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Are you looking for the latest industry headlines? Look no further.

1. Daily Column
2. New MMOG Articles at TenTonHammer Today
3. Hot Content
4. Real World News - You Can't Make This Up

1. Daily Column

Getting top billing today is the fact that Coyote has been writing his "blog that is not a blog" for a year. Congratulations Coyote.

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It's official. The Sigil/SOE coupling that I wrote about and that you, the loyal readership commented on is now a reality.

"May 15, 2007 San Diego, CA – Sony Online Entertainment LLC (SOE), a global leader in the online games industry, today announced that it has completed a transaction to purchase key assets of Sigil Games Online, Inc. Through the deal, SOE now owns Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, Sigil’s tentpole property, a highly-successful massively multiplayer online game. The Sigil acquisition also builds on SOE’s successful strategy of cultivating game development studios around the world to further boost the company’s capabilities.

The announcement was made by John Smedley, President, Sony Online Entertainment.

As part of the acquisition, a majority of the Sigil team will join SOE, integrating into SOE’s worldwide group of studios which includes offices in San Diego, Seattle, Austin, Denver, Los Angeles and Taiwan. The acquisition will strengthen SOE’s position as a leader in the online gaming space by expanding the company’s portfolio of gaming offerings.

“With an unparalleled team and exceptional product, Sigil has been a creative force in the online games space. We look forward to continuing the vision for Vanguard and to continue to deliver some groundbreaking game play,” said Smedley.

In May 2006, SOE acquired the title’s rights and the two companies agreed to co-publish Vanguard. The MMO launched in late January of this year and has sold nearly 200,000 retail and digital units worldwide. Sigil CEO and Vanguard creator, Brad McQuaid will become a consultant with SOE as Vanguard Creative Advisor. "

So there you have it. The important points for those of you keeping track at home are as follows:

• SOE now owns Sigil's "tentpole" property, which is an ironic term considering they are propping something up.
• A majority of the Sigil team will join SOE.
• Not all of the Sigil team appeared to be destined to continue their work on Vanguard as 'integration' into other offices is mentioned.
• Brad McQuaid will become a consultant with SOE as "Vanguard Creative Advisor"

There wouldn't be a Vanguard story without something being tapped out by Nino, an outspoken member of the development team.

"I promised not to be publically [sic] scornful, but I will say this: I hope those truly responsible for the deep rooted failings of the company lay in bed tonight and relive the events that transpired today in their heads, over and over. For not ONE of you is without your job come tomorrow morning."

I really don't know who is to blame. Nino seems to think it is management. He may be right. He may be wrong. I do know that without the management team he wouldn't have had a job at all. Nino goes on to state that he was working 80-100 hour weeks during the final year. Welcome to the club Bucko. I'll send you a T-shirt. In the last five-years I can the number of weeks on my fingers that I didn't work at least 80 hours.

At least some of the devs are going to have jobs, Nino included when all is said and done.

Our forums are buzzing, as will be the comments section of this blog.

For some happier news, check out this video.

• Gods and Heroes: Rome Rising - Video Interview With Chris McKibbin, Executive Producer

Vote, rank, share, comment or email me directly.

2. New MMOG Articles At Ten Ton Hammer Today

• OGDC: Interview With NetDevil
  "NetDevil may have been a small, start-up company at one time, but now that they've received the green light to develop the LEGO MMO, they can't help but grow. Cody "Micajah" Bye and Jeff "Ethec" Woleslagle had a sit down conversation with Scott Brown, Hermann Peterscheck, and Grace Wong to discuss their upcoming projects and what new projects are on the horizon."
• OGDC: Interview With Monty Sharma of Vivox
  "Monty Sharma is always a great interview, partly because of his wit and friendliness, and also because he has something new up his sleeve related to integrated gaming voicechat. OGDC 2007 was no exception. An update on the state of the art, using Vivox for positional voicechat, text-to-speech and real-time transcription, ever-improving voice fonts to morph and age voices, and possible applications of voicechat technology in the mainstream- all this and more was on the table in our latest exciting interview with Vivox's Monty Sharma."
• OGDC: Stargate Worlds Interview With Joe Ybarra - Part 2
  "At OGDC '07, Cody "Micajah" Bye and Darren "The General" Lee had the opportunity to chat with Joe Ybarra about Stargate Worlds. Posted in a two-part series, this final portion of the interview diverted away from puzzle solving and focused on exploration instead. While the initial questions were mainly aimed at geographic exploration, Joe wanted to include other aspects of exploration as well, so we obliged. Enjoy!"
• Dungeons and Dragons Online: Quest Guide - Taming The Flames
  "Fireballs, elementals and mephits aplenty are found in the scorched caverns beneath House Kunderak.. and to add to the fun, plenty of lava! Like to know how to survive this fiery deathtrap? Blackwater tells us how with his new quest guide: Taming the Flames!"
• Gods and Heroes: Rome Rising - Video Interview With Chris McKibbin, Executive Producer
  "We were privileged to lend our ears (and eyes) to Chris McKibbin, Executive Producer of Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising, at the recent SOE Gamer Day event in Los Angeles. He shared his thoughts on why it's a good time to release a game geared toward mythological content and the one thing he hopes people will "get" about the design of Gods & Heroes above all else. Also included are Chris's comments on the newly announced Nomad class and some great in-game video and screenshots."
• Vanguard: Saga of Heroes - Cleric Creation Guide
  "By level 8 you are getting a good idea of your fighting capabilities. At this point you’ve probably collected some additional armor and learned the perfect timing for throwing in a heal while fighting."
• Wiki.TenTonHammer: RO Guides, Gods and Heroes Updates
  "Our wiki has gained 2 new RO guides, how to upgrade your armor and weaponry, and what you can expect out of the PvP system. In addition, images were added to the 9Dragons page, and Gods&Heroes got more information added!"
• World of Warcraft: Topic Of The Week - Which Class Heals Best?
  "One of the best things about WoW is that you have a choice in which class you might want to heal you when things get tough. Each healing class has their positives and negatives. So this leads us to this week's Topic of the Week: Which class, do you think, heals best?"

3. Hot Content

• Gods and Heroes: Rome Rising - Video Interview With Chris McKibbin, Executive Producer
• OGDC: Stargate Worlds Interview With Joe Ybarra - Part 2
• OGDC: Interview With NetDevil
• OGDC: Interview With Monty Sharma of Vivox
• OGDC: Interview - SOE's Alan Crosby on Community and Vanguard
• OGDC: Stargate Worlds Interview With Joe Ybarra
• OGDC: Interview - Gavin Longhurst of BigWorld Technology
• OGDC: AISeek And Smarter NPCs in Dynamic Worlds
• OGDC: Collaborative Art and MMOs? Markus Weichselbaum Interviewed
• OGDC: Marvel Universe Interview With Victor Wachter and Shayne Herrera
• OGDC: Marvel Universe Animation Rig - Video

4. Real World News

• Proposed New Crime: 'Attempted' Copyright Infringement [Thanks Matt]
  Did you win the lottery? No, but I sure tried. Can I have the money?
• Welcome To The 25 Hour Day [Thanks Matt]
  ..or welcome to my world.
• Tatoo Pic Gone Wrong
  Or how to make a pretty girl look like Skeletor
• Google's PigeonRank
  So that's why Google craps on many of our pages.

Thanks as always for visiting TenTonHammer.com

John "Boomjack" Hoskin