Welcome to the 1,220th edition of Loading...
Loading... is the premier daily MMORPG news, coverage, and
commentary newsletter, only from Ten Ton Hammer.
Social networking--love it or hate it, it seems to be here to
stay. But while social networking has advanced greatly over the past
few years, community building in MMOGs has remained relatively
stagnant. Could the MMOG industry learn a thing or two from the likes
of Facebook and Twitter? We explore the social networking phenomenon in
today's Loading...Friends in Real Life.
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href="http://onegamecard.com/sub/games.aspx" target="_blank">21
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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/" target="_blank">What
is The Pulse?).
Here are today's top 5 Pulse results:
-
target="_blank">World
of Warcraft -
Dungeons
and
Dragons Online (Up 1) -
EverQuest
2 (Down 1)
-
EVE
Online (Up 2)
-
Age
of Conan (Down 1)
Biggest movers today:
-
href="http://tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/2213">Dragon Age
Origins (Up 4 to #7)
-
Star
Trek Online (Down 3 to #11) -
Global
Agenda (Up 3 to #18)
- 9/22 -
Fallen
Earth (release date) -
9/22
- Aion
(release date) - 10/8
- Cities
XL (release date) - 11/3
- Dragon Age:
Origins (release date) -
style="font-weight: bold;">11/10
- Final Fantasy
XI Ultimate
Collection (release date) - 12/1
- LotRO:
Siege of Mirkwood (expansion) - 12/1
- EVE
Online: Dominion (expansion)
Releases
- 12/2
- DOFUS 2.0
(release date) - 12/15
- EverQuest:
Underfoot (expansion) -
style="font-weight: bold;">2/2
- Star Trek Online
(release date) - Early 2010
- APB - Feb. 2010
- href="http://everquest2.station.sony.com/expansions/sentinelsfate/index.vm">EverQuest
2: Sentinel's Fate (expansion)
Loading... Daily
It's trendy to pick on social networking. We
href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PN2HAroA12w">make fun
of people who post innane comments about their daily lives
("Ate oatmeal with raisins for breakfast. Yum!" "I had to shave my
cat." etc.) on Twitter and laugh that
href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSnXE2791yg">people on
Facebook seem to have far more online friends than they could
ever claim to have in the real, and much scarier, world. And
yet most people, and many businesses, have Facebook pages and Twitter
feeds. (In fact, you can follow Ten Ton Hammer on
href="http://www.facebook.com/pages/Ten-Ton-Hammer/9621518062">Facebook
and Twitter,
and we certainly hope you will.)
In an open
letter to the community yesterday, Facebook founder Mark
Zuckerberg wrote, "It has been a great year for making the world more
open and connected.
Thanks to your help, more than 350 million people around the world are
using Facebook to share their lives online."
I don't know about you, but I find that 350 million user landmark mind
boggling. Now, I know it's true that some Facebook users have multiple
or fake accounts (I'm friends with Zombi Man, for instance, and I'm
pretty sure that's not his real name), but for the most part Facebook
users seem to be the real deal, which means there are roughly 350
million unique individuals using the social networking site. Given that
information, we're almost forced to conclude that social networking is
here to stay.
It seems to me that people like to reach out online. Back when I played
EverQuest, we often used the acronym IRL, for In Real Life,
to refer to things in the physical world as opposed to the virtual one.
"I'm a writer IRL," I would tell the people I became well acquainted
with online. But I've notice this term used less and less over the past
decade, and it makes me wonder if perhaps the real world and the
virtual one are starting to become synonymous. It's gotten to the point
where online friendships are no longer considered weird and high tech;
they're standard fare. We no longer seem to question whether we can
grow attached to the people we meet online and become close friends
because it happens to so many of us. I don't know about you, but I
don't separate the friends I see face-to-face and the ones I have
online into categories, real and virtual; they're all real to
me.
So the question now isn't whether connecting to one another online is a
real and valuable thing; we're learning more and more that it is as
people reach out through social networking sites, blogs, forum
communities and many other mediums. The question now is how we'll
continue to use this knowledge that community is king to grow and
expand our global sense of connection.
Over the years, MMOGs have grown, alongside other socially-centered
Internet phenomena like Usenet groups and bulletin boards, as a means
for people to connect with other people online. But where things like
bulletin boards have evolved into their current iterations as
multi-functional and user-friendly forums, and the chat rooms of old
have transitioned to Twitter tweets and Facebook status updates, MMOG
communities have remained almost static. I say almost because they have
evolved to some degree with features like active scoreboarding and
character tracking (SOE's
href="http://eq2players.station.sony.com/characters/index.vm">EQ2
Players is a great, and pioneering, example), and yet, in
terms of content-rich social networking sites like Facebook, they seem
to have a long way to go.
We've discussed over
and over
in Loading... and on Ten Ton Hammer in general how today's MMOGs lack
the community of the MMOGs of old, which is ironic considering those
older MMOGs lacked many of the tools, like LFG and guild functionality,
that now make connecting and finding people in-game easier. I don't
have the magic formula for community building in a MMOG. I wish I did,
because I'd preach it from the mountain tops and become a gaming
legend. But I do think MMOGs have a thing or two to learn from the
success of Facebook and Twitter. People, MMOG players included, seem to
need people and we long for an easy to navigate online community. We
may not want to share what we had for breakfast or how we tormented our
pets of the feline persuasion like some folks on Facebook or Twitter
do, but we want to be connected nonetheless. Connection to
other people is the reason we play MMOGs and not single-player games.
What can the MMOG industry learn from the social networking boom? How
can developers facilitate the community players long for? Share your
thoughts and ideas on the
href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=48178">Loading...
forum.
Shayalyn's Epic
Thread of
the Day
From our href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/forumdisplay.php?f=6">Articles,
News and Events Discussion forum
style="font-weight: normal;">Mythos is Reborn
Once
upon a time there was a MMOG, in development by Flagship Studios, named
Mythos. Its beta was promising, and Ten Ton Hammer's Danny "Ralsu"
Gourley once chose it for his href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/60341">2008 Best of
F2P Awards
as the best...game that failed. Because that's exactly what Mythos did.
While in the midst of beta, Flagship halted production of Mythos and
then eventually closed due to financial issues. But now
Mythos is back
under developer Redbana, and our forum community is talking about it.
Get the scoop and href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=48162">discuss
the game.
==============================
Awesome Quotes from the
Epic Thread
"Hell yeah, there we go!
I was in
the original closed beta for Mythos when flagship owned and I loved it.
Now I'm hopefully going to be getting into this CB as well. This is the
type of dungeon crawl I really enjoyed.... style="font-style: italic;">"
- Khalus
==============================
Have you spotted an Epic Thread on our forums? href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=32559">Tell
us!
4 new Ten Ton Hammer MMOG
features today! 123 in November! 3,095
in
2009!
New Exclusives and Guides today at Ten Ton
Hammer
-
style="font-weight: bold;">Global Agenda
Robotics Class Q&A with Todd Harris
Using
deployables and droids, Global Agenda's Robotics class alone has the
ability to hold sway over vast portions of the battlefield. But before
you think that these turret-constructing tacticians spend all their
time ratcheting a holohgraphic wrench, you haven't read about the sheer
variety of devices, droids, and weapons available to the Robotics
class. Enjoy reading about Global Agenda's Robotics class, and as a
special bonus, learn a little bit about what role "mechs" - or
one-player robot suits - will play in the game. It's all in this
exclusive interview with Global Agenda Executive Producer Todd Harris!
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/newsletter/issue43">
style="font-weight: bold;">WoW - "The Overpull"
- Guild Hopping
The
Overpull is here again this week full of fun, news, comics, discussion,
and lore. That's a lot! This week we examine the habits of people who
join guilds in the Barrens, have an awesome holiday inspired comic,
talk about The Forsaken, and cover the last week in news. Come join The
Overpull each week as we bring you ten tons of awesome online and to
your inbox. -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/guides/classes/druid/equipment"> style="font-weight: bold;">WoW Druid Equipment
Guide
title="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/guides/classes/druid/equipment"
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/guides/classes/druid/equipment">Need
an up-to-date equipment, gems, and enchant guide for the Druid? Our
guide's got everything an aspiring Druid needs to know on gearing up,
gemming, enchanting, and more. Check it out and get to work on making
your gear the best that it can be. -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/guides/classes/sorcerer_stigmas">
style="font-weight: bold;">Aion Spell List:
Sorcerer Stigmas
Stylize and personalize your Sorcerer with stigmas of all levels. If
you're looking for ways to slot those stigmas, review the complete list
and then you'll be armed (and dangerous) with knowledge.
Today's Hottest Content
-
style="font-weight: bold;">Global Agenda
Robotics Class Q&A with Todd Harris href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/77382"> style="font-weight: bold;"> -
style="font-weight: bold;">Dragon Age: Origins
- Creating Your
Own Adventures - Gearing
Up in Star
Trek Online An Exclusive Interview with Cryptic Studios -
Sins
of the
Solar
Spymaster #33 - Preparing for style="font-weight: bold;"> href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/77400">Dominion - Dragonica
Online Impressions: Side Scrolling Madness - Rolling
a Save
vs. Budget - a Look at Dungeons and Dragons Online:
Eberron
Unlimited - Odus
Comes to EverQuest
2 - A Sentinel's Fate Expansion Q&A with Alan
Crosby - Interfacing
with
Star Trek Online - A UI Discussion
with Cryptic
Studios -
style="font-weight: bold;">Torchlight (PC)
Review -
style="font-weight: bold;">Lord of the Rings Online: Siege
of Mirkwood
Beta Impressions
Thanks for visiting the Ten Ton Hammer
network!
- Karen "Shayalyn" Hertzberg and the Ten Ton Hammer team
