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Daily Column

Loading... it's like an extra day off tagged to the tail of your weekend.

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?)

1. World of Warcraft - 200 BPM
2. Age of Conan - 127 BPM
3. EverQuest II - 98 BPM
4. Lord of the Rings Online - 88 BPM
5. Vanguard - 62 BPM
6. Warhammer Online - 39 BPM
7. Dungeons and Dragons Online - 38 BPM
8. Tabula Rasa - 35 BPM
9. Auto Assault - 33 BPM
10. Guild Wars - 32 BPM

A few months ago, Wikipedia removed the entry for Ten Ton Hammer because in the words of the regime that acts as judge and jury at the publicly edited website, "Ten Ton Hammer is not notable enough". I disagreed with the all-powerful Wikipedia warchiefs,, but it was just me and 400,000 of my closest friends against a site that believes "Penis game" is a notable entry, whereas Ten Ton Hammer is not. I appreciated that the readers of Ten Ton Hammer attempted to change every instance of the word hammer into Ten Ton Hammer in the Wiki. Of course I didn't condone or encourage such behaviour, which if it happened again would of course be very, very funny.

So it was with great joy that I recently read "The WTF World of Wikipedia" by Charlie Barratt, posted over at Games Radar.

"You. Your friends and family. Your classmates and coworkers. In the brave new world of the internet, everybody has power. Information is interactive, knowledge is collaborative and history is open source. The nerdy kid next door has just as much influence as a high school teacher; the dorky dude at the comic book shop has just as much voice as a college professor.

Problem is, the nerds and dorks tend to have a lot more free time - and passion - than the teachers and professors. The end result? A hilariously skewed, terrifyingly twisted view of the world in which all the wrong things are deemed "important" and worthy of serious academic discussion." -- Games Radar

Mr. Barratt points out that that Call of Duty, a game about World War II has more written about it than World War II itself. Final Fantasy compilation albums have more written about them than 'Rock and Roll'. There is more written about 'Mario's Legacy' than 'Jesus' Legacy'.

"As expected, Jesus whoops Mario by quite a large margin in total Wikipedia word count. In a miraculous turn of events, however, Mario's Legacy section is actually longer than Jesus' Legacy. Yes, you heard right - a pixelated plumber is considered to have had a bigger impact on the world than the central figure of Christianity and, to some, the physical embodiment of God. Wow." -- Games Radar

It's obvious that Wiki writers love Mario, but until he lands the leading role in Super Mario Brothers Online he doesn't get to spend much time in this MMOG column. It would be interesting to take a look at our hobby as seen through the eyes of the Wikipedia population. Let's take a look.

Typing MMOG into Wikipedia brings back a list, the topmost of which is 'massively multiplayer online game' which has at the moment of this writing, 4085 words. World of Warcraft proves that it is larger than the industry itself, rolling in at 9,046 words, making it 2/3rds as important to the history of mankind as 'Roman Empire' which has 13,606 words to commemorate its inconsequential effect on the shaping of the human race.

Wiki scribblers find what they write so important that fights break out over the simplest things. For instance, one poor soul described Northrend, the land mass to be added to World of Warcraft in the upcoming expansion as 'croissant shaped'. Silly, yes? Did it require this reply? Probably not.

"Crescent is definitely a better descriptive word. For a start the word croissant, a French pastry, comes from the French word for Crescent which is, yes, croissant. Since this is an English-language wikipedia the shape is like a crescent, not a croissant. To describe it as croissant-shaped is simply poor English and consequently unencyclopedic." - Wiki Denizen.

So there, you croissant eating pansy! We'd better call in some Jedi to clear up these pastry problems.

"You can't even begin to comepare (sic) the Deathknight to the old Village SWG Jedi (yes I am an ex-SWG player). " --Wiki Denizen

Which prompted,

"Maybe not the old Village SWG Jedi, but the Holocube Jedi? yes there seem to be many similarities..." -- Another Wiki Denizen

Which brings us to the debate about whether Wrath of the Lich King is a rip-off of the Lord of the Rings: Rise of the Witch King name.

"it just me or is it suspicious that Wrath of the Lich King is such a similar name to Rise of the Witch King and the two games have such similar covers? Is it meant that way as a joke?" - Some Wiki Denizin

To which was written,

"I don't any real similarity between the names other the witch king and lich king and the lich king is already in warcraft lore also what would you prefer it be called if not wairth (sic) of the lich king" it would probably be "wraith of that guy" -- Some Other Wiki Denizen

This is the best entertainment ever! It's like watching raindrops crash down into an ant hill. Every time a new piece of information is introduced the splash sends the drones scurrying in all directions before eventually forming a perfect line of absolute lunacy again. It's too bad that ants aren't as important as World of Warcraft, coming in at a mere 6,848 words.

Let's list game developers in order of their relevance. That should be a real knee-slapper.

1. Scott Jennings (Undisclosed project at NCSoft) - 1118 words
2. Richard Garriott, (Ultima Online, more recently Tabula Rasa) - 1079 words
3. Raph Koster, (Ultima Online, more recently Star Wars Galaxies) - 773 words
4. Brad McQuaid, (EverQuest, more recently Vanguard: Saga of Heroes) - 693 words
5. Mark Jacobs (Warhammer Online) - 658 words
6. Paul Barnett, (Warhammer Online) who apparently is also not "notable" given the HUGE not notable stub on his page. - 424 words
7. Jeffrey Steefel, (Lord of the Rings Online) who also has "notability" issues. - 315 words
8. Jeff Hickman (Warhammer Online) - 305 words
9. Rob Pardo, (World of Warcraft) - 261 words
10. Andrew Gower (Runescape) - 231 words
11. Jeff Kaplan (World of Warcraft) - 89 words
12. Gaute Godager, Jørgen Tharaldsen and Erling Ellingsen (Age of Conan), Jack Emmert (City of Heroes) - no words can describe them apparently.

So, based on Wikipedia and an entire 30 minutes of research on my part, Scott Jennings is the most influential game developer on the planet. Visit his blog and tell him! Congratulations Scott! Your wikipedia award will be winging its way to you once they can decide what to name it. So far, only 22,987 suggestions have been made with each suggested name receiving exactly 22,988 complaints towards it. I suggest you use this newfound nugget of information to press NCSoft for a raise. Heck, they should give you two raises. You're more important than Richard Garriott and Starr Long combined!

No Jedi were harmed in the writing of this column though I'm sure Scott Jennings will be blamed if any turn up injured.

Find your favourite MMOG entry in Wikipedia and share it!

(Note: In Scott's defense, he writes a fantastic blog that I read every day. He is no doubt an excellent game designer. I'm confident that he gets the joke, but just in case...and to be brutally clear, this is in no way, shape or form a shot at Scott, his abilities or the fact that John McCain dislikes him. )

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.

--
[A big thanks to Phil Comeau for putting together the links and Real World News.]

18 new MMOG hand-crafted articles today! 84 in July! 1662 in 2008!

New MMOG Articles At Ten Ton Hammer Today

Previews

• World of Warcraft: WWI 08 Sneak Peak at Orgrimmar Arena
• World of Warcraft: WWI 08 Sneak Peak at Dalaran Arena

Interviews

• Warhammer Online: Christian Bales on Living Guilds - Part 1

Op/Eds

• EVE Online: The Temptations of a Unique MMOG

Images/Video

• World of Warcraft: Dalaran/Orgrimmar Arenas, Northrend Battleground
• Warhammer Online: Games Day Baltimore Q&A, Part 1
• Atlantica Online: Cinematic Trailer
• Atlantica Online: Gameplay Trailer
• Dreamlords: Launch Video

Community

• World of Warcraft: UI Database Update
• Age of Conan: Clan Soup - The Final Issue
• Vanguard: Dalmarus' Chronicles - State of the Union

Free-to-Play

• Top 10 Free-to-Play MMOs

Contests

• IGG Quiz Winners

Guides

• World of Warcraft: Rogue Guide Update - Trainers/Weapons Masters
• Age of Conan: Necromancer Spell List Lvl 61-80
• Tabula Rasa: Medic Guide Update
• Lord of the Rings Online: Creature Bestiary - Ered Luin

Hot Content - Or, what I took a fancy to

1. EVE Online: The Temptations of a Unique MMOG
2. World of Warcraft: WWI 08 Sneak Peak at Orgrimmar Arena
3. World of Warcraft: WWI 08 Sneak Peak at Dalaran Arena
4. World of Warcraft: Dalaran/Orgrimmar Arenas, Northrend Battleground
5. World of Warcraft: Is the Blizzard Authenticator Worth It?
6. Warhammer Online: Christian Bales on Living Guilds - Part 1
7. Warhammer Online: Games Day Baltimore Q&A, Part 1
8. Top 10 Free-to-Play MMOs

Real World News

Thanks as always for visiting TenTonHammer.com.

- John "Boomjack" Hoskin and the Ten Ton Hammer Team