The next patch will bring some class changes, an Onyxia update, and yes some companion pets. WOW is one of those games that have many options, raiding, pvp, questing and non combat pets. The next patch will see the addition of several new pets. Get ready for these:

1-Onyxia Whelping. Just log on during the 5th anniversary and you will receive one.
2- Pandaren monk, always a fan favorite. Now you can have a little Kung Fu master panda following you around.
3- Lil’KT. A mini version of Kel’Thuzad.
4-Zipao Tiger
5-Wind Rider Cub
5-Gryphon Hatchling

Burbank, California – Today The Walt Disney Company surprises the world as well as Wall Street by announcing their $4 Billion deal for comic book giant Marvel Entertainment Group.

I am greatly impressed by this combination of two powerful entertainment companies and look forward to future content released by the new “Walt Disneyized” Marvel Superhero brand. Although many may shrug it off as and move on to bigger and better things, as I am reading more reports I can already tell their will be many changes going forward. How will this affect the average person? In many ways and this is how it looks from my point of view.

The stockholders.

Best seat in the house in my opinion. If you are an owner of Marvel shares (MVL) then you enjoyed a 25% increase in value today, which adds up to a nice $9 premium. That means, for every 100 shares you made 900 bucks. Good for you. As this deal closes, which can take months and still needs to be approved by shareholders and the FTC, as it stands, shareholders will receive $30 in cash and ¾ of a share of Disney (DIS) for every 1 share of Marvel they hold. Your options are to ride it till the end, collect your cash and hopefully Disney is trading around where it is now or higher, you will get roughly a $20 value and some cash in hand. Or…sell now, take the money and run. I am a long term perspective type of guy so I would ride it out.

Video Game Companies.

This deal was mostly about integrating the Marvel brand names into the Disney machine. As reported on Kotaku.com, Disney has already stated that they will be reviewing their video game contracts as they expire. If I was Sega and THQ I would worry, for their contracts rely heavily on video games created from movies made by Marvel that will now be made by Disney.

Good luck with that.

Gazillion: With the new Marvel MMORPG in the works they are now dealing with a whole new creature. Walt Disney has always been very strict on wholesome content and their focus on children’s entertainment. This means it is going to have to be squeaky clean to get past Disney. I have seen my share of adult humor and thongs in MMO’s. Psylocke (left)  has always been my favorite super-booty in Marvel comics, expect less thongs and more full bodysuits if that. Marvel has always portrayed their female heroes as super-sexah and very top heavy. Expect to have the 7 dwarves looking over your shoulder every chance they get and going over your contract with a fine tooth comb. Disney has been famous for their strict code-enforcement and totalitarian tactics.

Moviegoers.

Marvel’s move towards creating their own movie studio has been very successful and profitable for them. Disney has a long line of successful (and not so successful) movies. Expect to see more X-men and more characters coming to fore with their own animated or live action films. Expect to see Spiderman 8, 9, and 10. One thing I would recommend: Do the Secret Wars films and get the story of Spiderman’s black suit right finally, thank you.

Theme park patrons.

Expect to be on more Marvel Superhero rides. Expect your small child to have the Bejuses scared out of him by a life-sized Wolverine. Expect to pay through the nose for that Captain America shield designed plate at the souvenir shop and expect to slap your husband/boyfriend/fiancée for flirting with the life-sized costumed version of Storm. And no h0ney, that is not Halle Berry.

Gamers.

Wait it out. That’s all I can say. Disney Interactive studios haven’t exactly tore up this end of the spectrum with their entertainment business. Bolt??? Cars??? Kim Possible??? No thank you! And as of last month their games have slumped down 20% in sales. Well, for one reason is we really don’t like to play games after Disney movies. We like the rough stuff unless you’re a small young child and in that case you will play anything your parents put in front of you. But if you can make a game where I can Hulk-smash Hannah Montana I might consider it. Expect to see Wolverine in the next Kingdom Hearts game. Not that the KH series are bad games at all, I played one a little and it was actually fun.

Don’t judge me.

MMO Gamers that are waiting for the Marvel MMO.

This could go either way. Gazillion and the new Disney/Marvel mash up might be able to play nice and get along. Or Disney might find some loopholes in the contract and make their lives so miserable they might scrap the whole thing. Either way expect the Marvel MMO to be either totally gimped or don’t be surprised if it doesn’t happen at all. This is one of the reasons why I think Dis had a real interest in Marvel; this plants them into the mmorpg market firmly. How that will play out long term, only time will tell.

Overall I feel that this is a positive move for both parties. Heck, I didn’t know that Marvel was even worth 4 billion smackaroos and I am sure that this was someone’s big payday. As for the public we get to be inundated by even more whitewashed and smarmy Disney entertainment, which now will come in assorted superhero flavors.

Play safe,

Frank

Cataclysm is still some time away, in the meantime we have patch 3.2 to look forward to. One of the big changes in the patch is upgrading Onyxia to a 10 and 25 man dungeon. This comes with new loot, which will have stats for level 80 players but will have the art work of the original loot. Many players love the old style, so this will allow them to keep that old style yet have good stats.

Onyxia will also drop a 310% speed flying mount based on her model. Here are the patch notes of everything on PTR right now, of course subject to change, from Blizzard (Patch Notes) ;

General

• The Brood Mother Returns
  • After years of lurking in her lair battling the many brave adventurers who travelled from afar to challenge her, Onyxia returns to commemorate World of Warcraft’s five-year anniversary.
    • Onyxia has been scaled to offer new challenges to level 80 players and is now available for testing in 10- and 25- player modes.
    • Adjustments have been made to the encounter to keep it fit for modern raiding, but the fundamental experience of fighting the Brood Mother will remain, as will the horror of the Deep Breaths!
    • Some classic items Onyxia offered level 60 players will have their stats adjusted appropriately for level 80 players.
    • Brood of Onyxia, a very rare 310%-speed mount modeled after Onyxia herself will be available for the luckiest of challengers.
• Copied Test Realm characters will no longer be copied with their achievement history in order to better facilitate the character copy process.

PvP

• Battlegrounds
  • Players level 11 and higher will always see a daily Battleground quest, as the quest giver will only offer daily quests for a Battleground in which a player is eligible to participate according to level bracket (i.e. players levels 11-20 will always be offered a Warsong Gulch daily quest, while players levels 11-50 will be offered either an Arathi Basin or a Warsong Gulch daily quest, etc.).

Death Knights

• Pets
  • Gnaw: This death knight ghoul ability now has a 1-minute cooldown.

Druids

• Talents
  • Balance
    • Moonkin Form: This form now also reduces the damage the druid takes while stunned by 15%.
    • Typhoon: The knockback distance from this spell has been increased to match Thunderstorm and the range of the ability has been reduced to 10 yards.
  • Feral Combat
    • Predatory Strikes: This talent now also causes the druid’s finishing moves to provide a 7/13/20% chance per combo point to make the next Nature spell with a cast time below 10 seconds instant cast.

Mages

• Arcane Blast: The buff from using this ability now stacks up to 4 times instead of 3, and each application increases mana cost by 175% instead of 200%. In addition, the duration of the buff has been reduced to 6 seconds.
• Talents
  • Arcane
    • Missile Barrage: The effect from triggering this talent now removes the mana cost of Arcane Missiles. In addition, the chance for Arcane Blast to trigger this talent is now 8/16/24/32/40%. All other listed spells continue to have a 4/8/12/16/20% chance to trigger it.

Paladins

• Righteous Fury: The bonus threat from Holy spells caused by this talent has been reduced from 90% to 80%.
• Talents
  • Protection
    • Blessing of Sanctuary: This blessing now grants 10% strength in addition to its current effects. Also, the strength and stamina bonuses from this blessing will no longer be lost when Blessing of Kings is removed.
    • Judgements of the Just: The reduction in cooldown to Hammer of Justice provided by this talent has been reduced to 5/10 seconds instead of 10/20 seconds.
    • Touched by the Light: This talent now provides 20/40/60% of the paladin’s strength as spell power instead of 10/20/30% of the paladin’s stamina.
  • Retribution
    • Seal of Command: This ability now chains to strike up to 2 additional targets when it is triggered by an attack that can only strike a single target.

Rogues

• Envenom’s scaling has been increased from 7% to 9% of attack power per combo point.
• Fan of Knives: The damage done by this ability has been reduced by 30%.
• Talents
  • Assassination
    • Master Poisoner: Now also provides a 33/66/100% chance of preventing Envenom from consuming Deadly Poison.
  • Combat
    • Throwing Specialization: This talent no longer causes Fan of Knives to interrupt spellcasting.
  • Subtlety
    • Honor Among Thieves: A 1-second cooldown is now enforced on how often a rogue can gain combo points from his party via this talent.

Warriors

• Talents
  • Arms
    • Sword Specialization: Now has a 2/4/6/8/10% chance to proc an extra attack, up from 1/2/3/4/5%.

Dungeons & Raids

• Shadowfang Keep
  • Wailing Guardsman: Screams of the Past will no longer have multiple applications on a target. Recast time has been increased.

Items

• Druid Tier-8 Healer 4-Piece Set Bonus: The amount of healing this set bonus grants on the initial cast of Rejuvenation has been reduced by 50%. In addition, this set bonus no longer has strange interactions with Harold’s Rejuvenating Broach.
• Glyphs
  • Glyph of Mind Flay: This glyph no longer reduces the magnitude of the movement reduction on the Mind Flay victim.
  • Glyph of Typhoon: This glyph now increases the range on Typhoon by 20 yards in addition to its current effects.
• Libram of Obstruction: The buff to block value from this relic is now exclusive with the buff to block value from Libram of the Sacred Shield; it is impossible to have both buffs at once.
• Libram of the Sacred Shield: The block value buff from this relic has been increased to match its item level.

User Interface

• The size of the Focus Frame can now be adjusted via the Interface Options menu.
• For additional notes on Lua and XML changes please visit the UI & Macros forum.

Bug Fixes

• Arcane Missiles: Ranks 12 and 13 will now properly cause players to enter combat.
• Balance of Power: Misleading tooltip reworded. The tooltip previously reported an incorrect value for the increased chance to hit with spells. The actual benefit of the talent is unchanged.
• Demonic Circle: This ability now correctly removes the snaring component of Frostfire Bolt.
• Divine Aegis: Ranks 1 and 2 now work with Holy Nova.
• Hand of Freedom: This ability now correctly removes the snaring component of Infected Wounds and Frostfire Bolt.
• Hunter Tier-9 2-Piece Bonus: Critical damage from Serpent Sting will now work properly with the Mortal Shots and Expose Weakness talents.
• Master’s Call: This ability now correctly removes the snaring component of Infected Wounds, Frostfire Bolt, and Slow.
• Mote of Flame: Corrected typo in tooltip.
• Shard of Flame: Corrected typo in tooltip.
• Trap Mastery: Tooltip now states the correct amount of snakes summoned.
• Val’anyr, Hammer of The Ancient Kings: This item’s special bonus now works properly with Prayer of Mending and the heal-over-time effect triggered by Flash of Light cast on Sacred Shield targets.
• Vanish: This ability now correctly removes the snaring component of Frostfire Bolt.

According to the Courthouse News Service, Turbine is sueing Atari over the pair’s deal for Dungeons & Dragons Online.  The original post is full of courtroom jargon so we will break it down for you.

Atari is being sued by Turbine, developer of DDO and the move to the free variant, Eberron Unlimited, for failing to allocate the correct funds to the project.  Turbine alleges further, that by doing so the publisher knowingly compromised the title’s future, and hamstrung the developer from performing its contractual duties.  All while accepting payments from Turbine.  “Atari knew it would not perform its obligations under the agreements and knew it wouldpretextually seek to declare Turbine in breach of the agreements”, the document states.

Furthermore, it seems that Atari is seeking to end the partnership with Turbine, a move that Turbine says would put the company’s “past investment” in jeopardy.  Not to mention the fact that such a move “threatens the goodwill that Turbine has developed with the thousands of players who play “DDO: Stormreach” and are expected to use the “DDO: Unlimited” service.”

Seems that the fate of DDO:EU is now up to the courts.  This could get ugly.  Very ugly.

[Edit] To cheer you up, here are some new screenshots.

Torn between other games, money and life, iTZKooPA weighs the fate of a single Champions Online subscriber.

MMO gaming is not a cheap habit by any means.  Nor is it one that’s easy to pick up and put down.  These games require days worth of play to “finish”.  An amount of time that can easily be pushed into multiple months, or compacted into a few sleepless nights.  World of Warcraft is my main game, it isn’t going anywhere, but I do enjoy dabbling in other universes.  I’m in it for the stories.  The ones produced by the content creators, and the ones experienced as a player.  Considering that Champions Online is about as far away from Warcraft as you can get it seemed like a nobrainer, right?  Yet,  I remained on the fence about Champions Online for some time.

It’s not that I didn’t enjoy my time in the Closed Beta, or Open Beta, I did.  My indecisive attitude had almost nothing to do with the title’s small faults.  I, like Inktomi, have other things going on that have been stopping me from picking up that 6-month subscription deal.  First off, there’s my subscription fee to World of Warcraft, a game that will take up most of my time until something earth shattering comes along.  Then there’s the fact that Dungeon & Dragons Online: Eberron Unlimited goes live just a week after Champions.  And that title is free.  Then there is the list of chores – life, work and housekeeping – that one has to deal with on a daily basis.  I took the deal anyways, and here’s why.

The character creation process cannot be over estimated, or over appreciated.  Making an ugly toon may not take much skill, but players have been doing absolutely amazing things with the editor.  Want to play a Watchmen? Done. A WoW Succubus?  Saw it in game.  How about a BSDM character? Scarily possible.  In far too many varieties.  Oh, and you can craft a completely original, normal looking super hero if you want.  Just in case you’re the boring, unimaginative type.

Fear not, I’d never subscribe to a title just because I can make a samurai in a french maid outfit (saw it).  You also get to customize your character’s starting attributes, or powers as they are known.  Like the general design, you can start from a basicarchetype or go all out and create from scratch.  The ability to customize your toon, both visually and mechanically, to just great lengths captured my attention.  And the rest of the title has managed to hold on to it.

I haven’t played a ton, I never do in betas.  Certainly not enough for a full review, but during my 10 hours the game has held my attention with its shiny visuals, arcade-y combat and refreshing (to a long standing fantasy MMO subscriber) stories.  Champions is by no means groundbreaking in its originality, technical aspects or game design, but it’s a solid mix of old ideas with new twists.  That’s why I took the plunge and closed the deal on a six month subscription despite my misgivings.

What does this mean for you readers?  It means that you can expect in-depth coverage of Champions Online from MMOCrunch for the foreseeable future.

Get your tights ready.

Yesterday at Blizzcon the new expansion for world of Warcraft was confirmed, the reports are everywhere. The confirmation arrives with a plethora of information about old zone changes, class changes and new races. Here are some of the features that will change Azeroth for ever;

Two new races Worgen and Goblins have been confirmed. The will each have their own starting zones that level from 1-15. Here are the racials that they have been given;

Goblins
• Rocket Jump – Activate your rocket belt to jump up to 20 yards, every 2 min
• Rocket Barrage – Fire your belt rockets at an enemy within 30 yards, every 2 min. (Shared cool down with Rocket Jump)
• Time is money – Cash in on a 1% increase to attack and casting speed.
• Best Deals Anywhere – Best possible gold discount, regardless of reputation.
• Pack Hobgoblin – Calls in your personal servant, allowing you bank access every 30 min.
• Better Living Through Chemistry – Alchemy skill +15, Your potions give more health / mana
• Goblins can be all classes except Paladin or Druids

Worgen
• Darkflight – Activate your true form, increasing movement speed by 70% for 6 sec, every 3 min.
• Viciousness – Increase damage by 1%.
• Aberration – Reduced duration on Curses and Diseases used against you by 15%.
• Flayer – Skinning skill +15, you skin creature fast, and you don’t even need a knife.
• Worgen can be all classes except Paladins or Shamans

It has been mentioned that the old world has been changed, but it has been drastically and completely changed. Here is the story behind the change;

 
While the attention of the Horde and Alliance remained fixed upon Northrend, an ancient evil has been lying dormant within Deephome, the domain of earth in the Elemental Plane. Hidden away in a secluded sanctuary, the corrupted Dragon Aspect Deathwing has waited, recovering from the wounds of his last battle against Azeroth, nursing his hatred for the inferior creatures that infest the surface realm…and biding his time until he can reforge the world in molten fire.

Soon, Deathwing the Destroyer will return to Azeroth, and his eruption from Deephome will sunder the world, leaving a festering wound across the continents. As the Horde and Alliance race to the epicenter of the cataclysm, the kingdoms of Azeroth will witness seismic shifts in power, the kindling of a war of the elements, and the emergence of unlikely heroes who will rise up to protect their scarred and broken world from utter devastation.

The face of Azeroth is altered forever as the destruction left in Deathwing’s wake reshapes the land and reveals secrets long sealed away. Players will be able to re-experience familiar zones across Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms, rewrought by the cataclysm and filled with new opportunities for adventure.

 
Everyone has been tired of vanilla wow for quite some time. Blizzard always a step ahead of the competition has remade the old world. Here are some of the new features;
• The old world will be much darker than it was to make heroism and brotherhood more meaningful like Warcraft should be.
• Every zone will be revamped with new quests, items, and art. The old world will be a brand new experience and you won’t have to deal with the annoying agility/spirit quest rewards anymore.
• Azeroth is now flyable. Pretty much all the zones will be changed to some extent, some of them like Elwynn Forest won’t change too much but others like The Barrens will be sundered in two by Deathwing.
• The Wailing Caverns are now a lush and verdant Area.
• Desolace now has a lot more waters and a lot of plants can be seen in the screenshots.
• The Horde finally conquered Southshore.
• Auberdine was destroyed and the night elves have set up a new camp north of it. Garrosh wants to expand the horde and has built a fortified camp at the south of the zone.
• Stonetalon has been cleaned by the Goblins, Azshara will be the new Goblin zone, and are using quarries in the mountains of Azshara to build their town.
• Apparently Orgrimmar will be rebuilt and reinforced with steel; it now looks a lot like Garrosh strongholds…
• Undercity has been redesigned to be flyable; it now looks much more impressive from the outside.

Seven new zones have been added to the game here is a brief description on those zones;

Starting Areas
• The Worgen and Goblins starting zone level goes from 1 to 15. The Worgen will start in Gilneas and the Goblins on the Lost Isles.

Vasj’ir
• Sunken City of Vashj’ir will be an underwater zone and was the home city of Lady Vashj before the original sundering; this is a gateway to the Abyssal Maw. Going through the Abyssal Maw will take you to the Elemental Plane of Water, even if the zone will be underwater you will be walking on the sea floor here, new underwater mounts will be available and should have the same speed as normal flying mounts.

Deepholm
• Deepholm will be the new hub of the expansion, you will have portals here to let you teleport to Hyjal, Uldum, etc … The Twilight’s Hammer now serves Deathwing and have brought him back to full health in the Temple of Earth at the center of the map.
• Deepholm isn’t really connected to Azeroth; the connection is where Deathwing emerged from the ground.

Uldum
• Uldum will have at least two dungeons and is heavily inspired from Egypt. The sea at the west of Tanaris was just an illusion created by the Titan and Uldum is actually a brand new zone. It is rumored to hold a super weapon. Uldum is also the home of the Tolvir, a race of stone-like cats created by the titans.

Plane of Fire
• Ragnaros used the cataclysm to come back from the Plane of Fire where we sent him and is now sieging the World Tree in Mount Hyjal to burn it down. Malfurion is back from the Emerald Dream. The whole zone (Hyjal) will make extensive use of phasing.

Twilight Highlands
• The Twilight Highlands will feature Grim Batol; Deathwing literally broke open Grim Batol as he emerged from the ground. This is the new Twilight’s Hammer base in Azeroth and both Horde and Alliance will have a new port town with boats here. The Red Dragonflight is still here but has been pushed back to the west of the zone near the Wetlands.

These changes are definably drastic but also definitely needed. This expansion will change our virtual world forever, but also give other MMO companies something to think about. I am looking forward to this expansion. Leveling alts in a brand new, darker Azeroth will be incredible.

Anaheim, Calafornia – Blizzcon 2009: Recently there has been some speculation on if the leaked information surrounding Blizzards latest World of Warcraft expansion “Cataclysm” was official.

Now it’s official.

Today Blizzard released details of it’s world changing expansion Cataclsym.

Some of the new features of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm include:

Now, it’s time to believe the hype. Do I want to play World of Warcraft again? I considered it for 10-30 seconds, I have a soft spot for goblins.

See you ingame,

Frank

Needless to say I was intrigued by the indie movie Second Skin and the people that were portrayed in the film. A benefit of the wonder of the internet is the ability to actually locate people that you would never know how to get a hold of. It works wonderfully to reunite old family members, rekindle old relationships and even get in touch with old school members.

It also works great for journalists, luckily I ran into Dan Bustard on Facebook. When I approached him asking if it was who I thought it was he was very apprehensive, he first asked me if he owed me money. After awhile he opened up and he agreed to an interview. And here it is…

Me: Did you think it was possible to get addicted to a video game?

Dan: Dude, I’ve been gaming hardcore since Atari 2600 back in the early 80’s of course I took a few reality farts during the process, you know go to school, hang out, drink, get stone, work, watch TV, movies, sports, girls, parties, relationships, had my real life fun.. I took some time out of my destiny to play “real life” as others see it, but addicted, no I don’t buy into the whole “addiction life style”

Me: At what point did you feel you had a problem?

Dan: When I stopped getting ^%&%^.

Me: What was your bottom? What did it feel like?

Dan: My bottom had nothing to do with the game it was when I injured my back, it felt terrible and took over 2 years to rehab; luckily I had WoW to keep me company during the times I couldn’t move around much.

Me: What was it like at Liz Woolleys sober house?

Dan: There’s nothing sobering about Liz’s house, she’s a very domineering &^$% that is easily amused by the hardships of others. Christ she couldn’t even by a pack of gum without giving the cashier a hard time.

Me: She called you a “gamer”, and you were upset by this. Was it because you were trying to give it up and didn’t feel it fit anymore?

Dan: Not upset at being called a gamer but the way she went about it. She used me to parade around like I was a mental hand job that she could only heal. I think her thing is all about the attention she gets..

Me: Even though you left not on the best of terms, when you returned home you eventually turned away from gaming. Why?

Dan: I had other things to do, I game hard for 12 hours a day or even more but what isn’t mentioned in SS is that I constantly stated I would only play for about a 1 to 3 months then take a few months off, so I could never be in any hardcore guild because I wasn’t a dedicate gamer… the whole suicide thing wasn’t just because of gaming it was because of my life in general.

Me: you feel that a seed was planted back at ‘Ole Woolleys House?

Dan: Yea a seed of hypocrisy, I really love how she tells everyone that online relationships aren’t real but yet she was an active dater on yahoo personals. So imo she’s in no position to judge other peoples online relationships, at least people in WoW do a ton of playing and communicating before showing up on each others door step.

Me: How did you get caught up in “Second Skin“?

Dan: At Woolley’s house, I was already doing interviews for networks like NBC etc… Talking about gaming, I then hooked up with Liz and she had this brilliant idea of us paring up for the press. Which was why I went to her house, she lied about so much, she would tell the media that she bought the house next to hers for gaming addicts show them the place etc.. the whole time she was renting the rooms out to Penn State kids.. there were no gamers in that house, I wasn’t allowed to stay in there.. She also made me sign a lease. She degrade me in front of people, including a friend she worked with that was my age.

Me: You do realize that at certain points of the movie you are not portrayed at your best. Weren’t you embarrassed? Why did you do it?

Dan: No I like looking like an ass in front of people, I don’t know why I did it, I just did…

Me: Did you think that being part of Second Skin was attributing to your changes at all?

Dan: No.

Me: What do you feel about video games now?

Dan: I think they’re great! I think if a person is a gamer then do what you do best and game hard.

Me: Have you read any of the feedback from the “mmo gaming community” about the movie Some of the feedback was negative, why do you think that was?

Dan: I don’t know maybe they didn’t like the movie.

Me: Certain bloggers and podcasters called actors in second skin “nerds”, “geeks” and “sanctimonious freaks”. Why do you think they reacted like that? They play the same games as you, how does that make you feel?

Dan: Because some people can’t get a hard-on unless they are putting someone else down. MMO’s all come down to one thing, “who has the bigger ePenis” nothing else matters, so these same geeks calling other people geeks are doing so because they feel their own ePen shrinking because they missed a chance to be in a movie.

Me: If you were clinically diagnosed with having ‘video game addiction’ and could file a lawsuit against someone, who would it be?

Dan: I don’t believe in addiction so no I would not.

Me: Is your friend/roomate in the movie with you still playing wow as he was?

Dan: No.

Me: Why do you think they made “second skin” was it a message?

Dan: Young producers trying to make a name for them and so a ground floor opportunity in making a movie about MMO’s, it’s just business to them.

Me: If you knew that other gamers like yourself that might suffer from ‘video game addiction’ might see this, what would you want to say to them?

Dan: That they aren’t addicted, that perhaps they are right where they ought to be and shouldn’t worry what others think so much.

Me: Would you do it all over again?

Dan: Hell yea, I’m downloading WoW as I type this.

Me: Do you still game at all? How much?

Dan: Not that often, I played PotC a few weeks ago for maybe 4 or 5 hours, it’s an okay game but lacks depth.

Me: If there anything you would like to add that I missed?

Dan: Yea if your world is virtual but keep being disrupted by the real world then you need to make the real world bow down to you so you can keep gaming.. good luck it’s hard enough to balance one reality let alone two. &^$&’em them all and game hard!

There you have it, from the hardest of the ‘Ardcore gamers. The question of if pathological video game overuse (as the medical society calls it) is still a reality or some virtual old wives tale. Coming from Dan’s point of view it doesn’t exist and tells the community to “game hard.”

Thank you Dan for being honest and collaborating on my blog. See you all  ingame!

Play safe,

Frank

This is what happens when an angry female gets a hold of the character creation system in Champions Online. Continued…

CCP CEO Hilmar Petursson - Photo courtesy Gamasutra.com

Cologne, Germany – CCP Ceo Hilman Petursson announces during his keynote address at GDC Europe, the companies entrance into the console market with a new MMO in developement: Dust 514.

The project being developed in secret at CCP Shanghai for the past three years is connected to the EVE uninverse as a standalone MMORPG. The new Dust 514 is a new real-time  strategy/FPS hybrid that will enable players to take their battle to the field on planets from the EVE Universe. EVE since 2003 has only given players the opportunity to claim soveriegnity in certain regions and to create their own space stations, Dust 514 will now allow players to battle over planets in the EVE-verse.

The trailer, containing the tagline “one universe, one war” showing fast paced FPS action, CCP has detailed that players of the original PC game will be able to “fund mercanaries and give them assets” as they keep the fight in the skies above.

CCP’s Petursson jokes, “While the fleet does the flying, the infantry does the dying” as a referance to the ’97 science fiction film, Stargate Troopers. He (Petursson) hopes that “these communities will meld over time”, expecting specific Dust 514 corporatiosn, then bridging into the social structures of existing EVE online player owned corporations.

When Petursson was questioned on what console he declined comment, but did assure reporters that it will be “current generations technology.”

I just can’t wait!