Blizzard will be hosting the Battle.net World Championships this year in Asia, launching Diablo 3, Mists Of Pandaria and the first StarCraft 2 expansion, maybe even going to Bed, Bath & Beyond if they have enough time, I don’t know.

But one thing that we do know is that because of their full schedule there will be no Blizzcon this year.

In light of our jam-packed schedule, we’ve decided to hold the next BlizzCon in 2013.

Hmm, so does that mean we’ll get no new info about the Titan MMO project either? Or perhaps we’ll see Blizzard at E3? I had predicted Blizzard would reveal what Titan is in 2012, but now with Blizzcon canceled, I don’t know. We’ll see.

Ok, semi-new, it was released last Thursday via the Playstation Pulse webcast, however I just saw it today.  The DUST 514 footage is buried inbetween other videos and previews so I decided to cut out the good part and re-post if for those of you who also missed it.

The video is short, only about 25 seconds and shows off two vehicles in action, a warthog (I know that’s Halo) and a dropship. The rest of the video just shows some mashed up combat scenes.

Check out the DUST 514 gameplay video below.

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Last week BioWare released a video of Game Director James Ohlen talking about some upcoming changes to Star Wars: The Old Republic, one of which was the Legacy System.

Up until now, we knew that the the Legacy system would create a sort of family tree for your main and alt characters and they would gain some sort of benefits. I for one assumed the benefits would be non-combat such as cosmetic gear, titles, mounts or something along those lines, however in the video James clearly states that all characters will gain new abilities and powers.

Being someone that has never played an alt character and who doesn’t plan to, this Legacy System completely gimps players who choose to stick with a single character. The Legacy System almost forces players to start over with an alt in order to remain competitive with other players.

Since SWTOR is all about story and is the game’s main focus, it’s no wonder BioWare would put in place a system that puts a huge incentive for players to start over. However for those of us who are not alt-players, this system makes it pointless to continue playing as we would do so with a permanently gimped character.

What BioWare is trying to do is add replay value to a genre that quite frankly doesn’t need it. Incentivising players to start over should be the last thing any MMORPG should do as the game itself should be engaging enough for players to continue logging in even after completely the story. However when you create a game that has the same old game mechanics and endgame as every MMORPG of the last decade, getting players to start-over is probably the only way to keep your subscribers.

ArenaNet is embracing the Lunar New Year, which is today and according to the Asian zodiac system is the first day of the Year of the Dragon. The dragon embodies passion, independence and ambition which is something that ArenaNet can related to with what they’ve accomplished with Guild Wars 2.

To celebrate the Lunar New Year, ArenaNet has revealed their plans for beta testing and has officially announced that Guild Wars 2 will be released in 2012.

We recently finished our first closed beta test, and we’re now ready to hold progressively larger events. In February we’ll invite select press to participate in beta testing, and in March and April we’ll aggressively ramp up the size of our beta test events so that many of you will have a chance to participate. And of course, this all leads to the release of Guild Wars 2 later this year.

It seems closed beta testing will last at least to April, with open beta and the launch to follow. No hints were dropped as to when GW2 might launch, but it will definitely be in the second half of 2012. Can’t wait!

What is currently taking place on the planet of Illum is an absolute slaughter and travesty. Republic forces, vastly out numbered by Imperials, are being decimated with little to no hope of making any type of stand. With no hope of survival, Republic players are staying clear of Illum, turning it over to Imperials who now sit and wait for those unfortunate Republic players, unaware of the situation, to enter.

That’s the current state of the game for Star Wars: The Old Republic on the PvP world of Illum after the release of Patch 1.1. While the patch brought with it a new flashpoint and operation, more importantly it brought much needed changes to PvP.

Up until now Illum has been a merry-go-round where players, for the most part, would stay clear of each other in order to trade off objectives and farm rewards as quickly as possible. Patch 1.1 however introduced some incentives for players to actually kill each other, except BioWare forgot that Imperial players vaaaastly outnumber Republic players on nearly every server. So instead of a merry-go-round, we have a one sided slaughter where Imperial players are camping Republic respawn areas and hunting down new players when their location is revealed through the new Illum notification system.

But it doesn’t stop there. Imperial players are also farming NPC turrets, which respawn almost instantly, allowing them to rack up HUGE amounts of valor. WTF BioWare!?  PvP rewards for killing NPCs? (UPDATE: Seems this was reported falsely by players, turrets and NPCs do not provide valor)

I’m all for giving players incentives to kill each other and I’m still waiting for some in open PvP zones, but this seems like such a rookie mistake. Hasn’t anyone at BioWare played a PvP MMORPG before?  How about some safe zones or added incentive for the factions that’s outnumber to help bolster their numbers. Or maybe just a faction player cap and definitely no Valor for killing NPCs, that’s just plain idiotic.

If you’re interested in checking out the slaughter, below you can find a video that was recently uploaded by a Republic player.

UPDATE: BioWare has responded by adding a population cap to Illum and are working on correcting the issue where enemy players are able to enter the opposing faction’s safe zone without being killed.

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In an interview with VideoGamer.com, Dave Kosak, the lead quest designer for World of Warcraft, stated that patch 4.3 would be the last major update in relation to Cataclysm before the Mists of Pandaria expansion.

4.3 is definitely the climax of Cataclysm so there’s no more Cataclysm content. Traditionally we’ve had a grace period where we patch the game before the expansion comes out and you get sort of mechanical changes before you get the new expansion content. So we’ll have a world event prior to Mists of Pandaria, but that’s mostly a part of Mists of Pandaria’s launch and it’s not really more Cataclysm content.

It seems the release of Mists of Pandaria is closer then we thought, much closer. Looking at the time-span between each expansion’s release date, we can see that on average it’s slightly less than 2 years.

Burning Crusade > Wrath of the Lich King – 22 months
Wrath of the Lich King > Cataclysm – 25 months
Cataclysm > Mists of Pandaria – 13 months (so far)

With no major patch updates planned, I would doubt Blizzard would wait another 9-10 months for the release of Mist of Pandaria. So does this mean we’ll see a summer release? Perhaps, perhaps not. Blizzard is also known to make gamers wait, so a Nov or Dec release is just as likely.

It’s official, Star Trek Online is now free-to-play and to kick things off Cryptic has released a new launch trailer. Interested readers can head over to the STO website to download the F2P version if they want to try it out.

It’s a pretty generic trailer that doesn’t even mention the fact STO is now free-to-play, which is odd to say the least. You’d think they would have made that the major point of the trailer. Anyway, check out the Star Trek Online F2P launch trailer below.

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Today En Masse Entertainment officially announced May 1st, 2012 as the release date for their upcoming MMO game TERA.

TERA will be available both online and in stores with standard and Collector’s Editions available, although no info has yet be revealed about the CE.

Closed beta signup opened up over the weekend on the TERA website and are expected to begin within a few weeks. For those of you who want to signup to the beta, head over to their beta signup page.

Rumors began spreading yesterday that THQ was planning to cancel all of its 2014 projects, including its MMORPG Warhammer 40K: Dark Millenium, to position itself to be sold. The rumors began when a game industry veteran, Kevin Dent, tweeted that THQ had canceled its entire 2014 lineup.

Today THQ responded to the rumors via Gamasutra stating they are false and have made no plans to cancel War 40k: Dark Millenium.

THQ has not cancelled its 2014 line-up, and has not made any decisions regarding the planned MMO,

As part of the ongoing review of our business, we have made decisions to ensure that the company is strategically addressing the most attractive markets,

As we have previously announced, we have dramatically reduced our commitment to the kids’ boxed games sector which leads to a significantly more focused release schedule moving forward.

Good news if you’re one of the many fans, like myself, that was looking forward to Dark Millenium. Although it’s undeniable THQ is facing some serious financial troubles. This time last year their stock was hovering around $6.00 and today it sits at $0.66. So I don’t think Dark Millenium is in the clear just yet, but at least it’s still alive and kicking.

The first major content update to Star Wars: The Old Republic, called “Kaon Under Siege”, is going live on servers on January 17th and will introduce players to a new flashpoint. Today BioWare released the official trailer for the update which you can view after the jump.

The Rakghoul plague has spread across several worlds and has made it’s way to the small world of Kaon where both Republic and Empire foruces will create an alliance in order to combat the spread of the plague.

The trailer seems to show the intro of the flashpoint with some gameplay later on, although brief. If you played BioWare’s original Star Wars RPG, Knights of the Old Republic, you’ll remember that it featured Rakghoul mutants as well, so it’s a bit of a throw back.

Check out the Kaon Under Siege trailer below.

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