Arg, this week you guys. Daybreak is currently wading in the aftermath of one of the biggest unforced errors I’ve seen in the MMO genre in a decade, from inexplicably deciding to answer Russian sanction rumors by abruptly claiming it’s not owned by the company it’s said it’s been owned by for three years to laying off over 70 people in what was allegedly an unrelated H1Z1 crisis.
It’s such a mess that you probably missed our farewell to EVE Online’s Andie Nordren and our impressions pieces on Project Gorgon, Sea of Thieves, and Elder Scrolls Online’s Summerset. Oh yeah, and Belgium declared lockboxes illegal and threatened a bunch of international corporations with criminal penalties. No big thing.
Read on for the very best of this week’s MMO news and opinions.
THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES
Daybreak says it has ‘no affiliation’ with Columbus Nova, the company it said bought it in 2015 - Note: We've updated this piece heavily at the end with Daybreak's statements and further links. A chain of business connections could have a real and dire impact on Daybreak Games…
Daybreak has now been hit with layoffs [Confirmed] - Daybreak has now confirmed the layoffs, and we've got lots more information from our own sources - see below for updates and context. Multiple game industry veterans are discussing layoffs…
Daybreak update: Chief Publishing Officer Laura Naviaux has left the company - Yesterday, Massively OP put together a piece on MMO company Daybreak Games Company and its corporate overlords, chronicling the US government's asset freeze of Russian megacorp Renova on down the…
EverQuesting: Columbus Nova or not, Daybreak is tying its own noose - How about those Red Sox? Seriously, that's a conversation I'd rather be having than the one that has cropped up this week -- and I don't even follow the Red…
Impressions of Project Gorgon from an Asheron’s Call player - It's finally time for me talk about Project Gorgon as a released product. As you might have guessed, I was avoiding the game prior to launch. I've spoken out against early access…
WoW Factor: Things that actually worry me about Battle for Azeroth - The Battle for Azeroth beta is here, at long last, and it feels like it might have come a little early in the process. Usually beta testing is mostly for…
Tamriel Infinium: First impressions of Elder Scrolls Online’s Summerset (mostly without spoilers!) - [AL:ESO]Over the years, I suspect I've made it well known what I find most important in my Elder Scrolls Online gameplay. I enjoy the environments and the quest storylines. I…
Belgium orders Overwatch, CSGO, and FIFA 18 to remove lockboxes or face criminal penalties - Back in 2017, at the height of mainstream outrage over lockbox shenanigans, Belgium became one of the very first countries to take the problem seriously (instead of just passing the…
EVE Online Executive Producer Andie ‘CCP Seagull’ Nordgren is leaving CCP Games [Updated] - [AL:EVE]It's always tough when a development studio loses one of its top people, but today's news is sure to sting more than usual for both EVE Online players and the…
Impressions of Sea of Thieves, one month in: Deep-diving retro world PvP - It's really hard for me to not to gush hard about Sea of Thieves. I know many out there won't agree, and it's easy to say why, especially for RPG and theme park…
Wild West Online crosses the launch frontier on May 10 - Saddle up, pard'ners, 'cause it's about to be a bumpy ride. Wild West Online announced today that it is officially launching on May 10th. Yes, as in two weeks from…
Here’s how Defiance 2050’s class unlocks work as the closed beta resumes today - As previously announced, Trion is running another Defiance 2050 beta event this weekend, this time including console players along with PC players. Worth noting is that Trion is also selling founder…
The Game Archaeologist: Red Planet’s Lost Colony vaporware - You know the story of Roanoke, right? That early American settlement that abruptly went missing with only the word "Croatoan" carved into a tree for later colonists to find? It's…
Project Gorgon explains why its appeal isn’t merely nostalgia-related - Project Gorgon, the scrappy indie MMO that recently went into Steam early access, hosted an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit to talk about the game yesterday. Gorgon is a…
Massively Overthinking: How accountable should MMOs hold players for out-of-game toxicity? - Brendan's discussion with CCP Falcon at EVE Fanfest last week included an interesting chat about out-of-game harassment and whether gaming companies had an obligation to do something about it. Falcon…
Black Desert celebrates South and North Korean peace summit with global buff tonight - Anybody for some good news? Yeah? Me too! If you follow real-world international headlines even a little bit, you surely are aware that history was made yesterday as North Korea's…
Epic Games’ Paragon closes down tomorrow - The day is just about here. After announcing its intentions to close Paragon in January due to lackluster popularity, Epic Games is about to flip the server switch from "on" to…
Ragnarok Online shuts down in Europe due to new regulations [Update: US servers blocking EU access] - Update: This story was a miscommunication in the media. It turns out that while the servers are staying up, Ragnarok Online's North American servers are blocking IP addresses from Europe…
Fortnite has become the ‘largest free-to-play console game of all time,’ SuperData says - "Fortnite is now the largest free-to-play console game of all time, in revenue generated and monthly active users," SuperData has declared in its monthly revenue report for the gaming industry…
Guild Wars 2 tortures Dervish fans with an outfit but no class, denies excessive data collection in ‘spyware’ controversy - World polish and bug fixes are at the forefront of Guild Wars 2's latest patch, which went live yesterday. Several nagging issues across the game were addressed, including hang-ups in…
Perfect Ten: What your MMO quantity says about you - It occurs to me that it is very difficult to find MMOs that I have literally never played before in some capacity. There are titles on the list, of course,…
EVE Fanfest 2018: CCP Falcon on EVE’s community team layoffs and having Hilmar as a CEO - [AL:EVE]It's safe to say that it's been a rough year for CCP Games, with the company pulling out of VR game development and laying off around 100 staff worldwide. The…
Wisdom of Nym: Final Fantasy XIV’s next patch reveals our future story - [AL:FFXIV]The next patch for Final Fantasy XIV is something we should all watch closely. Because it's going to tell us plenty about where we're heading in the next expansion. We…
Leaderboard: Does the Daybreak fiasco affect whether you play its MMOs? - Over the last couple of days, we've been covering the Daybreak scandal - specifically, how concerns over the impact of government sanctions on Daybreak's parent companies would affect the games,…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 167: Daybreaking news
Massively OP Podcast Episode 166: Russia breaks the internet
The Stream Team: Partying in Paragon Chat to celebrate City of Heroes’ anniversary
The Stream Team: Mounting an ARK crab rescue
The Stream Team: Working up to Warframe’s Sanctuary Onslaught
The Stream Team: Things that go bump in the Secret World Legends night
The Stream Team: Doing the Star Trek Online Delta recruit thing
The Stream Team: Happy 7th anniversary Allods Online!
The Stream Team: Walking the World Tree’s Dream Plane in AdventureQuest 3D
The Stream Team: Celebrating 11 years of Lord of the Rings Online
The Stream Team: Teamwork and pteras in PixARK
The Stream Team: A sneak peek at Defiance 2050’s closed beta
AND FROM OUR FRIENDS AT BLIZZARD WATCH
Strand of the Ancients is gone in WoW’s Battle for Azeroth
What do you want to see from Diablo 4?
Blizzard is mostly finished with class changes in Battle for Azeroth
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 little bits of news we didn’t cover anywhere else.
