Survival MMO Population Zero rolled into Steam early access this week, but it was a bumpy ride, followed by apologies and patches and an ambitious short-term roadmap.
Meanwhile, EVE Online turned 17, Fallen Earth is still being revived, Trove launched its Delves update, Albion Online is racking up players, we poked our noses into Blizzard’s and EA’s financials, and every MMO tried to make Star Wars day a thing.
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
The Game Archaeologist: The rise and fall of Landmark and EverQuest Next - The year was 2013. Sony Online Entertainment was still a functioning and seemingly robust MMORPG studio, and its yearly SOE Live convention was a highlight of the community's social calendar.…
Perfect Ten: The top 10 things we loved about WildStar - WildStar was a really neat game that was run by people who had no idea what was good about it. I'd apologize for that statement, but it's true. Seriously, even…
First impressions of Fallout 76 Wastelanders from a true newbie to the game - So I did something completely unexpected: I bought Fallout 76. It wasn't my idea. A few people in my guild had been talking about how much fun it was, especially…
Activision-Blizzard Q1 2020: Blizzard MAUs flat at 32M, but revenue jumps ahead of Shadowlands - It won't surprise you, given the current global health crisis, that a large portion of Activision-Blizzard's first quarter revenue report and conference call focused on the impact and response to…
WoW Factor: Examining Shadowlands’ Rogue, Death Knight, and Warrior changes - I do find a certain amount of irony in the fact that in this tour of the World of Warcraft Shadowlands class changes, Warrior was both last in the alphabetical…
Vague Patch Notes: What causes the preponderance of disconnected MMO endgames? - Yesterday, I wrote a whole column about how WildStar had some really great stuff in it. I did not mention its endgame at all. And part of that was because…
Population Zero is back on track with May roadmap, promising optimization, balancing, and character visual tweaks - Yesterday, we covered the shaky launch of Population Zero and the apologies of the devs at Enplex Games, who admitted there were technical problems as well as confusion about the…
Fallen Earth’s reconstruction continues slowly but surely – check out the new screenshots - After Fallen Earth was taken offline last fall, players considered the odds pretty low that Little Orbit would be able to redeem its word by rebuilding and re-releasing the post-apocalyptic…
Destiny 2 promises ‘aspirational armor,’ better rewards for raids and dungeons, and a transmog system - The developers of Destiny 2 are looking ahead to the game's Year 4 in this week's report, specifically at changing the way players earn rewards. Or "aspirational" things, as they…
Massively Overthinking: The oldest MMORPGs we still play - When I was still a teenager in my earliest MMOs, the trend in the communities I ran in was to play MMOs sequentially, due in large part to the fact…
An Old School RuneScape fan has started making an audio drama based on the MMORPG - What do people who love theater do when they can't partake in the theater due to the pandemic? They turn to audio dramas, apparently, and one such person who also…
Working as Intended: Sparking joy in MMOs - On this week's podcast, I mentioned that I'd just finished off Marie Kondo's The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, something that superficially seems unrelated to MMOs but (as I'll eventually…
Population Zero apologizes for technical and DLC snafus following early access launch - "No sugar-coating and straight to the point - please accept our sincere apologies for how the launch of Early Access has gone so far." So begins Population Zero's state-of-the-game missive…
Conan Exiles’ Architect of Argos DLC and Followers II update are live today - Blink and you'll have missed it: Just a few days after confirming Architect of Argos was launching at Conan Exiles' latest builder-centric DLC, Funcom has set it all live. "Funcom…
Mad World previews ongoing alpha development in new gameplay video - It's been a while since we heard much from upcoming MMO Mad World, hasn't it? That's the isometric, grimdark MMO from Jandisoft that was at one point supposed to launch…
MMO Cartographer: Exploring Revelation Online’s Skyward World update - Revelation Online, originally developed by NetEase and published in the west by My.games, recently launched its Skyward World update. It contained updates for players of every level, including an updated…
EA delivers solid Q1 2020, YOY revenue increases, and a promise of game upgrades for next-gen consoles - Activision-Blizzard beat revenue expectations for the first quarter of 2020, so it won't surprise anyone to learn that EA did too. But while revenue was still down year-over-year for Activision,…
Finnish startup Dazzle Rocks raises $7M for new mobile ‘social sandbox MMO’ - So hey, who wants to hear about a new MMO? It's a new "social sandbox MMO" from Finnish startup Dazzle Rocks, and it just scored almost $7M in funding from…
Half a million people played Albion Online in April, so its studio is hiring again - Blizzard is far from the only company making bank thanks to millions of gamers stuck at home sheltering from the pandemic right now. Sandbox Interactive, the studio behind Albion Online,…
MMO fan creates an infographic to help you choose a game - With such a wide field of MMORPGs out there, it may be pretty daunting to figure out where to start -- or where to go next. One Reddit user decided…
The Daily Grind: Which MMO has the best Necromancer class? - Do you like to play with dead things? Heck, who doesn't? It's one of the most well-adjusted activities that any person can do while causing all sorts of awkward silences…
Developer Crate Entertainment considers the possibility of a Grim Dawn 2 - What's next for Grim Dawn? How about a sequel? It's one of the things that developer Crate Entertainment is taking into consideration according to a recent interview with game designer…
EVE Online celebrates 17 years with login rewards and Triglavian fights - While this celebration was brought up in the EVE Pulse video, 17 years of operation is definitely nothing to sneeze at nor put as a bullet point in a wrap-up…
Trove’s Delves update is live for PC players today with new delve mode and Tomb Raiser revamp - [AL:Trove]Whoa, when Gamigo said it was launching Trove's Delves expansion/update "this spring," we didn't realize that it meant "basically now." And yes, it's officially live for players, moving from the…
Survival MMO Population Zero has formally launched into Steam early access - Actiony survival sandbox MMORPG Population Zero has officially opened for business on Steam as an early access title this afternoon. As we've previously covered, the title includes PvE, crafting, building,…
Fight or Kite: Valorant’s place in an MMO player’s rotation - The new hotness from Riot Games, developer of League of Legends and Teamfight Tactics, delivers twitchy, intense FPS action in Valorant. The game has been described as a Counter-Strike clone…
Fortnite adds a non-combat in-game social space known as Party Royale - Sure, Fortnite is a battle royale shooter, but once in a while it's also been a point for some impressive social gatherings. It's this sort of interaction that Epic Games…
Choose My Adventure: The first steps as a Romulan in Star Trek Online - In last week's column, I mentioned that the start of our Star Trek Online journey would not be done alone, and sure enough I've got company with me in the…
Amazon Game Studios’ PvPvE shooter Crucible launches May 20 — here’s a video outlining its modes - Most of the news regarding Amazon's online multiplayer shooter Crucible has been kind of thin. We know that it's made some pretty big business moves, that it wants to blend…
New World dives into the mechanics of its factional PvP warfare - War! Huh! Good God, y'all, what is it good for? Capturing the other faction's territory in New World, it seems. While last week we were graced with a video about…
Guild Wars 2’s No Quarter episode launches May 26 with new map and mastery - [AL:GW2]This won't come as a huge surprise, since we already knew Guild Wars 2's next living story Icebrood Saga episode is called No Quarter and that we'd be getting the…
See how insanely tall some LOTRO structures are thanks to this fan’s video - You might have seen some of those YouTube videos that compare and contrast the size of real-world buildings or fictional spaceships to each other to give you an idea of…
Wisdom of Nym: The curious rebirth of Final Fantasy XIV’s old content - So originally, this column was going to involve a fair amount of speculation regarding some ambiguous phrasings and translations of timing for the next Final Fantasy XIV patch. Then the…
Interview: Black Desert on crossplay, the engine, and the future of mobile - [AL:BDO]A few weeks ago, we chatted up Pearl Abyss' lead producer Jaehee Kim about some pressing Black Desert questions. Now, I'm not one to waste a golden opportunity when I'm…
MMORPGs around the globe celebrate Star Wars day - May the 4th (as in, May the 4th be with you) is upon us, and plenty of MMOs would like you to know that they, too, like Star Wars, or…
Massively Uplifting: Communities and companies bolster COVID-19 relief and mental health support - April showers of good deeds bring May flowers of comfort and hope. And after the last couple of months, we sure could use a garden full of those! April was…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
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.
