Before I begin with my list allow me, if you will, to explain that I am basing this entirely off the “cool” factor of the class. Any actual functionality or usability isn’t really taken into account. Not that we wouldn’t want to judge them based on that, but really, with the amount of changes that occurs in any given MMORPG these days, the same class today probably won’t be the same class tomorrow, ya know? So. . . ya. Enjoy!

Coming in at number 5: The Necromancer! As seen in Everquest, Everquest 2, Guild Wars, Diablo 2, etc. The Necromancer has always been one of the coolest classes to be introduced to any game, let alone an MMORPG. The ability to raise the dead and command them to slaughter and maim your enemies has thrilled millions for at least a decade in what can only be dozens of MMORPGs. Given it’s indescribable cool-factor I think it’s safe to say that it deserves our number 5 spot.

Coming in at number 4: The Paladin! As seen in Everquest 1/2, World of Warcraft, etc. Despite being almost the exact opposite of what the Necromancer is, the Paladin still holds it’s weight in “cool”. Being a badass warrior of light has plenty of perks that one can only dream of. Despite all this though, if you take away the magic, the name, and the mystique, they still wear some of the coolest armor ever designed. Seriously. . . what is it about Paladin’s and awesome-ly designed protective wear?

Coming in at number 3: The Rogue/Assassin! As seen in almost every MMORPG out there. The Rogue/Assassin is probably one of the most under-represented classes across the board. Developers usually neglect giving their clothing any sort of “flair” due to them being mostly invisible. Nobody really wants to be seen as a Rogue/Assassin anyways right? Despite being accessory handicapped the Rogue/Assassin makes up for it by having some of the coolest skills in the game. One needs only look as far as the “Backstab” or “Assassinate” skill to know how devilishly cool this class is.

Coming in at number 2: The Druid! As seen in Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, World of Warcraft, etc. The Druid is, by far, one of the coolest classes. Not because of their inherent hippy-like nature (haha I’m punny!) either. The main reason why Druid’s are so f-ing cool is because, most of the time, they can shape-shift into some badass creatures for the sole purpose of mauling their enemies. Who wants to shapeshift into a Were-Bear? That’s right. . . everybody does. Aside from that their easy-on-the-eyes nature motif for clothing doesn’t hurt either.

NUMBER ONE: The Priest/Cleric! Seriously, this class doesn’t get major “cool” points for their style, or their skills. No, no, no. This class gets our number 1 spot for one reason. They keep us the hell alive, and anybody who helps keep me alive is not only my best friend ever, but also very cool. So the next time you are out wandering around the MMO of your choice and you see a random Priest/Cleric happen by remember to stop, and admire how cool that guy must be, afterall, if has hasn’t saved your own ass today he has probably saved somebody elses.

So that’s it. Those are our top 5 classes. Of course, we have not put in any classes for games that have not yet been released. As much as I wanted to add a couple Age of Conan or Warhammer Online classes I felt that it just wouldn’t be fair to the already released games. Thanks for taking a few minutes to read this! I’d love to hear what your favorite class is!

I ask this question because it seems like nobody else in the industry is going to ask it. Why is Cryptic Studios making Champions Online? It baffles me that they would even think about persuing another game in this direction. Don’t get me wrong, I liked City of Heroes and all that, and I fully believe in Cryptic’s ability to make awesome MMORPGs based on superheroes, but it just seems so odd. Allow me to start from the beginning.

A few months ago, Cryptic and NCSoft agreed on a deal to transfer ownership of City of Heroes/Villains over to NCSoft. Before this, the game was published by NCSoft, and was owned by Cryptic. Cryptic then announced that they had been working on a new MMORPG, one that was not yet announced. Of course, everybody, at that time, knew that Cryptic had entered into a deal with Marvel and Microsoft to create a new super heroes MMO based off the Marvel comics entitled: Marvel Universe. It was naturally assumed that this was the “unnamed” project that Cryptic would be working on (MMOCrunch.com was no different). As it turns out, however, Marvel Universe got the axe by Microsoft and the title slipped into oblivion. Of course a few days after we all heard about the Marvel Universe news, we also heard about Champions Online.

Now back to my original question. Why Champions Online? Why would Cryptic, who already had a good relationship running a successful MMORPG for NCSoft suddenly sell their old property to them to begin work on a new IP based roughly around the same idea? City of Heroes was a success, and still is (130,000 subs and counting). Perhaps it was because NCSoft refused to allow Cryptic to make a City of Heroes sequel. Let’s face it, most of the time, MMORPGs do not need/warrant a sequel. They usually aren’t profitable and players from the first game don’t want to lose everything they achieved to begin work on a new one for the sequel. So, is that it? Was Champions Online birthed simply because of NCSoft’s refusal to support a sequel? Perhaps Champions Online was actually City of Heroes 2, but upon rejection of the idea late last year by NCSoft they decided to continue to persue it under a different name. We’ll probably never really know. . .

Of course, a lot of my article here is speculations and conjecture. I don’t know why exactly we have what we have today. However, it still seems a bit odd to me that Cryptic would want to sell City of Heroes and then go out and start a new MMORPG that would put itself in direct competition with their old IP. Something must have happened that caused the split between the two. But if not my theory then what else could have happened?

Its been a while since our last comic, so today was have a new one.  Hope you like it.

Click the image for full view 

This year at GDC Blizzard dropped some more hints that indeed a Starcraft MMO could be on the way. At the “Future of MMOs” talk, President of Blizzard, Rob Pardo, had this to say when asked “Can sci-fi be as successful as fantasy in the MMO space?”

Provided by WanderingGoblin.com

Kim stated that IPs that are easy to identify, like Star Trek or Star Wars, make this problem disappear. Players know what to expect in a Star Wars universe, and it could be successful. Looking sidelong at Rob Pardo, he indicated that a Starcraft MMO, for example, would be immediately understood by players and, “I’d probably play that instead of WoW.” (both the panelists and the audience laughed at this exchange.)

Rob Pardo had a tinge of palpable disdain for the question. He reminded everyone that in the 1970s, people thought sci-fi couldn’t be successful on TV or in the movies. “Then a little film called Star Wars came along and it revolutionized everything.” According to Pardo, a big, successful sci-fi MMO simply hasn’t been seen yet. You just have to have the right product, and it could easily be just as succesful as WoW.

I have to be frank in saying that three WanderingGoblin.com staffers attended this panel discussion, and Pardo’s comments had the three of us raising our eyebrows and looking sidelong at one another. It wasn’t simply the answer he gave, one that was very strongly in support of the idea of a big sci-fi MMO. It was the tone he took when answering it. While we can’t say that Pardo was intending to drop a hint about Blizzard’s unannounced, in-the-works MMO, it is obvious that Blizzard thinks that a sci-fi MMO like Starcraft could be a big success.

With World of Warcraft showing its age, Blizzard knows that if they want to continue being kings of the MMORPG world they will need to branch out. Doing a Diablo MMO might make more sense in the fact that Diablo is already a RPG, so turning it into a MMORPG would be a natural transition. However by doing a Starcraft MMO, Blizzard can really do something completely new. A Starcraft MMO would most certainly be very very different from WOW. Only time will tell, but as I said months ago, I’m putting my money on a Starcraft MMO.

Over the years that WoW has had it’s mega-success very few people have stopped to look at the pieces that have been left in the games wake. It’s very easy to look at the numbers of subscribers and amount of profits they rake in each quarter and claim that the industry as a whole is growing and is very healthy, but is it really? In all of WoW’s success have they almost single handedly killed the industry?

Just to clear things up before I continue, I like WoW. To me, it is a very polished game that was loads of fun. While I don’t currently retain my subscription to it I did play for about 2 years. . . I even had a druid at level 70. Please refrain from calling me a WoW-hating fanboy of another game. All around I am a huge fan of Blizzard. I had to get that out of the way, sorry.

Anyways, back on topic, I am sure if you were to ask a number of developers the primary reason for their games floundering or not acheiving the same level of success as WoW they would blame it on the extraordinary success of the World of Warcraft. So, are these developers just bitter and envious of success, or do they actually hold some merit of truth? Look at it this way: Lord of the Rings Online is often touted as a very successful MMORPG. However, that said, if you look at the recently updated MMOGChart.com website you notice that LoTRO still only has around 300,000 subscribers. This is a far cry from the 10,000,000 that WoW boasts in it’s ever increasing fold. How is a game that is called a “break-out” hit in 2007 only account for 3% of what WoW has?

This, of course, isn’t to say that all industry flops are WoW’s fault. There have been plenty of stinkers released that failed on their own accord. Vanguard launched way to early and as such became known as one of the biggest flops in the history of MMORPGs. WoW had nothing to do with that. However, for games such as Tabula Rasa, and Pirates of the Burning Sea, both decent games that are inherently different from WoW, is the success of the World of Warcraft causing shortages of subscriptions for these games? Probably, both of these games were funded heavily, and launched with hopes to gain a sizable subscriber base to make the games profitable. Unfortunately, I doubt either one is profitable right now, and that only spells out one thing: less investor interest.

My entire point with this article is basically to look at the success of WoW, and the flops of almost every other MMORPG in comparison, with the eyes of an investor. If you had money to sink into an MMORPG property would you, honestly, be willing to take such a gamble? Afterall, the chances are extremely high at this point that the game will not achieve the same level of success as WoW, and as such will never gain the same amount of money. In fact, you probably will never see a return on that investment ever again. . . Is that something you really want to invest money into? Probably not, and I am sure this has turned away at least one investor prior to my writing of this. I guess the only thing we can truly hope for in the de-thronement of WoW into a more stabilized MMO economy by the likes of Warhammer Online and Age of Conan.  

Thanks for reading.

Its been a few weeks now since I’ve rejoined the forces of Middle Earth to fight against the evil within it and I have to say I am rather enjoying myself this second time around. Could it be all the new content that was added during my time away that has sparked these feelings? Quite possibly. I’ve played through Book 11 and am in the beginning chapters of Book 12 and I have to stay that the storyline is very enjoyable to go through. Aside from that, my Kin also has its own house now which I visited for the first time yesterday. Nothing big, but it was cool to see the neighborhood. Book 12 also introduced new clothing options and while I myself have not been playing dress up, its nice to see people walking around that all don’t look the same.

There is one major new raid, The Rift in Angmar that is a hot spot for some of the best new items in the game, both drops and barter items.  This raid was added in Book 11, not 12, but since I missed Book 11, its still new to me.  It’s a 12 person raid where the end boss is a Balrog! Common, you know the huge fierly creature that Gandalf fought in the first Book of LoTR while traveling through the mines of Moria. Very cool new raid quest.

I have also noticed that PvP has become much more popular. I’ve yet to go to Ettenmore where some sort of raid wasn’t going on. Aside from the beefed up action, there are actual good items now that you can obtain by participating in the raids and PvP, which most likely is the reason why its become more popular.

Overall I’m happy that I went back to LOTRO. Oh and if you couldn’t tell that hunky elf hunter is me Damn check out those guns.

As more and more information gets revealed by SOE’s upcoming Agency “MMO” the more I feel like the game is being mainly designed for the PS3 crowd. Which is all well and good, but, really, I am a PC gamer at heart, and as such I like my MMORPGs to be designed for the PC first, and then the consoles or whatever. Of course, I have no problem being proven wrong, but as I see it now the Agency is looking like a no-go for me. But that’s fine, because there is another Spy MMO being developed right now: Global Agenda.

Originally announced way back in March of 2007 (about a year ago) the game is being developed by an independent studio called Hi-Rez Studios. This is their first game, but a quick look at their website’s “About Us” section reveals that they have got a lot of talent under their belt with people who have worked for games ranging from City of Heroes to Oblivion. Pretty good games if you ask me.

The game is being designed using the Unreal Engine, which means that the game will have a solid base to run off of. This is hopefully an indication of the type of gameplay we will be able to enjoy. It should help realize some of the robust features that Hi-Rez has planned for their launch title which includes:

• Create, extensively customize, and develop an agent character that is unique within the world. Protect your secret identity through covert activity while increasing your skills and influence.
• Join a player-created agency, compete in a technology race for advanced weaponry, and advance your own agenda.
• Engage in solo, co-op, and team objective-based missions against non-player and other player-created agencies.
• Experience a dynamic world of espionage and intrigue, where in-game events and locations are influenced by the actions of players and agencies.

No other information has been revealed about the game. A trailer was released last year as well, but it contained very little details. What we do know is that Spy gameplay mixed with Science fiction equal one bad ass Spyience-Fiction MMORPG. Oh! One last note about the game: expect instanced zones. Lots of em. . .

I’m trying to get an interview or press kit available for our website currently. Hopefully we get that sometime soon. Until then enjoy this interview done last May.

Finally a MMO that can compete graphically with the big boys, I’m looking in your direction FPS. Blue Mars, by Avatar Reality was first announced back in March of 2007 and has just released the first screenshots of the game. While they look very similar to Crysis ala exotic island and beautiful foliage, but it’s more than just that.

Blue Mars is a online massively multiplayer virtual world (MMVW), not a MMORPG. From what I can tell the game is closer to Second Life then it is World of Warcraft, concentrating more on the social aspects of online gaming then just fighting and killing. The game is set on a terraformed Mars in the year 2177, so you can just imaging what cool stuff you’ll be able to do. From some of the screenshots, it looks like the game will be highly customizable. You can go shopping and pimp out your online self with what ever cloths and accessories your little heart desires and I’m sure you’ll be able to do the same thing to your house or apartment.  There hasn’t been much discussion on the actual game play yet, so I’m not really sure what you can and can’t do, but realistic physics will be a part of what ever it is.

Blue Mars is currently scheduled to go into Beta late 2008, so look for it sometime 2009.

For as long as I can remember MMORPGs have had a monthly payment plan, decent ones at least. Back in the days when I used to play Ultima Online and Nexus these were new ideas and ones that were strictly taboo amongst mainstream society. Hell, you couldn’t even really play normal video games back then without getting odd looks from most people. So, suffice it to say, paying a monthly bill to play one was virtually (haha I’m punny) unheard of. Of course, these games were both about $10 a month, a simple fee that I didn’t think much of at the time. So how did $14.99 become the standard for mainstream MMOs today?

Well, there isn’t exactly a history of MMO subscription fees lying around the intertubes. If there was it would make answering this whole question a hellofalot easier. So, what I am putting forward next is very clearly my own theories and conjectures. That said, I do believe the 14.99 price fee began with the inception of Everquest by Sony Online Entertainment.

Everquest is touted as being the first fully 3d MMORPG (I’m not sure if it actually was or wasn’t). Because the game was one of the first it was justified as being more “costly” to produce. Now, the cost to produce and develop a game is largely dependent on the technology of the time. We probably will never know exactly how much it cost Sony to make the game, but given the technology available it could have been less expensive to develop the title than even Ultima Online. However, due to it being introduced as cutting edge technology Sony was able to use that as a fall-back in order to secure the right to charge more than it’s 2d brothers of the time being. When the game launched in 1999 you had to pay a $14.99 monthly charge. When the game launched in 1999, under 989 studios, the monthly fee was $9.89, charged after the name of the company. However, when SOE bought the game a few years later they upped the charge to $14.95. No specific reason was given for this change, but a look at other MMOs showed that the cost was increasing industry-wide. Mythic had released their first game for $12.95, therefor it became beneficial for Sony to up their cost as well.

So, how did this affect the rest of mainstream MMO society? Well there is a very simple answer for that, Everquest was successful. Because the the popularity of the title it gave Sony, and other developers such as Turbine and Blizzard, validation that $14.99 was a good fee to use to charge gamers monthly. Had Everquest failed we’d probably see games still hovering around the $10 monthly mark. Now, this goes without saying, that as more and more MMOs come out the $14.99 charge could be more. Especially when a certain assumed mega-blockbuster title is hinting at that very possibility. Who knows? Anything is possible. . . I’m just theorizing here.

EDIT: Changed some thinsg to better portray what actually happened as opposed to going off my own theories. If you spot anything else wrong with the article feel free to leave em in the comments. Like I said, this was written almost entirely off my own theories and conjecture, a lot of this pricing history was buried in the intertubes somewhere. . . I couldn’t find it.

You don’t play for a couple of days and Turbine goes and does its next big content updated.   Right now I’m downloading the update which looks likes its going to take a least an hrs, after that I’m going to jump on and see just how cool some of the new features are.  I’ll be sure to post a pic of my rocken Elf hunter after I pimp him out with some new threads.