Any hope we had for the Great Server Migration of Lord of the Rings Online this week was swiftly dashed as it became clear that the game’s infrastructure was utterly inadequate to manage the simultaneous transfer of a large and passionate player base. Transfers are still occurring today, taking some players over 48 hours to reach, and we fully expect that this will continue until the second or possibly third week, even though SSG eventually published the new servers (with housing disabled).
Meanwhile, Throne & Liberty released its Wilds of Talandre expansion, Fractured Online revealed it was purchased by a player’s company, RuneScape is getting a new CEO, and Pantheon unveiled the Druid class. Furthermore, the confession in Guild Wars 2 is imminent on Tuesday!
THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES
Lord of the Rings Online plans to activate 64-bit servers today, while transfers are still waiting. The beginning of what was supposed to be the next significant chapter in the history of Lord of the Rings Online was marked by a week of poorly managed transfers and haphazard communication.
The Throne and Liberty Wilds of Talandre expansion opens this afternoon. Wilds of Talandre, Throne and Liberty’s first significant expansion, is officially going live today following a protracted outage that began yesterday. The expansion, now in progress in Korea, will introduce participants from around the world.
Fractured Online and its development team have been acquired by a new studio, and it’s not a bitcoin fraud. opened a sandbox for MMORPGs. Fractured has been making subtle allusions to something big for the past month, and earlier this week, Dynamight’s Jacopo Gallelli revealed that he recently signed a
Janthir Wilds: Guild Wars 2’s Repentance content releases March 11 – Next week, Guild Wars 2’s quarterly rhythm will continue with the official release of the game’s third content chunk, or second post-expansion chapter, Repentance.
It’s reasonable to say that Standing Stone Games hasn’t had the kind of fruitful week they were hoping for with Lord of the Rings Online. With 64-bit servers coming this Friday, the transfer problems will persist into the third day. What ought to have been a relocation of one day…
MMO sandbox: “I think we’ve prepared” BitCraft prepares for a Steam early access beta. In 2021, we started keeping an eye on BitCraft, a brand-new MMORPG sandbox simulation. BitCraft was not at all a bitcoin abomination, despite its maybe unfortunate name.
Stars Reach raises $550,000 on Kickstarter to unlock a full guild alliance system. Players eager to explore the MMO sandbox have contributed nearly $550,000 to Playable Worlds since its launch last week, and the Stars Reach Kickstarter is still expanding.…
Overanalyzing: How should MMO corpse runs appear in 2025? – A few years ago, MMO creator Damion Schubert tweeted about a conversation he had with a Vanguard. Yes, I keep strange things in my “ideas bin” folder.
Following a month offline, APB Reloaded is fully back online—and we don’t just mean the test server—as Little Orbit refers to Fallen Earth as its “next big priority.” Both Little Orbit MMORPGs, APB Reloaded, were released at the start of February.
LOTRO Legendarium: The creation of new communities during the massive server rollout It’s Tuesday morning as I write this, and Lord of the Rings Online’s Great Server Migration of 2025 is well under way. By the way…
MMO for blockchain EVE Frontier, the “hardcore” survival space MMO that CCP claims isn’t able to function without being on the blockchain, appears to be taking its in-game economy very seriously, or at least has hired a real-world economist to assist improve it.
The First Descendant says that support for older consoles will stop in June and gives a sneak peek at next week’s update. This week saw another developer livestream for Season 2 Episode 2, further teasing The First Descendant’s already teased March update: Update on Into the Void,
Why I Play: 2025 Edition of Splatoon 3 Nintendo didn’t “get” online play yet, according to my initial evaluation of the original Splatoon. Instead, they made a game that succeeded with its general vibe: painting maps.
Extremely busy: Pokemon Go’s Unova Tour was operational but unfunny – Pokemon GO recently announced the next Go Fest, but the Unova Tour LA Tour and the Global Tour have just ended, and I’ll agree that
A top Roll20 and OrbusVR developer created the top-down bullet hell roguelike MMO, Wyld Land. If you enjoy tabletop role-playing games, you’ve definitely heard of Roll20, a virtual tabletop (VTT) website that allows users to play their preferred TTRPGs without having to deal with the annoying “meeting up
The Fallen Banners DLC’s Exiled Redoubt dungeon is featured in Elder Scrolls Online. You might be happy to hear that the other dungeon being packaged isn’t quite as big as the first one Elder Scrolls Online showed off.
I doubt anyone was going to contest that Brighter Shores had the most exciting and captivating combat system in the MMO industry when it launched the first phase of its combat overhaul. Actually, the first time that fighting was used
Storyboard: How do you roleplay in massively multiplayer online games that forbid it? – Readers, I’m going to blow your minds away. Are you prepared to be completely astounded? I can assure you that it will be a tremendous shock. As it happens, I
Path of Exile discusses the probable June expansion and prolongs the Legacy of Phrecia event. The Legacy of Phrecia event in Path of Exile won’t end, which is fantastic news if you were hoping it would last forever. Or at
Although I don’t consider the gigantic mecha genre to be my favorite, I’ve always had a soft place for it. Fight or Kite: Steel Hunters introduces mechas to the extraction shooter genre. I guess…
After Nexon filed a complaint, Dark & Darker was removed from the Epic Games Store. We reported last month on what seemed to be the tumultuous midst of Nexon and Ironmace’s continuing legal battle over the Dark and Darker series. In 2023, Nexon…
Perfect Ten: Sorting actual vacations in MMOs from the worst to the best MMO celebrations fall into two main categories: those that are “inspired” by real-world holidays and those that are created specifically for the game. Yes, some games do attempt to smack.
“Infinite” MMO sandbox DreamWorld launches an open playtest till March 16 and releases a gameplay trailer. We began investigating the KickStarted game DreamWorld four years ago. It was a purported “infinite sandbox MMO” that made some extravagant claims and relied on an AI tool that allows
Vague Patch Notes: The first impressions of MMOs that terrify new gamers I briefly discussed power creep last week. However, tucked away as a rule for this week’s piece was something that you might have overlooked, in no small way.
The Druid class is introduced in Pantheon Rise of the Fallen, along with a number of changes and modifications. It’s time to activate Pantheon’s nature wizard: In its most recent version, Rise of the Fallen, a sandbox MMORPG, formally debuted the Druid class. Explained by…
March will have quests, spring, and anniversary events in Phantasy Star Online 2 New Genesis. Typical Phantasy Star Online 2 players: Two anniversaries are commemorated by New Genesis: one for NG and another to commemorate the general release of PSO2. That later incident is what’s
WoW Factor: Undermine(d) draws attention to the chaotic, goofy aspect of World of Warcraft – World of Warcraft Update 11.1: Now that Undermine(d) is available, the community is definitely excited. Although I had some suspicions, this has now been verified: This…
On March 18, Fallout 76 aims to turn you into a ghoul. The only race option available in Fallout 76 up to this point is ugly human. However, when player ghouls come on March 18th, everything will change.
In order to fix an unidentified “important issue,” Elite Dangerous stops the construction of a new colony. The first week of Elite’s open beta for system colonization: Dangerous is over, and this week has been incredibly busy, with 13,000 facilities finished and over 8,000 systems claimed.
Due to a hacked transfer system, Lord of the Rings Online postpones the launch of its 64-bit server. The huge endeavor yesterday to let Lord of the Rings Online gamers transfer all of their characters to the new 64-bit servers completely caught us off guard.
Choose My Adventure: I think Blade & Soul NEO isn’t all that different from Blade & Soul; I guess I may have set unrealistic expectations for this month’s game. As you can see, Blade & Soul NEO was somewhat of a
Transfers to four new 64-bit worlds for Lord of the Rings Online have opened today, and the results are a happy jumble. There’s something even more significant taking place today, but I hope many of you were able to reserve your names for the four new 64-bit kingdoms in Lord of the Rings Online yesterday. As
Due to the resignation of Jagex CEO Phil Mansell, RuneScape will have a new boss. We’re seeing a change of leadership at Jagex following RuneFest: Phil Mansell, the CEO, is resigning. For the past eight years, Mansell has been the CEO of Jagex.
In order to carry out its “very ambitious and exciting plans,” Skull & Bones postpones its second year of programming until April 15. You will regrettably have to wait a while if you were one of the players eager to get Skull & Bones’ second year of content, as
PvPvE extraction RPG Dungeonborne will end its early access period in May, having been available for less than a year. An additional title has been claimed by the wide gap between early access shutdowns. The medieval-themed first-person PvPvE extraction role-playing game Dungeonborne, which went live in early access in July, has now verified that it
Wisdom of Nym: What is causing the event missions in Final Fantasy XIV to deteriorate? – I am excited for Final Fantasy XIV’s Little Ladies’ Day event as I write this, or more precisely, I am excited for the rewards from the
In less than a week, Stars Reach’s Kickstarter has already raised half a million dollars and delves deeply into the fishy princess Hansian species. Keep in mind that two months ago, we had no idea that a Kickstarter would even exist! – Stars Reach has successfully raised $500,000 through crowdsourcing.
According to Blizzard, there are “many many many months of content left” on the Season of Discovery servers for World of Warcraft Classic. The experimental Season of Discovery servers in World of Warcraft Classic might have a brighter future than initially thought. The project manager stated in a long statement that there are “many more
THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS
Every week, check out our MMO Week in Review to learn about the most recent developments in the MMO genre and the top content from Massively OP! Do you want more content roundups? Check out Friday’s Betawatch for highlights of MMO testing, Saturday’s Make My MMO for updates on MMO financing, and Sunday’s The MOP Up, which covers all the news we didn’t cover elsewhere.