
Cloud Imperium says 'there's NO place for racism in the Star Citizen community'
Several members of the Star Citizen community messed around and found out. The story begins with a plea to CIG to introduce a profanity filter to the game's general chat in order to battle back against hate speech and profanity. "A simple filter to catch the worst and often illegal explicit language should go without […]
Aika Online announces a September 15 sunset date
In this latest episode of "I didn't even realize that game was still running," Aika Online is finally closing its doors after over a dozen years of operation. Publisher T3Fun announced that it's sunsetting the game on September 15th, saying that "this isn't a decision that [it] came to lightly." No reason for the closure […]
World of Warships studio Wargaming addresses row that led to influencer exodus
Yesterday, MOP's Ben Griggs deep-dived a shocking development in the World of Warships community: As many as 22 content creators had abruptly quit Wargaming's program, denouncing the studio for everything from "aggressive monetization" and gambling mechanics to an abusive and toxic relationship between the company and its influencers. It was a situation simmering over the […]
The Daily Grind: Is the MMO industry a zero-sum game?
A while back I spied a thread on the MMORPG subreddit that was lamenting the fact that Final Fantasy XIV has been blowing up. It's deleted now, as so many of these threads are, but it's worth discussing. "[FFXIV's] rise in popularity has to be frustrating to people who already know they don't enjoy it," […]
Moonlight Sculptor merges servers tomorrow, previews content update
The future of mobile MMO Moonlight Sculptor is one of merging servers and extra layers of existing content according to the game's most recent post. Server merges will be happening on Tuesday, August 17th, while the game's next regular maintenance will happen that following Thursday, August 19th. Exact timing for both events will be announced […]
War Thunder's Summer Landing event offers rare vehicles for completing achievements
What War Thunder player doesn't like getting free vehicles? The game is all about military vehicles blowing one another up, so presumably having more choices in that regard is a welcome thing, which means that the Summer Landing event is going to be very interesting to players as it's handing out six rare vehicles for […]
Profane shares another alpha roadmap update, plans to test character creation soon
PvP MMO Profane is back on its Twitter trip, this time offering another update to its alpha roadmap and a quick rundown of the various development milestones made by the team at Insane Studios. Some of the updates called out in the Twitter thread include work on basic combat and the weapons systems, which should […]
RuneScape opens the Senntisten mini dig site and hands out free action bar presents in latest update
Last week RuneScape talked up the small scale Senntisten Archaeology dig site that was coming today, so it stands to reason that this week's news letter is all about the content's launch. The new content is available to subscribers who have an Archaeology level of 60 or higher and offers six excavation spots across four […]
How to make 18-year-old Star Wars Galaxies look pretty on one rogue server
If you read my trip through Star Wars Galaxies Legends for Choose My Adventure, you already know I made a lot about the help that the Napyet Gaming YouTube channel provides, and for good reason; the channel is full of extremely helpful guides for new players as well as some thoughts on the game, all […]
Path of Exile's next patch makes a number of changes to Expedition vendors
Either sometime today or later this week, Path of Exile will be getting its next patch, but as of yesterday players are able to check out the patch notes for the update, which features a fairly long list of updates for the Expedition League. Among these changes are the addition of item level 86 goods […]
Atlas previews plants and spider mounts arriving in the game's next major patch
So, Atlas fans, what do you want from the next major patch? Small clan support? Well, that's not in there. Major bug fixes? Uh… well, hopefully. Better ship customization? Improvements to the core gameplay loop? More player customization? Well… Look, let's start this post over. Hello, Atlas fans! What you're getting in the next patch […]
City of Titans' flight travel power is getting good tester feedback
There is no superhero travel power as iconic as flight — and none that is as important for a superhero MMO to get right. City of Titans knows this, which is why it's been soliciting feedback from testers on its flight mechanics following the power's introduction into the build. On the whole, this first pass […]
Brazilian police have arrested a suspect in the murder of an Overwatch voice actress
PC Gamer is reporting the shocking news that Brazilian voice actress Christiane Louise has been murdered and that police have now arrested the suspected killer. Christiane Louise would be best known to our audience for her role as the Portuguese-language version of Mercy in Overwatch, but the site also notes that she had roles in […]
Blade and Soul 2 offers a quick look at sword versus axe one-on-one PvP gameplay
There have been plenty of videos coming out of Blade and Soul 2, but a vast majority of them have been pre-rendered CG animations, with only one trailer actually showing active gameplay. That trailer count has increased to two now, as the game has offered a new video with some 1v1 PvP action. The video […]
Project Gorgon teases its August patch, with five new non-combat skills
It's been a month and change since we peeked into Project Gorgon, and if you just follow the game on Twitter, you will have missed all the stuff Elder Game has apparently been posting in its Discord since then. Back in July, the company collected questions for a Q&A – yes, in Discord – and […]
WoW Factor: World of Warcraft's burning of Teldrassil plot wrap-up is terrible
Fair warning: This post contains spoilers for the current World of Warcraft plotline for anyone who has not finished up the latest parts of the covenant campaign. If you have not finished the campaign and do not want to read spoilers, you should avoid this post. These spoilers are stupid. But it does contain spoilers. […]
Bless Unleashed PC counts a million downloads on PC since its Steam launch
So, how is Bless Unleashed doing since its PC launch earlier this month? Well, apparently, as it's now claiming 1M downloads on PC alone. "Neowiz and Round8 Studio are thrilled to announce that Bless Unleashed has already seen over one million downloads on PC. Since the game's August 6th launch on Valve's Steam platform, the […]
Opinion: Free Guy is a great watch – particularly for MMO fans
I don't wind up writing a whole lot of movie reviews. This isn't because I don't watch a lot of movies or don't think about movies a lot, but just because, well… Massively Overpowered is an MMO site, and there's not a whole lot of space for me to talk about movies on a regular […]
WildStar's Stephan Frost shares the depressing 'flat circle' of MMO development
Former WildStar lead Stephan Frost piped up on Twitter this past Friday to share a story. This isn't just any story, but rather all stories of MMORPG development, from concept to release and beyond. In summation, he says that this "flat circle" brings around the same problems, struggles, and fallout of development again and again. […]
The Soapbox: World of Warships' aggressive monetization incited a mass-exodus of content creators
Gaming monetization has been a topic of intense conversation ever since box copies of software diminished in favor of persistent online experiences. Subscription services entered the scene but presented the problem of a monthly commitment to the unknown. Then we got swarmed with free-to-play titles and the introduction of cash shops and designs intended to […]
Amazon Game Studios retracts policies that claim rights to games made by workers after hours
Nobody is going to accuse Amazon Game Studios of being a house of ideas, considering the studio has already been exposed as a place where trends are chased and games get cancelled the moment they're unpopular. This notion was reaffirmed when a software engineer at Google shared a part of a contract AGS employees have […]
Elyon outlines equipment and gear enhancement, opens pre-download for CBT2
The video series all about the systems in Elyon continue with a look at equipment and enhancement. Equipment comes in one of five tiers from common to legendary, and each piece of gear has stats, a number of slots that represent how many times it can be enhanced, a random effect in some cases, and […]
The Daily Grind: Does a class' style or playstyle matter more to you in MMOs?
Consider this my ode to the Guild Wars franchise's Mesmers. I love everything about them but how they play in practice. I love how they look. I love how their skills look. I love the idea of dancing around with illusions and riddles and light weapons and fancy outfits. But I've never loved how they […]
MMO Week in Review: Astellia Online gives up, Guild Wars 2 gets classy
Classy as in elite specs, that is. Yes, Guild Wars 2 fully revealed its first three End of Dragons elite specs this week, making fans of the Mesmer, Necro, and Guardian happy. Or not happy; it's really hard to tell with GW2 players. Meanwhile, Astellia Online threw in the towel, Blade & Soul set a […]
Battle Bards Episode 199: World of Warcraft tavern tunes
At the start and end of a long day of adventurin', the Battle Bards love to kick back with a frosty mug of (ginger) ale or a stein of (root) beer at their favorite taverns. And what watering holes have better music than World of Warcraft, which actually released a full album of it? In […]
The MOP Up: Warface's Hidden War is revealed
This week, Warface kicked off its Hidden War season: "The season update adds a new PvP-map called Ruins for capture mode where players can use traps against their opponents to change the map topology and gain a tactical advantage. Two new series of weapons and a set of armor complement the collections of players. Soon, […]
Lineage W is yet another mobile version of the MMO series 'strategically developed for global users'
At this point, the Lineage series is going to undergo so much mitosis that it will finally become a multi-cellular organism that will randomly wander the world and unleash massive AOEs on the planet. Until that time, there's word of another mobile entry in the MMOARPG series known as Lineage W. And as the lede […]
The Stream Team: Firing up the transdimensional steam engine of Voidtrain early access
When news of the early access survival sandbox Voidtrain crossed our desk, it perked a few ears in the staff. One of those perked ears belong to MOP's Chris, which is an anomaly because survival sandboxes usually aren't his bag, but who doesn't love trains? Interdimensional ones at that? Join him at 12:00 p.m. EDT […]
Destiny 2 covers changes coming to armor and mods in Season 15
Last week, Destiny 2 offered players a look at PvE changes due for Season 15, and this week the game's newsletter focused in on armor and mod changes that the new season will be bringing. The post goes through a variety of adjustments, including some tuning to Exotic armors that refund Super energy and buffing […]
One Shots: Flying into bugs at 90 mph
Flight may look cool on the superhero travel powers selection screen, but what they don't tell you in the shop is that it comes with a whole bunch of drawbacks: neck cricks, sun damage, collisions with amateur drone conventions, and a face full of bugs smacking into you at 90 miles per hour. You keep […]
The Daily Grind: What's the dumbest thing you've seen an MMO dev do on social media?
The great thing about social media is that it can be a great medium for people to communicate in real-time and let everyone know what you're thinking. The worst thing is… exactly that. But however bad it is when you accidentally say something that a bit more thought would have told you that it was […]
