Biggs' Zone

A Geek's Cogitations, Conjectures and other Cortical Experiences

Tag: World of Warcraft Page 21 of 22

The MMO Times: First of 2012

By

On January 13, 2012

In Gaming, MMO Times, MMORPG

Issue 25

Hellooooo Everybody! Sorry for the delay between issues, the Christmas and New Years holidays have a tendency to make things pretty busy. So without keeping you any longer, check out these headlines that I hope you find interesting as I have. Enjoy!

TERA Beta Sign-ups Opens

January 12, En Masse has sent to call for TERA testers. This game got a lot of attention in the gaming conferences last year. The graphics look pretty awesome. I probably will not have time to try out the beta, but if anyone else does check it out, let me know what your thoughts are. Remember, this is just a sign-up which means its not a guarantee beta invite. Follow the links for the Massively article or the TERA website for signing up.
Massively Article | TERA Website

League of Legends Hits 11.5MM

This is probably another foreboding sign for Blizzard and World of Warcraft. League of Legends, a Free-2-Play MMO by Riot, now has 11.5 million active players far surpassing the 10.3 million that are playing WoW. I think its pretty interesting that a F2P game now has more players then WoW. Follow the link to see the Forbes article.
Forbes Article

More On MechWarrior MMO Going F2P

A developer at Piranha Games explains the reasons the MechWarrior MMO will be going with the Free-2-Play model. They mention in the article that the games anticipated release is expected to be in the second half of 2012. There is also a link in the article that elaborates on the CryEngine 3, which is the graphics engine the game is being built on. Follow the link to read more at VideoGamer.
Video Gamer Article

Rift Offers New Subscription Plans

Another interesting competitive move by one of WoW’s biggest competitors, Rift. They have adjusted their subscription plans which actually makes playing Rift cheaper then playing WoW. As if Blizzard didn’t have enough problems keeping players in WoW, lowering prices below their rate is going to make life even more difficult. Many have been clamoring for Blizzard to consider the Free-2-Play model and they have fervently stated they will not consider the Free-2-Play model beyond level 20. Follow the link to read more at tom’s hardware.
tom’s hardware Article

SWTOR ‘Fastest Growing MMO’

I love reading good things about SWTOR and I think this one is really exciting. Based on the millions of players that flocked to play SWTOR when it was released, it has been crowned the “Fastest Growing MMO in History”. I think that is a pretty prestigious acolyte. Follow the link to read more Attack of the Fanboy.
Attack of the Fanboy Article

SWTOR Covers New Flashpoint

On January 17th Bioware will be issuing its first content patch for SWTOR. The patch will fix several known bugs and introduce a new, level 50, flashpoint. The planet of Kaon has fallen victim to the Rakghoul plague (which is the Star Wars version of zombies – because who doesn’t like zombies!). Players must go to the planet to rescue survivors and eliminate the plague. Follow the link to read more on Massively and view the trailer.
Massively Article

WoW 4.3.2 Patch Notes

I decided to go way back on WoW Insider to find the post about the 4.3.2 patch. The reason is that I wanted to  point out a particularly interesting feature that will be in the patch. You will be able to enter Raid Finder with your Real ID friends (as long as you are the same faction). So if your friends are on other servers, you can now do a raid, or older normal/heroic raids. They are also fixing a few bugs, such as the annoying mature language filter, and players winning multiple copies of an item in Raid Finder. Follow the link to read more at WoW Insider.
WoW Insider Article

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The MMO Times: The Force Has Arrived!

By

On December 12, 2011

In Gaming, MMO Times, MMORPG

Issue 23

Welcome back gamers to another MMO Times. We have some exciting stuff in this issue so I hope you enjoy what I have provided for you! I thinking about renaming the MMO Times to The MMO Pulse; not sure if I like the sound of it yet.

Diablo III Cinematic

So many people are excited about Diablo III. I haven’t even played the first two and I am excited so I can’t imagine what the people who are fans are feeling right now. Blizzard released the official opening cinematic for Diablo III so enjoy (because it looks frakking awesome!)
Massively article
Diablo Fans website

Updated MoP Talents

Blizzard recently updated the talent trees for the Mists of Pandaria talent system. The new system is receiving a lot of criticism from the player base. It seems many are upset that they are taking away the granular talent trees to the more versatile version Blizzard introduced. I’d be interested in some of your thoughts so please feel free to leave a comment on the post with your thoughts. The link I provided is to the actual talent calculator.
MoP Talent Calculator

SWTOR Tips & Tricks

This is another shameless plug. I wrote a post with some tips for getting started in SWTOR. These are some of the things that are often asked by people in the global channels and things I often forgot to do myself when I had to start toons over. I hope anyone playing SWTOR finds them useful.
Biggs Zone post

EverQuest II Goes F2P

Yes, you read that right. SOE announced Monday, 12/12/11, that EverQuest II is now Free-2-Play. You can now download, install and play EverQuest II without being charged, however you will be limited on what you can do. Things like races, bags, spell tiers, character slots are restricted for those playing for free. I found the article on The Daily BLAM.
The Daily BLAM article

SWTOR Launch Guide

I would still highly recommend checking out my post on starter tips for SWTOR, but Massively has assembled a launch guide for SWTOR. I haven’t gone through the entire post but just looking at it briefly it seems pretty comprehensive. Check it out and tell me your thoughts.
Massively SWTOR Launch Guide

Top 5 Biggest MMO Flops

Piki Geek has a list of, what they consider to be, the top 5 biggest MMO Flops. I only recognized like two of these titles, and I was a little surprised to see that Lego Universe didn’t make the list. Check out the list and see if any of them is something you tried out.
Piki Geek post

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The Chuck Norris ..er MMO Times

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On November 28, 2011

In Gaming, General Cogitation, MMO Times

Issue 22

Hello Gamers! I hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving. Here are some of the postings I found during my various opportunities to peruse the internet during my holiday. I hope you enjoy.

F2P DCUO Pays Off

I find the shift to Free-2-Play paradigm fascinating. Some of the games that have converted to F2P were met with failure, recently Lego Universe suffered this fate. Recently Sony decided to take DC Universe Online Free-2-Play and it looks like it paid off. I’m glad to hear that this worked out well for them. I found an interesting read at Venture Beat.
Venture Beat article

Chuck Norris Commercial

Blizzard aired a new WoW Commercial during the football games the Sunday before Thanksgiving. Yes, the newest celebrity to don a World of Warcraft character is the iconic Chuck Norris. Below is the video but for the e-mail I have a link to the WoW Insider post that contains the video for you to watch. Iconic, yet a bit corny. Enjoy.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arKpdxjHamI[/youtube]
WoW Insider post

Mists of Pandaria Talent Calculators

Blizzard unveiled the Mists of Pandaria talent calculators. I suspect WoW Head will have theirs updated to match the official talent calculators. I haven’t been able to look at them too much yet but its exciting to get to play around with them early.
WoW Insider post

TORHead Beta

One of my favorite websites for World of Warcraft is WoW Head. I love the information about all the loot and the talent calculator. Last week the beta of TORHead went live. It also has talent calculators, item details, crew skills, all the stuff you would expect it to have based on WoW Head. I’m very excited.
TOR Head website

WoW Patch 4.3 Live

The final patch for the Cataclysm expansion hit the live servers this week. The final raid, Dragon Soul, is now available to raiders. This is the final showdown with Deathwing. Players will also receive Transmog, Void Storage, three new instances as well as a few other goodies. The post from MMO-Champion has an excellent summation. WoW Insider has the official announcement from Bashiok.
WoW Insider article
MMO-Champion post

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The MMO Times: Panda Edition

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On October 30, 2011

In Gaming, MMO Times, MMORPG

Issue 19

Welcome back gamers! Issue 19 is brought to you by our new panda friends. We have a couple of interesting things to read in this issue but it is a little short. There is dated news in here so this issue needed to go out before November 1st. I hope you enjoy.

Aion 3.0 – Housing and Mounts

Aion is getting a huge patch soon and apparently it includes player housing and mounts. I guess the PvP players of Aion are none to excited about player housing the everyone else is. I guess there will be an armoire to store the variety of Daeva wardrobes (some of those costumes can be quite … interesting). The Wings Over Atreia post on Massively has a pretty good write-up.
Massively article

Secret Word Beta Has 500k Signed Up

I hadn’t realized there was so much interest in the upcoming Secret World MMO, and apparently Funcom was also surprised. They have already had half-a-million players sign up. I may have to check out this game to see what all the fuss is about. Speak up if you have an idea. Along with the link to the GameSpy article I have also provided a link to the games website where you can register for the beta.
GameSpy article
Secret World website

DC Universe Online Going F2P

Another MMO hops on the Free-2-Play bandwagon. SOE has offically announed that on November 1st (that is this coming Tuesday!) DC Universe Online will be Free-2-Play. I always find it interesting when another MMO decides to go Free-2-Play. I know it has to make things more competitive for other companies also trying to release and promote their titles. Personally I’m on the fence about Free-2-Play, perhaps a topic for a future post. Massively has the article.
Massively article

Diable 3 for WoW Players

I haven’t read this post in its entirety yet but I definitely will (that’s what the iPad is for), but I am definitely one of those WoW players that hasn’t played the first two Diablo’s but will be playing D3. I think a post like this is excellent for players, just like myself, to get caught up in the lore so we don’t feel so lost when we start playing Diabloe 3. Check it out on WoW Insider, it looks to be a good read.
WoW Insider article

Mists of Pandaria Developer Q&A

You can probably find the summary of the developer Q&A for the next WoW expansion everywhere, but I like the way MMO-Champion does it where its a transcript written like a blue post. You do have to scroll a bit to get there (there is a video of the Tyrael’s Charger mount for Annual Pass subscribers as well as a couple other PTR things). There is some good things covered but its a long read.
MMO-Champion post

[Shameless Plug] SWTOR: Bioware’s Launch Plans

One of the things I’m concerned about is how Bioware plans to handle launch. The way I understand it, and anyone please correct me where I’m wrong, is that Bioware plans to limit or control the number of players that can log in at launch… <read more>

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Bioware Has Blizzard Scared

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On October 23, 2011

In Gaming, SWTOR, World of Warcraft

So I have been watching Blizzcon to see all the new things Blizzard is introducing with their various gaming franchises. I think the biggest news from Blizzcon this year is the concept of the World of Warcraft Annual Pass where anyone who commits to keeping WoW for a year will receive Diablo 3 for free and a guaranteed entry into the Mists of Pandaria beta.

I thought that was a pretty bold move by Blizzard and then it occurred to me, I think this is a tactic to combat the release of Star Wars. I think Blizzard is actually scared about losing players to Star Wars. So much so that they want players to commit to playing their game for a year, and if you do, they will let you play their other game for free. I know that quite a few of the Blizzard employees are Star Wars fans, they have made many comments during other Blizzcons and there is the various Star Wars references in the game (ex: an NPC named Landoo). So I know they have been following the development of SWTOR just as much as the rest of us have been following (obsessively?) it.

I don’t know if any of you watched the in-depth coverage of Mists of Pandaria but some of the Monk abilities seem to have a Star Wars influence. The Monks have a Holy Power-like resource called Dark/Light Force and the Death Knights are getting a new ability called Asphyxiate. Asphyxiate is a new silence ability where the Death Knight chokes the target while lifting them in the air … seems blatantly obvious.

Perhaps Blizzard is trying to increase the Star Wars influence in the game to keep players from going to SWTOR. I’m sure that’s just wild conjecture but its hard to deny suspicion when some of these mechanics are “lovingly” ripped off from Star Wars.

Despite their best efforts, World of Warcraft will never be Star Wars. I’m sorry Bilzzard but no matter how close a Gamorrean is to an Orc, the two will never be the same. If Star Wars fans want to play SWTOR, they will play SWTOR regardless of the fact that a Death Knight can do a Force Choke.

Cheers!

The MMO Times Returns with E3!

By

On June 6, 2011

In MMO Times

Issue 15

Holy Cow! I have really dropped the ball, haven’t I. I apologize to all of you that enjoyed reading my MMO Times posts and e-mails; I do hope you all stuck around especially those on the mailing list. I became extremely busy and therefore couldn’t keep up sending the e-mail and reading the various blogs and news sites. Well, I’m back to give it another shot so read on gamers, I hope you enjoy the following articles!

SWTOR Game Trailer
So we should resume The MMO Times out right with some news from E3. Bioware teased the gamers and the eager Star Wars fans with the news game trailer. I tell ya, my heart rate increased and my palms started to sweat watching this video. The link below will take you to the video at the SWTOR website.
Video Link(s): SWTOR Website

E3 Announcements
The Old Republic trailer was probably the biggest announcement to come from E3 thus far (though still no mention of a release date, sadly) but there were other important titles mentioned. Halo 4 (yes, another Halo game), Battlefield 3 Release Date, Mass Effect 3 Release Date, Farcry 3, etc.
Links: E3 Annoucements

64-Bit Client
This article from MMO-Champion has other things on it but I was mostly interested in the potential 64-Bit client. I don’t know whether I should be excited about this or be worried. If 64-Bit software is built properly it can have huge performance benefits, however if its built poorly it will be an utter nightmare.
Article Link(s): MMO-Champion

Beta News

Gods & Heroes Open Beta
Heatwave Interactive’s Gods & Heroes started their open beta today. You can also pre-order the game and get started a week ahead of launch. Apparently pre-ordering can also get you some headphones. I haven’t signed up for a beta on this game because I’m too busy with other games but if you try it out let me know what you think.
Links: Massively,  Gods & Heroes Website

Shameless Plug
I received a re-invite to test The Old Republic again so I have begun blogging about it, if you haven’t seen it yet I have provided the link here. Yes, I know, I am plugging my own stuff but hey, I write these articles and emails so I’m allowed some shameless plugging.
Post Link: Back In The Beta

Old News

Aion 2.5 Patch Empyrean Calling
On May 25th NC Soft released the 2.5 patch (called Empyrean Calling) which introduces new high level instances, the mentor program and new skills and PVP gear.
Article Links: Massively

New WoW Pet Store Mount
Blizzard knows that if they want to make another couple million bucks in a short period of time then they just have to release a new mount in the pet store. On June 1st Warcraft players will be able to purchase the Winged Guardian for $25 from the Blizzard pet store. I gotta admit it looks pretty awesome!
Article Link(s): WoW Insider

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