Loading... Marketing Ups and Downs

by Jeff Woleslagle on Sep 30, 2008

<p>Welcome to the 926th Edition of Loading... </p>

Welcome to the 926th Edition of Loading...

If you aren't reading this in your e-mail, you could be. Sign up. Are you looking for gaming news? Look no further for all of the headlines. General industry news, right down to game specific and forum thread feeds are all yours as part of Ten Ton Hammer's RSS feed . Enjoy!

Daily Column

It was a typically busy Monday in the news, and Im not just talking about the failed bank bailout bill here in the US. This from a federal government that allocated the $1.5 billion, (the GDP of Zimbabwe), to help buy everyone a digital TV tuner. I cant help but think that maybe, just maybe, if wed spent that budget on ads urging a little financial responsibility, we wouldnt be in this election year-hyped, highly depressing mess.

One company thats never felt a financial crunch since its office-in-the-one-car-garage days is Google, and after hooking me on their search engine, free email service, and maps, Google is after not just my phone, but my online game engine as well.

Shacknews had the scoop as Kevin Hanna, director of the Googles Lively social networking engine, couldnt discuss whether Google had an actual online games in development, but an extensible platform is definitely in the works. He also had this to say about corporate mandates meant to generate mass market appeal: "It's sucking the life out of what should be the most creative and innovative medium out there."

One creative and innovative game developer took Hannas disdain of corporate mandates to heart. Spellborn, developers of Ten Ton Hammers pick for Most Innovative at the years biggest show, announced Monday that The Chronicles of Spellborn would not be free2play - which seemed to run counter to North American publisher Acclaim Games announcement that as with all of Acclaims games, Spellborn will be free to download and play once players have registered for an account. But those players who want to access advanced features and unlock extra game content will have the option to purchase a premium service that will offer several payment options.

Spellborn clarified that only the opening zone would be a freebie in lieu of something like a free trial, with the parameters of said zone still under development. Perhaps this will be the last word and well have CoS with our turkey leftovers this Thanksgiving weekend, but we know Acclaims Dave Perry is a true believer in F2P. Hopefully Spellborns free offering will be enough.

Our sharp newsies picked up on a thread in the Lord of the Rings Online forums noted that Turbine is head-hunting a senior-level engineer to help Turbine unify the best of massively multiplayer online games, virtual worlds and social networks on and across both PC and Console platforms. Im with Boom in saying that to me, playing a traditional MMORPG like LotRO on a console would be about as much fun as grinding pumice with a cheese grater, but a console port of the more active combat-oriented Dungeons & Dragons Online might warrant a second look.

Not to be left out, one of SOEs published MMORPGs announced freebies. Pirates of the Burning Sea is one of those polarizing, slow-boil games in the vein of EVE Online that you have to play to form a respectable opinion of. Theres never been a better time to do so, since Flying Lab just announced a 14-day free trial - its first in 9 months of operation.

Its already a busy week in MMORPG news, but tomorrow were going to blow the lid off two of the more exciting projects in development with a host of exclusives.

Have something to say? Like or dislike the new format? Share your thoughts in the Loading... forums.

Ten Ton Hammer Epic Thread of the Day

Sometimes they're funny; sometimes they're foolish; sometimes they're flaming;
sometimes they're cool. Whatever this one happens to be, it's
our Epic Thread of the Day.

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From our WAR: General Discussion

Convince Me! - A thread for the unsure

LiquidAppo
was uncertain whether to shell out hard earned gamer money on Warhammer
Online. Instead of asking the usual "Is this game worth it?" LiquidAppo
challenged our forum members to convince unsure gamers to give WAR a
whirl by posting "poems, pictures, videos, articles, stories" and
"anything fun you can think of about the game to show how great it is."

Are you unsure about WAR? Or do you have a great story to tell? This thread's for you.

Awesome Quote from the Epic Thread:

"Warhammer Online is perhaps the best PvP-centric MMORPG to be released since Ultima Online.

Additionally it is by far the most epic MMORPG since... probably... ever.

And I don't mean epic like:

'Zomg We are Fighting Illidan!'

Because that's not epic. That's scripted and boring." - Barbarious

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