$45M buys a lot of gold bullets.

Blizzard joins the illustrious ranks of the hacked. Even when you are in the business of fun, not every week ends up being fun. This week, our security team found an unauthorized and illegal access into our internal network here at Blizzard. We quickly took steps to close off this access and began working with [...]

In case you’re wondering why Mark Pincus of Zynga is compared to Steve Jobs so much (maybe you hear voices in your head, I won’t judge) Slate publishes a four part ‘interview’ with Pincus where Jacob Weisberg answers that burning question, while also remarking on just how awesome Pincus is, and how he can’t understand [...]

The Secret World kind of snuck out to the market in between all the loud explosions of SWTOR and 38 Studios collapsing and Guild Wars 2 ramping up to cover the world in fire or something. Which is a shame, because it’s pretty much everything MMO pundits have been looking for – a classless somewhat [...]

Ryahl at TSWGuides (which TSW players are probably already familiar with as a site for build discussions) posts an in-depth analysis of why Funcom shot itself in the foot with The Secret World’s launch – covering both the missteps made in planning and pitching the game to investors post-Age of Conan failed launch, in a [...]

NCsoft to close Paragon Studios and shut down City of Heroes due to “publishing restructuring”. As a recent NCsoft employee it would be inappropriate for me to express my inchoate rage in writing. Suffice to say that I have nothing but pride and satisfaction for the time I spent supporting Paragon Studios, believe that to [...]

9/11/2012: The US Consulate in Benghazi is overrun by heavily armed militants during a demonstration and several people are killed. Among them are the US Ambassador to Libya and one of his aides, Sean Smith, better known among Eve Online players as “Vile Rat”, chief diplomatic officer of Goonswarm. While online Eve players (who previously [...]

This one definitely goes in the oh-god-I-could-SO-not-make-this-up-file. Let’s hear it from the Maine Republican Party on one candidate for the state legislature, shall we? Colleen Lachowicz, AKA Santiaga, is a gamer in the massively multiplayer online role-playing game World of Warcraft(WoW), which takes place in the make-believe land Azeroth. Today, Colleen/Santiaga is an orc assassination rogue playing [...]

2000: I’m at E3. As it turns out, it was both my last E3 as a blogger, and my next to last E3 in general (the show went on hiatus shortly thereafter). E3 had just discovered what blogs were (though I don’t think the term itself had taken off yet) and had issued me a [...]

- I am still here! - Most of the discussion is on Broken Forum over here -> http://www.brokenforum.com/   Five out of three grognards agree: Broken Forum is great! - I have (as of this week) joined the merry crew at Portalarium to work on Shroud of the Avatar. Yes, I now work for Richard [...]

For the three of you who still have this somewhat comatose blog on RSS and don’t follow me on Facebook: This press release has set the new gold standard for one of the most loathsome public statements I’ve seen in … Continue reading →

2000: I’m at E3. As it turns out, it was both my last E3 as a blogger, and my next to last E3 in general (the show went on hiatus shortly thereafter). E3 had just discovered what blogs were (though … Continue reading →

This one definitely goes in the oh-god-I-could-SO-not-make-this-up-file. Let’s hear it from the Maine Republican Party on one candidate for the state legislature, shall we? Colleen Lachowicz, AKA Santiaga, is a gamer in the massively multiplayer online role-playing game World of Warcraft(WoW), … Continue reading →

9/11/2012: The US Consulate in Benghazi is overrun by heavily armed militants during a demonstration and several people are killed. Among them are the US Ambassador to Libya and one of his aides, Sean Smith, better known among Eve Online … Continue reading →

NCsoft to close Paragon Studios and shut down City of Heroes due to “publishing restructuring”. As a recent NCsoft employee it would be inappropriate for me to express my inchoate rage in writing. Suffice to say that I have nothing … Continue reading →

Ryahl at TSWGuides (which TSW players are probably already familiar with as a site for build discussions) posts an in-depth analysis of why Funcom shot itself in the foot with The Secret World’s launch – covering both the missteps made … Continue reading →

The Secret World kind of snuck out to the market in between all the loud explosions of SWTOR and 38 Studios collapsing and Guild Wars 2 ramping up to cover the world in fire or something. Which is a shame, … Continue reading →

In case you’re wondering why Mark Pincus of Zynga is compared to Steve Jobs so much (maybe you hear voices in your head, I won’t judge) Slate publishes a four part ‘interview’ with Pincus where Jacob Weisberg answers that burning … Continue reading →

Blizzard joins the illustrious ranks of the hacked. Even when you are in the business of fun, not every week ends up being fun. This week, our security team found an unauthorized and illegal access into our internal network here … Continue reading →

$45M buys a lot of gold bullets.

From GI: Specifically on the Star Wars news, Pachter noted, “We believe the free-to-play option and lower retail price will combine to significantly increase the number of Star Wars players by the end of the year as the two largest … Continue reading →

EA announces they are suing Zynga for copyright infringement, claims “The Ville” is a clone of Maxis’ “The Sims Social”. This is kinda a big deal. Zynga’s somewhat loose respect for intellectual property of game design has been an open … Continue reading →

I have occasionally gently mocked the budding cult of personality around MMO developer emeritus Scott Hartsman, but that cult exists for a reason: not only did he lead the effective resurrection of SOE’s flagship Everquest 2 after a disappointing launch … Continue reading →

It was foreshadowed for quite a while, and today EA finally made it official: SWTOR is going free to play. The matrix listed at first glance is fairly reminiscent of SOE’s offerings – theoretically, you could play the entire game … Continue reading →

What sort of things are covered in the John Smedley Track? And who is giving the John Smedley Track Keynote? Inquiring minds want to know.