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is the premier daily
MMOG news and commentary
newsletter, only from Ten Ton Hammer.
Welcome
to the 1,347th
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In the great Pirates vs.
Ninjas debate, when it comes to ticket sales for one of the hottest
MMOG fan events of the year it’s pretty clear that the
pirates are the reigning champs. Even with a second batch of BlizzCon
2010 tickets yet to go on sale this weekend, the secondary market is
already attempting to get a piece of the action. We’ll take a
little walk down memory lane to look at the ill effects of ticket
pirates today in Loading… Better Luck Next Round.
The Pulse
You vote with what you
view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the
result
is the Ten Ton Pulse (
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/thepulse/">What
is The Pulse?).
Here
are today's top 5 Pulse results:
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow">World
of Warcraft - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/war">Warhamer Online
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aoc">Age
of Conan - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/eq2">EverQuest II
- href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/eve">EVE Online
Biggest
movers this week:
-
size="-1">2/16
- href="http://everquest2.station.sony.com/expansions/sentinelsfate/index.vm">EverQuest
2: Sentinel's Fate (expansion) -
size="-1">2/16
- href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/81479">LotRO:
Oath of the
Rangers (content update) -
size="-1">4/5
- href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/1004">Pocket
Legends (iMMOG - release date) -
size="-1">5/1
- href="http://www.cityofheroes.com/news/game_updates/issue_17/issue_17_overview.html?utm_source=COHemail&utm_medium=US&utm_campaign=banner"
target="_blank">City
of Heroes - Issue 17: Dark Mirror
(content
update) -
size="-1">5/11
- Age
of Conan: Rise of the Godslayer size="-1">
(expansion) -
size="-1">5/26
- EVE
Online: Tyrannis size="-1">
(expansion) -
size="-1">5/27
- href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/2422">Craft
of Gods size="-1">
(release)
Releases
-
size="-1">June
9,
2010 - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/1004"
target="_blank">Mortal
Online (release) -
size="-1">June
29,
2010 - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/998"
target="_blank">APB
(US release- July 2 in UK, EU) -
size="-1">July
13, 2010 - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/1801"
target="_blank">Mytheon
(release)
-
size="-1">July
20,
2010 - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/2461"
target="_blank">Need
for Speed World (release) -
size="-1">TBA
2010 - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/2079"
target="_blank">Final
Fantasy XIV size="-1">
size="-1">Upcoming
Events
-
size="-1">
style="font-weight: bold;">6/15 -
6/17 - href="http://www.e3expo.com/" target="_blank">E3
Expo -
size="-1">
style="font-weight: bold;">6/25 -
6/27 - href="http://www.lfgexpo.com/" target="_blank">Looking
for Group
Expo -
size="-1">
style="font-weight: bold;">7/22 -
7/25 - href="http://www.comic-con.org/" target="_blank">Comic-Con
International -
size="-1">
style="font-weight: bold;">8/5 -
8/8 - href="http://events.station.sony.com/fanfaire/" target="_blank">SOE
Fan Faire 2010 -
size="-1">
style="font-weight: bold;">9/3 -
9/6 - href="http://www.dragoncon.org/" target="_blank">DragonCon -
size="-1">
style="font-weight: bold;">10/22 -
10/23 - href="http://us.blizzard.com/blizzcon/?rhtml=y" target="_blank">BlizzCon -
size="-1">
style="font-weight: bold;"> 3/24
-
3/26 (2011)- href="http://fanfest.eveonline.com/" target="_blank">CCP
FanFest
Loading... Daily
During the latter half of
the 1990s, Chicago was my local stomping grounds. While I ultimately
made my escape to the Pacific Northwest shortly after the world was
supposed to end at the chiming of the year 2000 bells, one of my
favorite things about living in that particular city was the multitude
of clubs, theaters and other random spaces to see live music in. Any
band with half a brain cell between its members was sure to make a
Chicago stop if they toured the Midwest, even if it meant playing such
awful dives as the Fireside Bowl which was a bombed out, stinky, rat
infested mess that tried to pass itself off as being a “punk
club”.
During that period the internet
was coming into its own, and that was
also when I discovered one of its unfortunate side effects. While
standing in line overnight to snag choice tickets to see a favorite
band had previously been a time honored tradition, it soon became
apparent that even being first in line physically could still mean that
tickets might be sold out before you reached the sales counter.
That in and of itself
wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. What
was, however, was the fact that internet ticket sales helped usher in
an era when Chicago’s many ticket brokers held sway over the
selling price for just about any major act to come through town. It
seemed like nearly overnight there were hundreds of shady ticket
brokers’ offices popping up all over the city, and the live
music scene began to suffer as a result.
The reason for my long winded
preamble today is of course none other
than the joyous insanity of the first round of BlizzCon 2010 tickets
getting snatched up in an estimated 23 minutes yesterday. In less time
than it took for the first wave to sell out, tickets were already
popping up on Ebay for between $400 and $900 for a pair, though I
suspect the real secondary market ticket circus won’t kick
into full gear until the second batch goes on sale this Saturday. The
current sellers are either too silly to realize that a second batch
will go up for sale this weekend or too confident that
they’ll be able to make a quick buck off of gamers with deep
enough pockets to afford the high price tag.
Either way, I still consider it
a shame that there were thousands of
legitimate Blizzard fans sitting in the ticket queue last night who
were ultimately turned away thanks in part to the capitalist crapfest
that is the secondary ticket sales market. To me the whole thing just
brings up bad memories of discovering that the only way to get into a
club to see a band I’d
been waiting for months or years to
see live was to pony up hundreds of dollars for what should have been a
$15 ticket. I refused to do so back then, and I certainly
don’t dig the fact that for some fans, ticket pirates may be
their only means of attending one of the hottest fan events of the
year.
Were you lucky enough to snag
BlizzCon tickets yesterday or still have
hopes of doing so this Saturday when the second batch goes on sale? Hop
on the Ten Ton Red Line and ride it on over to the Loading…
forum and let us know. And if you feel so inclined, you can also join
me in a chorus of loathing about the lameness of ticket pirates!
New
and Exclusive Content
Today at Ten Ton Hammer
4 new Ten Ton Hammer
articles today! 19 Ten Ton Hammer
features
in June! 590
in 2010!
PREVIEWS
Techno Beat-Down – A
Perpetuum Online Preview
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/previews/perpetuum">http://www.tentonhammer.com/previews/perpetuum
Quick,
what do you get when you combine hardcore PvP mechanics, a learning
curve steeper than the U.S. national deficit, robot avatars and strong
RTS elements? Well, if Hungarian developer Avatar Creations has
anything to say about it, you get Perpetuum Online. Will gamers
clamoring for a MMOG with a robot or mech focus want to take up arms in
a ruthless, skill-based world where only the strong survive? Join Ten
Ton Hammer’s own Jason “Medawky” Bolton
as he loads in to check out the
beta version of this intriguing new game.
MEDIA
NCsoft releases City of Heroes
- Going Rogue video
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/coh/video/lumberjack">http://www.tentonhammer.com/coh/video/lumberjack
NCsoft
has just released a new video of their Going Rogue expansion for City
of Heroes. This video is only the first in a series to get your heroes,
and vigilantes, excited for the new expansion. Watch in amazement,
spandex wearing do-gooders!
FEATURES & GUIDES
Making Hulks In EVE Online,
Part 2: Manufacturing Hulks
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/eve/guides/business/making_hulks_2">http://www.tentonhammer.com/eve/guides/business/making_hulks_2
The
manufacturing portion of crafting the Hulk exhumer-class mining vessels
is complicated as heck. Ten Ton Hammer Contributing Writer, Space
Junkie, is happy to explain the process to us, and to explain how to
make the most ISK off of this extremely lucrative section of industry
in EVE Online.
The World of Warcraft Remote
Auction House
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/guides/remote_auction_house">http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/guides/remote_auction_house
The
remote auction house is the latest upgrade to WoW. Players using a web
browser or apple devices like iPhones or iPod touches can log in
through their Battle.net accounts on the World of Warcraft Armory and
access the auction house from any of their characters. The
functionality of the remote AH is very similar to what's available in
the unmodified WoW UI with a few important changes. We'll tell you more
in this guide.
Today's
Hottest Articles, Guides, and Features
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/podcasts/live/9"
target="_blank">Ten
Ton Hammer Live Ep. 9 - TERA's
Sam Kim and Matt
Atwood -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/apb/impressions/community-day-2010"
target="_blank">APB
Community Day Q&A and Hands-On Impressions -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/features/editorials/personal-story-continued"
target="_blank">The
Impact of Story Pt. 2 - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/features/editorials/personal-story-continued"
target="_blank">Guild
Wars 2 href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/features/editorials/personal-story-continued"
target="_blank">'s
Interactive World -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/previews/cataclysm/zalazans_fall"
target="_blank">WoW href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/previews/cataclysm/zalazans_fall"
target="_blank">
PTR Patch 3.3.5 - Glory of the Darkspear
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/interviews/dev_talk/2010/may"
target="_blank">Dev
Talk: Top MMOG Devs Weigh
in on User-Generated
Content -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/eve/spymaster/45"
target="_blank">EVE
Online - Sins of a Solar
Spymaster #45 : Advice for a New CEO
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/giveaways/loco-cbt"
target="_blank">Land
of Chaos Online Closed Beta Key
Giveaway
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/editorials/return-to-guildwars"
target="_blank">The
Many Reasons to Return to Guild
Wars -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/beyond/guides/war-in-kryta"
target="_blank">Guild
Wars: The War in Kryta Guide -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/newsletter/issue-1"
target="_blank">The
War in
Kryta Advances - style="font-weight: bold;">GW2
Weekly Report
Thanks
for visiting the Ten Ton Hammer network!
- Reuben "Sardu" Waters and
the Ten Ton Hammer team
