An “overwhelming majority of video game workers” at Elder Scrolls Online’s ZeniMax Online Studios formally unionized this week, becoming the third union at Microsoft’s Bethsoft subsidiary and adding another 461 union members to the 6000 American tech workers under the CODE-CWA banner.
Meanwhile, Pantheon soared into early access, Ship of Heroes actually set a launch window, Elder Scrolls Online struggled through a nasty outage, Warframe 1999 arrived for romance-lovers, and we recapped the big MMO news from The Game Awards.
And finally, we’ve begin rolling out our annual awards! The first three – for most underrated MMO, best MMO rogue server, and most improved MMO – are already live. We’ll be running polls every day through the first week of 2025.
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
Design Mockument: What should Guild Wars 3 look like? - We know that Guild Wars 3 is happening... probably. I mean, we have no specific details about Guild Wars 3, other than the fact that NCsoft told investors it's being…
All the big MMO and multiplayer news from The Game Awards 2024 - If you watched the 10th annual Game Awards tonight - perhaps alongside Chris and MJ - then you probably don't need this post. But if you had other things to…
Casually Classic: WoW Classic’s unusual gift of time - When starting a column, I've found it's always best to kick off with gripping subject matter, so let's talk about scheduling! Earlier this year, I realized that my weekly schedule…
Eight-year-old indie superhero MMORPG Ship of Heroes sets a Q2 2025 launch window - Just a few weeks ago, we noted that it appeared Ship of Heroes' release plans had continued shifting around (at one point, it was targeting 2021), but as of today,…
MassivelyOP’s 2024 Awards: Most Underrated MMORPG - Welcome one and all to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards for 2024, our multi-week celebration of the highs and lows of our favorite genre over the last dozen months. Every year,…
LOTRO Legendarium: Looking back at LOTRO’s run in 2024 - How do we sum up the entire year of Lord of the Rings Online? That's always a hard task, but if I had to give a label to this MMO…
MassivelyOP’s 2024 Awards: Most Improved MMO - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Most Improved MMO, which was awarded to World of Warcraft Retail last year. All live MMOs, regardless…
MassivelyOP’s 2024 Awards: Best MMO Rogue Server - Welcome back to Massively Overpowered's formal end-of-the-year awards! Today's award is for the Best MMO Rogue Server, which was awarded to Warhammer Online: Return of Reckoning last year. Readers will remember…
Palia wants to be your ‘holiday homestead’ with next week’s update - Is it possible for Palia to get any cozier than it already is? Apparently so because this life sim is busting out a cheerful holiday update next week on December…
Happy holidays: 461 Elder Scrolls Online studio developers just unionized - Bethsoft has one union, yes. What about *second* union? In fact, this is more like third union, and we're not sorry to see it. Readers will recall that QA workers…
Lost Skies’ island construction tool is officially launched and F2P on Steam - Earlier this month, we noted that Bossa Games was pushing onward with its new multiplayer MMO-esque sandbox Lost Skies by releasing an Island Creator tool on Steam. Now, that tool…
World of Warcraft steels itself for next week’s Siren Isle while WoW Classic Classic gets into raidin’ - World of Warcraft has one final content offering for 2024 before it gears up for the even greater things coming with next year's Undermine. Patch notes are up for December…
The Secret World TTRPG group is working on a North American expansion book - Way back in 2021, Funcom officially gave its blessing to a player-run studio that wanted to build a Secret World tabletop RPG. In 2022, the group - Star Anvil Studios…
Pax Dei invites you to go on a shopping spree as its Market Square update is live - As promised, Pax Dei's Verse 2: Market Square is live this morning for all owners of the early access sandbox MMORPG, and it's all about gold. No, really: The patch finally…
Star Citizen rounds up the features for alpha 4.0, which is still on track for release by year’s end - There are only a few more weeks left in December, let alone 2024, but Star Citizen is still claiming in its final video digest for the year that alpha 4.0…
Marvel Rivals director speculates on Concord’s demise: “I don’t think anybody can accurately predict” flops - Marvel Rivals is a free-to-play hero-based FPS that has attracted absolute scads of players following its launch and earning favorable comparisons to Overwatch 2. This is in stark contrast to…
Massively Overthinking: The best and worst MMO developer quotes of 2024 - You know, this traditional end-of-the-year roundtable shouldn't be a thing. We've been doing this such a long time and getting so much coverage on the very dumb things that MMO…
Brighter Shores AMA confirms updates for combat, professions, and co-op play are en route - It looks as if the devs of Fen Research have plenty of updates planned for Brighter Shores, at least according to an AMA the studio held with its players, and…
Old School RuneScape provides an updated deep-dive into its new Sailing skill, confirms alpha for 2025 - It's been quite a while since Old School RuneScape talked about the development of its new Sailing skill, but that's not because Jagex has been sitting idle; it was just…
Massively on the Go: Planning your Pokemon GO December 2024 Community Day targets - As previewed thus far, Pokemon Go's upcoming Community Day round-up event from December 21st-22nd is bit of a letdown this year. Yes, Dynamax Beldums can finally become beasts, but the…
Elder Scrolls Online could be offline as long as 12 hours today thanks to a datacenter power failure - Hope you didn't want to play Elder Scrolls Online today: The core servers are having serious issues right now and won't be back anytime soon. ZeniMax Online Studios says that…
Not So Massively: Deep-diving ZeroSpace’s factions and final thoughts on the beta - We've reached the third and final piece of Not So Massivey's extensive impressions from the recent open beta of multiplayer RTS ZeroSpace. In my first piece, I tackled PvP and…
Vague Patch Notes: EVE Frontier’s blockchain foundation makes it a worse MMO - It is a mark of pride for our readers that basically none of you are having CCP Games trying to play around with the idea that EVE Frontier shouldn't be…
Former Dauntless dev decries Awakening update as ‘blatantly not player focused’ - It's not just the veteran players who are extremely upset at the Awakening update for Dauntless; the game's former associate producer Jessie Leigh Gagnon has also spoken out against the…
Pantheon Rise of the Fallen announces early access head start today and delay of buddy key delivery - Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen continues to perform its pre-flight checks before it takes off for early access tomorrow, which means that once again the MMORPG's Discord has new information…
Throne and Liberty launches the Startree Solstice event today alongside a cooking revamp - It's patch day for Throne and Liberty as Amazon and NCsoft roll out the planned holiday content, the first Christmas ever for the global game. The festive Startree Solstice event…
End-of-Year Eleven: The biggest MMO surprises of 2024 - I have not had a good 2024. I have, in fact, had the absolute opposite of that. I feel like I exist now through a thick gauze, scented strongly of…
Solarpunk MMO Loftia lands on Steam, shows off housing neighborhood trailer - Australian solarpunk MMO Loftia isn't going to let the holiday season arrive without a couple big gifts to its growing community! Qloud Games gleefully announced that not only has it…
Dungeons and Dragons Online releases update 71: Fall of the Night Brigade - Did you think that you were going to get out of 2024 without becoming a rat? Your number's up, pal, because Dungeons and Dragons Online is making this happen with…
Path of Exile 2 is scrambling to hire more support folks following its massive early access launch - Grinding Gear Games warned Path of Exile 2 players ahead of early access that the first era of the game might be a little rough, owing to the fact that…
Pantheon sets ground rules for character names and support ahead of early access - This Friday, December 13th, will see the early access floodgates open for sandbox MMORPG Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen, but before then, Visionary Realms laid out some rules for players…
Secret Level S1 E3 teaches New World’s favorite failson an important lesson about kingship - New World's episode of Amazon Prime Video's Secret Level animated series is live today, so of course we sat down to watch it so you don't have to - though…
Heroes of the Storm closes out 2024 with its fourth balancing and bugfixing patch of the year - The tail end of 2023 saw something pleasantly surprising out of Blizzard (for once): A sudden series of patches for its MOBA Heroes of the Storm after it entered maintenance…
Star Wars Galaxies Restoration teases new species, a housing deco upgrade, and a combat tree overhaul - Star Wars Galaxies fans always get a little sad every December as it marks the original MMORPG's deathiversary. But we're blessed to have multiple rogue server and emulator teams working…
Guild Wars 2’s Wintersday has returned through January 2 with plushie weapons - Guild Wars 2 friends, it's time to head to Divinity's Reach in your festive snow gear because Wintersday has returned to Tyria this afternoon. "As the year winds down and…
World of Warcraft has added a whopping 38,000 quests in 20 years - Here's a fun fact: Originally, Blizzard intended to create only around 100 Horde, 100 Alliance, and 100 neutral quests for World of Warcraft, as the studio saw these as an…
Choose My Adventure: Tiny ship takes on big battles in Star Trek Online - I didn't have a whole heap of time to myself in Star Trek Online this week, but considering that I was basically told to just stick with what I had…
Star Wars: The Old Republic GU 7.6 goes live today with Dynamic Encounters and new PvP season - Finally, Star Wars: The Old Republic will give players the content they've been craving since the game launched: the chance to herd Banthas on the surface of Tattooine. That's not…
Fantastic Pixel Castle shares new prototype gameplay and dev plans for its Ghost MMO - Fantastic Pixel Castle's upcoming MMO codenamed Ghost (aka Greg Street presents Ghostboi Adventures Online starring Bobby Battle Crab™) is wrapping up its year of development with a new prototype gameplay…
Marvel Rivals’ similarity to Overwatch apparently annoyed former Blizzard boss Mike Ybarra - It's not too much of a surprise that NetEase's free-to-play superhero shooter Marvel Rivals is being compared to Blizzard's Overwatch; the DNA is clear in both critical and player reaction…
Wisdom of Nym: Good aim and bad for Final Fantasy XIV Dawntrail predictions - We're approaching the end of the year, and that means once again looking at my prediction history for the year, which remains at around 60%. I am happy with that,…
Corepunk outlines plans for early level combat, loot updates, and additional new features - Following what it calls a "very informative and active week," developer Artificial Core is ready to share the next series of updates planned for its MMOARPG Corepunk as early access…
Fight or Kite: IfSunSets tasks players with surviving the night on a zombie-filled island - We are rapidly approaching the end of the year, and my game time is getting especially sporadic. This time of year things is a good time to be an online…
Soulframe talks up December pre-alpha updates, promises open testing and wolf mount next year - The very last dev livestream of 2024 for multiplayer action RPG Soulframe wrapped up over the weekend, and developer Digital Extremes was once again ready to share plenty of details…
Oddball indie MMORPG Spire Horizon Online makes it to its full launch - October was a month full of very random MMO, MMORPG, and multiplayer games during the Steam Next Fest happening that month, but we became low-key obsessed with one extremely oddball…
China’s mobile Blue Protocol ARPG rebrands as Star Resonance with a new test for December - We're all being reminded that Blue Protocol is technically not dead all over again. Readers will remember that a mobile version of the anime MMO entered closed beta testing in…
Warframe 1999 is officially live with new romance and story content - The previews for Warframe's newest update have focused on the fact that the update sees players team up with six individuals fighting against a horrifying infection in Hollvania who have…
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Massively OP Podcast Episode 497: Walking down the Path of Exile 2
The Stream Team: A fabulous Friday the 13th in AdventureQuest 3D
The Stream Team: Taking a peek inside of the early access release of Pantheon Rise of the Fallen
The Stream Team: Backseat Streaming The Game Awards live
The Stream Team: Wrapping up the Gianthold Wastes Saga in DDO
The Stream Team: Taking another swing at the Pi-Rat King in Cat Quest III
The Stream Team: Adopting Guild Wars 2’s Mr. Ribbington
The Stream Team: Pouncing on Path of Exile 2
The Stream Team: The debut of Warframe 1999
The Stream Team: Final Fantasy XIV roulette time with friends and family is back
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.
