Loading... Nigh Blasphemy

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The Pulse

First, you vote with what you view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the result is the Ten Ton Pulse (What is Pulse?).

World of Warcraft Stargate Worlds (UP 1) Warhammer Online (down 1) Age of Conan (UP 2) Guild Wars (down 1) Guild Wars 2 (down 1) EVE Online Atlantica Online (UP 1) Lord of the Rings Online (down 1) EverQuest 2 (UP 3)

Sinkers and Floaters in the Top 20

Requiem: Bloodymare (UP 4 to no. 16) EverQuest 2 (UP 3 to no. 10) Jumpgate Evolution (down 3 to no. 13)

Daily Column

Loading... where tongue-in-cheek meets kick-in-the-pants.

The sales figures are in, and Blizzard nearly topped 3 months of Madden '09 sales... in the first 24 hours. 2.8 million copies of Wrath of the Lich King moved in the first day (counting pre-orders), compared to the 2.96 million posted from July to September by the benchmark football franchise. No doubt WotLK has taken the lead by now, so congrats to Blizzard for once again topping the charts.

And retailers are watching. Well, the ones that will survive the current economic apocalypse of doom, of course, though I really won't miss Circuit City (and the local store's atrocious service and PC games stacked pell-mell on the floor). Following Target's lead in fronting shiny online game timecards at the register, 7-Eleven seeks to cash in on MMORPG success. Now we can buy a slurpie, some lottery tickets, a carton of cigs, a six pack (in 41 out of 50 states), and game timecards... all the lesser addictions, all in one place. Oh, thank heaven.

One project that won't see 7-Eleven, let alone the light of day, is Google's Lively, the search engine titan's bid to create an online community that would eventually evolve into an open-source MMOG development platform. That Google found the project beyond their ken makes the stalwart efforts of today's MMO game and middleware developers all the more impressive.

But if we are to overcome the economic downturn, it's imperative that we teach the Chinese to stop working 16 hours a day, 30 days a month, so maybe we in the West can fire up the ol' labor union-driven military-industrial complex again and get things working as they should. MMORPGs can do this, and Turbine is doing its part. In a recent interview, CEO Jeffrey Steefel expressed his booming optimism about the 2009 LotRO Launch in China.

Interestingly, I had a conversation about Tolkien and fantasy literature during my visit to China this summer. Most Chinese MMOs are built using the somewhat amorphous Chinese and East Asian mythologies as a premise; mythologies that are thousands of years old - older than our Greco-Roman (and especially our Norse) stuff. Consequently, when we put myths created less than 75 years ago on a pedestal, many Chinese think it's kind of amusing. This is nigh blasphemy, of course, so let's all hope Turbine can straighten them out.

Share your thoughts in the Loading... forum or, as always, feel free to email me.

Shayalyn's Epic Thread of the Day



From our Guild Wars Forum

Suggested by Ralsu

Guild Wars 2


What started off way back in February as an innocent discussion of
Guild Wars 2 resulted in an epic Wall of Text crit from forum
member BahamutKaiser today. The time line's a little confusing, so
follow along with me if you will:

04-11-2009, 01:56 AM - BahamutKaiser posted:

The
longer time goes by, the less likely I am [to] even consider their
merchandise. They had alot of unfulfilled potential in [the original
Guild Wars], and never did even a decent job of balancing it. They've
got no reputation left with me; if they do try another game, they will
have to earn it from scratch.

05-31-2008, 04:20 AM - hagakure responded:

Balancing? what are you talking about? this game is 100 times more
balanced than WoW. Seriously...I dont think you know what you are
talking about. No offense.

11-20-2008, 04:18 PM - BahamutKaiser replied:

Well,
I'm not going to paste it all here, but let's just say that
BahamutKaiser's Wall of Text critted for 1029 points (or words) damage.
And the winning part is this:

So now that I've set the record straight, I expect a retraction
hagakure. I'll save you any trampling because you simply didn't know
who you were talking to, but now you do, and if you can't admit your
mistake, you can alternately be ignored.

With
months passing between posts, you could say these guys have damn slow
weapons. But at least one of those weapons is sharp. You'll have to figure out for yourself which one.

=================================

Awesome Quote from the
Epic Thread:



"I freaking love the internet. This thread gets my nomination for Epic Thread."



- Ralsu

=================================



Do you have a favorite Epic Thread? Let
us know!

9 new MMOG hand-crafted articles today! 133 in November! 2931 in 2008!

New MMOG Articles At Ten Ton Hammer Today [Thanks Phil Comeau for links and Real World News]

Reviews

Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Series Age of Armor

Images/Video

Runes of Magic: Dragonfang Ridge Screenshots

Community

World of Warcraft: Comic - Goob & Begud - "Murphy's Law" Warhammer Online: WAR Journal - Heavy Metal Age of Conan: Border Kingdom Cryer - Community Feedback

Guides

Warhammer Online: Greenskin Leveling Guide - Chap 10-12 Age of Conan: Gemcutter Recipes - Tier 1 Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria - Iron Garrison Miner Rep Rewards

Hot Content - Or, what I took a fancy to:

Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Series Age of Armor World of Warcraft: Comic - Goob & Begud - "Murphy's Law" Warhammer Online: WAR Journal - Heavy Metal Age of Conan: Border Kingdom Cryer - Community Feedback Exclusive LOTRO Mines of Moria Launch Interview with Jeffrey Steefel WoW: Where to Adventure Guide - Northrend World of Warcraft - Death Knight FAQ Ten Ton Hammer's Atlantica Online Review Creative Hear to Believe Giveaway

Real World News

Man attacks woman with sandwich

Authorities plan to charge him with assault and ciabattarry Hitler only had one testicle - war medic

I did Nazi that one coming. Anne Frankly, I doubt the medic did, either. Blind woman threatened with lawsuit over $.01 water bill

Claims she never saw this coming.

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- Jeff "Ethec" Woleslagle and the Ten Ton Hammer Team