Not So Massively

Dota 2 celebrated the incredible sales of its world championship interactive compendium with free gifts for all players; the compendium has now sold over 266,000 units, raising the prize fund in The International to over $2,000,000 US. Third-person MOBA SMITE has recently entered the competitive tournament scene with two new weekly $1,000 tournaments. Rise of Immortals also announced its first competitive tournament since the Battle For Graxia update and revealed details of its hilariously-named ranged centaur character Murderhoof.

League of Legends revealed the new custom item set feature coming in Patch 3.7 and published a new champion spotlight video on classic ranged carry Ashe. Guardians of Middle-Earth also released its latest paid DLC character, The Mouth of Sauron, based on a character who was originally cut from the cinematic release of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

Diablo III celebrated the first anniversary of its release on May 15th with anniversary livestreams and a magic-find bonus for all players. The latest patch also raised the increments in which money can be sold on the Real Money Auction House to ten million in response to massive oversupply. Path of Exile revealed details of its upcoming Patch 0.1.1.0 that will add new party loot options and other features, and Star Citizen showed off its new website with a special e-commerce section in which players can buy ships for cash.

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This week is packed with MOBA news as almost every major title released a new patch. Infinite Crisis introduced new champions Poison Ivy and Gaslight Catwoman and announced that the game's closed beta will start in two days' time on May 8th. SMITE introduced new Norse god Fenrir the Unbound, and League of Legends released a champion spotlight on new Ice Witch champion Lissandra. Dota 2 also released new hero Elder Titan based on the original DotA hero Tauren Chieftain, and Heroes of Newerth released several months of balance changes at once in its colossal version 3.1 update.

Star Citizen celebrated hitting $9 million US in its ongoing crowdfunding campaign, and to celebrate, developers controversially gave all current backers free lifetime insurance on their ships. The title's success has also spurred EVE Online developer CCP Games to show off its own virtual reality dogfighter called EVR that uses the upcoming Oculus Rift headset.

Diablo III's first anniversary is just over a week away; details of any celebrations haven't yet been released. Developers confirmed that the PlayStation 4 version will not be getting mouse and keyboard support and that the PC version won't be getting support for analog controllers. For those of you up for some oldschool dungeon-crawling, Diablo II also announced that its ladder will be reset on May 14th this week and all players will start the game fresh again.

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Details of this year's $1,600,000 US Dota 2 world championship have been released ahead of next month's qualifiers for the remaining three competitor spots. Heroes of Newerth began gearing up for its own tournament at DreamHack Summer 2013 with details of a qualifier tournament to determine which teams will face off at the event. Team Stay Green may be in with a chance if it enters, as the group just took home $32,000 US following a decisive win in the HoNTour grand finals.

A new Diablo III exploit that allowed Witch Doctors to farm XP by repeatedly killing their pets was discovered this week and promptly hotfixed. Riot Games released spotlight videos for newly revamped League of Legends champions Trundle and Sejuani, and CLG pro gamer Peter "Doublelift" Peng discussed his challenging road to success and heartbreaking family issues in a fantastic short documentary for Machinima.

Turbine released details of two new Infinite Crisis champions this week with video spotlights on hulking brute Doomsday and the gadget-wielding Gaslight Batman. Russian success Prime World let press into the English language beta for a first look at its castle-building and MOBA style gameplay. Rise of Immortals geared up for the official launch of its Battle For Graxia game overhaul with the addition of a new reputation system. And Star Citizen developer Chris Roberts revealed that he's been holding off on accepting investor deals because of the success of the game's crowdfunding campaigns.

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If you've been following the development of upcoming crowdfunded sci-fi sandbox Star Citizen with interest, Massively has a brand-new column you might enjoy. The Diablo III test realm hinted at upcoming boosts to life regeneration and the damage output of a few spells, but Blizzard also suggested that a nerf to the Wizard Archon Form might be on the way. Path of Exile started its second season of race events, with over 200 events to take part in and massive prizes to be won.

Third-person MOBA SMITE added the 34th god to its roster this week with acrobatic assassin Ne Zha entering the fray, and Guardians of Middle-Earth released new DLC character Kili the Dwarf. Rise of Immortals added support for game replays and introduced and interesting new White Knight feature that lets players take over from characters who have disconnected or quit in the middle of a game.

Heroes of Newerth announced a huge upcoming balance patch that may finally get rid of the paid-for early hero access and promises to rebalance much of the game's expansive roster of characters. Dota 2's streamlined abuse report update backfired when players discovered they could use the report feature itself to abuse other players. And Firefall may finally be edging toward release with the announcement of a date for the start of open beta.

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Patch 1.0.8 was released to the Diablo III public test realm this week, adding some big multiplayer upgrades and fixing quality of life issues with the Wizard class, crafting and the auction house. Path of Exile published its first series of articles in a new Development Manifesto forum looking into the thought process behind upcoming game changes and features. And sci-fi sandbox Star Citizen tackled the age-old problem of letting players have unique names without breaking immersion.

The European Dota 2 servers experienced heavy disruption this week as what appears to be a DDoS attack interfered with the DreamHack Invitationals and the G-1 qualifier tournament. A research firm also claimed that the game had recently passed giant of League of Legends in peak concurrent users despite publicly released statistics to the contrary.

Following on from its huge success in Russia, castle-building MOBA Prime World officially entered its English-language closed beta this week. Newly announced DC Comics MOBA Infinite Crisis released a champion profile video on new hero Green Lantern, and Heroes of Newerth published a classic hero spotlight on fan-favourite Devourer.

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It seems as if everyone is jumping on the MOBA bandwagon lately and trying to cut a slice of the action for himself. Creative Assembly announced that the next game in the Total War series will be a MOBA with RTS elements named Total War: Arena. MMO developer Turbine has also thrown its hat in the ring, teaming up with Warner Bros. and DC comics to develop a MOBA based on the Infinite Crisis DC storyline.

League of Legends continued its plans to revamp old characters with overhauls to Sejuani and Trundle. Developers also revealed upcoming Ice Witch champion Lissandra, a crowd-controlling mage who can cast some of her spells mana-free. Guardians of Middle-Earth finally released Frodo Baggins as a DLC character, and Heroes of Newerth announced that the $60,000 grand final of HonTour Season One will take place later this month in Las Vegas.

In a new Diablo III developer journal, Blizzard discussed its efforts to get players into multiplayer and public games, including some gameplay improvements and a new matchmaking tag system. Path of Exile's Patch 0.10.5 went live today, adding three powerful new support gems, four new unique items, and several balance changes and bug-fixes. And Torchlight II gave modders a huge gift this week by releasing its in-house development tools to the public and officially adding Steam Workshop support to the game.

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It's been a huge week for MOBAs, with several new characters being released and one game closing its doors for good. League of Legends finally revamped underused champion Karma and released new character Zac, a strange green blob who drops parts of himself all over the battlefield and can even revive after death. Dota 2 released classic hero Bristleback, a spined boar who slows enemies with a disgusting snot attack and slowly peppers them with spiked quills.

SMITE released god of music Apollo, who can deal damage by playing his lyre, sing enemies to sleep, and even power-slide like a rock star. Heroes of Newerth is in between hero releases, but its recent HoN 3.0 update has earned it the title of Best MOBA at PAX East 2013 by gaming website RTSGuru.

Warhammer-themed MOBA Wrath of Heroes officially closed its doors on March 29th, and its website has now been replaced with a message by producer James Casey. Finally, Diablo III's former Game Director Jay Wilson gave a talk at GDC 2013 in which he blamed many of the game's downfalls on both the gold and cash auction houses.

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A demo of Diablo III running on the PS3 was shown at PAX East 2013 this week, and developers confirmed that the game is not necessarily exclusive to Sony. Many PC players have been enraged by the demo, which showed improved loot and singleplayer features developers had previously said were not possible. Red 5 Studios was also at PAX this week to reveal its ambitious plans for a gaming TV channel. The studio plans to expand its gaming video channel Stage 5 with several new high-quality shows about indie games, cosplay, and gaming tropes. Path of Exile also released information on three completely overpowered new support gems currently in alpha testing for its upcoming Patch 0.10.5.

In MOBA news, League of Legends officially launched in Italy this week with a huge launch ceremony in Rome. Several professional players were unrelatedly banned for boosting other players' stats artificially, and one team was given its final warning for using a DDoS attack during a match. Heroes of Newerth received new melee strength hero Prisoner 945, and Guardians of Middle-Earth released a free map update along with a purchasable spider character DLC. Upcoming MOBA SMITE was given a loose launch window of summer 2013, and Russian MOBA Prime World took a big step toward European and US launches with the translation of much of its Russian website into English.

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Doubts were cast on SimCity's always-online requirement this week when a player managed to hack the game into playing completely offline despite developers saying it wouldn't be possible. Maxis General Manager Lucy Bradshaw also caught a lot of flack from gamers this week for claiming that the game was in many ways an MMO. Petroglyph's Victory Kickstarter that we announced last week has now been cancelled, making the future of the game uncertain.

League of Legends revealed its plans to finally update two-year-old champion Karma and release new champion Zac, who is literally a pile of green goop. Guardians of Middle-Earth published iconic character Saruman as a new piece of DLC, and SMITE added new god Aphrodite, who heals and supports her teammates with hugs and kisses.

In addition to fixing some major bugs, Diablo III's recent patch 1.07a was shown to have nerfed many popular Wizard builds, including critical mass Energy Twister and Meteor builds. Path of Exile's latest patch added a new Cyclone skill that's reminiscent of the Diablo II Whirlwind skill and introduced three fun new game types for this season's upcoming race events.

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Fresh from its work on End of Nations, developer Petroglyph launched a Kickstarter campaign this week for its own online RTS Victory. The campaign hit $19,574 in the first five days but has a long way to go to hit its $700,000 target. SimCity's always-online DRM backfired spectacularly as launch server capacity and stability issues left thousands unable to play what they thought of as a largely singleplayer game.

Diablo III revealed details of its upcoming loot overhaul that will make legendary items a little more legendary and rare items and good bit rarer. Path of Exile's patch 1.10.2 was deployed successfully, adding a few item mods and significantly improving the Duelist class area of the passive skill tree.

League of Legends celebrated its 100th Summoner Showcase with a look back at the community's best creative output and announced a brand-new comic contest that will see players voting for the winner. SMITE announced its $10,000 PAX East invitational tournament, and Guardians of Middle-Earth tempted players back with 75,000 free in-game gold in a new weekend event.

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It's been a huge week for MOBAs, with the release of several new characters, a ton of balance changes, and even a game closing down for good. League of Legends announced that it will start officially supporting Mac and released a new Smart Ping system designed to help players work together as a team despite language barriers. SMITE showed off its new crowd-controlling water god, Poseidon, and console MOBA Guardians of Middle-Earth released a new Survival game mode DLC.

We heard the unfortunate news that Wrath of Heroes will be closing its doors at the end of the month, and it's not the only game going out of business. Online FPS Bullet Run, formerly known as Hedone, is due to shut down on Friday, March 8th, in a big final event. It's not all doom and gloom, though, as Dota 2 has hit another impressive milestone, passing 300,000 peak concurrent players. The first season of Heroes of Newerth's HoN Tour league is soon to draw to a close, and developers are planning a huge balance patch before the next season kicks off.

Blizzard enraged Diablo III fans this week with the announcement that the console version will not feature the controversial always-online DRM and can be played offline. Path of Exile detailed its next open beta patch, which is due to introduce a new fire skill, a 3v3 dueling arena, and significant Duelist class buffs. Online FPS Firefall produced a new trailer this week showing off its flight gameplay amidst criticism from fans over its lack of beta content. Finally, sci-fi sandbox Star Citizen gave fans a look behind the curtain of game development in its biggest development update video yet.

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Blizzard revealed this week that Diablo III will be coming to both the PlayStation 3 and Sony's new PlayStation 4 console and will be shown off at PAX. Torchlight II developer Runic Games announced that the game will soon be localised to Japanese and Chinese for its upcoming release in Asia; a free DLC is on the way with three new Asian-themed pets. Path of Exile revealed the schedule for its first full season of ladder-style race events and announced new account security options along with its new policy to never restore items from hacked accounts.

League of Legends unveiled its new champion duo, Quinn and Valor, a dynamic pair of characters that work together as a single champion to dominate teamfights. Heroes of Newerth revealed its own new hero with a video spotlight on Saloman, a melee support hero who gains power from movement and can heal and shield his allies.

Dota 2 added a new Hero Build feature to its beta this week, giving players access to community-produced skill and item builds for all heroes. Console MOBA Guardians of Middle-Earth showed off its new goblin DLC character Snaga, and online FPS Blacklight: Retribution detailed its upcoming Onslaught expansion, which comes with three new game modes.

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Path of Exile released several patches this week, adding new map types and fixing a number of bugs. Developers also revealed that the schedule for upcoming open beta content additions will begin with the next patch. Diablo III released patch 1.0.7 this week, adding a new dueling mechanic to the game and a brand-new endgame farming task based around collecting Demonic Essence to craft powerful account-bound gear. The patch also included some much-needed buffs for popular Wizard and Monk abilities.

SMITE revealed its new ranged crowd-control god Neith this week; she manipulates invisible magical weaves to empower her attacks. And Dota 2 released classic hero Tusk, who can roll himself and his team into a giant snowball of death. League of Legends announced a series of buffs for Nasus, Akali, and Riven in a new Patch Preview video, in addition to changes to items with the cooldown reduction stat.

Heroes of Newerth's patch 3.0.2 fixed an exploit with the Insanitarius item, while competitive team Trademark eSports secured its fourth win in the Diamond division of the HoN Tour league. Finally, Star Citizen continued to break gaming crowdfunding records this week as its total funds raised passed the $8,000,000 US mark.

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Path of Exile continued upgrading its servers to cope with the increasing load of new players following its open beta release, closing the servers for three hours this week to add several new database servers. Massively exclusively revealed Blacklight: Retribution's new Safehold and metro maps, and Firefall developer Red 5 Studios explained its development plans for the next quarter.

Rise of Immortals released a spotlight video on its new long-range mage immortal Undine, while Guardians of Middle-Earth showed off its latest two DLC characters Radagast the Brown Wizard and Glóin, father of Gimli.

League of Legends made some balance changes to its Honor system, which rewards players for being nice to each other. Riot also talked to some of Season 3's newest competitive players about what being a professional gamer means to them. Dota 2 finally got its long-awaited team matchmaking system this week, and community broadcaster Beyond The Summit launched a crowdfunding campaign to pay for full-time tournament broadcasting.

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Heroes of Newerth's Patch 3.0 was released this week, updating the game with new graphics and adding bots. The revamp is part of a move to capture gamers who are unfamiliar with the MOBA genre by lowering the barrier to entry. Upcoming MOBA Sins of a Dark Age detailed its own plans to revamp the MOBA genre with its new Realm Quest feature in a new development diary this week. Third-person MOBA SMITE continued beta development with the introduction of its new melee magical tank, Vulcan, the Smith of the Gods.

League of Legends officially started its third competitive season this week, complete with a new Championship Series website and live matches scheduled every week. Online FPS Blacklight: Retribution prepared for its upcoming competitive games with updates to the weapon recoil system, and Firefall announced plans to solve its PvP balance issues with standardised "regulation" PvP gear. We also got a look behind the scenes of upcoming co-op FPS Warframe, which lets players run along walls like ninjas.

Bloodline Champions showed more signs of reaching the end of its lifetime this week as developers shut down the game's Russian servers. Online FPS Bullet Run abruptly reached the end of its own life this week when Sony Online Entertainment announced the game will close its doors on March 8th. The announcement came as a surprise to many who weren't even aware of the game's release. Path of Exile's playerbase continued to grow this week, reaching a peak of over 70,000 players and causing some server stability problems.

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