Shroud of the Avatar is hereby granted no more launches! Yes, this week Richard Garriott’s Ultima-inspired MMORPG officially shed its in-testing shroud, while, Star Citizen launched its 3.1 alpha, Guild Wars 2 rolled out SAB, and April Fools’ Day gripped the genre. And at GDC, we took a look at big game data, SpatialOS, Defiance, and Ultima Online through the eyes of its original creators.
Read on for the very best of this week’s MMO news and opinions!
THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES
Star Citizen’s 3.1 alpha is live for the holiday weekend - If you're bored on the holiday weekend, and you happen to be a Star Citizen backer, you're going to be taking to the skies, thanks to CIG pushing live the…
GDC 2018: Ultima Online post-mortem with Richard Garriott, Starr Long, Raph Koster, and Rich Vogel - Plenty of panels at GDC are recorded and uploaded to the internet weeks after the event, including this one. It's not quite the same as being there, as you miss…
GDC 2018: Hands-on with Trion’s ‘reimagined’ Defiance 2050 - Before my GDC interview with Producer Matt “Destromathe” Pettit last week, I was really frustrated with the news about Defiance 2050. I wasn't a huge fan of the first Defiance, but mostly out of…
Sea of Thieves patches in performance improvements, promises to get everyone in to play as it breaks 2M players - One week after launch, Sea of Thieves is sailing the choppy ocean of live operation with two million players already. The developers uploaded an update video about the "hectic" week…
The Game Archaeologist: A Tale in the Desert - Once asked what he thought was the most innovative MMO from the last decade, Dr. Richard Bartle, the creator of MUD, gave a succinct answer: "A Tale in the Desert. Note that…
World of Warcraft’s first 3-D level designer is Kickstarting a massive behind-the-scenes book, and it’s already written - The Ancient Gaming Noob himself tipped us off today to a bizarre but intriguing Kickstarter that should appeal to that cross-section of our audience into World of Warcraft, coffee table…
Massively Overthinking: How much money spent makes you an MMO whale? - Several conversations I saw after our report on the new RMT mounts in Guild Wars 2 got me thinking about how the MMO community uses the word whale. I had…
GDC 2018: Ready Player One Now, billion person gaming, and mitigating abuse - It's no surprise that Ready Player One was constantly being referenced at GDC 2018, especially in VR, AR, and MMO panels. It's not just because of the movie's release but because the…
GDC 2018: ARK Park’s Snail Games on VR, science, and the future of the franchise - As you may recall, I was given just a little time to hit up Snail Games' ARK Park a few days before I left for GDC 2018. I was able to make…
Choose My Adventure: Frenzied slashing in Warframe - [AL:WarF]So, for this week's antics in Warframe, I bought a frame. "Shenanigans!" you cry. "The poll went against your buying a frame!" And it's true, the poll did go against…
Tamriel Infinium: Where did the Elder Scroll Online Summerset come from? - [AL:ESO]Even though I don't believe that Summerset was the best choice for the next expansion for the Elder Scrolls Online, that doesn't mean that the chapter is without merit. According…
GDC 2018: Exploring SpatialOS with Improbable CCO Bill Roper - SpatialOS: You've probably been seeing this name pop up more and more in the MMO sphere. Worlds Adrift, Mavericks, Fractured, Seed, MetaWorld, and Identity are just some of the titles we've mentioned that have sprung up to…
Fortnite passes $5M in mobile sales while adults grapple with its popularity - Like it or not, the Fortnite wave has yet to crest in our culture. The multiplayer shooter just passed $5 million in mobile sales over the first 10 days of…
GDC 2018: Yokozuna, big game data, and the future of MMO monetization - GDC isn't E3. It isn't PAX. It's not even what I think stereotypical gamers can appreciate. But I think the Massively OP crowd is a different sort, and because of…
No Man’s Sky announces free ‘NEXT’ update for all platforms – yes, Xbox One too - Ahead of an apparent impending leak, Hello Games' Sean Murray dropped a "small announcement" about No Man's Sky this morning. "Coming in Summer 2018 is No Man's Sky NEXT, a…
Perfect Ten: More anthropomorphic MMO studio conversations - A while back, you may recall that I posted some of my conversations with anthropomorphized concepts of MMO studios. If you don't remember this, you will not be eligible for…
GDC 2018: A look at Funcom’s Mutant Year Zero Road to Eden - I didn't play it, but I can't be the only one who thought of the original tabletop when Funcom announced Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden. Well, if you haven't…
ARK-inspired PixARK enters early access - It's a big day for a small game. If you've been seeking a title that has the visual aesthetics of Trove and the dino-taming madness of ARK, then PixARK is…
Trove’s Heroes expansion is live today with superheroes and a new biome - [AL:Trove]Trion's blocky sandpark Trove is patching up any minute now with Heroes, a brand-new superhero-themed expansion - all live today for PC, PS4, and Xbox One simultaneously. As we've previously covered,…
Over 2,000,000 people have now registered accounts for Star Citizen - Star Citizen hit another milestone this week: It's reached 2,000,000 citizens. Accounts, specifically. The game has been in production since before its Kickstarter launched almost six years ago. According to…
Guild Wars 2 preps Super Adventure Box, patches in direct-buy mounts and CHAIRS - [AL:GW2]If you try to zoom into Guild Wars 2's Super Adventure Box today, you're... going to be wholly disappointed. That's because while the patch notes and associated updates are live…
The Hunter’s Arsenal: Massively OP’s guide to the weapons of Monster Hunter World - Throughout their time in Monster Hunter World, players will have to make a lot of decisions, but none of them are as important -- or as difficult -- as deciding which…
GDC 2018: Making sense of battle royale MMO Mavericks with Automaton Games - So as you may know, I'm an MMORPG guy - not really a battle royale guy. There are some cool ideas for people who like the combat of survival games turned…
Shroud of the Avatar officially launches today - The sun is rising over New Britannia today with the official release of Shroud of the Avatar. While the game has been in a persistent world state for hundreds of…
Sea of Thieves abandons its planned death tax, focuses on griefing - Don't worry, death-prone pirates: You won't have to pay the piper more than once when you go down to Davy Jones' locker. Some players raised concerns over the recent announcement…
Bless says its excessive attention to environmental detail is in the service of immersion - With Bless Online due out on western shores this coming May, players who've never paid much attention to this Korean-born MMO may be wondering about how the world actually looks…
GDC 2018: Funcom’s Tor Egil Andersen on Conan Exiles’ early access, launch, and beyond - My initial impressions of Conan Exiles, written just about a year ago, weren't exactly glowing. While I know not every game I play needs to appeal to me, so much of the…
GDC 2018: The Legends of Aria devs talk closed beta, gankbox PvP, and the MMORPG genre - One thing I love about GDC compared to other conventions I cover is how many actual developers I get to talk to, especially without PR and Marketing handlers. Everyone has…
Sea of Thieves does blockbuster sales in the UK while former artist criticizes its lack of depth - Rare has a reason to rejoice this week, as Sea of Thieves has sailed to a number one spot on the sales chart in the UK. The studio has only…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 163: Expansions ‘Я’ Us
Battle Bards Episode 118: More starting zone themes
The Stream Team: Project Gorgon’s big-headed bully
The Stream Team: Jumping into Guild Wars 2’s Super Adventure Box for the first time
The Stream Team: A time out in Secret World Legends’ Nursery
The Stream Team: A first peek at PixARK
The Stream Team: Shroud of the Avatar has launched
The Stream Team: Super Trove Hero adventures!
The Stream Team: Celebrating SMITE’s 4th birthday
AND FROM OUR FRIENDS AT BLIZZARD WATCH
Boop! Battle for Azeroth adds /boop as a new emote
Are you still interested in Vanilla servers?
Upcoming quest changes in Battle for Azeroth
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.
