Oh, you might have thought the news would slow down ahead of the holidays, but we are just getting started, clearly. This week, Daybreak announced PlanetSide Arena officially, Star Wars The Old Republic launched Jedi Under Siege, EverQuest launched The Burning Lands, Elite Dangerous launched Beyond Chapter Four, and Wildcard delayed Atlas a pinch.
Meanwhile, we’ve begun week one of our end-of-the-year awards rollout; so far, we’ve tackled the most underrated MMO, the biggest surprise, the best business model, the best trend, the worst business model, the biggest disappointment, and the best player housing, with many more to come!
Read on to catch up with the very best of this week’s MMO news and opinions today as every Sunday in Massively Overpowered’s Week in Review!THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES
Daybreak’s new game is PlanetSide Arena, and yes, it’s a battle royale - Earlier this week, Daybreak began sending emails to players and former players teasing a new game being worked on within the studio's walls and scheduled for a Twitch reveal today…
Perfect Ten: MMOs to watch in 2019 - The MMO genre is in a strange and uncertain place right now -- but also one that is quietly thrilling. We've long passed the days where studios were pumping out…
LOTRO Legendarium: Lord of the Rings Online’s 2018 review - It was the best of years, it was the worst of years for Lord of the Rings Online -- but no matter what, it wasn't a boring year. As this…
More details emerge about Studio Wildcard’s Atlas as next week’s launch looms - Even with a slight delay, the launch of Studio Wildcard's Atlas has come out of nowhere this holiday season and sent many MMO gamers scrambling to find out more about…
Hyperspace Beacon: First impressions of SWTOR 5.10 ‘Jedi Under Siege’ - Faith in BioWare products has been waning as of late, but Star Wars: The Old Republic seemed to always maintain a core fan base. I would consider myself one of…
Valve’s Steam store has been challenged hard by Discord now, not just Epic - If you haven't noticed lately, the discontent over Steam's profit split with creators, the overabundance of trash games, and the whole mess with moderation (or lack thereof) has opened a…
Anthem tries to sell you on slick skins and inspirational speeches - There's no doubt that BioWare's Anthem has a lot of expectations and excitement resting on its shoulders, so it's a good thing that those shoulders are massive and reinforced with…
Daybreak isn’t abandoning PlanetSide 2 just because PlanetSide Arena is cooking - You might have wondered about the status of PlanetSide 2 now that Daybreak has announced PlanetSide Arena. After all, just ask PlanetSide 1 fans how much attention their game got…
Dungeons and Dragons Online sells out $300 season passes, talks Sharn expansion - Wondering just who -- if anyone -- would plop down $300 for a two-year "season pass" to Dungeons and Dragons Online? Turns out that there were at least 1,000 dedicated…
Vague Patch Notes: The taxonomy of corporate apologies in video games - Somehow, Bethesda managed to persevere after the Great Canvas Shortage of 2018 to replace the Fallout 76 CE bags that were essentially plastic shopping bags with, you know, the bags they…
LOTRO loses its lead designer, starts Yuletide with two new instances - Santa's bringing both coal and presents to Lord of the Rings Online players this Christmas. First, the coal. Long-time Lead Designer Ben "Dr Octothorpe" Schneider announced on Twitter that he…
ZeniMax and Oculus have finally settled their multi-year lawsuit – out of court - When John Carmack and ZeniMax settled their long-running legal dispute earlier this fall, we noted that the companies were continuing to appeal how much money Oculus would be pay out…
EverQuesting: It’s a cash shop Christmas in EverQuest II’s Frostfell - Abandon hope all ye who log in here. That is how I felt at the start of EverQuest II's Frostfell this past Tuesday. As of stream time that night, there…
Black Desert’s new Archer and tree decorating events are live as Pearl Abyss sets up shop in California - Hope you got your proto Archer rolled in Black Desert because he's live as of today and you can actually log him in and get to playing. "The Archer uses…
Pantheon’s full world begins to emerge as pre-alpha winds down - One of the big hopes of the future of the MMO genre is finally putting all of its pieces together. Pantheon announced in its December newsletter that for the first…
Conan Exiles launches Seekers of the Dawn DLC, but don’t expect a winter event - Conan Exiles isn't doing Christmas, but it is launching a new DLC. It's called The Seekers of the Dawn, and it focuses on the eastern kingdom of Yamatai. This means…
EverQuest: The Burning Lands has launched - Well, it's time for another EverQuest expansion, go have fun. Yes, perhaps we don't sound very excited here, but that's not because of lack of affection; it's because The Burning Lands is…
Daybreak is announcing a new game on Thursday - Some Daybreak fans, including our own MJ Guthrie, are receiving a cryptic note from Daybreak this week - best check your old email accounts! Apparently the MMORPG company, most recently…
China’s Online Games Ethics Committee lifts year-long ‘freeze’ on game licenses but bars multiple games - As MMO players will recall, in March of this year, the Chinese government put a freeze on reviewing and approving video games for domestic release, resulting in many game releases…
Choose My Adventure: Postcards from the Star Citizen universe - Your votes last week in my first Choose My Adventure gave me a great way to start looking around the environs of Star Citizen by actually... well... looking around! Exploration…
Elite Dangerous’ Beyond – Chapter Four is live today with exploration, background sim, and guilds - The fourth chapter of Elite Dangerous' Beyond campaign is live today, and if it seems as if we've been covering it forever, that's only because Frontier has been remarkably good…
Guild Wars 2’s next living story episode will not make 2018, but Wintersday is live today - If for some reason you still thought there was a chance that ArenaNet could push out Guild Wars 2's next living story episode today or this week... well, I suppose…
Wildcard’s new MMO Atlas has been delayed a week for polish - When Studio Wildcard and friends announced a full-scale, 40,000-person MMO called Atlas last week, we were all excited. When they announced it was launching - into early access - this…
The International Olympic Committee casts doubt on the inclusion of esports at the Olympics - The tug-of-war over whether esports should be included at the Olympic Games is becoming its own sport. In 2017, statements from the Paris Olympic bid committee and the International Olympic Committee, plus…
UK parliament committee will investigate addictive tech, lootboxes, and harmful gamification - Given that UK researchers this year found a "relationship between problem gambling and the use of loot boxes" as well as determined that problem gambling among underage kids is on…
South Korea now has a law criminalizing the act of boosting in online games - Let's say you really care about your competitive rank in a video game, but you don't have the time to actually practice and get good at the game to improve…
Anthem player learns why you don’t break NDAs. Or why you don’t use Origin. It’s one of those. - With the line between live and beta in online games blurring more and more by the year, it's no wonder some folks have gotten accustomed to not taking their NDAs…
Former Square Enix America CEO advises Bethesda and Blizzard to learn from Final Fantasy XIV - If you somehow managed to miss the news (perhaps due to extended undersea exploration missions or an archaeological adventure in the jungles of South America), Diablo Immortal and Fallout 76 are currently…
Funcom’s Conan Unconquered isn’t an MMO – it’s a strategy game - When Funcom announced last week that it was debuting yet another Conan title, the guessing game was on. Battle royale? OARPG? Mobile? Retro? RPG? Card game? Camel punching simulator? (That…
EVE Evolved: How could Project Nova live up to its true potential? - I think it's fair to say that EVE Online developer CCP Games hasn't had much success when it comes to avatar-based gameplay. The studio's first attempt at a first person…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
The Stream Team: Commemorating Star Wars Galaxies’ deathday in an emu
The Stream Team: Dog pile on Ship of Heroes!
The Stream Team: Checking out Conan Exiles’ Seekers of the Dawn DLC
The Stream Team: Celebrating werewolves and vampires this AQ3D season
The Stream Team: A new Secret World Legends Krampusnacht
The Stream Team: Jumping into SWTOR’s Jedi Under Siege
The Stream Team: Chasing presents in EverQuest II’s new Frostfell quest
The Stream Team: Valnir Rok drops a huge update and free codes
The Stream Team: Guild Wars 2 bunny or bust
The Stream Team: Hunting for Frostfall presents in Dauntless
AND FROM OUR FRIENDS AT BLIZZARD WATCH
• Elixir of Tongues will make cross-faction communication possible soon
• The real secret is how much tanks and healers need each other
• Do you know how to get around in Battle for Azeroth’s cities?
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 bits of news we didn’t cover anywhere else.
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