GameZig

Jordan Weisman, the founder of FASA Corporation and creator of the MechWarrior franchise has reacquired the license for MechWarrior back from Microsoft along with a few other properties previously in the FASA catalog.  He has taken his newly reacquired franchises back and launched a new game company to boot, Smith and Tinker.  While he hasn’t made …

A week ago I got that special email from the makers of Mythos inviting me to join their closed beta playground. Initially I had to create an account with the usual stuff; user ID, password, email, and etc. No problems on that end registration was simple and didn’t require any …

With the atom bomb that Mythic Entertainment dropped yesterday about the massive cuts for Warhammer Online it’s leaving many WAR fans in an emotional fog and just as many WAR haters saying, “I told you so”. It is a lot to take in for sure, I still can’t quite wrap my mind around whether or …

Mark Jacobs announced some good news and some bad news for Mythic’s upcoming Warhammer Online.  Well, he announced some good news and alluded to other good news, heh.  First we’ll start with the good news, the bit he alluded to:  Warhammer Online won’t be delayed, probably.

The other good news, the part he actually did announce …

With CrypticStudio’s having their ever so cryptic hint at a possible upcoming Star Trek MMORPG, questions are beginning to circulate about what it would be like.  After reading an interesting question from the folks over at Massively, it got me thinking of possibilities.  To sum it up, …

You see the ads for these two game economy wreckers all the time - power leveling and gold farming.  Hell you probably see one right now - wink wink.

World of Warcraft is a good example of how powerleveling and gold farming damage a games economy.  Now don’t get me wrong, farming in a game for …

I’ve been leveling my fire mage now for a while off and on to get him into the 49 bracket for some serious twinkage but I’ve stopped for a bit along the way at 39 to do some battleground PVP to start working on my PVP gear for my mage.  I need enough marks of …

 
 
The first of dungeon to be announced by the Warhammer Online team is The Bastion Stair.  Both the Order and Destruction are drawn to this source of Chaos power.  The Order will …

Blizzard did a 180 turn on us and went from ice to fire to announce Diablo III: And the Heavens Shall Tremble.  The game will not be the next-gen MMO Blizzard has been working on, my bet is still on Starcraft for …

In the next big patch (I beleive scheduled for next week?) is going to introduce apprentice mounts for players now at level 30.  To train for the ability to ride the new mounts will be 35 gold giving the lower level players a cheap boost to speed.  Every 10 levels or so usually has a …

In my ever growing quest to see some changes take place in our fast-becoming stale MMORPG template I’m going to publish more and more ideas. Out of the box thinking is what it will take to spice up upcoming titles and give them something different from the World of Warcraft mold so many games seem to be …

GameSpot just did some research into what it takes to run Age of Conan and what it takes to run it well.  Unfortunately, the page with the full article appears to be down so I can’t get in and read what the post says - but I can read between the lines.  Having played AoC …

Oh the great debates we could have!  I hear people complaining in World of Warcraft battlegrounds all the time when a twink kills them.  They complain because he is uber powerful with all that extra gear!  Being that I’m usually playing a twink myself the complaints go in one ear and out the other without …

I was just reading an article by Kevin Murnane over at Massively about greed.  Kevin’s right in that there is a lot of greed in MMO’s - friends stabbing friends in the back for epic loot and the like.  With that in mind I started reflecting on end game content and …

Dice and Electronic Arts are sitting on a virtual gold mine with the battlefield series as a possible candidate for the next big MMO.  Overall the vast majority of gamer’s fall into one of three main categories: MMORPG, FPS and Strategy.  With a title like the Battlefield series that originated in the FPS and already …

Getting back to the MMORPG Cookie Cutter topic, to keep MMORPG’s from getting stale and give developers a fresh perspective on things gamers want, I started thinking about some interesting ways to bone up on features in new and even some current MMORPG titles.  Now, these aren’t necessarily a major …

I recently read a few posts at various other sites talking about how all the MMORPG’s coming out as of late have been pretty well cookie cutter games.  In other words, the same game repackaged with a few ’stand out’ features.  Like AoC for example, a lot of people are comparing that to WoW in …

Once again Massively delivers a unique insight to the world of warfare in their series in which they talk about the dynamics of attacking keeps and fortresses in the upcoming MMO Warhammer Online.  Some of the highlights of their coverage is the siege weapons themselves.  There are four classes of siege weapons …

Awhile back, I went to visit my brother who plays a lot more console games than I do and he had rented Mass Effect for the weekend from Blockbuster. I’m not big on game pads but he coaxed me into trying it out, since it’s more fun than just watching him play I gave it …

InfinityWard has released the next big patch for their Call of Duty 4 game for the PC.  Patch 1.6 features a few bug fixes and some much needed updates to the killcam. But what was even more needed is fresh content for this title and InfinityWard delivers …

Gaute Godager over at Funcom wrote a letter to the community today discussing some of the upcoming changes to Age of Conan along with some additions and fixes.  The first bit of good news is that Funcom seems pretty dedicated to making this as smooth of a launch as possible.  There have already been some …

Definitely a rarity in the MMOG universe, Eve Online is set to release there latest content upgrade in the form of a free expansion, Empyrean Age.   The most anticipated addition in this expansion is the new PVP system, Factional Warfare.  This allows for all out war between rival factions and encourages players to form militias …

 
The ultimate goal of any MMORPG is to totally immerse you in the game world.  That’s what keeps you coming back, in the game world you can be whoever you want to be.  You are a jedi knight constantly at odds with the Empire or a …

A few patches ago I began getting consistant crashes when exiting AoC asking me to report the error to Funcom. It was annoying but I was pretty much just living with it until I found a fix posted online by Lefty1117 (gotta give props). Basically the problem seems to be caused by right permission on …

One thing I’ve always talked about and have thought is missing within most major games since my early days of MMO’s have been the ‘game within a game’ idea, or mini-games.  Star Wars Galaxies had the concept in early development with some mini-games but they quickly were moved to the back burner and never made …

Based off of the premise that early access will start at 5pm GMT on 05/17, here’s the start time for some world cities (Saturday is 05/17, so adjust accordingly):

UPDATE: START TIME MOVED BACK 3 HOURS

Addis Ababa Sat 8:00 PM
Adelaide Sun 2:30 AM
Aden Sat 8:00 PM
Algiers Sat 6:00 PM
Almaty Sat 11:00 PM
Amman * Sat …

I understand that pausing and resuming the early access download is another solution to keep the download speed up at normal levels.  This works for me when I try it this way but slows back down to a snails pace after about 5 minutes or so.  You can just pause and resume again every five …

In this newest edition of the Hyborian Insider, a developer discusses the core components of the game.  Crafting and building player cities.  Watch the video for more:

Age of Conan, the long anticipated MMO is finally set for release this month! I gave up on this game ever coming out a while back and stumbled across it in my musings. It looks better than ever and looks like all the major features promised will be included in initial release. …

Before you get your hopes up, no there is no Star Wars Galaxies sequel in the works, at least not that I am aware of.  This is just a short list of some of the things I would like to see included if SOE and Lucasarts decided to make another go at it.  The chances …

Many people have many different feelings about Star Wars Galaxies. Some people love it just the way it is. But for the most part, many of the original players feel it is a dead game. Compared to the number of subscribers now as to pre-NGE, the old players are right. To …