| The Road to Mordor: Getting over the 40s hump in LotRO Posted: 10 Aug 2013 10:00 AM PDT Filed under: Fantasy, Lord of the Rings Online, Opinion, Free-to-Play, The Road to Mordor, Guides Sometimes column topics are handed to you on a timely platter of complaints. Over the past week, I've heard several people in the Massively office and in my guilds talk about how they hit a wall in Lord of the Rings Online in the level 40 range. If you hear just one person talk about it, it's probably nothing. But when four or five mention it independent of each other, I think it's important enough to discuss. The 40s are a tricky time for LotRO players. It's the last stretch of pre-expansion road that must be traveled, the levels start taking longer, and unlike much of the 1-40 content, 40-50 really never has been revamped to bring it in line with the rest of the game. As a result, for some the 40s can be a slow slog that requires a lot of zone hopping to conquer. Oddly enough, it's never been a big problem for me, although I think I approach LotRO in a slightly different way than some. In any case, today we're going to examine the "40s hump" and come up with a few strategies to get over it and get into Moria ASAP. Continue reading The Road to Mordor: Getting over the 40s hump in LotRO  The Road to Mordor: Getting over the 40s hump in LotRO originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 10 Aug 2013 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| WRUP: Mature science fiction edition Posted: 10 Aug 2013 08:00 AM PDT Filed under: Massively Meta, Miscellaneous Harold and Dana went for a walk outside. While they were walking, Harold noticed a large number of leaves collected on stone steps which had not been replaced with robotic future ultra-steps, causing him to briefly reflect on the nature of the human experience while surrounded by advanced technology. Later, he would relate this experience to someone while he was in the process of dying to save a spaceship for poorly explained reasons, possibly while making an allusion to poetry from the 19th century. While I wait for my Hugo award, you all can read this week's installment of WRUP just past the break, in which Massively's writers share our plans for the weekend in terms of gaming. Oh, and you can let us know your plans for the weekend down in the comments, too. Please, no musings on the relative scale of individual human beings compared to the entire universe. Continue reading WRUP: Mature science fiction edition WRUP: Mature science fiction edition originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 10 Aug 2013 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| The Daily Grind: Are there MMOs you'd like more if the setting were different? Posted: 10 Aug 2013 06:00 AM PDT Filed under: Culture, Lore, Opinion, The Daily Grind, Miscellaneous EverQuest Next hadn't been on my radar before the big reveal, but at this point it's hard to not be on board. The game looks gorgeous and has a lot of really interesting ideas underpinning its development, and I find myself eager to find out more as development progresses. But despite that enthusiasm, I really wish it weren't another fantasy game. The market is full of fantasy games. Obviously it couldn't be a science fiction game within the franchise, but still, I find myself wishing that they'd taken all of these principles and applied them to a more interesting setting on a whole. Maybe you're in the opposite camp, though. Maybe you'd be more enthusiastic about WildStar if it were a fantasy game. Perhaps you'd prefer The Secret World in a steampunk setting. Are there games you'd like more if the setting were different? Or are you happy with things just the way they are?  Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!The Daily Grind: Are there MMOs you'd like more if the setting were different? originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 10 Aug 2013 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| Betawatch: August 3 - 9, 2013 Posted: 09 Aug 2013 06:00 PM PDT Filed under: Betas, MMO Industry, News Items, Betawatch, Miscellaneous It's been a long wait for Final Fantasy XIV fans, but the relaunched version has almost finished its beta testing. R2 Games has also released the first alpha of its upcoming side-scrolling Android title, Excalibur. If you'd rather sling pretend cards around, you can look forward to the upcoming beta test for Hearthstone. Meanwhile, WildStar has finished a phase of testing and is looking toward the future, which means a better game when it finally launches. Unfortunately, it's not all good news this week, as Civilization Online doesn't appear to be heading this way in the near future. But it is mostly good news. Of course, if that's not good enough news, you can feel free to peek into the list of games in testing just past the break. As always, let us know if there's something we missed or if a game's trying to sneak past the launch radar with surreptitious sales. Continue reading Betawatch: August 3 - 9, 2013 Betawatch: August 3 - 9, 2013 originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| Storyboard: Brother from the same mother Posted: 09 Aug 2013 04:00 PM PDT Filed under: Opinion, Roleplaying, Storyboard, Miscellaneous An awful lot of characters seem to be only-children. In some countries this is pretty normal, but it's certainly not normal where I'm living. Pretty much all of my friends and contemporaries have at least one sibling. So it seems a bit odd that your roleplaying characters don't have any fellow family members to talk to. The realistic reason, of course, is that most of us don't spend a whole lot of time thinking about those siblings. And in some cases it's entirely reasonable to say that your character might not know her several half-siblings. But in the interests of verisimilitude, it's worth thinking about this, even if you never want siblings to become a major focus of roleplaying. You can come at this topic from two angles. You can talk about how to handle siblings, or you can talk about the impact of siblings. For this column, I'm going to focus on the former. What are the options for including your character's siblings? Continue reading Storyboard: Brother from the same mother Storyboard: Brother from the same mother originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| Firefall open beta weekend includes dev-hosted missons Posted: 09 Aug 2013 03:00 PM PDT Filed under: Betas, Sci-Fi, Events (In-Game), Free-to-Play, MMOFPS, Firefall Been dying to try out Firefall but have had the worst luck obtaining a beta key? Sir or madam, this weekend is for you (and everyone else). Red 5 is kicking off the first of Firefall's open beta events with a weekend packed full of activities and specials. The open beta weekend begins today at 8:00 p.m. EDT and continues until Sunday at the same time. During the weekend, players will enjoy a 2X bonus to all Crystite drops, easier access to Firefall's newer zones, and discounts on battleframe unlocks. Red 5's devs will also be hosting missions through the five-man Blackwater Anomaly. If you're able to get in on one of these instance runs, you'll be treated to special rewards and be able to tell your jealous friends and family that you rubbed shoulders with developer royalty. [Source: Red 5 press release] Firefall open beta weekend includes dev-hosted missons originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| Take a tour of Final Fantasy XIV's monsters Posted: 09 Aug 2013 02:00 PM PDT Filed under: Betas, Fantasy, Video, Previews, News Items, Consoles, Final Fantasy XIV It's no secret that Final Fantasy XIV will host quite a number of monsters. Some of those are already familiar to players from both the beta weekends and from the original game, but there are a lot of monsters even after you count those. The team behind the game has put together a new trailer showing off the various monsters and humanoid enemies that players will encounter on the fields of Eorzea. Some of these will be familiar, such as spriggans and coblyns. Some will be unfamiliar in Eorzea but familiar to fans of the series, such as the behemoth and the tonberry. And others are imported from other games or are completely novel. So whether it runs, flies, crawls, swims, or portals through the void, you can see it in the video embedded just past the break. And then you can spend the next week before testing guessing at how you're going to kill it. Continue reading Take a tour of Final Fantasy XIV's monsters Take a tour of Final Fantasy XIV's monsters originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| EQII gamer goes missing after cross-country trip [updated] Posted: 09 Aug 2013 01:00 PM PDT Filed under: EverQuest II, Culture, Legal, Miscellaneous One of EverQuest II's players, Katherine Masson, was driving home from Las Vegas when apparently she vanished. According to The Raven-Mythic, she has been missing for over two days now after sending out a text message from a rest stop in New York. A police report has been filed, but there have been no announced leads concerning her disappearance. So what happens when one of our own gamers goes missing? The community mobilizes, of course. The folks at The Raven-Mythic, an EverQuest II roleplaying guild, are continually updating a thread about Katherine's disappearance, spreading the word, and doing some of their own detective work. Katherine is also known as Jia, Essie, and Willasye in-game. Her last known location was at a rest stop near Albany, NY off of I-90, heading toward Boston. Parties with any information should contact Dan at dmak205@gmail.com. [Update: Katherine was on a business trip and wasn't attending SOE Live.]EQII gamer goes missing after cross-country trip [updated] originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| Guild Wars 2's Johanson hints at the game's anniversary plans Posted: 09 Aug 2013 12:30 PM PDT Filed under: Fantasy, Patches, News Items, Guild Wars 2, Anniversaries, Buy-to-Play Have you gotten Guild Wars 2 a present yet? It's celebrating its first birthday in just under three weeks, so it'd be rude if you didn't get it anything. Even if you're not getting the game a present, director Colin Johanson has dropped some hints about the presents that characters and players will be getting from the game, including a promise that characters will receive annual gifts as seen in Guild Wars. Johanson is adamant that the update on the anniversary will change the world forever and will bring together all of the stories that have been in motion over the past year. He goes on to explain that the changes will help give players a hint as to where the game is heading in the future. Exactly what the changes will be and how well several disconnected stories will tie together remains to be seen, but fans have to wait until August 28th to see what goes down on the one-year mark. Guild Wars 2's Johanson hints at the game's anniversary plans originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 14:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| Ask Massively: The better to stalk you Posted: 09 Aug 2013 12:00 PM PDT Filed under: Massively Meta, Humor, Ask Massively, Community Q&A, Guides, Miscellaneous, Player-Generated Content Long-time reader and podcast-listener Avaera recently posed a question to the Massively staffers clearly designed to send our egos into the clouds: Is other any chance for Massively itself to somehow integrate the wonderfully reflective and personal blog entries that you and the other writers maintain separately from their paid work? Even a round-up style column of some of the best MMO blog posts of the past week, or on a particular theme, would be fascinating. My first thought was that most of us put most of our work on Massively because if we can get paid to write, we'd be fools not to do so! I didn't think there'd be enough writing material to even justify a roundup, and that's probably true; I update my own ranty blog only every other month, for example. But who's to say blogs are the only interesting thing we do? So I polled all of Massively's staffers about where they write their writings, video their videoings, and tweet their twitterings. If you have a serious urge to stalk us, you're in the right post! Continue reading Ask Massively: The better to stalk you Ask Massively: The better to stalk you originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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| Tamriel Infinium: Audience expectations, Elder Scrolls Online, and EverQuest Next Posted: 09 Aug 2013 11:00 AM PDT Filed under: Fantasy, Culture, Lore, New Titles, Opinion, Sandbox, MMORPG, Tamriel Infinium Last week was a huge week for MMO fans. We were expecting some cool news from Sony Online Entertainment about EverQuest Next from SOE Live. Despite not being a huge EQ follower, I was enormously interested in what SOE (one of my personal favorite game developers and publishers) planned on doing with its staple franchise. Then Bethesda announced that for the first time ever the ZeniMax team would show in-game footage of the Elder Scrolls Online on Twitch TV. Specifically, players wanted to see the first-person view not seen at previous conventions. ZeniMax delivered, and the crowd went wild. I believe both presentations were wonderful, and I would be lying if I said that both presentations didn't pique my interest. I would also be lying if I said that I had no concerns about how each of the games will be received. I talked about it with my guild, Nefarious Intent. We have some hardcore Elder Scrolls fans and some MMOers who have been playing EQ games since the '90s. During the course of the debate, we came to the conclusion that the audience of each game expects something completely different and that pitting these two titles together is completely unfair. So of course that's why I have to do just that in today's column. Why are there different expectations between ESO and EQN? How is it going to be completely possible for both games to be highly successful? Continue reading Tamriel Infinium: Audience expectations, Elder Scrolls Online, and EverQuest Next Tamriel Infinium: Audience expectations, Elder Scrolls Online, and EverQuest Next originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 Aug 2013 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Amazon console could be released by Black Friday
Pirate Browser is an enhanced portable version of Firefox
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