This weekend’s BlizzCon was either a fantastic festival of fun or a full-on fail-face flop, depending on whom you talk to — and which games you care about. In our wheelhouse, we saw the Overwatch Sombra ARG come to a close with her reveal, heard about Blizzard’s apparent rapid-fire next three patches for World of Warcraft, and puzzled over Diablo III’s plans to import classic Diablo content and charge for a Necromancer class pack. Saturday’s WoW panels, however, left our writers and commenters more annoyed than thrilled, and it’s hard to argue the convention wouldn’t have had more pop with a truly massive reveal.
Oh yeah, and then Nostalrius inserted itself into the weekend with the announcement that it’s releasing its source code to the community and allowing a rival emulator group to restart the sunsetted emu.
Don’t forget to pick up a “MoCree” Overwatch parody t-shirt, and then read on for the very best of this week’s MMO news and opinions.
BLIZZCON 2016
Leaderboard: How much do you expect to pay for the Diablo III Necro pack?
BlizzCon 2016: World of Warcraft Q&A panel
BlizzCon 2016: World of Warcraft’s Legion design panel liveblog
BlizzCon 2016: Diablo’s 20th anniversary panel liveblog
BlizzCon 2016: WoW’s Tomb of Sargeras and beyond to Argus
BlizzCon 2016: Play Heroes of the Storm for Overwatch loot
BlizzCon 2016: Diablo III’s Necromancer class and classic Diablo experience
BlizzCon 2016: You’ll never see Overwatch’s Sombra coming
BlizzCon 2016: Opening ceremony liveblog
WoW Factor: BlizzCon betting odds
Buy a Massively OP ‘MoCree’ Overwatch parody tee in honor of BlizzCon
THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES
Massively OP’s guide to upcoming MMORPG expansions - If there is one consistent inconsistency among MMORPG studios, it is that teams keep swinging back and forth on pursuing the expansion model. How many times have we seen an…
Funcom’s Q3 2016 financials hint at large Secret World update in early 2017 - Fans of The Secret World should be excited today, as Funcom's third quarter financial report to investors reveals that "The Secret World team is mainly focused on a large update to…
Check out Lineage Eternal’s official teaser trailer - NCsoft released a quickie trailer for Lineage Eternal's new teaser website, a likely herald for the closed beta test expected to take place in Korea later this month -- though we can't be…
EVE Online players raise $6000 for widow and family of fallen gamer - [AL:EVE]If you've played MMORPGs long enough -- or played some of the older ones especially -- you've surely met or heard about a fellow MMO player who's passed on, leaving…
Massively Overthinking: The MMORPG board games connection - MOP reader Kastaguro sent us an interesting question last month about MMORPGs, board games, and a possible playerbase shift. "I was wondering if any of you play board games? I…
Activision-Blizzard Q3 2016: Blizzard claims ‘biggest quarterly online player community in its history’ - Activision-Blizzard's Q3 2016 financial report PR just released, surprising no one with record-setting piles of money and success. "The Activision and Blizzard segments had record combined third-quarter performance with $1.10B…
Cross-platform space MMO Nebula Online has launched today - EVE Online has a little bit of competition in the hardcore kitchen this month, as indie title Nebula Online launched today on iOS, Android, and PC. An Xbox One release…
EVE Online GMs removed at least 25 trillion ISK worth $400,000 from the game - [AL:EVE]If you've been reading the gaming news this week, you may have heard about the enormous amount of wealth that was recently removed from EVE Online's economy when the players behind…
Chaos Theory: A guide to The Secret World’s Samhain 2016 - Well, there you have it. After 12Â months of anticipation, the 2016 Samhain event in The Secret World is here. And I most definitely have a few things I want to…
Flameseeker Chronicles: Amazing Guild Wars 2 in-game Halloween costumes - I've devoured all of my homemade pumpkin pasties and downed the last of my butterbeer while enjoying the Halloween festivities in Guild Wars 2, gaining some very pretty treats for my…
Check out the trailer for Revelation Online’s first closed beta - [AL:Rev]My.com has just announced that the Revelation Online closed beta has finally begun, after a week's delay. "Today players can create characters on the North American or European server of…
Marvel Heroes celebrates the Dr. Strange film with new costumes and free access to the hero - A big-budget Dr. Strange film is hitting theaters on Friday. No one, not even the studio executives responsible for the film, is clear on how this was permitted to happen.…
Mark Kern posts new WoW Legacy server petition ahead of BlizzCon - There's yet another petition related to legacy World of Warcraft servers live this week, this one begun by Mark Kern himself. Kern (more on his backstory here) is a controversial former…
The Elder Scrolls Online celebrates a year of the Orsinium DLC - It's been a year since players in The Elder Scrolls Online first took on the struggles in Orsinium, and if you've been playing over the past year, you've probably been…
Kakao Games signs on as publisher for Bluehole’s next MMO, Project W - What is Project W? Is it part of the most ambitious ARG ever that kicked off with last night's World Series win by the Cubs? Probably not, but it is…
Today’s Black Desert’s patch preps a whirlwind of seasonal events - Today's Black Desert patch is a relatively small one once you set aside the cash shop additions. Kakao has tweaked items, adjusted pet sounds, modified animations, buffed Hexe Sanctuary, and…
Voice actors union pickets WB Games, disputes game studio claims - Members of the voice actors guild striking against the top echelon of video game companies are today picketing outside WB Games in Burbank, California. Since it began negotiations in early…
This exclusive ArcheAge Revelation art Q&A covers dwarves, mythology, and beer - [AL:Arche]Last week, Trion revealed that the western version of ArcheAge will soon get the 3.0 Revelation update first announced for Korea last summer. The massive update introduces the Dwarven and Warborn races,…
Hyperspace Beacon: Are Uprisings the SWTOR group content we’ve been looking for? - [AL:TOR]As we step closer to the launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic's next expansion, BioWare spills more and more information about the content we will soon see on the…
Civilization (Online) is coming to an end - Remember all the grumbling when XLGames revealed Civilization Online at a big presser in New York and then told us it was launching in East Asia only? Welp, the game is…
Star Citizen backer flips pixel ships to buy an actual car - Vice posted a cute piece over the weekend by Star Citizen player who explains how he used the old "one red paperclip" trick plus basic trading strategy to turn his Star…
Crowfall breaks $3 million in crowdfunding - Crowfall has a lot to cheer about this morning: ArtCraft Entertainment just announced that it has "amassed more than $3 million in crowdfunding to bring [its] flagship MMO title, Crowfall, to…
Guild Wars 2 has overhauled its lockboxes - Guild Wars 2's lockboxes got a bit of revision in today's patch. "You won’t find boosters among your loot anymore, but you will find a rotating selection of rare and…
Smed’s Hero’s Song enters alpha 3 for backers - Hero's Song's alpha 3 kicked off yesterday as promised during its Indiegogo campaign, opening up to early backers. "We've automatically upgraded everyone who did not select a perk to the…
Sandbox Project Gorgon launches Indiegogo for additional funding - Elder Game's Eric Heimburg and Sandra Powers have today posted a new Indiegogo campaign for the in-development alpha indie sandbox MMORPG Project Gorgon with a $20,000 flexible goal. The game…
Perfect Ten: The craziest things The Secret World has asked me to do - As I am fond of saying, there is no MMO that I've ever played that has the capability of being so frustrating and downright mean toward me as The Secret…
World of Warships adds Steven Seagal as a six-point commander - [AL:WoWS]Where do the action stars of your youth go when they can no longer single-handedly demolish an enemy navy? In Steven Seagal's case, he's going to World of Warships, arriving…
Final Fantasy XIV patch 3.45 adds more Palace of the Dead and Anima quests - [AL:FFXIV]It's time to go even deeper into the Palace of the Dead in Final Fantasy XIV. The latest patch for the game has arrived, and it adds another 150 floors…
ARK: Survival Evolved abandons most of its planned Halloween update - ARK: Survival Evolved's Fear Evolved 2 Halloween event arrived over the weekend, but it wasn't entirely to plan. Early in October, Studio Wildcard teased vampirism and lycanthropy as well as…
EVE Vegas 2016: EVE Online is finally getting a real tutorial - [AL:EVE]One of EVE Online's developers once described the new player experience with the line "Welcome to EVE, here's a Rubik's cube, go f**k yourself," and he wasn't wrong. EVE has a well-earned…
Bless Online releases English trailer, promising 2017 launch - Bless Source has got its mitts on a new English language Bless Online trailer promising the game's "coming 2017 with a completely overhauled action combat system," though it's decidedly low-rez and…
League of Legends crowns 2016 world champions - [AL:LOL]This past weekend, the battle went down in League of Legends' biggest tournament of the year. When the dust settled, Team SK Telecom T1 emerged victorious, winning a 3-2 series…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 89: The book of Revelation
The Stream Team: A glimpse of Revelation Online
The Stream Team: Hunting ARK’s dangerous DodoRex
The Stream Team: Dungeons and Dragons Online does Halloween
The Stream Team: Chasing the Rider in The Secret World
The Stream Team: Continuing Chronicle: RuneScape Legends’ PvE campaign
The Stream Team: Merry Mogloween in AQ3D with Artix
The Stream Team: Halloween night in The Secret World
The Stream Team: Haunted houses in Shroud of the Avatar
AND FROM OUR FRIENDS AT BLIZZARD WATCH
What we know about WoW 7.1.5’s Micro Holidays
Class and spec themed mounts coming to WoW Legion in 7.2
Blizzard’s new Overwatch esports league mimics pro sports
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.
