The hidden art of Star Trek Online There is much buzz in the MMOG universe this morning about the upcoming title Star Trek Online. Being absolute fanboys and fangirls of Star Trek ourselves (much like our friends at STO Zone who had the same idea) we wanted to show you a couple of nuggets of interesting art that we've extracted.
	Age of Conan rep talks Kingship, new zones, and more The folks at Ten Ton Hammer met with Funcom Product Manager Erling Ellingsen at Comic Con over the weekend. Ellingsen described many of the planned updates to Age of Conan.
	Official Asheron's Call blog is nostalgic Asheron's Call's 100th update is imminent, and to celebrate, Turbine has started a "Nostalgia Blog" in which old designers of the game reminisce about their experiences of elation and tribulation.
	Microsoft's Shane Kim on Xbox 360's MMO failures EDGE spoke with Microsoft Game Studios corporate VP Shane Kim about the MMO genre's failure to come to fruition on the Xbox 360 game console. Two MMOs that were planned for the platform -- Marvel Universe Online (an in-house project) and ...
	Comic-Con 08: Hands-on with Warhammer Online Last week at Comic-Con in San Diego, I sat down with Warhammer Online producer Jeff Skalski and got my hands on the beta for the first time. I could go in-depth on all the new features and functions of the game, but ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	EVE Online patch day time-lapse video makes us laugh Have you ever wondered what sort of craziness goes on inside a developer's offices during a major patch day? We've always had a sneaking suspicion that certain hi-jinks occur, but ...
	Cryptic Studios is hiring ... for Star Trek Online! There's still a little over 24 hours left on the countdown clock located at Cryptic Studios' official website as of this writing. Unfortunately, staffing needs seems to have ruined the surprise a bit.
	Rumor: Warhammer Online set to release on September 23rd We have a date! Not that kind of date, not the awkward first kind. This is a better date, one where Warhammer Online will be released unto the masses.
	Funcom suffering a loss of investor confidence Funcom, makers of Age of Conan, are dealing with some serious financial flux. Since the launch of AoC, their stock has tumbled from $54 to $24 a share on the Oslo Stock Exchange ...
	E308: Walking through The Agency's trailer While at E3 2008, we had a great deal of time to talk to Matt Wilson, Executive Director of Development for SOE Seattle, the studio in charge of making the new MMOFPS title, The Agency.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 28 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Testing out Age of Conan's new PvP system As we mentioned earlier, the new PvP system (or at least a large part of it) for Age of Conan is currently on the Testlive server, and undergoing rigorous testing. We're particularly impressed by tester Ydiss ...
	Making/Money: Hurry Up and Wait It took a few weeks, but I finally made it to level 20 in Age of Conan. It was an intense time getting through quest after quest, killing random mobs, and starting to mark my map with waypoints in anticipation.
	Big Download taps into Champions Online We give em' two big thumbs-up, and we hope you don't think super-hero and villain MMOs are overplayed. One very cool thing ...
	Brief glimpse of City of Heroes Issue 13 IGN have been talking to NCSoft at ComicCon, and have come away with a few pieces of intel about City of Heroes Issue 13. Most surprising is how it's described as the last free Issue for 2008. There's only been one issue so far this year, which was Issue 12: Midnight Hour ...
	RMT company Live Gamer to work with virtual economist Live Gamer, the legit Real Money Trading (RMT) company that handles all legal transactions for EverQuest II and other games, has brought on "noted virtual econonomist" Vili Lehdonvirta. Lehdonvirta is a former game designer ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 25 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Feared censorship once more fails to appear in Age of Conan Just what does it take to kill a rumor, anyway? Not so long ago, we investigated rumors that the mature content in Age of Conan was being 'scaled back', and came away unconvinced that any such thing was happening. More recently, the anatomical changes to the succubus model suggested that rather than taking mature content out ...
	Zero Punctuation reviews Age of Conan Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw is the naughty charismatic pontificating stallion behind Zero Punctuation, the hilarious weekly videogame review web program. It's not often Croshaw will review an MMORPG ...
	EVE Online currency sellers rip off players (shocker) Well, here we are again... certain people among EVE Online's player base who buy their isk from shady sites are the focus of another dev announcement. GM Grimmi just posted the following:
	World of Warcraft 60-70 leveling to get faster in Lich King Alongside the obvious insta-leveling of Death Knight characters, a post to the World of Warcraft forums by lead designer Jeff Kaplan has confirmed that leveling between levels 60 and 70 will get faster after Wrath of the Lich King is released.
	Ten things every new player should know about EVE Online There are some valuable lessons learned as you progress in EVE Online, lessons which get pounded into you when making mistakes. There are so many things you wish someone had told you ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Research: Subscription model unappealing to vast majority of users A survey performed by researchers Parks Associates titled "Electronic Gaming in the Digital Home II" concluded that there is very little room for market expansion for subscription-based MMOs.
	EA CEO Riccitiello doesn't think investors care about quality When you're playing your favorite MMO, how much thought do you put into the finances of the game? Do you wonder if the game had initial investors, or if they were banking on a big-name publisher?
	Notes for AoC's 23rd of July patch: extra-short edition We've had a long run of meaty patches for Age of Conan, and whether or not they addressed the most important issues on players' minds, the patch notes were always long and full of fixes.
	Hellgate: London saved by Namco-Bandai Didn't really think we'd be talking about this game ever again, but it's nice to be wrong. Tipster Matt let us know that a Senior Director for Business development has posted to the official Hellgate:London forums letting everyone know that 'word' is coming soon.
	Buddy Keys finally implemented in Age of Conan Buddy Keys have been a long time coming, but they're finally part of Age of Conan. Funcom assured us last week that they'd be going live this week, and they've made good on that.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 23 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Patch report for Age of Conan's July 17th update Yes, it's time again for another edition of undocumented Age of Conan patch notes. We briefly mentioned them in the invisible hotfix edition that took place shortly after the latest Age of Conan patch.
	The Daily Grind: What MMOG would you kill off? Yesterday we asked what deceased MMOG do you miss the most. Let's flip that question around and make it somewhat evil. It could be before the MMOG ever launched essentially erasing it and making it unknown or sometime after it launched. Any MMOG is fair game.
	Massively takes on EVE Online's learning curve EVE Online is a complex game. There's no doubt about that. That complexity is a large part of the draw, but that doesn't mean learning about the game has to be a daunting experience.
	E308: Exploring an improved Inevitable City in Warhammer Online Our discussion of Warhammer Online as seen at last week's E3 event continues, with a look at an improved Inevitable City. During our huge Massively goes to WAR feature spread earlier this year ...
	Succubi get perky in Age of Conan Rejoice, O ye demonologists. No matter what else might be wrong with Age of Conan, a grievance that has been endured since Beta is now no longer to plague you.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 21 Jul 2008 18:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Mythos beta is shutting down tonight The woes continue at Flagship Studios. It was just announced that the Mythos beta will shutdown tonight. The official time slotted for its cease of operations is at July 18th, 2008 at 11:59 CST.
	E308: Champions Online gameplay video It's late in E3 week but we've still got plenty of goodness coming. We've got a fun tidbit from the folks at 2K games (Champions' new publisher), a brand new gameplay video for Champions Online.
	Hellgate: London subscriptions suspended Exploring and fighting in post-apocalyptic London used to require a subscription but not anymore. Flagship Studios has announced that active Hellgate: London subscribers will not be billed nor will any new subscriptions be accepted.
	Double XP starts today in City of Heroes As promised, today is the day the City of Heroes is filled with the sounds of heroes and villains levelling up, as well as the ka-CHING of doubled Influence and Prestige rewards landing in their... actually, what do they keep that intangible stuff in?
	E308: 'Open Party' system to encourage grouping in Warhammer Online Our epic-level talk with Josh Drescher and Adam Gershowitz delved into a number of interesting topics. Warhammer Online is essentially feature complete, they said, and will offer players a level of UI customization ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 19 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	E308: Warhammer Online is pretty much done We had a chance to chat today with Josh Drescher and Adam Gershowitz, two of the leading lights behind EA Mythic's Warhammer Online. Even just two months after our huge Massively goes to WAR series
	Society system planned in 100th Asheron's Call content update Early Asheron's Call adopters are quite accustomed to the epic storylines that unfolded in the world. Some endless sojourns taken through Asheron's Call are still legendary among players.
	Behind the Curtain: Gone for good? I've been thinking recently about loss. Having been incredibly lucky with my own brush with the possibility of losing my World of Warcraft characters, I got to thinking.
	Not-in-the-notes for AoC's 17th July patch: invisible hotfix edition Yesterday's Age of Conan patch was one of the better ones we've seen in recent times, but it did bring back an old tradition: a longish list of changes that were not mentioned in the official patch notes.
	Aeria adds Diablo-like Cronous to its library MMO portal Aeria Games has acquired a new game called Cronous, which was originally developed by Lizard Interactive. Cronous' gameplay is similar to that of Diablo, Mythos, or Dungeon Runners.

The Daily Recap [Updated] originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 18 Jul 2008 12:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	KOTOR MMO confirmed by Electronic Arts We've had plenty of speculation -- lots and lots of it -- but now we've got confirmation from Electronic Arts chief executive John Riccitiello that Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic is indeed getting a massively multiplayer online iteration.
	E308: DC Universe Online roundup Sony Entertainment Online revealed a metric ton of new information on their upcoming superhero MMO DC Universe Online at E3 this week, and Massively was on hand to pick the spicy brainmeats of Creative Director Chris Cao, SOE-Austin VP of development John Blakely, and famed DC artist and Executive Creative Director for the project, Jim Lee. Check out the roundup of all the DCUO coverage from E3 including interviews, screenshots, a full breakdown of the trailer and analysis of DCUO's role on the console.
	Massively Speaking Podcast Episode 14 Massively Speaking Episode 14 is a another special episode! Two in a row! This week we're in Los Angeles for E3, and the minds behind the site's direction sat down for some jawwing about what we've seen. Alongside Leads Krystalle Voecks and Michael Zenke, Joystiq Producer Barb Dybwad and Joystiq Senior Editor Elizabeth Harper sat in for all the MMO news from the biggest games event this week.
	The serious growth of Jagex Earlier this week, we've been giving you a ton of news related to Jagex's Runescape and the newly-announced Mechscape. In a recent blog post by Relmstein, he gives us his impressions of this news, and why he takes them seriously.
	E308: The DC Universe Online trailer explained We aren't going to be able to provide you with the video itself for some time, but the voice content of the video is well worth reading up on.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Age of Conan may be facing a horse price crash If you've been planning to buy your first horse in Age of Conan, you might want to sit on that hard-earned gold for a few more days. An update to the patch currently on the Testlive Server has slashed the price of regular mounts ...
	E308: First footage of DC Universe Online Did you hear? Jim Lee showed up at the E3 2008 Sony press conference and not only talked about DC Universe Online, but showed it too! Our initial thoughts on the video? While purportedly still pretty early on ...
	Scheduled AoC patch postponed by a day again Age of Conan players will be feeling a bit of deja vu today. As was the case last week, today's scheduled patch is not in a suitable state to go live. A fix relating to "Bind on Equip" items in fact made certain items totally un-equippable ...
	E308: John Smedley on Star Wars Galaxies, reconnecting with players Our lengthy discussion with John Smedley yesterday focused primarily on Free Realms and the possibilities in SOE's future. We also chatted briefly about the newest surprise from the company ...
	38 Studios to use NaturalMotion's Morpheme engine 38 Studios, the star-studded development studio working on a mysterious MMO codenamed Copernicus, has announced that it will use an animation engine called Morpheme.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 16 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	E3: New Warhammer Online screenshots Though Mythic hasn't yet had anything to tell us about Warhammer Online, they have released a handful of new RvR-focused screenshots at E3 today. There are a number of nicely composed moments in there, including...
	HanbitSoft CEO claims ownership rights to Hellgate:London and Mythos We're still reeling over the news that Flagship Studios has met its demise. Seeing any hard working development studio with loads of potential go belly-up isn't easy considering all the real people affected from the fallout.
	New SOE video blog confirms announcement of DC Universe Online at E3 The inaugural video blog of Sony Entertainment Online features CEO John Smedley talking with Courtney Simmons, Media Consultant. Smedley goes on a little bit about Free Realms, Everquest 2, and The Agency ...
	Blizzard victorious in WoW Glider case Legally Blind is reporting that the WoW Glider case has been resolved in Blizzard's favor. The maker of the epic fantasy MMO has long contended that the MDY developers are infringing on the company's copyright. MDY makes the WoW Glider bot software ...
	Mythic offers FAQs for Warhammer's loss of cities, classes The removal of four classes and four capital cities from Warhammer Online last week continues to reverberate through the fan community. In an attempt to answer prospective player questions in a highly visible place, FAQs have been posted to the official website.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 15 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	The Digital Continuum: Diet WAR Diet Warhammer Online: same great taste, less content. Is it bad that the recently re-branded Mythic Entertainment just cut out a large portion of our Warhammer Online pie and put it in the deep freeze?
	Flagship Studios: It's worse than that; he's dead, Jim Although our previous coverage of Flagship Studios -- creators of Mythos and Hellgate: London -- mentioned that a large, undisclosed portion of the staff were laid off, it was only today that we discovered the true extent of the damage.
	How to beat game piracy according to David Perry David Perry, best known as the founder of Shiny Entertainment and Earthworm Jim, believes the way to beat game piracy is by distributing games for free. "The next big thing will be free games," said Perry ...
	Neopets creators enter the MMO world with Twin Skies After a bit of a tease a couple of weeks ago, Meteor Games, founded by the creators of the kids Flash game portal Neopets, has announced details of their first-ever MMO. Twin Skies will be a blend of a traditional, 3D MMO with innovative out-of-game elements. For instance, certain web-based mini-games ...
	Fallout and repercussions of the ActiBlizz merger Hail to the King, long may EA reign. But what of the recently completed merger between Activision and Vivendi? In an analysis on the Next Generation site, there's discussion of a possible future where Activision-Blizzard name hangs above Electronic Arts on the big board of game publishers.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 14 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Valve sees MMOs as the future of the medium We've talked previously about the tug-of-war that seems to be happening between the PC-yes and the PC-no crowd. Gabe Newell, head of the well-known Half-Life developer Valve, firmly stood up in the PC-yes column late last month.
	Age of Conan now available for digital download Funcom's Age of Conan is now available as a purely downloadable product. Folks who have been on the fence about buying the game because of the filthy retail box can now rest easy ...
	New Lucasfilm trademarks sound suspiciously KotOR MMO-like Lucasfilm has registered a number of new trademarks, including Star Wars: The Old Republic, The Old Republic, Star Wars Legends, and Star Wars Sagas. This news is interesting as is, but it gets really juicy when you read the type of patent and its description ...
	Mark Jacobs clarifies the loss of Warhammer classes, cities Yesterday's unexpected news of deep cuts into Warhammer Online's at-launch content is still sending shockwaves through the fan community. It seems like it's just been a whirlwind of WAR news of plate, with the announcement of the Guild Beta and the reacquisition of the Mythic Entertainment name close on the heels of the content losses.
	Ask Massively: You make the call For those of you who read Ask Massively but don't pay much attention to the comments, you might want to go back and check out the comments section from last week. I think there might be 3 or 4 columns worth of material there.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 12 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	New information on LotRO: Mines of Moria Lord of the Rings Online's Book 14 hasn't even released yet, and already we're getting previews of their first paid expansion: Mines of Moria. In a recent interview with Jeffrey Steefel ...
	Anti-Aliased: Dr. Podlove, or how I learned to stop worrying and enjoy EVE Online I've really been stuck in a rut lately. The only game that really appeals to me anymore is World of Warcraft because of the polish and spit shine that Blizzard put into it over the past few years.
	Hellgate:London patch update 1.3d now live All the scuttlebutt regarding fleeing Hellgate:London developers and programmers didn't stop the 1.3d patch from hitting the servers yesterday. The refreshing patch introduces changes to gameplay, a rebalancing act to the calculations behind rank experience ...
	Mark Jacobs announces major features cut from Warhammer Online In the latest of an ongoing series of interviews with MMORPG.com, Mythic Entertainment VP and General Manager Mark Jacobs has dropped big news on the Warhammer Online fanbase ...
	AoC patch on Testlive brings more fixes, causes combo drama Now that the Testlive forums are up and running, Age of Conan players have a chance to scope out coming patches before they go live. Right now, there's a new patch on the Testlive servers that's a possible candidate for release on the 16th of July.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 11 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Why do you pay for your games each month? How much game do you need to support a monthly fee? That's a question Tobold asked in his blog, noting that there are a number of games charging for monthly subs that would be better off with alternative business models.
	A complete guide to the LotRO Summer Festival As Turbine has shown in past Lord of the Rings Online events, they certainly know how to throw a party. The best part is the fact that these parties keep getting better and better each year!
	Leash on developers slackening thanks to Blizzard? Few developers in the world have the leverage with their publishers that Blizzard has enjoyed over the years. Where most companies involved in major mergers or corporate hullabaloo end up being cut up and sold for scrap, Blizzard actually had a major say ...
	Another blogger flees Age of Conan... Citing a waning ability to have fun with the game, item statistics that really don't help with anything, and a lack of variance in armor and items, Smith is calling it quits with Age of Conan. His comments seem to mirror the comments of many others
	Kingdon feels the fear Linden Lab's newly-minted CEO, Mark Kingdon, has posted another communique to Second Life users, and it isn't hard to see a certain fear in the phrasing and timing.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 10 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Mark Jacobs responds to 'magic show' accusations Earlier today, we posted a link to an article over at Warhammer Alliance that accused Mythic of conducting a "marketing magic show" on their fan-base by refusing to come forward with many of the juiciest ...
	The annoyance of status quo inventory management in MMOs Alec Meer - of the fantastic PC-gaming site Rock, Paper, Shotgun - had something he needed to vent about when it came to RPG inventory management. His complaint transcends the MMO genre ...
	Is Age of Conan a rousing success or a stinking failure? There's plenty of doom and gloom discussion surrounding Funcom's Age of Conan. The hours played and reported by X-fire users plummeted since it hit desktops.
	Google's Lively: Live public beta Open to the public just today, it seems hard to believe that Google's new Lively service is the much-vaunted virtual world product Project Snowcrash aka MyWorld that has been ...
	AoC Testlive forums now active As part of the process of testing its new patches, Age of Conan recently unveiled its new Testlive Server, where players can try out the weekly patches in advance and provide feedback ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 09 Jul 2008 18:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	CoX seeks player submissions for optional in-game ads As the City of Heroes dev team always said, optional in-game ads aren't all about advertising someone else's product. There's potential there for the players to use the billboard space, too; we thought the idea of advertising player-made publications ...
	Ask not what your MMO can do for you... MMO players are a devoted lot. When we're not actually in our game of choice, we're often on forums arguing about the latest patches, researching new talent builds to make better use of our given class' abilities ...
	EA Mythic putting on a marketing magic show for Warhammer Online? With Warhammer Online still several months from release, EA Mythic has been tight-lipped about some parts of the game's design. Endgame PVE content, for example, is still something we don't know a lot about.
	A conversation about MMOs: Why the WoW leveling/raiding model works so well What happens when one of EverQuest's most famous players and one of the the MMO world's most respected designers spend ninety minutes talking about the current glut of "leveling/raiding" MMOs, the good and bad points to them, and how they could be improved?
	Interview with AoC CM pulls some punches If there's one individual whose position we're glad we haven't been in for the past few months, it's that of Age of Conan Community Manager, Glen "Famine" Swan. We've long been aware of the trials and tribulations ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 08 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	The Gaming Iconoclast: Is Ignorance Bliss? It goes by many names -- Rumor. Speculation. Innuendo. Suggestion. Subtle hints. Vague allusions. Nudge nudge, wink wink. Slips of the keyboard. Loose lips sinking ships. Detective work. Snooping. Unearthing forbidden knowledge.
	A followup on the lessons of Blizzard's MMO design Back in March we mentioned an article at the OC Register talking all about the design lessons you can take away from World of Warcraft. It turns out that was just a small part of a longer series on the site.
	Power leveling becoming more prominent in Vietnam When you hear the words "power leveling," which country do you usually think of? The term almost always conjures images of digital content factories in China, where teams of workers grind around the clock ...
	Xfire's Age of Conan statistics eschew easy classification It's an interesting time for Age of Conan. On the surface, their monumental first month and record sales numbers give the appearance of a solid new contender in the MMO sphere.
	The Digital Continuum: Player abuse, redemption and revolution Lets go back about ten years or so to the original EverQuest. Now it isn't my intention to pick on any one game, I just happen to be more familiar with it than Ultima Online or Meridian 59.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 07 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	State of the Game letter issued for Vanguard: Saga of Heroes The development team for Vanguard: Sage of Heroes has released a brand new Producer's Letter offering up a state of the game. Despite the long history of problems and pitfalls plaguing the game, the team seems optimistic about their near-future projects. They've opened up a new win-back program ...
	IP vs. IP: Is LotRO better than AoC? Let's face it, in the past, big-name intellectual properties in the form of an MMO haven't fared too well. We're looking at you, Matrix Online. However, Lord of the Rings Online has proven that the curse of the brand IP might be breakable.
	Top 50 news nuggets about the Warhammer Online guild beta The Podcast of Reckoning recently had the chance to sit down with Josh Drescher, the Associate Producer for Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning. Their lengthy discussion covered a lot of aspects of the upcoming Guild Beta ...
	Empyrean Age factional warfare exploit identified Factional warfare in EVE Online, by design, ensures that ships of a much greater ship class cannot engage smaller ships in certain deadspace mission pockets. If you and your fellow militia pilots are in a zone designated for nothing larger than frigates, for instance ...
	New City of Heroes fanzine launched City of Heroes community relations manager Alex 'Lighthouse' Von Minden doubles up as the editor for a new CoX Fanzine. The current issue is technically Issue 1, the former 'Issue 0' having been released as a preview issue ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Ask Massively: Be careful what you ask for... Most of the time, when writing Ask Massively, it is fairly simple to keep my personal and professional life separated from my life as an MMO gamer and columnist. Today, I'm going to break down that barrier for just a little while.
	Winterblink: asset control and consolidation in EVE Online Warp Drive Active podcaster Winterblink is a man who's got everything, apparently. And too much of it, scattered throughout his hangars in New Eden. It's a common problem in EVE Online, particularly for players who roam a lot throughout the galaxy.
	X-play opens the Stargate and brings back Stargate Worlds gameplay video G4's X-play gained access to the FireSky Studios where the developers are hard at work on Stargate Worlds. G4 was allowed to open the Stargate and returned back with gameplay footage, while undergoing their mission they infiltrated ...
	Vivendi and Activision merge nears completion as Delaware Court denies preliminary injunction It's a hectic summer over at Blizzard HQ. Inundating the masses with Wrath of the Lich King across the pond at the World Wide Invitational, announcing Diablo 3 on top of that, and battling it out in the courts ...
	Ghetto grid: Katharine Berry slams Lab's negligence Famous Teen Second Life user Katharine Berry has spoken out on conditions in Linden Lab's Teen Grid. While, of course, there are rules about content and conduct, they're neither well-followed, says Berry, nor well-enforced.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 04 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Top 10 questions from WoW players on the EQ2 forums We get the distinct impression that EverQuest 2 players might not appreciate it when World of Warcraft players come to their forums. Call it a territorial thing, call it something else, but the beauty of this interaction is when we get a gem of an article ...
	Massively's readers (you) interview EQ2's Senior Producer About two weeks ago we asked you to pass on some questions we could give to the EverQuest 2 team. Our own team of bloggers and columnists pitched in a few questions as well, and we brought the best of those to the attention of EQ2 ...
	World of Warcraft's expansion lore needs addendums to understand? The blogger who's titled himself "Lume the Mad" (ahem) has an interesting take on the lore surrounding World of Warcraft's lore for the Burning Crusade as a whole, and the patch 2.4 content drop in specific. According to Lume, Blizzard needs to ...
	Rumor: Nintendo to reveal Animal Crossing MMO at E3 The picture above comes from the latest edition of the UK Nintendo Power, and the tag line up in the corner says "It's been a while. It's time to revisit an old friend. How's your village doing these days?" Looks like news about ...
	Blizzard's initial ideas for World of Warcraft were concieved in 1994 In an interview with Eurogamer, Blizzard's Mike Morhaime recently went into some depth about the origins of World of Warcraft. According to the company's CEO, the roots of the world-girding MMO giant stem from discussions held as early as 1994. Just after the release of Warcraft II, actually.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Car offered as prize in CoX machinima contest After a tense week of mounting expectation, in which we waited for the promised big news to hit the City of Heroes multimedia forums, the Toyota Matrix Machinima Contest has just been announced.
	PlayNC store expands payment options by adding PayPal NCsoft wants to make it easier for their PlayNC shoppers looking to buy one or more of the following MMOGs in their stable: Tabula Rasa, CoX, Guild Wars, and other digital-boxed goods. They've gone so far they are now accepting PayPal as a payment option.
	Blizzard may have considered free-to-play for WoW, but won't change the model now Gamasutra recently spoke with Paul Sams, chief operating officer at Blizzard Entertainment, just after the WorldWide Invitational came to a close. Alongside questions about the framework around Diablo 3 and the potential of user-generated content ...
	Dragon Nest MMO announced from Eyedentity Games From Korean developer Eyedentity Games comes a brand new MMO called Dragon Nest that bills itself as a "dynamic action fantasy online game", and uses Eyedentity's own proprietary Eternity Engine technology.
	BioWare founders appreciate Conan, tease their MMO BioWare's founders, Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk, have been cagey about the in-development BioWare MMO for months now. Unwilling to do more than talk around the edges of the project ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 02 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Blizzard's "Next-Gen MMO" is not the project codenamed "Hydra" We've been speculating about Blizzard's next MMO for quite a long time. We're not just talking about the splash screen from last week (which panned out to be Diablo III, a non-massive game). There have been job postings on the company's website ...
	Age of Conan surpasses 700k registered users We've been quite taken aback by the responses many players direct at Funcom's Age of Conan. We're not sure if the accusations of the game being a "beta version" or just a "total POS" are the product of unrealistic expectations or are just general animosity ...
	PotBS policy updates on cross teaming and selling durability Pirates of the Burning Sea's 1.5 patch deploys tomorrow morning, but effective immediately are two policy changes. In regards to cross teaming which is when a player uses two different accounts to play as a separate nation on the same server.
	Conan's female avatar DPS bug will take weeks to correct A few weeks back our own Adrian Bott took a close look at a very ... unique ... bug in Age of Conan. It seems that differing animation cycles in the game have resulted in an unforseen side effect: female avatars do less damage then male ones. At the time, the Funcom developers said they'd let us know as soon as they could about a fix.
	Player Consequences: The Need for Speed Traveling has always been one of the least popular parts of playing a MMO. It doesn't matter if you are marching through the lengthy Connall's Valley in Age of Conan or travelling across the galaxy in EVE Online. It can be tedious no matter what the setting.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 01 Jul 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Koster: MMOs removed more features from MUDs than they added Areae president, MetaPlace developer, and all-around-MMO-authority Raph Koster wrote up a blog post about the influence of MUDs on today's graphical MMOs. The post is part of the broader, cross-blog discussion that began with our interview with Richard Bartle last week.
	New MMO Forged by Chaos to use CryEngine 2 Panzar Studio has announced its development of Forged by Chaos, which will use the popular CryEngine 2 engine, which powered the PC game Crysis. From the looks of the character concept art, it needs all that power.
	Anti-Aliased: Keep crying, sportsmanship is dead One harsh world PvP battle later, your corpse lies on the ground as your opponent stands triumphant over you. Both of you put up one good battle, as even your opponent is down to barely any hit points -- the kind of battle where a few randomly generated misses ...
	Stargate Worlds to make a dramatic showing at Comic Con Firesky, MGM Home Entertainment, and the United States Armed Forces will be showing Stargate Worlds at Comic-Con 2008 in San Diego. The convention will run from July 24th to 27th. Firesky plans to deploy a full-sized stargate replica ...
	Age of Conan test server now open to public To our ever-lasting surprise and confusion, there always seems to be a significant number of players in any given game who are so eager to try out the latest patch that they're willing to spend their time on a test server testing content before it goes live.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 30 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Ask Massively: Massively's Guide to MMO Etiquette Here at Ask Massively, we've sought to inform and educate the masses on the esoterica of MMORPGs, but today we are going to go back to basics. We're going to give you some advice, or, if you consider yourself a Veteran of the Psychic Wars on the Internet ...
	Vanguard offers 5 days free to past subscribers The Vanguard team has deployed its own (more modest) version of EverQuest's much-publicized Living Legacy campaign. Anyone who used to have a Vanguard account may play for free up through the 31st.
	EverQuest's new lead designer on the future of SOE's venerable MMO Ryan Barker is the newly-dubbed lead designer for SOE's venerable EverQuest, and recently sat down with the folks at Curse to talk the state of the game - and even a bit about the game's future.
	Blizzard announces major World of Warcraft class changes at WWI Massively's sister site WoW Insider is currently hard at work at the Worldwide Invitational, Blizzard's big to-do in France. They were onhand this morning for the big announcement, and though it's not really Massive we have to admit we're still pretty excited for Diablo 3.
	The Digital Continuum: Kaiju MMO I know there's been a The Daily Grind about this subject already, but I felt like talking about my own personal kaiju (giant monster) MMO and this is just the place for that. Growing up there were certain things I could count on. For instance, there would always be some sort of Anime marathon in the summertime on the Sci-Fi Channel ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 28 Jun 2008 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Blizzard Authenticator adds new layer of security, for a price When you play online games these days, you always have to be mindful that you don't leave yourself vulnerable to viruses, account fraud, and hacks. Something as seemingly simplistic as a hidden keylogger in a UI mod can open the floodgates to strangers to come on your computer and take your account information.
	Behind the Curtain: Hacked account - opportunity or deathknell? Well, it seems I may have been too hasty in jumping on the 'omgblizzardgmsaretehsuckzorz" bandwagon last week. Merely a handful of hours after logging back on to my World of Warcraft account and submitting a GM ticket after reformatting my PC, not only had my deleted characters been restored, but all of their gold and items had been recovered.
	Funcom apologizes for downtime, awards free day Funcom showed some symptoms of growing pains yesterday, as the anxiously anticipated patch for Age of Conan, which promised to bring many important bug fixes, failed to get off the ground until around 7pm EST instead of 12pm EST
	First Impressions: Dreamlords the Reawakening Lockpick Entertainment has been hard at work on the relaunch of their fantasy MMORTS Dreamlords the Reawakening, and their efforts have not been in vain. This title is just as rich and complex a game as you'd hope for.
	LotRO PvP guide: The basics of Monster Play In the realm of Tolkien's Middle-earth, the ideals of general PvP get a bit complicated. For instance, you would never see bands of Hobbits battling with Elves, or vice versa. It's just not something Tolkien ever envisioned.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 27 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Huxley in-game footage reminds us of something It's not a bad thing that Huxley gameplay looks a lot like Unreal Tournament III, but it is a bit disconcerting for anyone interested in the MMOFPS in regards towards its possible uniqueness. The fact that what we're seeing in this video amounts ...
	Amidst speculation, Blizzard VP implies completely new game Blizzard fans all over the internet have worked themselves up into a frenzy over a vague splash screen at the company's website -- a melting wall of ice adorned with rune or sigil-like markings. Everyone's speculating. Is it Diablo 3?
	Age of Conan patch notes for June 26th The patch notes for today's Age of Conan update are now available, and a few of the fixes that we've seen talked about in recent times have made it in. There's nothing significantly game changing unless you're a Necromancer, or are waiting to get into Alchemy (and it's not the big PvP patch unfortunately) but Funcom's to-do list is now a little shorter.
	Patch postponed for AoC's US servers due to crashing issues Since the European version of Age of Conan updates ahead of the US, they have already patched and their servers are back online... well, sort of. It turns out that today's patch has caused some server instability, leading to constant crashing and disconnects. In order to prevent this from being introduced to the US servers, the patch downtime has been postponed.
	AoC is to WoW as steak is to McDonalds, says AoC director Gaute Godager, game director for Age of Conan at Funcom, has been on top of the world this past month. They successfully delivered the biggest MMO to hit that market since World of Warcraft, with over a million units shipped inside of a month. You could probably understand then if he comes off a bit smug when talking about the quality of his undeniably blockbuster title.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 26 Jun 2008 18:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Richard Bartle vs Tobold Massively's interview with Richard Bartle from last week has caused several tidal waves of opinion over the now-infamous line, "I've already played Warhammer. It was called World of Warcraft." by the father of the genre. MMO bloggers are coming out of the woodwork to give their own opinions on what this means ...
	NCsoft licenses texture software used in Xbox Live Arcade games Allegorithmic, the creator of a procedural texture production tool called ProFX, announced that NCsoft has licensed its product. ProFX produces highly compressed textures that are "tiny, typically a few kilobytes" in size.
	The Daily Grind: Has AoC earned your money for another month? The folks that picked up Age of Conan around the time of its release are nearing the one-month milestone of their accounts. The game's launch was fairly smooth as far as MMO launches go, with people actually able to log on and play for the most part.
	Interview with Chuck Kallenbach, Game Designer on Legends of Norrath What's this gab we're hearing about Legends of Norrath, it isn't all about the loot cards? Heresy! We're still buying up those virtual packs in hopes to score a rare loot card. Nevertheless, over on IGN's EQ2 Vault we came across this interview ...
	Don't expect World of Warcraft on the PS3 or Xbox 360 ever Blizzard Entertainment's Rob Pardo is a bona fide Rockstar in the gaming industry. In his recent keynote speech at the Game Developer's Conference at the Paris GDC he continued to indirectly extinguish rumors that suggested World of Warcraft is coming to a Console ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 25 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Testing Age of Conan: Gamespot's hardware roundup + performance guide You got bills to pay, no computer upgrades in a year, heck maybe it's been two or three, and here comes along Age of Conan with eye-dazzling effects that you must play. It also comes with launch bugs that don't ease the stress on your computer or your nerves for that matter.
	Xfire to broadcast WoW's Sunwell Plateau raid live This Wednesday at noon (EDT), Xfire will run a live broadcast of a raid in World of Warcraft's top instance -- the Sunwell Plateau. The raid will be performed by famous uberguild Nihilum, and the broadcast will run on the Dyyno technology.
	Richard Bartle expands on earlier remarks stated in Massively interview [updated] In this interview conducted by Michael Zenke, Richard Bartle discussed how to improve World of Warcraft and about MMOGs in general. One comment in particular overshadowed the whole interview: "I've already played Warhammer. It was called World of Warcraft." The comment thread on both Massively and WoW Insider was ...
	Age of Conan tradeskills getting badly needed attention In a recent forum post, Funcom developer Twicer acknowledges that Age of Conan's crafting professions are completely behind the curve, and are currently the subject of intense scrutiny by the development team. Considering that Alchemy in its current state is completely broken (when we say broken, we mean ...
	Rosedale: You can't do it Linden Lab Chairman, Philip Rosedale and freshly-minted CEO Mark Kingdon gave an introductory speech at 10AM Pacific time to open Second Life's fifth anniversary for 23 June, 2008. While some have considered the speech to be somewhat bland ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Exemplary conduct: WoW expansion adds over 80 new emotes There have been some leaks from the "friends & family" alpha test for World of Warcraft's second expansion, Wrath of the Lich King. Our sister site WoW Insider has kept up with some of the finer details from the leak, but one recent bit of info got us thinking....
	Ask Massively: WoW killer revisited Sorry I'm late, but my hard drive decided to try and break out of my computer case this week. Did I let such a disaster stop me from presenting my weekly edition of Ask Massively? Well, yes I did.
	Did Living Legacy bring you back? Were you a EverQuest or EverQuest II player who has returned because of this summer's Living Legacy promotion? You're not alone. From all we've heard, and all we've seen in game, people are coming back in droves. If you've come back, how are you liking it?
	AoC 23/06 patch notes: ToS and Necro AoE nerfs steal headlines The delayed notes for today's Age of Conan patch have now hit, and there are some significant changes in store for a couple of classes. The headline of this post pretty much spoils the suspense as to which two classes they are, but we'll discuss them in detail ...
	Peering Inside: The Second Life year in review Today marks the fifth anniversary of Second Life, and we thought we'd take advantage of the day to round up some of the significant happenings in this most well-known of current-generation virtual worlds over the last twelve months.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 23 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Exclusive: Richard Bartle on how he'd make World of Warcraft better Earlier in the year this blogger had the chance to attend the Independent MMO Game Developer's Conference, the second annual event held in Minneapolis, MN. A number of luminaries in the field made an appearance, such as Scott Hartsman (former Senior Producer for EverQuest 2) and Brian Green (best known for his work on Meridian 59).
	News flash! MMOs don't need to look like crap "There's a misconception among MMOs," says Realtime Worlds' Colin Macdonald, "that they don't need to look as good as other games." Macdonald, studio manager for the developers of upcoming street-crime MMO APB (All Points Bulletin), was speaking about the general state of MMOs ...
	Age of Conan: The siege warfare is a buggy lagfest Age of Conan players should think twice about partaking in the lag-ridden siege action this weekend; they're better off waiting until this coming Monday's patch. The naysayers concerns from beta were certified two days ago, when Sinister took part in Age of Conan's first full on siege since the game went live.
	Star Wars Galaxies celebrates its Fifth Anniversary starting June 24th Starting on Tuesday, June 24th, players of Star Wars Galaxies will be able to celebrate an incredibly auspicious occasion. Thursday the 26th will officially mark the 5th anniversary of the launch of LucasArts and Sony Online Entertainment's foray into the Galaxy Far, Far Away.
	The Digital Continuum: Square Enix's next MMO This recent interview with the Final Fantasy XI team by James "Milkman' Mielky of 1up.com internet fame got me thinking about the next MMO to come from the Square Enix camp. There isn't much meat on them bones as far as the next project goes, but ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 21 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Jumpgate's Peterscheck talks shop, massive battleships Hermann Peterscheck is the producer of NetDevil's Jumpgate Evolution. He has a lot of experience working on MMOs -- including the original Jumpgate. For those reasons, Ten Ton Hammer decided he would be a great subject for an interview about the process of developing an MMO.
	Official website teases the return of Ryzom The Saga of Ryzom met an untimely end in February. Its players were scattered around the MMO universe -- a diaspora of Ryzomites without a country to call home. History has shown us that not all MMO deaths are final, though, and Ryzom might be coming back.
	Behind the Curtain: My turn to get hacked It's official - my guildies are 'teh awesomez'. The reason? My World of Warcraft account was hacked yesterday afternoon, and I've already been inundated by offers of assistance and gold from my friends, should things go South once I log back into my account.
	Guild Wars: The best solo quasi-MMOG out there? Three glorious years, over five million boxes sold. Guild Wars has come along way in that time, and it's no surprise that NCsoft's darling is still managing to stake out new players. Shamus from over on Twenty-Sided is one latest victim, in his post: Guild Wars: Massively Single Player ...
	LotRO's Korean launch may alter western business model Turbine is busy gearing up for its Korean launch of Lord of the Rings Online. The title is currently in closed beta in Korea and moving toward limited open beta. Fantasy titles are hugely popular in the country, but the enthusiasm with which beta testers are greeting LotRO ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 20 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Play.com having WAR pre-order problems When we last reported on Warhammer Online's pre-order foibles, we knew that the confusion was far from over. There were too many variables going into the distribution of those promotional codes for everything to go strictly according to plan.
	Have Clone, Will Travel: 3 Essential Tools for Capsuleers With Empyrean Age finally released, I wanted to give it a try to get this old Carebear in some pew pew action. Since my main character, Treenara Mazouk, was part of an industrial corporation that wanted to remain neutral throughout this war time, I decided to ...
	Asheron's Call's June update arrives today with patch notes in tow Today, Asheron's Call receives its monthly update and corresponding event for June. This time, the event is called "Introductions." According to the release notes, you'll have to complete last month's quest before you can take on the new one.
	The latest Guild Wars skill balance explained In the most recent skill balance for Guild Wars, we're treated to something we don't normally get: a full explanation on the reasoning behind the changes to each skill set for the classes affected. In most skill balances (for any game) we get news of the changes to the skills, but ...
	Meet Avery Wong, Environment Artist for Champions Online The Meet the Team blogposts put out by the Champions Online developers is a great series. Far from being faceless, nameless, shadowy entities remaining behind the scenes, we find that these front-line troops are just as interesting and clever as we'd want them to be.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 19 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Massively's Dungeon Runner/Bling Gnome giveaway We know you want bling! We've seen you skulking in the shadows, MMO players. Here at Massively.com, we're here to help you. So we have a dozen Bling Gnomes ready and raring to go - all set to pick up gold, scarf magic items and poop out powerful weapons at your command.
	Age of Conan: Is it a fun mess or just a mess? One patch after another they descend with a clear purpose: fix the holes, eradicate the bugs, and to modify and further improve. Since its launch, Age of Conan has been overwhelmed with significant game-changing patches, leaving many wondering ...
	LotRO's anniversary pricing to end soon If you haven't taken advantage of the anniversary pricing special from Lord of the Rings Online yet, we're worried about your sanity. Yes it's still going on, but you only have less than two weeks left until the prices go back up.
	Recognizing Champions Online's tabletop roots One of the unexpected benefits (at least from our perspective) of Cryptic's shift from Marvel Universe Online to Champions Online is the professional relationship it fostered with the guys who managed the Champions pen and paper IP.
	Why APB's customization options might be a big deal (or not) There's a clip over at GameVideos (embedded above) that depicts All Points Bulletin's character customization system. We say "customization" instead of "creation" because we doubt all the exhibited features will be available to new players.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	A Hunter's guide to fast-travel in LotRO There are several reasons to roll a Hunter in Lord of the Rings Online. You can usually do the most damage. You are the primary ranged-attacker. You can track virtually anything in the game. You can provide speed buffs that help you and your fellowship run faster.
	Fan-made Vanguard trailer has community talking excitedly It's no secret that Vanguard: Saga of Heroes is a gorgeous game, we've given it very worthy spots in One Shots many times in the past few weeks. But every once in a while, someone's able to capture a game in a light that makes already amazing graphics become even better.
	Can an MMO/TV hybrid succeed? This past weekend Massively's big-sister site Joystiq took an editorial look at the SCI FI channel MMO/TV hybrid recently announced by Trion. Here at the site we discussed the initial announcement, and even did an interview with Trion's Jon Van Caneghem all about the ambitious project.
	AT&T says internet data caps and overage fees 'inevitable' Is a time really coming when internet use in America will be capped? AT&T sure seems to think so and we're inclined to wonder if they're right. Internet service providers could go about capping bandwidth in a couple of ways. They could be reasonable (hah!) and set the cap up high where it will only hurt people who are ...
	More undocumented changes found in yesterday's AoC patch Over the last couple of patches to Age of Conan, there has been a disturbingly lengthy list of changes implemented that were not even hinted at on the official update notes. This trend has continued with Monday's patch, and the game's community has once again pulled together to confirm ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 17 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Player Consequences: Pervasive Map Features There are a lot of reasons for the increasing popularity of MMOs and the amount of game developers who are entering into the market. I personally think that MMOs with their rich and complex fantasy worlds have a huge advantage over most single player games.
	MMOS X: How the MMOs and the iPhone can meet. Originally, this week's column was going to be a technical how-to, but a series of snafus -- not the least of which included me slapping my head and going, "You moron, combat logs changed after patch 2.4. That's why this new analyzer you are looking at is barfing on your Karazhan logs from February."
	TR Feedback Friday: Why all the PvP? This most recent Feedback Friday is chock full of the usual bug fixes and the announcement of Deployment 9's arrival on the live server within days, but we thought we'd address one particularly interesting response given to a question the developers received regarding the direction of the game recently.
	Gamers are not social misfits after all! It's been what, three hours since we've heard the last research study on gaming addiction? It almost seems like we could feed every starving child in the world with this research money given to these studies, but with the ever-growing popularity of online gaming, the concern is certainly no surprise.
	Linden Lab's big content takedown There are widespread reports today that Linden Lab has removed all content from Second Life (from in-world, and from user inventories and object contents) that were the work of a small number of users, apparently over DMCA issues.

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 16 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	The Agency under the scope, RMT not a part Genres are a sticky thing when it comes to gaming. On the one hand, they help us categorize and succinctly describe a hitherto unknown game. Simply referring to a game as an MMO, for instance, instantly conjures up a number of elements like a persistent world ...
	Mind Slayer, the sexy psionic In the latest of Cryptic's Champions Online villain profiles, we get a look at the sexy psyker Mind Slayer. Born of an abusive and broken home life, Mind Slayer's powers only manifested themselves under the extraordinary stress of a mugging by a group of thugs in a dark alley of Chicago's mean streets.
	Should EA Mythic offer an all-in-one pass for its games? The Green Skin has up a post wondering about the future of EA Mythic as an MMO service provider. At this point, the EA subsidiary is now responsible for three separate virtual worlds: Ultima Online, Dark Age of Camelot, and the in-development Warhammer Online. Snafzg ponders the great cross-promotion that Sony Online Entertainment gets from its Station Access program ...
	The Star Wars Galaxies dev team looks back on five years of gaming Late this month, on the 26th, is an auspicious day. Five years ago exactly Sony Online Entertainment and LucasArts released the Star Wars Galaxies massively multiplayer game. There were bumps and hobbles (this blogger's first character was wiped when the servers went down) ...
	Under The Hood: Choices and Consequences Despite the persistence of most MMOs, there's one thing that the majority of them lack. I am, of course, speaking about consequences for your actions. Sure, you can kill some NPCs for experience and you yourself level up, but what about the world? The NPC just respawns and continues on his merry way, ready to become fodder ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 14 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Account hacked? Why not stop and smell the flowers? It happens to the best of us. We try to be careful, we try to be conscientious, and then the unthinkable happens: your MMO account gets hacked. You log in to find your virtual life has been torn asunder. What happens then? Sean Sands, over at the Gamers with Jobs site, walks us through the ordeal of having his World of Warcraft account hacked.
	Ask Massively: Taking out the yard trash In last week's Ask Massively , we discussed some of the lessons learned from "Old School" MMOs and how they have been applied to newer games in the genre. This week, we're going to go into more detail about one area in particular ...
	WRUP: Frag Massively edition Time once again to ask you readers what you're playing this weekend, and this time, we know the answer: Planetside. That's right, tomorrow afternoon is our big event in the best MMOFPS of 2003, and we really hope you'll be there to join us ...
	Behind the Curtain: Why bother? What is it that keeps us playing, months and years after our first trip through the character generation screen? The obvious answer is that we're still having fun. Maybe you've been playing World of Warcraft since release or earlier, you've got an alt of every class ...
	Age of Conan newsletter previews new PvP, dungeons, and dancing! It's only been a short time since Age of Conan launched, but it has already seen some troubles. The newest edition of the game newsletter hints that good times are just over the horizon. Above and beyond bug fixing and regular patches, Funcom has announced they have a slew of new concepts and content ideas

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 13 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	Why exactly is Hellgate:London so bad? Earlier today we brought you word that there has been some unrest in the ranks at Flagship Studios, makers of Hellgate:London. Though Kotaku's discussion with studio representatives makes it sound like much ado about nothing, it's worth wondering where from Mr. Somberg's angst originated.
	A postmortem on Age of Conan's launch MMORPG.com's Mathew Reuther offers up a retrospective on the recent launch of Funcom's Age of Conan. We've obviously been following the game's ups and downs here on the site, but it's interesting to see the whole sordid tale laid out in one fell swoop.
	AoC grinds out the fixes By Mitra, is it Thursday already? That should mean a new patch for Age of Conan - and true to their word, FunCom are keeping up the relentless assault on AoC's bugs. Mounts come in for some more attention, Necromancers get a round of buffs, a host of quests are fixed or revamped ...
	Anti-Aliased: It will all be fine in ten minutes Back in the day when a 500 Mhz processor was fast, we were lulled into these weird online universes with multitudes of golden tongued promises. "Play online with thousands of others!", "Make a hero and save detailed and vast worlds!" ...
	New Final Fantasy XI update drops big changes into Vana'diel The much-anticipated June update to Final Fantasy XI is finally here! It dropped live onto servers just yesterday, and the official FFXI site is now offering a detailed guide to every little patch note. If you've been following along on Massively you probably already know about some of the highlights ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 12 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

	CoH Forum Moderator undertakes epic mission As well as being a fun game in its own right, City of Heroes can attribute much of its ongoing success to the rapport between the Dev and Community Support teams and the players. The level of Dev communication and openness is pretty much unsurpassed ...
	Come frag Massively in PlanetSide! Maybe you've disagreed with an article here on the site. Maybe you didn't like the way we covered your favorite game, or were too slow to jump on something you were really pumped about. Regardless, after reading the site for some nine months now ...
	Empyrean Age designed to make PvP more accessible the entire conversation focused on the new factional warfare system. Woodward explained that CCP hopes factional warfare will lower the barrier for entry into the PvP side of the EVE experience. Up till now, the transition from low sec mission running ...
	Fully public APB beta on its way We haven't heard too much in the past month about the cops and robbers MMO All Points Bulletin from developer Realtime Worlds. At least not until recently, we haven't. While gameplay information may still be scare at least we now know that APB is entering its Alpha stage ...
	A LotRO guide to the new rare crafting trophies In many MMOGs, there appears to be a plague of seemingly useless items you find along your travels. These usually include various animal parts in some disgustingly descriptive state. Many of these items are simply merchant fodder, but ...

The Daily Recap originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 11 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.