World of Warcraft continued making waves all week: Blizzard announced a new trading post feature that doesn’t sound half bad, Chris Metzen returned as a “creative advisor,” and work on a new Chinese publisher apparently continues.
Meanwhile, we checked in on Elite Dangerous, raised eyebrows at Elder Scrolls Online’s dramatic roadmap pivot, and continued our rollout of annual awards and recaps and predictions! Finally, the MassivelyOP Podcast celebrated a milestone this week: We’ve reached 400 podcasts since our relaunch back in 2015!
Read on to catch up with the very best of this week’s MMO news and opinions today as every Sunday (since 2010!) in Massively Overpowered’s Week in Review!THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES
Make My MMO: The biggest MMO crowdfunding stories of 2022 - Welcome to a special edition of Make My MMO, Massively OP's column keeping track of all the crowdfunding MMOs in our genre. Last year, the column got a big refresh with…
LOTRO Legendarium: A look back at Lord of the Rings Online in 2022 - Holy cow, are we already wrapping up another year of Lord of the Rings Online? I've been writing this column since 2010, and I still don't feel like I'm running…
Elder Scrolls Online nixes year-long story arcs for 2023 roadmap – here’s what to expect - If you thought the Elder Scrolls Online's 12-month-long storyline arcs were getting a little bit stale after the last several years, well, ZeniMax Online Studios apparently agrees with you. In…
Chris Metzen returns to the World of Warcraft team as a ‘creative advisor’ - Who had this on the "biggest surprise" bingo card? Blizzard has apparently rehired Chris Metzen to work on World of Warcraft and its extended universe. "It is with great joy…
World of Warcraft welcomes the ‘fripperies and fineries’ of Winter Veil - "Winter Veil has begun in Azeroth, and with it come all the fripperies, fineries, and delectable comestibles of the holiday," announced Blizzard last night. As with previous years, there's a…
MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Best PvP MMO - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Best PvP MMO, which was awarded to Albion Online last year. We halted this older award after…
MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Worst MMO Business Model - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Worst MMO Business Model, which was awarded jointly to Star Citizen and crypto scams last year. This…
The Daily Grind: How many MMOs did you actively play in 2022? - Now that we're really counting down the clock on 2022, it's time for some well-deserved reflection. I always like to look back over the year and see what I was…
Final Fantasy XIV will turn house demolition back on next year - Normally, there's a system of house demolition in Final Fantasy XIV so players who do not visit their houses for an extended period of time lose ownership of it, ensuring…
World of Warcraft offers an extra 30 days of subscription time for Dragonflight gift purchases through December - Blizzard: So it turns out that after releasing two terrible World of Warcraft expansions back-to-back, we've ensured nobody actually trusts us to release another one, and we don't have nearly…
Epic MMO Battles of History: Azeroth vs. Final Fantasy XIV antagonists - Not every single game is comparable to every other game. That's just the reality of things. Comparing every Mega Man game to every Castlevania game doesn't really work; comparing every…
MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Best MMO Business Model - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Best MMO Business Model, which was awarded to Guild Wars 2 last year. The award is intended…
Members of US Congress send letters to game companies about combating extremism in online gaming - According to a December report from the Anti-Defamation League, extremism in online gaming is on the rise for the fourth year in a row. That report from the ADL has…
Star Citizen recounts updates made in 2022 and summarizes features of alpha 3.18 - It's just about that time of the year when folks recount 2022, and CIG has done just that in its latest video digest, which looks back at the feature updates…
Diablo IV dev livestream talks up seasons, battle passes, and the Codex of Power system - With Diablo IV still eyeing its June 6th open beta early access release date (in spite of reports of crunch casting doubt on that date), the devs of the OARPG…
Massively Overthinking: Our MMO predictions for 2023 - Nobody can see the future, but it sure is fun guessing, and that's exactly what we're going to do for (to?) the MMO genre in this end-of-the-year-themed Massively Overthinking. I've…
Ship of Heroes shows off the 114 preset faces of its character creator - Many MMOs struggle with aesthetic faces for player characters, but in-development superhero MMO Ship of Heroes is tackling the problem head on - pun fully intended. Heroic Games has this…
Stick and Rudder: The year that was in Elite Dangerous, from self-owns to sloppy updates to slight hope - To say that Elite: Dangerous had a rough 2022 is putting it mildly (and pretty much dismisses the nuance this retrospective hopes to provide). The launch of Odyssey last year…
WoW Factor: World of Warcraft’s proposed Trading Post actually sounds good so far - I could, in theory, spend today's WoW Factor talking about the launch of the first endgame season in World of Warcraft: Dragonflight, but quite frankly there's nothing interesting there to…
Final Fantasy XIV launches its special site for Gods Revel, Lands Tremble - The next patch for Final Fantasy XIV will be arriving at some point next month, although the exact date isn't known just yet. But you know it's getting ever closer…
MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Biggest MMO Disappointment - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Biggest MMO Disappointment, which was awarded jointly to multiple underperforming new MMOs last year. Disappointments can be…
MY.GAMES says it will ‘exit the Russian market’ and offload Russian licenses - Back in October, Mail.ru sold its MMO subsidiary MY.GAMES to Aleksander Chachava of venture capital firm LETA Capital, for $642 million. The company's MMOs -  Skyforge, Allods Online, Revelation Online, Warface, Conqueror’s Blade, and Armored…
Guild Wars 2 says that 2022 saw more new players than any year since 2015 - It's been quite the year for Guild Wars 2 -- and ArenaNet wants you to know it. The hard-working studio took a moment to reflect back upon all of its…
Dual Universe’s 1.2 update introduces a tactical map, a returning planet, and new spawning rules for asteroids - Regular players of Dual Universe were likely already keeping abreast of the features due for the sandbox's next patch, but yesterday saw the update officially go live along with a…
Working As Intended: The hits and misses of MassivelyOP’s 2022 predictions - Every year we do an MMO predictions post full of obvious, not-so-obvious, and totally-out-there prognostication for the future of the MMO genre. And every year, we miss something big... and…
MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Best New MMO Class - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Best New MMO Class, which was awarded to Black Desert's Corsair class last year for its inaugural…
End-of-Year Eleven: The biggest MMO stories of 2022 - I might be biased - by which I mean I am definitely biased - but 2022 was a year of big stories and big surprises. And that's without getting into…
World of Warcraft launches Season 1 of Dragonflight’s endgame today - If you've been enjoying the lack of pressure to get in on weekly clears and such in World of Warcraft: Dragonflight thus far... well, sorry, but that time is over…
Choose My Adventure: Hitting my stride in another round of Guild Wars 2 Tyria mapping - I was almost certain our last Choose My Adventure vote would be a blowout one way or the other, but you fine folks had some pretty differing opinions about what…
New World will run a free-play event from December 15 to 19 - If you're curious about the MMO we called Most Improved of 2022, then you'll want to take advantage of its upcoming promo: Amazon is running a free-play event for New…
LOTRO Legendarium: Why the new class trait system changes are a bigger deal than you’d think - Greetings and salutations, fellow Lord of the Rings Online adventurers! I know I previously said that my next LOTRO Legendarium column would tackle the new delving system, but to be…
ROSE Online makes its early access return today after 17 years of absence - It would be easy to have forgotten about ROSE Online, a Korean MMO from Gravity Interactive, though it has had a pretty bumpy history. The game was originally launched back…
MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Best MMO Trend - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Best MMO Trend, which was awarded to the gaming industry's unionization efforts last year. This award is…
Black Desert doubles up on new classes with a twin-sane update - At Calpheon Ball in LA this past weekend, Pearl Abyss revealed the next big thing for Black Desert: a pair of twinned classes that are heading to different versions of…
Blizzard says it’s still working on finding a new Chinese publisher for World of Warcraft - Blizzard General Manager John Hight has posted a video and now a written message to Chinese players in the wake of last month's announcement that Blizzard and NetEase would be…
EVE Online’s mobile 4X strategy game Project M5 resurfaces thanks to recent player survey questions - Allow us to provide a little bit of additional context for this one: Among the reveals made during Fanfest in May, there was some initial information about a mobile 4X…
World of Warcraft plans new currency and stipend for monthly ‘Trading Post’ cosmetic shop - The concept of cosmetics seasons, cosmetic shops, and monthly stipends aren't remotely new in MMOs, but Blizzard is blending elements of all three in World of Warcraft for what it's…
Wisdom of Nym: A completely groundless hope about our next destination for Final Fantasy XIV - Normally when I do speculation columns - about Final Fantasy XIV or really anything else under the sun - I'm doing so for a particular reason that's at least more…
MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Biggest MMO Blunder - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Biggest MMO Blunder, which was awarded to the Activision-Blizzard/World of Warcraft clownshow last year. This award isn’t…
Neverwinter’s 2023 roadmap includes three module releases – but no new class - We've often noticed that maturing MMORPGs tend to trend toward a dependable, regular release schedule. So it's no surprise that Neverwinter's fallen into that comfortable groove, with Cryptic's MMO pumping…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 400: A fireside chat with Justin and Bree
The Stream Team: Reveling in this year’s Snowfest in Trove
The Stream Team: Delving back into Deep Rock Galactic
The Stream Team: Assembling AdventureQuest 3D’s trident in Atlantis
The Stream Team: Celebrating Starlight and reigning in a rideable reindeer in Final Fantasy XIV
The Stream Team: Tons of traps in Dungeons & Dragons Online
The Stream Team: Backseat Streaming through the endgame of Wolcen Lords of Mayhem
The Stream Team: Stumbling through the holiday season in Fall Guys
The Stream Team: Sinking a navy in Guild Wars 2
The Stream Team: Speeding through Path of Exile’s new Sanctum league
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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