Multiplayer games rather than MMORPGs are capturing the gaming industry’s heart this week as Baldur’s Gate 3 exploded and Palia puttered into beta.
Meanwhile, WoW Classic got a date for hardcore and we recapped FFXIV’s Fan Festival.
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
Singularity 6 interview: Palia is the cozy cottagecore sandbox to beat as it begins closed beta - The label "cozy" is in increasing danger of becoming a watered-down label thanks to how much it's being used in culture these days. Yet if any game deserves to showcase…
Dungeon Fighter Online grants compensation after catching former dev criming with an RMT ring - It's not often that Dungeon Fighter Online makes it to our headlines but that's mostly because the game just keeps on keepin' on with updates. However, a letter from Neople's…
Perfect Ten: 10 memorable MMO marketing campaigns from the genre’s past - Believe it or not, MMOs get off easy when it comes to notorious marketing campaigns. Anything on the following list, good or bad, is a pale shadow of what we've…
LOTRO Legendarium: Ranking LOTRO’s forests from maddening to awesome - J.R.R. Tolkien famously loved nature, and that passion seeps into his creation of Middle-earth. To him, the great outdoors was not something to be taken for granted but a vast…
Massively on the Go: Orna’s pet-battler is fluffy – but not cheap - Usually here on Massively on the Go, we have a lot of good things to say about Orna: The GPS RPG and its dev team. I recently gushed about how…
Design Mockument: What would a Transformers MMORPG even look like? - Everyone who has read my work here for a while knows that a Transformers MMORPG is a longstanding element of my pie-in-the-sky wishlist. This is not altogether surprising; I've been…
Victorian survival sim Nightingale adds third-person mode - While the upcoming Victorian survival sim Nightingale was designed around a first-person perspective, this didn't sit quite right with a number of potential fans. In response to player demands, Inflexion…
EVE Online removes a contentious item from a cash shop bundle after player backlash - CCP Games decided to once again test the patience of the EVE Online playerbase this week after the studio offered - and then removed - a cash shop item included…
Massively Overthinking: What’s the best way a studio can save a struggling mid-size MMO? - Temtem's Crema Games raised eyebrows earlier this week when it admitted that in spite of Temtem's successful launch, the game is having trouble; the studio has been adding monsters and…
Final Fantasy XIV Moonfire Faire 2023! Phoenix Ranger Returns Again For The First Time! - After 365 days, the bombards are free in Final Fantasy XIV! It's time for them to conquer Eorzea! But fear not because the adventurers of the realm must band together…
Baldur’s Gate 3 delivers a multiplayer-optional Baldur’s Gate threequel after 20 years - The internet is mad for Baldur's Gate 3, and if you can tear yourselves away from MMORPGs for a moment - and if this third installment in the trilogy suits…
ASTRA Knights of Veda is an upcoming 2-D ‘MORPG’ promising tactical beat-em-up action - We've got another new and developing MORPG to show you. And no, we didn't accidentally drop the first "M" from our favored acronym; that's how publisher HYBE describes ASTRA: Knights…
Kakao Games Q2 2023: ArcheAge 2 targets second half of 2024, Ares Rise of Guardians launches in Korea - Kakao Games is just one segment of the booming Kakao corporation, but the games segment isn't driving those figures. According to the company's Q2 2023 report, the game segment as…
Vague Patch Notes: Contemplating the origin of the Big Five in the MMO space - A few weeks back, I talked about the various tiers of MMORPGs, and that included a discussion of what we call the Big Five 'round these parts. This prompted some…
Wayfinder previews its player housing, promises neighborhoods in the future - My favorite part of the rise of cozy MMOs is that even non-cozy MMOs are rushing to highlight their cozy gameplay, and in MMOs, that means housing. Wayfinder is the…
New World’s 2.0.2 performance patch is finally expected this morning after 25 hours of delays - So New World's patch yesterday didn't quite go to plan, as you likely know if you follow the game's Twitter or poked your nose into our updated post: Amazon wound…
Blizzard posts Diablo IV patch 1.1.1 notes ahead of release on August 8 - To say that the past few weeks have been contentious in the Diablo IV community would be an understatement, but it seems as if Blizzard is certainly trying earnestly to…
Ilysia had to delay its beta yet again over an unspecified bug - Stop me if you've heard this one: Ilysia delayed its beta again. OK, so you've heard that one several times, and now you're hearing it for what will ideally be the…
Albion Online’s new legendary items will be one-of-a-kind craftables with unique histories - Albion Online's next big update is already set to be loaded with new content, and Sandbox Interactive is previewing yet another chunk of it today with the reveal of awakened…
War of Dragnorox pivots to Eternal Tombs moniker with new combat style and beta signups - If you ever missed the days of classic MMOs like Ultima Online, EverQuest, and Asheron's Call when live gamemasters put on events for the whole server... well, actually you can…
LOTRO and DDO go offline for 23 hours to add new storefront, LOTRO adds River Hobbit starting instance - Here's hoping that all you Dungeons and Dragons Online and Lord of the Rings Online players have alternate sources of entertainment today because pretty much none of you will be…
World of Warcraft promises new class-based sets on the Trading Post, previews August offerings - What do you think of when you think of Priest in World of Warcraft? Did you say "candles and octopus masks"? Why would you say that? You're weird, but apparently…
Guild Wars 2 teases Secrets of the Obscure’s new kryptis enemies and rift hunting mechanics - It's August 1st, which means we're exactly 22 days away from the launch of Guild Wars 2's next expansion as Secrets of the Obscure drops on August 22nd. Ahead of…
‘Medium-ly multiplayer’ cozy MMO Loftia just fully funded with $150K on Kickstarter - Loftia, the "cozy solarpunk" "medium-ly multiplayer" title we covered earlier in July, has officially launched its Kickstarter - and it's one of the slickest we've seen to date. Sydney-based indie…
Some Assembly Required: Building and fighting to the Industrial Age in Craftopia - As I've written before, I'm pretty much stuck in on Craftopia. The seamless world update has done a lot of good for the sandbox and made it a pretty regular…
Lawful Neutral: Assessing the privacy policies governing World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy XIV - It never fails to surprise me just what some people will say in general chat in an MMO. They'll say things they would never say in real life but have…
World of Warcraft Classic gets Hardcore realms on August 24 - Once again, Blizzard has released its "This Week in World of Warcraft" announcement where its biggest news item does not actually release this week. Or next week. In fact there…
Temtem game director defends standalone Showdown title as a ‘cost-efficient’ way to support the title - At the tail-end of June, Temtem developer Crema Games made the surprise reveal of Temtem Showdown, a free-to-play, PvP-centric standalone game. Since its release, its landed "Mixed" reviews on Steam…
Wisdom of Nym: Analyzing the Final Fantasy XIV Dawntrail fan festival - So that was a thing! You know, I'd honestly been kind of chill moving into the Final Fantasy XIV fan festival, probably because I had really been so jazzed about…
Not So Massively: Revisiting Heroes of the Storm in 2023 - Social media algorithms are a dangerous thing. A few weeks back, Reddit began recommending me the sub for Heroes of the Storm. Although I had played zealously for years, I'd…
Wurm Online internal comms show staff discontent, mass departures over conflict with owners - A small fan-favorite sandbox MMO such as Wurm Online should be allowed to spend its salad days enjoying modest growth amid a calm operating environment -- but apparently, this is…
World of Warships is the latest MMO to replace official forums with Discord servers - Another one bites the dust, friends: World of Warships has decided that forums are dead and Discord is the future, and has subsequently shut down its official forums over the…
Chronicles of Elyria boss explains how Soulbound burned through nearly $7M in three years - "I wanted to give current and future business owners - particularly game developers - an understanding of the actual and hidden costs of running a small game studio (avg. 17…
EVE Online’s studio is Kickstarting a Titan Forge-built EVE-themed board game - The trend of large and long-established game companies turning to Kickstarter to fund board game spinoffs continues today, as Pearl Abyss-owned CCP Games announced a partnership with Titan Forge to…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 431: FFXIV Dawntrail and Path of Exile 2
The Stream Team: Augments and new Nulgath content in AQ3D
The Stream Team: Taking on the Root once again in Remnant 2
The Stream Team: Fun and folderol in Fall Guys
The Stream Team: Peeking in on the cozy closed beta of Palia
The Stream Team: Going after the Guild Wars 2 dragon egg-napper
The Stream Team: Going to prison in Elder Scrolls Online’s High Isle
The Stream Team: Spinning the roulette wheel once again in Final Fantasy XIV
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.
