Everyone has a fighting chance
Two interesting pieces of news have arrived over night. In the first, the EverQuest Next Reddit has been updated with a full list of SOE/Daybreak employees affected by yesterday’s firings. Eric Smith, Jeff Butler and Steve Danuser join Dave Georgeson from the EQN team as those now seeking employment. The list goes on to show other employees from other IPs as well.
Multiplayer gaming isn’t what it used to be. Yes, MMORPGs have cornered the market on truly massive numbers, but there are a lot of games out there that feature the ability to play with large (but not quite massive) groups of players or smaller, tight-knit groups of friends, similar to what a MMO player would do while raiding. While I am a huge fan of "true" MMOs, I just as often enjoy logging in for some quick action or fun roleplay with a more immediate game.
When SOE turned into Daybreak Game Studio after being acquired by investment company Columbus Nova, readers began to speculate when staff shake ups would begin. A week later and rumors are beginning to float our way that at least two major players at Daybreak have received pink slips.
Fans of the old arcade classic "Asteroids" will be happy to hear that Atari is resurrecting the IP in a sense with the newly announced Asteroids: Outpost, an open world sandbox survival MMO. The game will feature players gathering resources, staking claims, crafting equipment and protecting all their worldly (or otherworldly) goods.
Welcome to another episode of Game On with MMORPG.com. Jessica and Braxwolf are back to talk about the latest news, including SOE’s transformation into Daybreak Game Company, more details on the GW2 expansion, Q4 financial reports from Activision Blizzard, and Crowfall’s new art assets.
There are a lot of MMOs out there now, but not all of them have the kind of player base that Azeroth, Tyria, or Norrath have. Some games, try as they might, just don’t attract a lot of people. The quest for today: would you or do you play one of those games?
NCSoft today released their earnings report for the 2014 fiscal year. While the company as a whole grew across the board, not everyone is presently drinking champagne and wearing silly hats at the NCSoft executive suite.
With Wednesday’s news about the layoffs at Daybreak Game Company (formerly SOE), including Dave Georgeson and Linda Brasse, we started thinking. There could be any number of reasons those two were let go, but being some of the highest profile members of SOE’s staff causes alarm. We were reminded of SOE Live just this past year, the bits of EverQuest Next info we were given… and why it just wasn’t enough for the press or the fans.
We’re at a turning point, people. Or rather, we have been. The MMORPG boom is over, and we’re settling into a new era for these games. For many of you, that’s scary. Some even seem ready to state that the MMO is "dead". I’m biased, but I’m not so bleak. In my eyes, everything that’s gone wrong in the industry for the past 5 years or more has done nothing but make us free to explore the potential of what I consider the greatest genre there has ever been or will be.
As we’re seeing with the announcement of our new forum system coming soon, big changes are afoot at MMORPG.com. We’re working our way towards a bold and new take on the 10+ year old site. Today’s quest is a simple one: what sort of things would you like to see in the new site?