MMO Week in Review: Hello to the MMOs of 2023

There’s never much news in the last week of the year, but we still had some bright spots – most notably the reveal that throne and liberty is now aiming for a global launch on PC and consoles in the first half of next year.

Meanwhile we discussed WoWs Endgame issues, grumbling about the state of MMO PvP and reflecting on the importance of value, plus we crowned our annual awards with our MMO of the Year, Best Expansion and Most Anticipated Titles.

Happy New Year everyone! Read on for this week’s very best MMO news and opinion today, as every Sunday since 2010!, in Massively Overpowered’s Weekly Recap!

THE TOP STORIES OF THIS WEEK

WoW factor: World of Warcraft’s mid-expansion endgame zone issue – Hey guys, who’s up for exploring new zones in Dragonflight? Does that sound exciting to you? That’s great, and over the past several years, World of Warcraft has made several additions…

Throne and Liberty announce plans for a global launch on PC and consoles in the first half of 2023 – Last week, Throne and Liberty promised a “Director’s Preview” which indicated the game had something big to say. Sure enough, this preview video premiered and made some big reveals,…

Vague Patch Notes: Loving an MMO isn’t the same as having a personality – There’s a story I always remembered that was shared back then by the now-defunct blog Websnark, so forgive me if I misunderstand the details. But the meat…

From the Depths: Five things to love about World of Warships – I think it’s time to admit it: After almost three years of playing every day, I have no choice but to come to terms with the fact that World of Warships…

Battle or Dragons: The many ways today’s MMOs are failing PvPers – Last week the MassivelyOP writing crew announced their award for the best PvP MMO of the year – but this time I couldn’t bring myself to vote.…

MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: MMORPG of the Year – Welcome back to the formal Massively Overpowered Year-End Awards! Today’s award is for MMORPG of the Year, awarded last year alongside Final Fantasy XIV and New World.…

Happy New Year to all the uplifting things in MMOs, 2022 Edition – It’s our tradition to bundle together all the reasons why we can’t have nice things – all the worst things that have happened to the MMORPG genre over the course of this year -…

Jukebox Heroes: The Best of LOTRO’s Before the Shadow Soundtrack – Since composer Bill Champagne took over the reins of the Lord of the Rings Online soundtrack, his confidence and skill has skyrocketed. This is obvious…

The Ultimate MMO Archives of Game Archaeologist v6.0 – And with that, this year is history! As everyone bids farewell to 2022, here at TGA we always look far back in time to see where we…

The best MassivelyOP streams of 2022 – The MassivelyOP streaming team expanded with a bang in 2022 when MOP’s Chris joined MOP’s MJ to form our core streaming duo. They not only dive into new highlights and…

MassivelyOP’s 2022 Golden Yachties: The MMO “Are we the bad guys” award. – MassivelyOP’s not-so-serious year-end awards continue today with our pick for the 2022 Are We the Baddies award. (We call these silly awards the Golden Yachties in honor of…

MassivelyOP’s 2022 MMO Lifetime Achievement Award – Welcome back to Massively Overpowered’s formal year-end awards for another special award. Readers will recall that last year we decided to launch a lifetime achievement award specifically for…

The Massively OP Podcast in Review, 2022 Edition – Summary of all shows released in 2022, bringing our total to 733 episodes (331 + 402).

The Daily Grind: Which MMO Has the Biggest Future in 2023? – How about some positivity for the last day of the week of the year? That’s right, we’ve revisited the ‘best future’ theme and I think there are two clear winners here:…

Massive Rethinking: Our MMO Resolutions for 2023 – I know that not everyone makes “resolutions” and that even most people who do make them don’t actually stick to them. And when it comes to MMO resolutions, I’m not even…

Ubisoft is trying to curb toxic behavior… by using a voluntary self-study course – To be fair, some effort is better than no effort, but one also has to raise your eyebrows at Ubisoft’s Fair Play program, which is an attempt to even the pressure…

NetEase space adventure Infinite Langrage officially launches on PC – After a year on mobile, NetEase’s multiplayer space sim Infinite Langrage launched yesterday on PC with a streamlined user interface. The studio said the track topped the charts…

Pantheon shares a fireside chat with EverQuest co-creator Steve Clover – It’s hard to argue that Brad McQuaid’s death has cast a shadow over Visionary Realms and its Pantheon project. And although the team after his…

Dune Awakening’s art parade continues with previews of in-engine locations and hazards – Before Dune: Awakening decided to share a trailer at the Game Awards, most of the previews fans got from the game were in concept art format. That looks…

End-of-Year Eleven: The cheapest MMOs for 2023 – Every year when I make this post, I think about what “value” actually means for MMOs, because it’s actually a tricky thing, and that intrigues me. And every year Bree…

MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Most Anticipated MMO – Welcome back to the formal Massively Overpowered Year-End Awards! Today’s award goes to the most anticipated MMO awarded jointly to Guild Wars 2’s Palia and End of Dragons over the past year…

Blizzard’s own studio Proletariat announces plans to form a union – Workers at a third Activision-Blizzard studio are planning the organization: Proletariat, which readers may recall, was the studio behind the battle royale game Spellbreak, made by…

Asheron’s Call Rogue servers add playable Olthoi from the MMO’s 11th anniversary – One of Asheron’s Call’s most iconic entries in his fantasy bestiary is now (again) playable. AsheronDB reports that ACE compatible rogue servers have been added back into playable Oltoi from the MMOs…

Rumor: Life is Feudal MMO could be making a comeback, with a sequel in the works – The medieval sandbox MMORPG Life is Feudal died something of a slow death, first with a sunset in January 2021, followed by a closure of the Chinese version in October 2022, resulting in…

Massively on the Go: Pokemon Go’s January events start off cold, but the raids are hot – The New Year won’t start off strong for Pokemon GO players as Niantic has outlined a more recycled sounding New Year’s event starting December 31st at 8pm and ending on…

Select My Adventure: My Time in Guild Wars 2 and Elon Riverlands Dungeons – This time it’s been part disappointment, part surprise in my journey through Guild Wars 2. The goals were pretty clear: GO back to the Path of Fire…

MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: MMO Expansion of the Year – Welcome back to the formal Massively Overpowered Year-End Awards! Today’s award is for MMO Expansion of the Year, given to Endwalker from Final Fantasy XIV last year. Each major…

The Division 2 is coming to Steam on January 12th – If you’ve been refusing to buy The Division 2 until it arrives on Steam… well, my goodness, you’ve been waiting a while. We applaud your self-control. And your wait continues…

Microsoft claims the FTC’s antitrust lawsuit violates its Fifth Amendment rights – Earlier this month, Microsoft’s big-money acquisition of Activision-Blizzard saw a snag at the US federal government level when the FTC filed an antitrust lawsuit to block the sale, citing…

Wisdom of Nym: What we learned from the second Final Fantasy XIV Gods Revel, Lands Tremble Live letter – Do you know what will be very interesting in Gods Revel, Lands Tremble? Unlike a usual x.3 patch for Final Fantasy XIV, this one won’t look like the…

MassivelyOP’s 2022 Awards: Indie MMO of the Year – Welcome back to the formal Massively Overpowered Year-End Awards! Today’s award is for Indie MMO of the Year, presented to Ship of Heroes last year. All indie MMOs…

Ashes of Creation wraps up a “crazy year of growth” with a larger team and new offices – The Ashes of Creation development team closed what was deemed a “crazy year of growth” with a reflective video hosted on their new office suite. Not only…

THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS

Catch up on the latest news in the MMO genre and the best content from Massively OP in our MMO Week in Review each week! Want more content summaries? Check out Friday’s Betawatch for MMO testing highlights, Saturday’s Make My MMO for MMO crowdfunding updates, and Sunday’s The MOP Up swiping up all the news we haven’t covered anywhere else.

advertisement