Jagex may finally actually make a non-MMORPG game work under its umbrella, though it’s relying on RuneScape’s cachet to do so: This week, the studio announced RuneScape Dragonwilds, a multiplayer survival sandbox that borrows quite a bit from the franchise except, you know, the massively part.
Meanwhile, Path of Exile 2 released Dawn of the Hunt, Pantheon opened its PvP servers, LOTRO posted a six-month roadmap, Elder Scrolls Online turned 11, and we took a look at the multiplayer announcement from the Switch 2 reveal – and the Switch 2 delay over the latest tariffs. Unfortunately, that last part isn’t an April Fools’ day joke.
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
Path of Exile 2’s Dawn of the Hunt goes live on PC and console this afternoon - It's patch day for Path of Exile 2 fans as the early access multiplayer OARPG is officially launching Dawn of the Hunt today - a release so powerful it actually…
Design Mockument: Which of the healthiest 2025 MMORPGs have space for a sequel? - Every year, Justin and I write all of our End-of-Year Eleven posts, and every year one of those is for the healthiest games going into the next year. This past…
RuneScape Dragonwilds is Jagex’s new co-op survival game, coming to early access this spring - Jagex has officially announced another game in the RuneScape franchise: RuneScape Dragonwilds. Before you get too excited, it's not a new MMORPG; it's an "open-world survival adventure game," with both…
Vague Patch Notes: What’s so hopeless about horizontal progression in MMOs? - A few weeks ago, I talked about power creep when it comes to MMOs in general, and one of the things I mentioned as an offhanded comment was that just…
LOTRO’s six-month roadmap teases the kinship refresh, homesteading currency, and Crown of Hamat - Over the last month, most of the information we've been getting out of Lord of the Rings Online has been coming from forum posts and Discord clips and occasionally videos…
Classic Guild Wars is gearing up for its 20th birthday with a loot-filled celebration - The Guild Wars franchise is gearing up for quite a party this month as the original MMO is about to turn 20 years old. "This month - #GuildWars turns 20…
Pantheon Rise of the Fallen officially opens up its two new FFA PvP servers in latest patch - Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen has been talking about its self-described "raw" PvP server plans for a little while now, but the time for talk has ended and the time…
LOTRO Legendarium: Should LOTRO players also check out Dungeons and Dragons Online? - You know what's always fascinated me? The connection between Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons and Dragons Online. These two MMOs are very much like siblings with the same…
Puzkin is an upcoming Kickstarted MMO that promises multi-platform play and a truly safe family-friendly experience - If you are told that an upcoming MMO is being built to facilitate kids having fun with creativity at the heart of the game, it is understandable if you think…
Cozy MMO Loftia confirms plans to enter alpha access sometime this month - Loftia, the cozy-looking solarpunk MMO from developer Qloud Games that we've had our eyes on since mid-2023, is now ready to take its next step in its development later this…
Marathon’s Twitter account reawakens after six months of silence with more cryptic teases - It has been about six months since Bungie said anything about Marathon, the extraction shooter version of what is otherwise a series of single-player FPS games that have nothing to…
EverQuest II teases next week’s Lure of Darkness update and announces a new PvP progression server - You've had one EverQuest producer's letter, yes, but what about second EverQuest producer's letter? In fact, it's literally the EverQuest II producer letter, which dropped last night, and if you…
Bossa’s multiplayer sandbox Lost Skies rolls into early access April 18 - We probably should've seen this coming after Lost Skies launched its island creator demo, but now it's official: Worlds Adrift studio Bossa Games is launching Lost Skies itself into early…
Trove is testing a new game mode, a major performance upgrade, and new non-cloud server tech - The perpetually underrated and overlooked MMORPG sandbox Trove has a patch on deck and a new community letter out from Gamigo this week, so heads-up to all the blocky voxelbox…
Massively Overthinking: The things that broke us from old beloved MMORPGs - Last week, MOP's Chris and I were discussing his husband's obsession with Sea of Thieves; he runs with a set crew that generally leaves people alone until provoked. I remarked…
Whatever happened to superhero MMO Valiance Online? (2025 edition) - It's been a couple of years since we heard much out of Valiance Online, one of the original superhero MMORPGs that spawned in the wake of the closure of City…
Odin Valhalla Rising global opens registration and name reservations ahead of April 29 launch - As promised, Kakao Games has officially opened registration for its mobile/PC MMORPG, Odin: Valhalla Rising, as of today, ahead of its April 29th launch. In fact, it's not just registration…
Fight or Kite: The myth is still real in Myth of Empires’ latest Persian DLC release - Call me a fool because once again I’ve duped myself into playing the latest DLC content that was released for Myth of Empires. Based off my experience playing MOE the…
Classic EverQuest outlines its May progression server’s ruleset: expanded start with resource hunter - Classic EverQuest's latest producer letter is not going to shock anyone who read Daybreak's full roadmap back in January, but it does have a few novel bits worth a note.…
Massively on the Go: Switch 2, Mario Kart World, and multiplayer takeaways from Nintendo Direct - For those who missed it yesterday, the Switch 2 details dropped, and it's exactly what you're expecting: It's still both portable and functional as a home console, it's backwards compatibile…
Elder Scrolls Online celebrates its eleventh birthday with the 2025 Anniversary Jubilee - Pay no attention to the 10-year graphic on the official site; Elder Scrolls Online is actually turning 11 years old this month, and it's partying with the return of the…
Star Wars Galaxies’ SWGEmu declares 1.0, plans a scale-down and sunset, and announces SWGRealms - If you're a Star Wars Galaxies rogue server fan, especially of the pre-NGE variety, there's a lot of info coming your way from the OG SWGEmu developer team, as first…
Steel Hunters is live now in early access with a ‘Mostly Negative’ review score on Steam - Here's the good news for people interested in Steel Hunters in early access: The game is free-to-play, even now, so if you just want to see how it plays you…
Astroneer studio announces Starseeker: Astroneer Expeditions, coming in 2026 - Astroneer fans, a whole new galaxy is about to open up to you, as System Era Softworks has officially announced the next game in the Astroneer franchise: Starseeker. "Starseeker is a…
Fractured Online’s new studio is now ‘eight people strong’ as devs talk background update efforts - Yes, having eight developers working on the slowly rebuilding Fractured Online is not a lot, but considering this game had three unpaid workers at a previous point, we'd say this…
Lost Ark’s Q2 roadmap previews the continent of Rimeria, Kazeros Act 3, and new progression events - As promised, we're finally getting a look at Lost Ark's roadmap for the next three months today, and it does indeed look as if it will make up for a…
Star Citizen’s $10M pledge haul in March caps off a first quarter YoY funding increase for 2025 - Yet again, the unfinished alpha spaceship sandbox Star Citizen continues to break crowdfunding records despite its long years in early development: CIG's sci-fi magnum opus has had a productive March…
Perfect Ten: The wild MMORPGs that came out in 2011 - Not every year sees equal releases in the MMORPG genre. We've had years of starvation and years of plenty. Every so often it's fun to zero in on a slice…
Choose My Adventure: A sense of confusion and curiosity mark the return to Nightingale - It's pretty frequently noted by this point that when I return to a game, I tend to do so with a little bit of trepidation and confusion. That's kind of…
Dungeons and Dragons Online’s U73 launches Dinosaur Crisis, the first part of its Tavern Tales quests, today - Update 73 lands on the live Dungeons and Dragons Online servers today with Tavern Tales, a new quest bundle for the game, or at least the first chunk of it.…
ZeniMax Workers United, the Fallout and Elder Scrolls QA union, has voted to authorize a strike - "Hundreds" of games workers at ZeniMax Media have voted to authorize a strike against parent company Microsoft after "nearly" two years of negotiations, according to a release from CWA last…
So how is the Lord of the Rings Online 2025 housing rush going so far? Well, it’s going - After a month of waiting for the server transfer queue situation to settle, Lord of the Rings Online players are finally able to start claiming houses on the brand-new servers…
PlanetSide 2 has officially launched its fishing minigame today (and no, not April Fools) - So listen, when an MMO developer chooses April 1st to introduce cozy content to a PvP title, it's usually an April Fools' Day prank. But believe it or not, that…
Dune Awakening discusses head start, guild size, soloing, and the consequences of death - Did you not have two hours to yourself to sit and watch Dune: Awakening's recent livestream? Don't worry because Funcom has elected to cut the important portions of that broadcast…
SWTOR says the team is still working on story updates as it teases 7.7 and Star Wars Celebration - We have to say we're really appreciating all the producer letters outta Star Wars The Old Republic and the Broadsword team, the latest of which dropped last night. The most…
Clash of Adventurers is a free-to-play sandbox MMORPG in pre-alpha development with all the trimmings - There's something to be said about splashy introductions being tossed aside for succinct and forthright descriptions, and that most certainly is the first impression granted by Clash of Adventurers, a…
Genshin Impact recasts a striking voice actor, Wuthering Waves releases its newest content patch - It's a tale of two multiplayer gacha RPGs in this news post, as both Genshin Impact and Wuthering Waves have some headlines, and one of those headlines as you can…
‘Less AI more game content’: Defiance’s new operators prep a new video and Saturday stress test - Last week, Fawkes Games put out a trailer for Defiance hyping up its return. When we ran it, you may have noticed the trailer didn't actually have any noticeable game…
Star Citizen confirms a one-day, digital-only ‘CitizenCon Direct’ for this October - If you were hoping to set up plans to visit the United Kingdom this year for Star Citizen's annual CitizenCon event, well, don't bother because this year will be an…
City of Titans’ Q1 update heralds progress on Unreal 5.5 upgrade, landscapes, and NPCs - Just ahead of the new year, Kickstarted superhero MMORPG City of Titans resurfaced from a year of tragedy and mourning to post a development roadmap; studio Missing Worlds Media told…
Wisdom of Nym: First impressions of Final Fantasy XIV’s Seekers of Eternity content - Here we are again with a new Final Fantasy XIV patch, and while there is a lot of interesting stuff happening on the story side, there's also a chunk of…
Magic to Master has arrived to Steam early access with a meager player headcount and scathing user reviews - We'd forgive our readers if they collectively agreed to purge Magic to Master from their memory, but we have a duty to report that, against all odds, the MMO that…
Blue Protocol’s mobile remake, Star Resonance, continues testing in China - Massively OP's biggest disappointment of 2024, the premature cancelation of Blue Protocol, isn't about to be reversed by the development of a mobile remake -- but it's better than nothing,…
Mabinogi Mobile makes its debut to Korean fans, Mabinogi outlines update plans for the summer - It's new game time for South Korean fans of Mabinogi as the newly released Mabinogi Mobile made its debut for gamers in the country this past week as scheduled. The…
NCsoft addresses ‘relentless and destructive’ DDoS attacks on Lineage II and Blade & Soul NEO - It's been a trying week or so for NCsoft's games, as the MMORPG giant's been dealing with several severe DDoS attacks upon its infrastructure and titles. While the company is…
Perfect Ten: 10 MMOs where you can actually afford to buy eggs - I don't know about you folks, but eggs are a staple protein in my household, and these past months watching egg prices soar upward from a combination of poorly mitigated…
April Fools’ Day around the MMO world, 2025 edition - Love it or hate it, today is April Fools' Day, and the MMORPG industry is not about to miss this epic chance to troll you. We'll be rounding up the…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 512: Equinox Homecoming is not horsing around
The Stream Team: A quick jaunt in City of Heroes Homecoming just for the heck of it
The Stream Team: A Dinosaur Crisis and The Same Old Song in Dungeons & Dragons Online
The Stream Team: Backseat Streaming hops back into the cockpit for some Nuclear Option dogfighting
The Stream Team: Two friends continue to march through the Inner Sphere in MechWarrior 5 Clans co-op
The Stream Team: Guild Wars 2 fashion and furry frenz for the first
The Stream Team: Reveling in the highest of silly days in EverQuest II
The Stream Team: Celebrating 12 years of Warframe
The Stream Team: Desiring Death’s bow in AdventureQuest 3D
The Stream Team: Do you want some free Dinkum?
The Stream Team: Barrel bomb bowling and bubble dragon battles in Monster Hunter Wilds
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.
