Cyberpunk 2077 all but killed off any remaining hope that a multiplayer version is still on deck, thanks to a corporate vision that will offer nonspecific “online experiences” even as the company “reconsiders” multiplayer for its cyberpunk title. In happier MMO news, Elder Scrolls Online and Final Fantasy XIV teased their next big content drops, we got our hands on Elite Dangerous’ Odyssey, Trove got a Nintendo Switch announcement, and more info on LOTRO’s brawler class slipped into the wild.
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
WoW Factor: We’re waiting how long for Shadowlands’ patch 9.1, now? - So it looks like World of Warcraft's next patch is going up for testing on the week of April 12th. What the heck is happening? At best, this just explains that the…
Casually Classic: In defense of a good ‘looking for group’ tool in World of Warcraft - While World of Warcraft certainly made a number of questionable design decisions over the years, for my money one of the absolute best moves Blizzard ever did was institute the…
Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen begins selling NFT-minted artwork to fund development - You either believe that NFT-minted artwork is the wave of the future, a brick in an impossibly tall pyramid scheme, or techbros turning the idea of card collecting into an…
Not So Massively: Magic Legends is messy, deep, and more of an MMO than you think - I can't remember the last time I struggled so much deciding whether I like a game or not. I'm a fan of ARPGs, and while I haven't played Magic: The…
CDPR says it’s ‘reconsidering’ Cyberpunk 2077’s planned multiplayer - Covering Cyberpunk 2077 has been an exercise in frustration here on multiplayer-focused MOP as CD Projekt Red has been stringing along promises of a distant multiplayer for ages now. Last…
April Fools’ Day 2021 across the MMOverse - Love it or hate it, April Fools' day is a Thing, and MMO companies seldom miss an opportunity to get in on The Thing. Let's take a peek into what…
Stick and Rudder: Shaky space legs and promising potential in Elite Dangerous’ Odyssey alpha phase one - Yep. This certainly was an alpha test. For those who are curious, yes, I bought my way in to the Elite Dangerous Odyssey alpha, as did my good friend Britarnya and…
Trove is coming to Nintendo Switch this year, Wizard101 and Pirate101 may get a console port - Whether you are a dinosaur tamer, a ruthless pirate, or a dashing superhero, you soon will have another platform to enjoy the antics of Trove. Gamigo parent company Media and…
Torchlight III unveils the new Cursed Captain class arriving with the next update - Pirates and curses just go together like peanut butter and chocolate, so it's not necessarily a surprise that the Cursed Captain is a thing. What might be a surprise is…
Lord of the Rings Online leaks Brawler class details - Trust MMORPG players to poke around where developers wish they wouldn't, especially when it comes to prying all of the secrets out of upcoming patches. Thanks to time spent on…
Perfect Ten: Top 10 annoying things you hear in MMORPG global chat - General chat, sometimes called "Barrens chat" or "zone chat" or "the party line," is both the bane and the secret fixation of my existence. It's like a text-based reality show…
The Soapbox: How Magic Legends went wrong with the Dimir Assassin class - Cryptic and Perfect World Entertainment are known for their love of lockboxes as a monetization strategy. Therefore it was not wholly surprising when Magic: Legends open beta launched with a…
New World discusses the ‘vision’ behind its alpha dungeons - "Expeditions" turns out to be a pretty popular concept right about now, but New World's might be a bit different from what you're expecting, as that's Amazon Game Studios' term…
The Game Archaeologist: The ballad of Fansy, EverQuest’s famous bard - It was summer, 2001. EverQuest had just rolled out Sullon Zek, a no-rules "penal colony" server where the realm was as lawless as the PvP was ruthless. Ganking, PKing, and…
Elder Scrolls Online drops Blackwood trailer, announces next-gen ‘Console Enhanced’ edition - Among the most interesting announcements made during today's Elder Scrolls Online Blackwood preview stream was ZeniMax's revelation that it's releasing an "enhanced" edition for the newest-gen consoles. The Elder Scrolls…
Final Fantasy XI updates with the latest part of the Voracious Resurgence - It's time for an update of dour elves with the latest patch for Final Fantasy XI, bringing in the final part of the Voracious Resurgence storyline in San d'Oria. Of…
Final Fantasy XIV shows off a trailer for patch 5.5, Death Unto Dawn - The next patch for Final Fantasy XIV is not far off at this point, arriving on April 13th, and players can now feast their eyes on the trailer for the…
Chronicles of Elyria team hopes to avoid the ‘one-man economy’ pitfall - At this point, it's anyone's guess what's actually going on over with Chronicles of Elyria and its supposed single-player spin-off. But hey, the blog posts still talk a good talk,…
Playable Worlds’ Raph Koster on the player-driven economies at the heart of virtual worlds - Playable Worlds' Raph Koster is back with another blog post that serves as a tip-off for what kind of MMORPG he and his team are building. And once again, if…
Massively Overthinking: Should MMOs sell exclusive items – in alpha? - MOP reader Randomness recently wrote to us about a Reddit discussion about games with exclusive item shops before the game comes out. The issue was two-fold: First, that an unreleased…
Chinese police team up with Tencent to take down a video game cheating ring - It was an illegal organization being taken down by the Chinese police force in a concentrated operation. It involved $76 million being made, with $46 million of assets seized by…
Vague Patch Notes: Template - The other day, I was in the middle of a humanizing anecdote when something happened that was tangentially related to MMOs. This prompted me to start thinking about this particular…
Stick and Rudder: Five potentially stupid yet fun Elite Dangerous spaceship builds - Even though I've logged a total of 112 hours of Elite: Dangerous at the time of this writing, I'm still pretty much a noob in the grander scheme of things.…
Camelot Unchained showcases work on alchemy, movement, Ériu updates, and a video of the Verdant Forest - With the month of April just beginning, there's a lot to look back on in terms of development progress made in March for Camelot Unchained. First off, the latest Top-Tenish…
Blizzard is surveying WoW Classic players on character clone pricing - While the mere confirmation that Burning Crusade Classic will feature a level boost option, prompted a whole lot of debate in the community, another upcoming paid service seems to have…
Massively on the Go: Why Nintendo and Pikmin make sense in Niantic’s hands - With the recent news that Nintendo and Niantic will work together for more AR games based on Nintendo IPs, I thought it might be time to revisit an old conversation…
Elyon preps western closed beta, opens registrations on English website overhaul - Back in December, just as Elyon (fka Ascent Infinite Realm) was launching in Korea, we were left to get excited over the opening of the game's western website. However, as…
No Man’s Sky adds a multiplayer-focused mode and improved multiplayer missions in the Expeditions update - Remember when No Man's Sky woefully underdelivered with regards to its multiplayer offerings? That seems like so long ago and the new Expeditions update is going to make that flub…
Dungeons and Dragons Online activates its fourth permadeath server season - You've only got one life to live in Dungeons and Dragons Online -- so make it a good one. The doors to DDO's permadeath server is open once more, as…
EverQuest II dives into the Plane of Shadows with this week’s content drop - The days may be getting longer, but that only means that the shadows are increasing in force. Yesterday, EverQuest II dared its players to return to the Plane of Shadows…
Sony confirms that the PlayStation 3, PSP, and Vita stores will shut down this year - It turns out that the rumor was true, unfortunately. Sony has confirmed that the online stores for the PlayStation 3, PSP, and PSP Vita will all be shuttered this year,…
Choose My Adventure: I think I accidentally turned my Cleric into a Necromancer in RIFT - One of the big selling points in RIFT has always been the ability to combine three of the game's Souls into a custom class. Granted, the Souls in question were…
Playable Worlds’ hiring page suggests Raph Koster’s upcoming MMO is a AAA sandbox - We're assuming that we're destined to hear a lot more about Playable Worlds' incoming MMORPG in the near future, what with Raph Koster's promise to do just that this year…
Project Gorgon swaps in new animation system, lays foundation for VIP program - Despite not being officially launched yet, Project Gorgon is already tossing out one system to replace with another. This week, the team announced that it swapped in a brand-new animation…
Fallen Earth’s revival has been held up by a project backlog, Little Orbit CEO says - After its shutdown in the fall of 2019 for rebuilding and recoding under new management, Fallen Earth - and its revival - is still in development limbo. Players hoping to…
Wisdom of Nym: The experimental nature of Final Fantasy XIV’s Blue Mage - One of my half-serious predictions during the initial batch of predictions for Final Fantasy XIV's big reveal showcase was that we'd learn about a new limited job. Obviously, that didn't…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 315: The Wrath Baby strikes back
Battle Bards Episode 190: Genshin Impact
The Stream Team: Chillin’ with some villains and man-eating mimicsin AdventureQuest 3D
The Stream Team: Fire vs ice in Dungeons & Dragons Online’s Taming of the Flames
The Stream Team: Droid party at Nar Shaddaa in SWTOR
The Stream Team: A pre-Easter egg hunt in Guild Wars 2
The Stream Team: Undead frolicking at Path of Exile Ritual altars
The Stream Team: Astroneer’s second great scrap event
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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