A Call of Duty MMO?


You've Been Promoted To Off-hand Rumor

I’ve played every Call of Duty game since Call of Duty 1, and I have to say the most recent iterations (Modern Warfare 1/2 and World at War) take a lot of elements from MMORPGs. You have a persistent character who levels up as you kill enemies and complete objectives. You rank up, offering you new challenges to complete and new weapons and items to use, and you can customize your gear to optimum efficiency. There is also an end-game.

In fact, the only things missing are loot (if you don’t count unlocked items), a persistent world operated on main servers. If Call of Duty were to be labeled as an MMO, it would be more akin to Huxley, Crimecraft, or even Guild Wars, where the action takes place on a private instance, even though Call of Duty doesn’t have the public “hubs” for players to hang out, and there is no trading whatsoever.

But the LA Times recently posted about Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2’s successful sales, and left this nugget at the end:

One person close to the company said it also was considering adapting Call of Duty as a massively multi-player online world.

Continue reading “A Call of Duty MMO?”

I Don’t Do Reviews, For Good Reason


The Fallen Earth LLC Boardroom
Where we go to discuss Fallen Earth.

If you’re a visitor to mmorpg.com, you’ve probably found yourself stepping into the middle of a controversy. Apparently yesterday’s review of Fallen Earth caused such an uproar that mmorpg.com’s staff saw fit to remove it from the website. I decided to get my super sleuth kit, and by super sleuth kit I mean grabbing part 1 off of Google Cache before it was deleted.

Continue reading “I Don’t Do Reviews, For Good Reason”

I Don't Do Reviews, For Good Reason


The Fallen Earth LLC Boardroom
Where we go to discuss Fallen Earth.

If you’re a visitor to mmorpg.com, you’ve probably found yourself stepping into the middle of a controversy. Apparently yesterday’s review of Fallen Earth caused such an uproar that mmorpg.com’s staff saw fit to remove it from the website. I decided to get my super sleuth kit, and by super sleuth kit I mean grabbing part 1 off of Google Cache before it was deleted.

Continue reading “I Don't Do Reviews, For Good Reason”

Crimecraft Going Freemium


There's no neck to break
I think this sums it up...

When I said that Crimecraft would stay online as long as it remained profitable, I was not specifically referring to the subscription based format. I try not to inject too much speculation into my articles, but I could not see Crimecraft running very long on a forced subscription based platform, even if it costs less than most other MMOs. There are just too many other shooters on the market that cost the initial $50, and then cost absolutely nothing to play per month.

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Hello Planetside 2!


planetside2

That’s right! Although the original Planetside downsized to one server this year, it appears that Sony is not yet done with the intellectual property. Yesterday, Sony sent out a mass email to their subscribers telling them that a new game based on the Planetside universe is being planned, and that they would like input directly from the players as to what should be put in.

This is where I admit that I looked at Planetside all wrong. John Smedley had this to say about the (soon to be) series:

John Smedley: PlanetSide fans will be happy We have big things planned in the next 12 months. Were working on something new thats really cool.

Sony Online Entertainment, as I have said, is notorious for keeping MMOs online as long as humanly possible, even if it means cutting every cost except for the electricity required to keep the servers running, as long as the title remains profitable. Although Planetside was a pioneer of its time, one of the first MMOs to bridge the gap between first person shooters on a massive spectrum, the title has aged greatly since its launch. A brand new Planetside would do justice to the game that capitalized on massive battles involving hundreds of players.

It should be noted that Planetside 2 is technically unconfirmed at this point. There is the possibility that this new game may be a complete rework of the original Planetside, reminiscent of what Jagex did with the transition from Runescape to Runescape 2.

Instanced Vs Persistent: The Guild Wars Debate


Ask someone if World of Warcraft is an MMO, and you’re bound to receive a raised eyebrow, and the kind of look you can generally only get when you ask how to download the internet on to your computer so you can go online. World of Warcraft is a persistent world, where players travel across miles of open terrain, fighting varied mobs, gaining levels, fighting other players, completing instances, etc. There is no doubt for many players that World of Warcraft is an MMO.

Continue reading “Instanced Vs Persistent: The Guild Wars Debate”