The Daily Quest : mmo

The Year Ahead

Indelible — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 23:35:14 GMT

2007 is officially over and it is sad to see it go. We had some great times over the past 365 days with titles like Hellgate London and The Burning Crusade being released to the masses as well as some exciting announcement such as StarCraft 2 and the merger of Activision and Vivendi Games.

Sadly however, 2007 is gone and we are now challenged with 2008 which is promising to be one of the most fruitful years in gaming. There are so many things to look forward to and to hope for over the coming year.

StarCraft 2 Release

No release date has been confirmed at the moment but most believe that Blizzard will release their new RTS to the masses at some point in the next 365 days. We wait with baited breathe for the successor to (arguably) the single most successful RTS game ever to grace the world of gaming. The odd thing is that no one is expecting a flop. People have seen Blizzards logo and simply accepted that the game will be the best thing since sliced bread. Frankly, it's going to have to be. With StarCraft being a pro-sport in Korea, StarCraft 2 is going to have to live up to some major expectations if it is going to overshadow it's predecessor and that is not going to be an easy feat to pull off.

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King

Again, Blizzard have not confirmed an official release date but many suspect that it will be a couple of months after patch 2.4 for the mammoth MMO goes live as Blizzard have not revealed any plans to patch under the 2.X line after that period. 2.4 is confirmed to bring the TBC story arc to an end and it is logical to assume that they next patch after that will begin the WotLK story arc in preparation for a Q2 launch. Wrath of the Lich King is promising more of the same as well as some interesting new additions such as Siege Warfare, non-optional PvP zones, new dances and haircuts and a new profession among other things, not to mention the addition of World of Warcrafts first Hero Class, the Death Knight. Wrath of the Lich King promises to be a content rich addition to the gaming world and what will be more interesting to see is how this expansion fairs in the way of record breaking sales. Can Blizzard smash Halo 3s newly set record or is the glint of WoW finally wearing thin?

The New Blizzard MMO Named?

One of the things on everyone's mind at the moment is the new Blizzard MMO. There are several things going through several parties minds. The first is whether the new MMO and Project Hydra are linked. Another is whether there will be a new single player (with limited multiplayer support) Diablo game. The last is what exactly this new MMO from Blizzard will be and how long the development process is going to last. We already know that the development is already quite far through just by observing the job postings on the Blizzard site. Will the title be Diablo based? An all out battle between the armies of Heaven and Hell is not a foreign concept as the end of D2: LoD left that open. StarCraft is another option for the game and with StarCraft 2 being released at some point in the next 12 months, Blizzard could be using the game to tidy up the single player lore so that it is more MMO friendly, much like they did with Warcraft 3. Then there is the new franchise speculation which, I personally don't see coming true. At least, not in the near future. No matter what it is, everyone is waiting on the edge of their seats to see what the developer of the Number 1 P2P MMO delivers next.

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning

There are some things that aren't Blizzard owned and this happens to be one of them. Next year will see an influx of big money franchises entering themselves in the MMO market in a way never before seen and Warhammer Online happens to be the first I'm going to talk about. Despite rumours and speculation as to the state of the game, WAR is certainly generating the most hype out of all none-Blizzard IPs in the MMO world at the moment. The first attempt to bring the Game Workshop table-top to the world of Internet gaming is set to be a glorious one and with over 500,000 beta sign ups at the moment, we can assume that lots of people are interested in the game. Sadly, Warhammer doesn't get clear sailing and still has one major battle to overcome before it will succeed - the battle against World of Warcraft. This isn't just going to be the same generic battle we've seen time and time again between new MMOs and the Blizzard machine. This promises to be a big one as Warhammer Online and World of Warcraft are very similar in their setting, context and lore. Blizzard admittedly borrowed heavily from Warhammer over the years so it will be interesting to see which of the two prevails. I know where my vote is. To spice things up a little, this will be the first time Activision Blizzard and EA will duke it out in the MMO market - things should get interesting.

Age of Conan

AoC is another title generating massive amounts of hype. With hands on previews popping up all over the place, it isn't hard to see why this game is looking like it could be a promising entry into the market. With an innovative single-player and MMO game engine and PvP being hailed all over the place, AoC should deliver some innovations along the way and whilst many are worried it will go in the direction of CoH/CoV, lots more are hoping it delivers something new instead of something reproduced. I'm personally looking forward to this title more than WAR or even WotLK and I sincerely hope that FunCom can pull it off.

Star Trek Online

The future of Perpetual and more importantly, Star Trek Online is a shaky subject at the moment with fans and observers worried that the début of the Star Trek franchise in the MMO market could be shelved or halted for a lengthy period of time. With a suspected release date around Christmas 2008 which runs neatly in line with the release date of the 11th Star Trek movie, people are worried this one will just keep getting pushed back. One in game screen shot has been released so far and Perpetual have kept very quiet about the development process and progress but they did release the screen shot to let everyone know that the game is well into development and is nearing beta stage. The Star Trek franchise has had a bit of a rough time over the past few years. Enterprise, the 5th series in the franchise, was cancelled due to poor viewing figures, making it the first series since TOS to be cancelled prematurely. The last three movies were slandered by critics who said that they were good Sci-Fi movies but not good Star Trek movies. A lot rides on Star Trek Online and Star Trek 11 as if they fail, we may see the silence of Star Trek for many, many years. Even if you aren't a fan, you will admit that is a bad thing.

Stargate Worlds

Ah now this is a funny one. Stargate is arguably the youngest sci-fi franchise out of the top 5 an dis competing with established titles such as Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica and still managing to hold its own. With the BigWorlds engine being used to bring the universe of Stargate to life and development nearing the beta phase, we should see the title at some point in the next 12 months, even if it is only open beta. There's not really much you can say about the game that hasn't already been said by someone, somewhere and all I want to know is if I can have my own mother ship.

All in all, there are some great games to look out for over the next 365 days. 2008 looks set to be a really hot year for MMO gaming and also looks set to see some

Role on 2008!

Things that make you go Hmmm...Craft

Indelible — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 17:16:16 GMT

Last night I logged on to my friends IRC channel to speak to some people about the mammoth that is Blizzard Entertainment and all I could get out of them was…

omgomgomgomgomgomgomgomgomgomgomg omgomgomgomgomgomgomgomgomgomgomgomgomg omgomgomgomgomgomgomgomg […]

So on and so forth.

I think that has something to do with Drysc and his rumour mill. He only went and revealed that the New MMO is not a WoW title on the US forums and thus, sent the whole world into a spin.

In true me style, I have theories… and they aren’t demons.

1 World(s) of (Hmm)Craft
2 World(s) of (Star)Craft
3 World(s) of Diablo
4 World of… aww… I really can’t be arsed

World(s) of (Hmm)Craft

I was bored with the term TheoryCraft so I renamed the entire concept of TheoryCraft to HmmCraft as A) It sounds cooler and B) It’s easier to type. The type of HmmCraft I like has nothing to do with maths or numbers and doesn’t focus around what skills I’m supposed to be using and where I’m supposed to be using them. It focuses around what we may be seeing from Blizzard in the next few years.

Many have discredited the idea of a StarCraft MMO set after the events of SC2 because, “the fans don’t want it,” but let’s be entirely honest here. Who in their right mind thought about and wanted a Warcraft MMO? I certainly didn’t and it certainly wasn’t the most logical franchise for Blizzard to pick as their debut MMO title considering Diablo had already made a pretty good story for an MMO environment. Despite this, it was and there is nothing we can do to change that now. All we can do is sit back and think about what the next one is going to be.

We know for a fact that Blizzard plans to MMO-ise all of their major franchises. They’ve said as much on multiple occasions. We also know that they plan to continue the other side to those franchises as well. Blizzard brass has already commented that Warcraft 4 is on the cards and they are making StarCraft 2 so it is apparent they don’t want to limit those franchises to the MMO world. So Blizzard wants to utilise all of their titles as best they can.

World(s) of (Star)Craft

Let’s role-back to Warcraft 3. Warcraft has always been an RTS title ever since its inception but things were blatantly going to change after the third title. Warcraft 3 neatly tidied away major bad guys and left Azeroth pretty much clean of any shite that may have hindered the transition from RTS to MMORPG. The expansion to the title, The Frozen Thrown, sorted out the Lich King and Illidan as well, putting one of them in seclusion and the other one on another planet behind a big, closed gate, which meant that the rest of Azeroth didn’t have any major antagonists to deal with for a few years.

At the moment, we’ve got StarCraft 2 in the works and it is suspected that it will be released next year. We have yet to hear what the storyline will be about but I wouldn’t be surprised if Mr. Metzen is working his magic again, cleaning away some of the antagonists and major characters to make the franchise more MMO friendly. In fact, I would hazard that that is going to occur, irrespective of whether the next MMO title out of Blizzard has anything to do with StarCraft.

Another fact that I think roles in favour of a Science Fiction StarCraft based MMO out of Blizzard is the current state of the MMO market and what other companies are looking to. Let’s face it. The fantasy arm of the MMO market has been milked for year and years. Fantasy has become the dominant area associated with MMO gaming thanks to titles such as World of Warcraft, Ultima Online, EverQuest 1+2 and so on and so forth. In fact, the only major Science Fiction based title I hear about on a regular basis is Eve Online. Even titles like Star Wars Galaxies and The Matrix Online have faded into oblivion.

Stargate Worlds, Star Trek Online, Firefly Online, A new Star Wars MMO – look how many major franchise titles are either debuting or reinventing themselves in the MMO market. Whilst some may think that Blizzard wouldn’t want to compete with such brutes, I don’t think that is the case at all. If a StarCraft based MMO were to be released and were to see off franchises like Star Wars and Stargate, think of the implications for Blizzard. Think of the money involved. In a situation like that, StarCraft could make more money for them than World of Warcraft has.

World(s) of Diablo

It’s been a while (see: nearly 10 years) since a Diablo title was released and recently, things have started to indicate that a new Diablo title is in the works. Seeing as Blizzard is working on StarCraft 2 and possibly an expansion (they like their expansions) we could assume that any StarCraft MMO is few years away.

Diablo presents some interesting ideas for an MMO environment. Firstly, World of Warcraft is very comical and immature in its presentation, as was Warcraft, as was StarCraft. Diablo, on the other hand, is a very mature and well developed, late-teen/adult orientated title. We have yet to see an MMO title that tries to appeal to people who want to be scared all the time. Hellgate arguably tried this a little every now and again but the game was more of a hack ‘n’ slash with as little emotion as possible (and it lacks the bodies on spikes that you got in D2). I personally feel that the Diablo storyline is far, far more epic than any other gaming storyline I have ever subjected myself to and as such, an MMO would have to be equally as epic.

There have been little hints here and there that have kept the Diablo spark alive and I think almost all of these, “accidents,” were intentional. From the beta keys at BlizzCon that weren’t for a WoW title, to the mysterious happening with the Diablo3 domains that Blizzard own. Comments by a famous Diablo author, in which he stated he was not writing for a dead game and other more prophetic speeches by Blizzard employees have really done well to keep the fire burning quite furiously but all of a sudden…

Silence has befallen the Diablo community.

For the last few years there has not gone a day where something has not been generating Diablo hype specifically. I know you are sitting there saying, “What about the Next Gen MMO Matt?” and all I have to say is that is far too impersonal for my liking. For the last 3 years we’ve had specific Diablo hype occurring. All of a sudden; nothing; not a hint; a few comments about a couple of novels about 6 months ago and then… silence.

I admit that is a weird impression to derive from such an occurrence but I genuinely believe that there has been no hype because Mr. Blizzard is far to busy focusing on the franchise in a development way rather than, “har har let’s wind the fan base up,” way.

World of… aww… I really can’t be arsed

All of this speculation and conjecture is making babies cry. We’re all an impatient bunch of hippies really, aren’t we? There are only two ways we are going to know what the next title is and we can theorise all we want but that isn’t going to change.

1)Organise a picket. Head to Blizzard. Sit outside Blizzard HQ and chant, “What do we want? Clarity. When do we want it? When it is ready,” for the next 3 or so years. 2)Wait.

I think I’ll stick with the latter.

Yes, I know this looks oddly like me bailing out.

Do you remember when...

Indelible — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 18:30:47 GMT

I’ve been gaming since I was able to push the keys on a keyboard and I’ve seen good games, bad games and classic games that have been welded on to my memory. I remember the classics like Diablo 2, Neverwinter nights and even Worms and all the while, I’m adding memories and encouraging my nostalgia and it seems my latest addiction, The Witcher, has triggered this nostalgia.

So, do you remember when…

…Deckard Cain first said, “Stay a while and listen,” ?

I remember it well. The first time I stepped into the Rogue encampment and Deckard Cain said the immortal words, “stay a while and listen.” I didn’t think about it then but now I look back and that is one of the first things I think about when I remember the Diablo games. It brings back fond memories of sitting there, listening to Travis whilst mindlessly slaughtering imps.

…Worms shouted, “INCOMING!!!!” ?

Worms was probably the single most entertaining game… ever. Better than Lemmings. Lemmings didn’t have Holy Hand Grenades after all. Despite the fact that the Worms series was ruined for me by the primordial filth that is Worms 3D, I still look back at Worms, Worms: United and Worms 2 with massively fond memmories, which usually involves sitting there, sqeuking, “INCOMING!!!” under my voice, followed by a, “HAAALELUAH!!!” which is followed by at least 2 hours of Worms theme tune whistling. I’ve still got to learn that on the guitar – I shall add that to my things to do list.

…Dungeons and Dragons was cool?

Ok… ok… D+D is still cool. Possibly not as cool as it was when I was playing Neverwinter Nights or the original pen and paper D+D but it is still fairly cool. Neverwinter Nights 2 and D+D Online did the infamous rule set no favours but we look to the future longingly, right? Ah, the stress that persisted when spending my talent points on my Sorceror. When to go and not to go… prestige. That was the question. It still is as well as I still play Neverwinter Nights occasionally, just for the memories and the kicks. Damn you Obsidian and your franchise ruining dev team of doom.

…the Borg were scarey?

Some of you may slightly disagree with this but as far as I am concerned, the Borg WERE scarey and Star Trek Armada was a good game. It provided me with hours of entertainment. I mean, what could be more fun than assimilating NPC ships and stations just because you can? What is more enthralling than a story line consisting of four races stealing some random particle of each other intermittently like children in a school yard fighting over a piece of candy? I know… nothing! I still remember Worf in Armada… flying around in his Defiant class starship…

…Tetris was hot?

Ok… so now I’m going really retro on you but come on! Tetris was the hottest game around and is probably as legendary as Chomp! Aliens WILL one day invade Earth, they’ll find Tetris and we’ll drive them off simply because they’ll be too busy ooh-ing and aah-ing to care about the fact that we are shooting them with atomic warheads! The one thing I do hate about the game however is the theme tune. It gets stuck in your head for days and days and days and it hurts your mind after a while. So much so that everything morphs into the closest Tetris block for it’s shape and you start wondering how to fit it with the other blocks around you.

Those are just a few of my memories and there are plenty more. I miss the good old days when gaming was fun and not a chore. It still is for the most part but when you have concepts like grinding in World of Warcraft, the fun factor is destroyed by addiction.

So anyone else got anything nostalgic to say?

Innovation in the MMO World: In 5 Years

Indelible — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 16:22:55 GMT

The gaming world of late has been suffering from the fatigued player base games like World of Warcraft have left behind. It seems that game developers have picked up on this and instead of developing expansions for existing titles or revisiting the generic feeling of old games, they have been looking for ways to innovate the MMO genre with new, exciting titles that can challenge World of Warcrafts dominance and end its reign as number 1 P2P MMORPG.

So what can we expect from the MMO genre in the next 5 years? Well, in short, we’re looking at seeing some of the most famous franchises in the media make the move to MMO and whilst we are all used to unfinished, unrefined games going live, it seems that the new age of game development for the MMO environment is very much about delivering a game that feels finished but has room for expansion.

One of the arms in the MMO genre that seems to be getting a lot of attention of late is the science fiction area. The fantasy area is very much saturated at the moment with games like EverQuest 2, Lineage, Guild Wars, Lord of the Rings Online and World of Warcraft delivering good content and quenching fantasy fans thirst for this genre. Even World of Warcraft is suffering from a market area that has too many competitors for the numbers involved. It is logical then to assume that the next major area that will be targeted by game developers is the science fiction area and this is shown in announced and rumoured titles that are in development.

Currently, Star Wars Galaxies and Eve Online are the major players in the science fiction area of MMO gaming. Star Wars Galaxies is still very much alive and kicking but it is suffering for the bad design and content decisions that have been made over the years. It won’t be long before this title out lives its welcome.

Eve Online is very much going strong. With an engine redesign and massive content changes that will allow you to actually control your character penned for release in the future, CCP are very much putting all of their efforts into trying to chokehold this area. I personally don’t see this happening. Eve is a good game but for the most part, it is a very time consuming game that requires unprecedented levels of attention for tasks that are menial in other environments. I have no doubt that it will remain as one of the big names for a while yet but I don’t see it being the title to knock World of Warcraft off its thrown.

There are some titles that have been confirmed which represent hope for the MMOers out there. Tabula Rasa is the first of the next-gen sci-fi titles to come out and having played the open beta for many, many hours I am genuinely excited about this title. There are new, innovative ideas coupled with industry standards that make this game the single most refined MMO since World of Warcraft was released oh so many years ago. It feels good, it looks good and whilst there are still some improvements that can be made on top of what it already has, it plays as if someone has sat down and thought long and hard about what makes a game playable as a pose to what makes a profit. It also delivers a fresh new look and feel that no other game can reciprocate because no other game has tried to. While Eve takes care of space ships and fleet battles, Tabula Rasa portrays what it feels like to be a ground troop in a similar environment. The coupling of guns with spell-like abilities doesn’t come across as implausible as you would think either. The concepts behind every aspect of the game are well thought out and leave no room for ifs and buts.

Another title that is suspected for release in 2008 is Star Trek Online. Star Trek had yet to make the move to an MMO gaming environment and with the weak and tired gaming titles it currently has, this is no surprise. Over the 36 years that gaming titles have been developed for the franchise, only three spring out; Armada, Bridge Commander and Elite Force; and even then, they were average to poor for the most part. The latest incarnation for the PC, Legacy, was poorly received, poorly designed and poorly executed and Star Trek fans are very much disenfranchised because of this. This is why Star Trek Online needs to succeed. Perpetual are a new developer so hopefully this means they will be willing to make some choices that will innovate the game. That said however, the new status of the team represents a risk for the title and we could simply see another flop in the Star Trek gaming franchise. Not much has been released about the game yet excluding some concept art and a couple of screenshots and this is a good move as it destroys any expectations fans may place on them. As an avid fan of Star Trek myself, I am hoping that Perpetual pull it off but I am not expecting them to. If Star Trek Online succeeds along with Star Trek 11 (the new movie) it could represent a brand new life for the franchise but if either/or fail, it could be a long, long time until Activision risk revisiting the Star Trek franchise.

Another major science fiction franchise that is making the move to an MMO environment is Stargate. The Stargate franchise is one of the younger franchises in the science fiction world and it has done well to succeed where series like Sliders and Seven failed. Even Enterprise, the latter Star Trek title paled in comparison to the two Stargate series that were in circulation at the time it was aired. Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment, another newcomer to the MMO development world, is developing the MMO title. That said there are many famous names from many companies on the team so it isn’t like they have an amateur squad developing this one. So far, they have told us that it will be canon and run in partnership with Atlantis and the as-yet unnamed third series currently in development, which means that the lore and on going story should be rich and uncompromising. The screen shots and concept art they have released tells us that the game will be aesthetically pleasing but once again, they have released very little about the game play itself, which (again) removes any expectations the fan base will have on the developers. Of course, they will want to see the staple Stargate and DHD that we are all familiar with as well as places and faces from the series but at the same time, the developers will want to add their own view of certain events and situations that they don’t really want the fan base to know about. Luckily for the Stargate franchise, this isn’t a make or break title. There has yet to be a Stargate PC game actually released. Interestingly, an FPS based on the popular TV show, SG1, was in development and set for release but various sources stated that the title had been cancelled. Despite this however, the developer, Perception Studios, seems intent on releasing the title in 2009, which is a risky business for a company in such turmoil. Add to that the fact that the cancellation was never officially confirmed by either Perception and/or MGM. Whether the title will actually be released is another matter. Stargate Worlds is where most of the attention is focused at the moment so if it is the only incarnation of Stargate to be released to the PC in the next few years, nobody will ever notice that SG1: Alliance was ever around.

There are rumours surrounding BioWare and its entry into the MMORPG world. Most of these rumours do surround a Knights of the Old Republic MMORPG and whilst many fans of BioWare have effectively demanded that they make a Baldur’s Gate or Jade Empire MMORPG, BioWare haven’t actually said anything against the prospect of a new Star Wars MMO. Star Wars Galaxies would have been going strong now if certain changes to the game had not driven a lot of the player base away from the title so it makes sense that Lucas Arts would look at developing another MMO title to go up against the array of next-gen titles to come out. Knights of the Old Republic is effectively the single best Star Wars title to come out of Lucas Arts and it was developed by BioWare. If BioWare approached Lucas Arts with the offer of developing a Knights of the Old Republic MMO, I have no doubt that Lucas Arts would jump at the chance. Whether BioWare, who stated that they would not develop Knights of the Old Republic 3, would work with Lucas Arts again is in question on some fronts. Despite this however, the prospect of a Knights of the Old Republic MMO has developed quite a following and if BioWare are watching and are actually doing this, they must be quite impressed with the amount of conjecture flying around the Internet at the moment. Again, this would be a make or break title for the Star Wars franchise in the MMO area. If it is in development and it fails to attract the ex-Star Wars Galaxies players back to the franchise then this could represent a death in the Lucas Arts family and a resolution to develop single player titles for the immediate future. I personally would like to see this title but many are pinning Obsidian as the developer of the next Knights of the Old Republic title, which, to me, is a bad thing. They got Knights of the Old Republic 2 wrong so I would hope that Lucas Arts would keep them well away from any Lucas’ owned IP. If a new Star Wars MMO is in the works and the guys at BioWare are developing it, it will no doubt be a massive player in the P2P market and possibly the strongest contender to World of Warcraft.

Blizzard Entertainment seems to be cropping up all over the place these days. With a Warcraft movie well into development and Starcraft 2 and Wrath of the Lich King announced and expected for release next year, they are very much alive. Blizzard has effectively confirmed that they are working on a new MMO title to replace World of Warcraft as its staple MMO and this isn’t surprising. Whilst development for the Warcraft MMO franchise might continue for the immediate future, the game is very old and is starting to feel dated compared to newer releases so Blizzard will be preparing a newer title to take over as it’s flagship game. With the announcement of Starcraft 2, many fans suspect that Blizzard is preparing a Starcraft MMO title for release in the future. A lot of people don’t think this is the case but I don’t think it is entirely implausible. Warcraft 3 and its expansion, The Frozen Thrown, was used to set up much of the back story for World of Warcraft so it isn’t foreign to assume that the single player Starcraft 2 campaign might tie up some of the less MMO-friendly story arcs in the title in preparation for another MMO. With the fantasy market saturated, it seems like a good idea fro Blizzard to move into the sci-fi MMO area. That said, Diablo hasn’t had a release for near on 8 years now so Blizzard could be developing an MMO based on this franchise. At the moment however, no information has been released about any new MMO projects or even Blizzard projects excluding the word, “Hydra,” so what Blizzard are up to is anyone’s guess.

The MMO genre looks like it is going to be very active, especially the science fiction area. World of Warcraft is old and can not hold its place indefinitely but someone is going to have to do something new in order to knock it out sooner, rather than later and science fiction seems to be where gamers and developers are pinning their hopes. Warhammer Online and Age of Conan might succeed in doing the unthinkable but if they don’t, World of Warcraft won’t have any other major contenders to worry about. At least, not for the next decade unless someone can come up with a new, innovative idea that everyone likes and everyone likes science fiction.

Diablo 3 - A Pipe Dream

Indelible — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 15:02:21 GMT

I’m an avid Diablo 3 supporter and I frequently check to see if there is any news on a development project for the title but time and time again I have been shot in the face (metaphorically) by Blizzard who seem to like messing with my mind. It’s sad that a game company has the power to do such a thing but we all accept that Blizzard isn’t just any old game company.

Diablo, Diablo 2 and Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction are three of the best RPGs to ever be made. Lord of Destruction added more to Diablo 2 than most expansions do to games. The only other example I can think of is Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark (which just made that game for me). Despite having this massively successful title sitting on the desk at Blizzard HQ, they don’t seem to want to throw us a bone…ever.

New artwork has been appearing on the Blizzard website of Diablo. Legendary Pictures had a brief moment of Diablo on their homepage. There was that business with the Diablo 3 Europe domains. All designed to create hype even though Blizzard knew they weren’t going to be announcing anything. It is probable that they won’t announce anything Diablo until BlizzCon next year. All we know is that there is a third title in production and also that they are working on a Next Gen MMO. World of Diablo anyone?

So let’s look at this. World of Warcraft is getting old. Its graphics are dated and even MMOs only have so much playability. Once they get to a certain point you have to say, “Right! That’s it! Let’s move on!” Despite this however, Blizzard say they will be releasing an expansion per year until they feel it is not economical to do so. Could this be a hint from Blizzard that they are fully capable of and will be ending World of Warcraft at some point? Again, possibly. You never know with Blizzard.

So, we have one dated MMORPG that has a finite life span and one massive RPG title that Blizzard haven’t touched in the last 6 years. We also have job adverts for the team behind Diablo 1 and 2 and a team working on a next gen mmo. One and the same? Pfft. Don’t want to think about that. Have to but don’t want to.

Another interesting comment by Blizzard was that Warcraft 4 could be made after Starcraft 2 has been released. Could this be another hint that they are preparing to shut down World of Warcraft and move on? They could set Warcraft 4 far enough in the future to allow for WoW to continue or even set it during the events of World of Warcraft.

Ah the possibilities. Pointless speculation always makes me want to cry. It will be interesting to see what happens but there are plenty of things to think about over the next coming months.

It's Been A While

Indelible — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 15:00:37 GMT

I've not been blogging much recently due to real life commitments and issues that have taken priority but I feel now is a brilliant time to step away from all of this and return to what I like to consider my pass-time here on Curse. I am going to look at a behavioural complex that effects a large proportion of players who play any MMOG and this is the complex that has led to many, "hiding behind their avatar."

I have met many players from many walks of life in World of Warcraft and the game has one of the single most diverse population of people of any game I have played. Not only do we see a large representation for the different gender groups but also a large representation for different social groups. Jocks, chavs, goths, grebos etc etc. All are represented within World of Warcraft and this has led to a phenomenon that, in my honest opinion, can only serve to better the world at large.

In this day and age, we are surrounded by diversity. Religious diversity, to name but one, has led to war on a global level and we can see evidence of this by the growing tensions in the middle east between the Christian led American Government and the Muslin led Iranian Government over the presence of Israel in the area. This difference is something that is testing political stability world wide. Another example is the differences between communist countries, such as Cuba, and capitalist countries, once again like America.

In a gaming environment however, these differences seem to be very much left in the real world and guilds of people from many different religions, creeds and view points come together for a common goal - the game. So why do people feel that it is fine to leave these difference outside of gaming but perfectly ok to renew them in a real life situation?

In Britain we have a social group called chavs. Originally, much like any minority group, chavism was a trend of clothing that spread amongst teenagers and young adults on a national level but eventually, the mindset associated with this trend came to light. This mindset led to individuals becoming very hostile towards each other and chavisms is now associated with knifes, guns, petty crime, theft and robbery and a host of other malicious activity and due to the fact that the majority of chavs are older teenagers, my age group is treated with contempt due to their actions.

I have met a few people in World of Warcraft I could and willingly do label chavs. The difference between these chavs and those on the streets of the place I live are that they leave the social divides behind when they log on to WoW. I spend a lot of my time actually talking to these people and enjoying talking to them even though if it were an irl situation I would go out of my way to avoid them simply by the way they act and dress. They seem to act differently to those I meet irl and this leads to me actually liking the person they are on the internet. This is a good example of someone hiding behind their avatar but not all examples are this peachy.

Forums are a haven for trolls. That is to say people can and do at in a way that would be deemed socially unacceptable in real life. They do this because they suffer little to no repercussions for their actions if they do step out of line and feel that the line they draw irl can be moved much further away from morality in this situation. People make personal attacks on other not because they are retaliating to them but because they can. This is a bad example of why hiding behind your avatar can be detrimental to the community of people you play with.

Needless to say, avatars provide people a way of being someone different (and 99% of the time the idealistic version of themselves) without any repercussions. Some people are overly vicious and others are overly nice. In the end, not everyone is who you expect them to be and if you make that step to meeting them in irl, you could get a nasty surprise upon seeing them and talking to them or you could get a pleasant one.

The Old Story of Good or Bad

Indelible — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 14:14:02 GMT

Since World of Warcraft became the first and currently only massive success in the MMOG market based on numbers, psychologists have been studying and generally condemning the MMO industry for not only creating highly addictive games but also encouraging addictive behaviour in pre-teens. Nobody has however looked at what governments are doing to prevent addictive behaviour in the population or at least educate people to deal with addictions of this nature.

There have been arguments thrown back and forth about the addictive side to MMOs for years but the argument only came to the forefront of media coverage thanks to the success of World of Warcraft. We've all heard about the tales of parents neglecting their children and inevitably loosing them due to government intervention. We've heard about marriages and relationships ending due to people not paying their partner enough attention because they would rather grind than, "grind."

One extreme example of addiction effecting real life issues occurred in China, when the Chinese government and other organisations began to point the finger at MMOs, claiming that they would lead to the collapse of the countries economy and possibly the world economy in a short space of time. If we ignore the decreasing amount of trade occurring in china due to such things as insufficient safety checks in factories, which is set to see China loose billions of dollars of income, I can see how they drew this conclusion. Aside from that however, I believe the government haven’t really looked at the issue in any great detail.

One solution however, is sitting right under our Governments noses, and that is in our schools. It is all well and good condemning Blizzard and other companies for creating addictive games and promoting addictive behaviour but I do not recall any education on psychological addiction. I remember being told that alcohol and tobacco, among other substance, are physically addictive but I do not recall being told what a psychological addiction was or educated on how to deal with these psychological addictions. Why is that?

Well the answer, as far as I can see, is that psychological addiction was not really an issue until now and 18 years ago (when I was born), the Internet was but a brain-child and not anything it is today. Now however, it is a multi-national multi-billion dollar industry and the last bastion of freedom (which will inevitably be taken away) and is the single biggest psychological addiction in existence. If we take this into account, psychological addiction possibly has the single largest detrimental effect on not only economic conditions in the world but also encourages anti-social behaviour. Surely the government has seen this and responded by implementing policy or at least a white paper that calls for sustained training into the causes, effects of and ways of preventing (or at least dealing with) psychological addictions. If they have, I haven’t heard of it.

In the end, we are all subject to psychological addictions from every angle. Prior to the Internet, we had television. Prior to TV, we had radio. There has always been something to latch on to, so to speak. Perhaps now is the time we start educating and investigating ways of dealing with it, not only so we can continue to play MMOs and use the Internet with the confidence that we know the risks but also so that freedom of speech and action continues, undisturbed by corruption.