game design
Vague Patch Notes: Bro, do you even play your MMO?
So Guild Wars 2 had some problems with the process to unlock its siege turtle mount. As launched, it required players to take part in...
Massively Overthinking: What else could Blizzard do to fix World of Warcraft?
Last time in Massively Overthinking, our writers and readers sure did have a lot of good ideas to fix New World that Amazon won't...
Pantheon’s lead programmer opens up about coding the guts of the game
While we're always fascinated by the high-level revelations of game design given by developers, all of those ideas would stay just that -- ideas...
Massively Overthinking: How would you fix New World?
Amazon's New World is one of the biggest, most ambitious, and most beautiful MMORPGs the industry has seen in years, and yet since its...
Perfect Ten: Genuinely fun MMO minigames
Few people are without opinions on minigames in MMOs. Some love 'em, some hate 'em, and some just ignore 'em. Some even despise that...
The Daily Grind: What kind of update would bring you back to a lapsed MMO?
If the biggest thing that kept you away from Elyon was the lack of an ability to arrow things in the face, the game's most...
Massively OP Podcast Episode 355: All your ships are belong to us
Justin, Colin, and Bree discuss Elder Scrolls Online, Lost Ark, ArcheAge, Elyon, EVE Online, and Guild Wars 2, with adventures in LOTRO, ESO, and GW2, plus mailbag topics on choice in MMOs and resurrecting Landmark.
Richard Bartle’s new book seeks to intersect theological thought and MMORPG design
If you're new to our genre, first of all welcome, and second of all you should be familiar with Dr. Richard A. Bartle, a...
Vague Patch Notes: MMOs are so stupid and I love them
It's well past time for me to get something off my chest. MMOs are dumb. MMOs are full of weird stuff. This genre is weird...
Massively Overthinking: The best and worst MMO developer quotes of 2021
One of my favorite traditions every year is to put a spotlight back on some of the wild things MMORPG developers said every year....
Visionary Realms rebuts the idea that Pantheon Rise of the Fallen is a niche game
The devs at Visionary Realms feel pretty strongly about where Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen fits in to the whole MMORPG universe, as evidenced...
The Daily Grind: Are you bothered by boosting in MMOs?
A few weeks ago, the World of Warcraft playerbase was grumbly over a tweet from the new Blizzard co-president that encouraged boosting, which is...
The former lead designer of Ultima Online and Meridian 59 is braving a brutal brain tumor
The universe has been hungry the past couple of years, and now it's threatening another member of the extended MMORPG developer community. This morning,...
Playable Worlds’ Raph Koster on gaming’s social design problems masquerading as technical challenges
In case you hadn't noticed, Playable Worlds' Raph Koster is basically handing out a free 101 course in how video games work in his...
Massively Overthinking: Would you play your favorite MMO without its IP?
Nonameplease recently posed us an interesting topic, inspired by a thread on the Star Trek Online subreddit. "It seems most people don't think the...
Raph Koster’s plan is to build the metaverse tech, build a sandbox MMORPG on it, then open it all up
If Raph Koster's metaverse talk has you more confused than before, then don't worry; his new more technical blog is going to scramble your...
Black Desert launches PC season+ server, offers next-gen console support and roadmap
It's Wednesday, which means another weekly deluge of Black Desert news.
First, over on the PC servers, where the game is celebrating 2000 days online...
The Daily Grind: Which MMOs begin as they mean to go on?
In Eliot's open letter to new players and vets of Final Fantasy XIV last month, he noted that Final Fantasy XIV's endgame is not...
Profane proudly showcases a suit of metal armor and beats the FFA PvP drum once more
Some people like cloth armor, some like leather armor, but some like the big, bulky, and (ideally) secure feeling of metal armor. Unsurprisingly, Profane...
The Daily Grind: What’s the best way to maintain immersion in an MMO?
Klei Entertainment's Kris Ruff once tweeted about game design term I've never heard before but whose description I most definitely recognized when another dev...
