Guild Wars 2’s Rising Flames episode rolled out this week, beating the originally announced cadence with nostalgia-fueled content buffed by the resumed development of legendary weapons, the reveal of the Eternal Coliseum PvP map, and an AMA on that touched on everything from repeatable hearts to insider trading.
Read on for the very best of this week’s MMO news and opinions.
THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES
Flameseeker Chronicles: First impressions of Guild Wars 2’s Rising Flames - [AL:GW2]Logging into your Guild Wars 2 account right now will grant you access to an absolute treat in the form of episode 2 of the Living World, named Rising Flames, which…
Star Citizen as the ‘unwieldy, ever-changing dream project’ - Kotaku has a long piece on Star Citizen out today, cobbled together over months of discussions with Star Citizen developers, anonymous and not. Julian Benson's Inside the Troubled Development of…
What to do in World of Warcraft when you’re level 110 - Let's start with something simple and straightforward: When you hit level 110 in World of Warcraft: Legion, you aren't done. At all. Even if you have no interest in raiding…
Tamriel Infinium: Cracking Craglorn’s overhaul with Elder Scrolls Online’s Rich Lambert - First and foremost:Â One Tamriel puts all players on an even playing field in Elder Scrolls Online PvE. Players can go where they want when they want. They can play the…
WoW Factor: The state of WoW’s dungeons and how we got here - I've still been having a blast in Legion over the past few weeks. Nithogg might have been unkind to me by offering me no loot on two separate characters, but…
Marvel Heroes’ newest board member admits he’s a F2P whale - There are two things you need to know about the newest member of Gazillion's board of directors. Mark Rubin is an avid MMORPG player (he cites both Marvel Heroes and…
Massively OP’s guide to the best upcoming indie MMORPGs, part one - When you write for an MMORPG website that covers literally hundreds of games and could probably add in hundreds more that are extinct, are in operation only overseas, or are…
LOTRO discusses March of the King update, premium housing - [AL:LOTRO]Dungeons and Dragons Online got a hope-filled producer's letter earlier this week -- now it's Lord of the Rings Online's turn. "We are currently hard at work on Update 19,…
Ultima Online turns 19 years old this weekend, grants cash shop currency to veteran players - Nineteen years ago this weekend, Ultima Online launched into the world, a creaky sandbox that even its own developers did not fully realize would take off in popularity and spawn…
MMOFPS Heroes & Generals has officially launched today - World War II-themed persistent MMOFPS Heroes & Generals has formally launched as of this morning. During its early access period, it had counted over 8 million players; today, it leaves…
Eternal Crusade launch-day roundup and trailer - Following the deployment of patch #24 yesterday, Warhammer 40,000: Eternal Crusade is finally prepared to launch today. Players who jumped in last night found themselves in a surprise headstart period…
TERA plans non-cash shop prehistoric dragons, launches The Guilded Age - [AL:TERA]The new prehistoric dragon mounts of TERA are decidedly draconic, indisputably iconic, likely quite laconic, and sending players into understandable histrionics. After all, when you get such cool dragons added…
EverQuesting: Looking ahead to EverQuest II’s Kunark Ascending expansion - I love fall. Fall is the best season. It has the best holiday, changing leaves, and awesome weather. Fall also means that EverQuest II's next expansion is right around the…
Analyst: China should port MMOs westward (carefully!) as mobile competition stiffens - China is the biggest game market in the world. So why the heck do so many games exported from there to here seem to flop? That's the question Mantin Lu attempts to…
Perfect Ten: My favorite memories from City of Heroes - I've noticed that some people get irritated when others repeatedly bring up long-dead MMORPGs. I think there's the mentality of, "What's done is done, let it go, it's in the…
WildStar is bringing lockboxes to raids - If you've played WildStar and lamented the fact that there just aren't enough places to get lockboxes in the game right now, you'll be happy to know that raids will…
Elder Scrolls Online has begun testing its new lockboxes - What will Elder Scrolls Online be like when lockboxes come to town? Players have a chance to get an advance look at this future, as crown crates full of cosmetic…
H1Z1: King of the Kill dumps Daybreak cash for new currency - The PvP half of the H1Z1 split, King of the Kill, has done away with Daybreak Cash as of its update yesterday. Players will no longer be able to use…
Blizzard is retiring the Battle.net name, though not the service itself - Raise your hand if you remember the days of playing Diablo II or Warcraft III on the service then often referred to as B.net. Now raise your hand higher in salute,…
Paladins’ Todd Harris rebuts ‘Overwatch clone’ allegations - A lot of folks who'd never paid Hi-Rez's new shooter/MOBA Paladins any mind started paying attention to it last week when it soared into open beta. And a lot of folks…
Riders of Icarus touts one million western players since soft launch - Nexon announced this afternoon that Riders of Icarus now counts a million western players registered for the free-to-play MMORPG. "Since the launch of its open beta in early July, Riders…
Guild Wars 2 resumes development of legendary weapons - [AL:GW2]Guild Wars 2 players might recall that back in March, ArenaNet President and Game Director Mike O'Brien announced that he was instructing the team to indefinitely suspend development on new…
Dungeons and Dragons Online plans 2016 patches, Halloween update, and 2017 Ravenloft - [AL:DDO]Dungeons and Dragons Online producer Rob "Severlin" Ciccolini has a new dev letter out for fans of the venerable D&D MMORPG this week. Ciccolini writes that the game is due…
Amazon Game Studios’ Breakaway might be a Norse-themed game - The clock is ticking down to September 29th, a date that will witness the reveal of at least one major project that Amazon Game Studios has been developing. This week…
RuneScape has counted its 250 millionth player - RuneScape continues to be ridiculously popular: Jagex formally announced this afternoon that the game has officially seen 250 million accounts created since its original January 2001 release. Sure, it's a hybrid…
Curt Schilling settles 38 Studios lawsuit with Rhode Island - Ready your "beating a dead horse" memes one last time, MMORPG readers, because baseball star and video game mess Curt Schilling has finally settled at least part of the Rhode…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 83: The joy of cooking (in MMOs)
The Stream Team: Ascending SMITE’s charity challenge rankings
The Stream Team: Derek Brinkmann dishes about Shards Online
The Stream Team: Tame a Jerboa on this ARK scavenger hunt
The Stream Team: Fishing and frolicking in Shards Online
The Stream Team: Aion’s 7th anniversary includes mega XP birthday buffs
The Stream Team: Starting SMITE’s charity challenge
The Stream Team: Having a blast in Heroes & Generals
The Stream Team: Bottoms up in Black Desert’s beer festival
The Stream Team: Storm-ing through the Marvel Heroes story
AND FROM OUR FRIENDS AT BLIZZARD WATCH
What you need to know about WoW’s Emerald Nightmare and Mythic+
The latest WoW hotfixes let Nomi burn more food
Brewfest is live with a fashionable new toy
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.
