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Daily Column

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First, the Ten Ton Pulse, your finger on the beating heart of the MMOG industry.

If the Top 10 isn't enough, we also show the Top 20 and Top 50 lists as well, available to everyone on our homepage. (What is Pulse?)

Age of Conan - 200 BPM
World of Warcraft - 175 BPM
Lord of the Rings Online - 65 BPM
EverQuest II - 54 BPM
Warhammer Online - 36 BPM
Dungeon Runners - 30 BPM
Lineage 2 - 29 BPM
EVE Online - 26 BPM
Guild Wars - 26 BPM
Vanguard - 23 BPM

We no longer participate in an industry with only one or two game choices. In fact, there are so many choices now that new players could not help but be deafened, numbed and disoriented by the amount of information and disinformation available to them. Ten Ton Hammer covers 236 MMOGs. It takes something special for a game to be a success. Having a ready-made market helps.

Warhammer Online is a MMOG with roots that run deep and true through soil rich in gaming nourishment. Thousands of players have hand-crafted armies, painting and building for hours, immersing themselves in the Warhammer Fantasy Battles (WFB) universe. They are invested in it. They have an understanding of the background, the lore and the history. In essence they have created their own action figures and found others with the same passion who will play with them. It sounds like a 10 on the nerd-o-meter, but in truth it is a very rewarding hobby. (filled with nerds)

Unlike Lord of the Rings Online and Star Wars Galaxies which had rich stories that fans passively read or watched, WFB allows players to partake in the history, oftentimes writing it themselves. Players with Dwarven armies take great joy in testing their mettle versus those playing Chaos, High Elf or Skaven. Ask any player if another race is inferior to the one that he plays and the answer will inevitably be "yes". Players become attached to their armies, not only because of the financial and time investments required to create them, but because Games Workshop stores provide an island in the rough seas of the shopping mall where players can find other people who shared their passion. Players become attached to the stories, the community that so lovingly cares for the game and the company that makes it possible.

Warhammer Fantasy Battles, was released over 25 years ago. A quarter century of lore, both official and fan created has been built, massaged and perfected. Based in a gritty, dark world, the lore nonetheless is permeated with humour; intelligent, dry and sometimes politically incorrect. I firmly believe that the humour and "did you see that?" moments are part of the charm that set World of Warcraft on its path to success.

In an unusual twist, the Warhammer lore does not set racial battle lines. Everyone fights with everyone. Without too much massaging, any races can be allied with, or set against, any others. In Warhammer Online the alliances are setup as Order (Dwarfs, Empire and High Elves) versus Destruction (Greenskins, Chaos, Dark Elves). At first glance these seem the norm for racial alliances, yet the WFB world is open enough that that the alliances could have been setup in any combination. Everyone fights with everyone else It's like watching politicians debate the necessity of clean water. Nobody can agree on any point.

The racial choices in Warhammer Online are interesting ones. I couldn't dig up any data on which tabletop armies are played the most, but with the exception of the Dark Elves I would be inclined to believe that Dwarfs, Empire, High Elves, Greenskins and Chaos are either the five most popular or very close.

With the possible exception of StarGate Worlds, I can't think of a game in production that has a more open intellectual property behind it. World of Warcraft did well with limited lore, scraped from the real-time-strategy titles. Everquest did well by creating their own lore from a blank slate. Will Warhammer become the first title to take tabletop gamers, keep them in comfortable confines and introduce them to the massively multiplayer online game market?

How many of you play or played Warhammer Fantasy Battles? Is your army represented in the launch list? I played (poorly I might add) a Wood Elf army from 2000 - 2002.

I'll leave you with a reminder that tomorrow is the start of WoWs PvP Season 4 and that Blizzard has a teaser up on their main site. Could we see the announcement of the next MMOG? The Starcraft 2 launch date?

Do tell. The Loading Forums await you. Do you feel the need to contact me personally with naughty pictures or derogatory comments? Here's my E-mail.

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[A big thanks to Phil Comeau for putting together the links, headlines and taglines compliments of yours truly today. ]

20 new MMOG hand-crafted articles today! 221 in June! 1517 in 2008!

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