Week in Review: Sony Offline Entertainment

At the end of every week, we round up the best and most popular news stories, exclusive features, and insightful columns published on Massively and then present them all in one convenient place. Miss a big MMO or WoW Insider story last week? You've come to the right post.

Things just couldn't be bleaker for Sony Online Entertainment. Still reeling from the massive PSN hacking that has seen 77 million accounts compromised, SOE was this week forced to take its PC MMO services offline (affecting another 24 million accounts) after determining that the original attacks jeopardized the Station, too. Accused of lax security and suffering Congressional inquiries and lawsuits, SOE has scrambled to answer its customers questions and compensate players both in-game and out. Is Anonymous to blame? If so, the hacktivists aren't making any friends among gamers.

Are you twiddling your thumbs, waiting for your favorite SOE MMO to return to service? Why not cure that boredom past the break with a peek at this week's other top MMO stories.

The Old Republic expected launch window confirmed, SWTOR testing begins soon in Europe
EA said SWTOR is still expected to launch this year; meanwhile, testing preparations got underway.
Guild Wars 2 developers offer new information on PvP, servers, titles
A new dev interview brought GW2 PvP details to light.
TERA producer: Getting to endgame doesn't take a lot of time
En Masse said TERA's focus will be on endgame, not on level-grinding.
The Soapbox: Why we grief - a therapy session
Jef tackled the ever-present issue of online griefing.
RIFT 'Spoils of War' mini-event kicks off today
Trion's event aimed to tide players over until the next update.
The Tattered Notebook: Free level 90? Heck yeah!
Karen debated EQII's proposed return-to-Norrath incentives.
Blade and Soul videos feature PvP, gliding
The Korean MMO launched trailers showing off various game elements.
SWTOR reinvents the tank role in PvP
BioWare discussed the viability of PvP tanks.
Enter at Your Own Rift: Notes from the front
We considered coin-locking, hacking, and bad AI in RIFT.
Free for All: So how DO they make their money?
Beau pondered the many ways F2P developers make money.
Aion reveals a new trailer for Empyrean Calling
NCsoft will attempt to breathe new life into Atreia.
The Perfect Ten: Why a Harry Potter MMO makes sense
Justin argued that the time is right for the Potter franchise.

And from our sister site, WoW Insider...

WoW Rookie: You're level 85 ... now what?
What to do next when you've capped out your levels.
World of Warcraft patch 4.2 patch notes
WoW Insider previewed what's coming up on the test server.
Gold Capped: Goodbye, level 84 crafting alts
Blizzard removed barriers to crafting at lowish levels.

Reader Comments (31)

Another stellar week for Sony. : 0

that's why im proud to say im xbox 4 life

@Miami Prodigy That's why I'm proud to say I hold no preference over any of the consoles. They all sit next to the big daddy PC platform.

Good try, though.

@ChainSmoker Like sony does* /facepalm

@ChainSmoker

Xbox does get "cool" games
Better exclusives is subjective
Random immature Halo bashing tripe I won't bother with
FFXIII-2 is coming to 360 as well.

Got any more drivel we can listen to?

@ChainSmoker

At least I can play multiplayer games online.

ooohhhh

@ChainSmoker the third party games are just as good for XBox and for PS3. Hell they used to be so much better than until a year or so ago

@Tempes Magus
It has more to do with the fact that it takes longer to develope a game for multiple systems, I would think. Most of the "multi-system" games that come out are crappy movie to game ports and the like.

@Miami Prodigy Online gaming sucks for the most part - Its nothing but repetetive gameplay really - I personally prefer campaigns and story's or whatever you wish to call them.
Online game = Same maps , same guns etc etc depending on the genre your playing (FPS, Racing , MMO)

N64 4 life

@wqerty No way Saturn had awesome Working Designs games and Guardian Heroes!

@Seldra
Guardian Heroes HD this fall on XBLA. Where is your Juice Now????

Woah, the picture includes someone from EQOA? Did you google all SOE games or did you know EQOA was a game they own? If so mad props Brianna

SONY, I AM DISAPPOINT: A press release from Anonymous
http://pastehtml.com/view/1eejiqj.html

@cic Nothing to be disappointed with Sony about.
Every security has loop holes and backdoors.
We know Anonymous did it and now they're trying to cover their ass trying to sound smart about this situation - It may of not been the original group who done it but one group may of continued the attack on Sony or even a single entity.
I pity Anonymous for trying to act all defensive over this though - they know someone out of their group did it or else they wouldn't be trying to get defensive over it.
They'd be "lulzing" it off in their forum and making stupid pictures involving the heads of Sony company.
It's going to slip up eventually and someones going to get pinned for this .. and it's going to take down the whole network.

Sony trying to blame Anonymous is pathetically lame. Can't even own up for their own faults. So I don't see how they are going to be any better in the future.

Spafford has no knowledge AT ALL of Sony's network and only ASSUMED.

From Spafford's congressional testimony: " I have no information about what protections they had in place".

People (and the media) took Spafford's claim that the company was using outdated server software without a firewall as fact.

Now, the media is to blame on how they bring information to the masses. See Toyota's break system which was found Toyota is not at fault but the media already "destroyed" the carmaker's reputation.

Sony's network was up to date and had 3 firewalls:

http://bitmob.com/articles/detective-work-reveals-psn-servers-up-to-date

@Tempes Magus I don't really hate joystiq, been coming here forever, love they layout too, most of the people who post here a make me laugh. So that's why i keep coming back. I see my last comment got delete. Awesome.

Son to father "Father, who is Sony?"

Father to son "Well son, a few years back when they existed they made games and things"

@Tempes Magus After all this blows by, and the law suites are throw out, Sony will be just fine.

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Week in Review: Sony Offline Entertainment

Reader Comments (31)

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:05PM EX Rock said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:09PM Miami Prodigy said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:10PM Frozen Radiator said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:17PM ChainSmoker said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:34PM McWilly said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:37PM Miami Prodigy said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:43PM Daeths said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:44PM (Unverified) said

Posted: May 8th 2011 9:38PM ChainSmoker said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:31PM wqerty said

Posted: May 8th 2011 10:11PM Seldra said

Posted: May 9th 2011 10:52AM Spookimitsu said

Posted: May 8th 2011 8:42PM Zetsuei said

Posted: May 8th 2011 9:16PM cic said

Posted: May 8th 2011 9:44PM ChainSmoker said

Posted: May 8th 2011 9:29PM (Unverified) said

Posted: May 8th 2011 10:34PM Ballistic H said

Posted: May 8th 2011 11:45PM mmmfishtacos said

Posted: May 8th 2011 11:37PM Graill440 said

Posted: May 9th 2011 12:10AM mmmfishtacos said

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