MassivelyOP’s 2024 Awards: Best Classic MMO

December 27, 2024 11:00 AM

Welcome back to Massively Overpowered’s formal end-of-the-year awards!

Today’s award is for the Best Classic MMO, which was awarded to Final Fantasy XI last year. We’ve been running this award since 2021, and for it we’re looking at games from around 2010-ish and earlier – but only live MMOs from that period, not rogue servers (we have a separate award for them). We know “classic” is hard to define, but we try! Don’t forget to cast your own vote in the just-for-fun reader poll at the very end!

And the MassivelyOP staff pick for the Best Classic MMO of 2024 is…

CITY OF HEROES HOMECOMING

Brianna Royce: LOTRO, UO New Legacy, City of Heroes. So here’s a treat: If City of Heroes Homecoming doesn’t count as a “rogue server” anymore, that makes it eligible for Classic MMO, and if ever there was a year to honor it, it’s this year, the year it officially snagged a license to operate. This isn’t just a great old game; it’s a great game period, whether you’re talking customization, combat variety, or the sprawling base system that hooked me this year. Well-deserved award.

Carlo Lacsina: WoW Classic, EverQuest. Game is still chuggin’ along and even got an expansion this year! It’s an artifact of an era long gone and with servers like project 1999 providing a snapshot of what early 2000s MMO gaming was like, it’s still one of the best classics. Bring friends, though!

Chris Neal: LOTRO, City of Heroes. Yep, CoH is an operating classic now! And boy has it earned the spot. Even if missing attacks can suck, the fact that CoH still stands up to this day against all of the new things out now is testament to what a good classic game really is. Long live the superhero MMO king.

Eliot Lefebvre: City of Heroes. It came back. Microphone dropped. Yield the stage.
Justin Olivetti: WoW Classic, OSRS. There are so many great versions and options for WoW Classic, and it’s great to see how it hasn’t been a flash-in-the-pan but has seen growth in its community and experimentation from the devs. Getting it included in the same sub as retail WoW is a nice bonus, too! And not only is Old School RuneScape oddly more popular than the regular RuneScape, but it’s been evolving in a new and delightful direction thanks to community suggestions and developer investment.

Larry Everett: City of Heroes

MJ Guthrie: City of Heroes, Aion Classic. Because CoH:H is now a real game! And Aion Classic brought back the zones and gameplay that Aion stripped away, gutting the game, and even continued updating it this year.

Tyler Edwards: WoW Classic

City of Heroes took our award for Best Classic MMO. What’s your pick?

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How does MassivelyOP choose the winner?

Our team gathers together to nominate and discuss candidates and hopefully settle on a consensus winner. We don’t have a hard vote, but we do include commentary from writers so that you can see our thought process. The site’s award goes to the staff selection, but we’ll include both it and the community’s top nomination in our debrief in January. Reader poll options include all MMOs nominated plus a few others we thought should be included.