It’s been an interesting week for MMORPG players frustrated with toxicity in the gaming community as three distinct stories highlighted how studios are cracking down on troublemakers in our midst: Old School RuneScape banned players for blatantly racist harassment via slurs and costumes, Trion’s community team posted its plans for combating toxicity on ArcheAge’s forums and chat channels, and Blizzard issued press releases vowing to find “consensus and collaborat[ion]” on managing problem gamers in the wake of harassment of an African-American Hearthstone tourney player.
Will measures taken to fight toxicity have any lasting effect? That’s the real question. Read on for the very best of this week’s MMO news and opinions.
THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES
Blizzard and Twitch address harassment defiling game event streams - In case you had forgotten since yesterday's news that RuneScape had to ban players for running around in-game wearing KKK costumes and shrieking racial slurs, some gamers are still racist…
Desert Nomad: The misplaced individuality of Black Desert - Hello, friends, and welcome back at long last to another installment of Desert Nomad. I'm very sorry to have kept you all waiting during my impromptu sabbatical, and if it's…
Elder Scrolls Online’s Matt Firor on game population, not going F2P, and defining MMOs - ZeniMax Online’s Matt Firor told players back in April that the console versions of The Elder Scrolls Online had "opened the game up to millions more new players," and he's…
See your future in Path of Exile’s Prophecy mini-expansion on June 3rd - [AL:POE]I see something coming in the future... something that will be of interest to Path of Exile fans. And it will arrive on June 3rd. It's the big mid-expansion update!…
Trion CM Celestrata has big plans to clean up ArcheAge’s ‘toxic community’ image - [AL:Arche]ArcheAge Senior Community Manager Seraphina "Celestrata" Brennan has this week unveiled serious plans to clean up her game's community image. In the first of what she says will be her dedicated…
Lord of the Rings Online suspends digital sales until June - We've included Turbine's statement to us at the end of this piece. [AL:LOTRO]Lord of the Rings Online is suspending its online sales for the duration of the month. Under a…
Defiance now has a game-wide auction house - Don't you hate when a new gun drops in Defiance and you don't need it? If the developers would implement a gun that shot other guns, it'd still have a…
WoW Factor: Alternative content release models for WoW and beyond - It has been noted in the past that I am a big fan of having big, show-stopping expansions released for games. I will not deny it; I don't want to…
Star Citizen’s Around on Verse on 2.4, animations, events, and shopping - Star Citizen's Around the Verse this week sees the return of Ben Lesnick just in time for the 2.4 patch to land on the public test server and drop its…
The Secret World reveals the housing-esque Museum of the Occult - After hinting about a new Secret World feature with the monster T-shirt contest and letting players speculate for a week, devs finally revealed their plans during the latest Streaming Ones episode.…
Jukebox Heroes: Great tunes from dead MMOs - When a beloved MMORPG is canceled, it doesn't entirely vanish without a trace. After all, there are thousands (if not millions) of eyewitnesses with long memories, screenshot folders filled to…
Funcom’s Q1 2016 revenues, costs decline - Funcom's first quarter 2016 financial report is unlikely to shock anyone who read the 2015 annual report a few weeks ago. Revenue fell by nearly $600,000 over the fourth quarter…
CCP announces Gunjack Next for Google Daydream - EVE Gunjack is getting a sequel, and it's an exclusive for Google's Android-based Daydream VR platform, which itself was announced just today. Gunjack Next -- yes, that's its codename -- is planned…
RIFT launches a sentient 10-man raid; here’s the trailer - [AL:Rift]Live in RIFT's patch today is a brand-new 10-man raid called The Comet of Ahnket. A lore piece last week revealed that the eponymous comet led scholars to discover a…
Flameseeker Chronicles: Unpacking the proposed Guild Wars 2 WvW scoring improvements - [AL:GW2]In my last edition of Flameseeker Chronicles, I outlined ArenaNet's recent WvW player poll and discussed the possible implications of voting for each of the two options presented. On one…
Black Desert expands world and PvP with Valencia, refuses costume alteration refunds - Black Desert is getting a massive update on June 1st when the first chunk of the Valencia update is launched. According to Daum, Valencia will include "hundreds" of new quests,…
Elder Scrolls Online’s Dark Brotherhood DLC buffs up the group finder - Are you into grouping in The Elder Scrolls Online? Good news for you: ZeniMax says today in a new dev blog that it's focused on improving the grouping tool once…
WildStar’s soundtrack is finally coming to market - One of the most requested MMORPG soundtracks of the current era is finally coming to market, causing every rowsdower in the galaxy to start jitterbugging with happiness. That's right, you can…
Guild Wars 2’s 64-bit client launches along with PvP Season 3 - Guild Wars 2's 64-bit client is out of beta as of today, according to the patch notes released this morning. "The 32-bit client will now automatically switch to the 64-bit…
Go to see the Warcraft movie, get a free copy of World of Warcraft - Do you somehow not have a copy of World of Warcraft? It's weird, but it happens. But now you can get it for just the price of a movie ticket,…
Old School RuneScape bans players for racism, harassment - Old School RuneScape has had a brush with the banhammer. Jagex told players on Reddit today that an unspecified number of players have been banned for "repeatedly harassing a number of…
Blade & Soul announces Vengeance Breaks update for June 1 - It's a day that ends in Y, so that means it's time for another massive Blade & Soul announcement. NCsoft has revealed today the June 1st update, what it's calling Vengeance Breaks.…
Mark Kern to deliver Nostalrius petition to Blizzard next week - The Nostalrius team isn't the only one heading to Irvine to meet with Blizzard: The ex-WoW, ex-Firefall developer Mark Kern says he's locked in a meeting as well. "I’ll be having…
Rumor: TERA destined for Xbox One, PS4 console ports - We've updated the end of this post with En Masse's statement to Massively OP. [AL:TERA]Is TERA one of the MMORPGs announcing a leap to the console market this year? MMO…
Trion Worlds CEO: RIFT’s retention rate is ‘astounding’ - [AL:Rift]In a new interview with VentureBeat, Trion Worlds CEO Scott Hartsman stated that RIFT's retention rate is "astounding" compared to the rest of the MMO industry. "We just checked the other…
WildStar’s lead writer is gone too - Over the weekend, former WildStar Product Director Mike Donatelli and Design Director Chris Behrens announced on Twitter that their last day working for Carbine on WildStar had come. Now we've…
Lifeless brings the zombie apocalypse to the comfort of your home - Tell me if you've heard of this game before: It's an action-survival title set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland full of hungry zombies that you must fight while looking to build…
Wisdom of Nym: Final Fantasy XIV’s class weaknesses and why they matter - [AL:FFXIV]The other day, I was browsing the official Final Fantasy XIV forums for a reason I can no longer recall. I am sure it made sense at the time, but…
Nostalrius heads to Blizzard in June - Blizzard's promise to meet with the team behind vanilla World of Warcraft emulator Nostalrius was more than just lip service; the amateur devs reported that they will making the trek…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 65: Make yourself at home
The Stream Team: Battling the boss in HEX’s dream dungeon
The Stream Team: Starting SWTOR’s Shadow of Revan for real
The Stream Team: Bebopping about Black Desert
The Stream Team: Sharing SMITE adventures and Susano codes
The Stream Team: Captain America FTW in Marvel Heroes’ Civil War
AND FROM OUR FRIENDS AT BLIZZARD WATCH
Get Ready: Here’s when Overwatch is launching
WoW: Legion beta introduces talent change restrictions
Are Demon Hunters the last class WoW should add?
Every week, get caught up on the MMO genre’s latest news and Massively OP’s best content in our MMO Week in Review! Want more roundups of content? Try Friday’s Betawatch for MMO testing highlights, Saturday’s Make My MMO for MMO crowdfunding updates, and Sunday’s The MOP Up, which mops up all the little bits of news we didn’t cover anywhere else.
