John Smedley1, the President of SOE, has announced that his organization intends to release a free online game in the fall of 2006. Free, in this case, appears to mean:
1. The game will be a free download.
2. There will be no monthly subscription fee.
3. Expansion material such as extra gear or levels/zone will require a one time puchase. At this time there are no details regarding what the game will be named or how it is themed.
Damion Schubert of The Escapist2 has written an interesting article concerning the dynamics of guild design and the importance of the guild structure within MMORPGs. See the article here.
What happened at BlizzCon? All kinds of stuff that we'll be hearing about soon enough, I'm sure, but at the moment Atomic has an article that fleshes out some of what we have heard about The Burning Crusade Expansion.
Having trouble impressing your friends and guildmates with your online prowess? In yet another attempt to find ways to make money playing games, Gaming-Lessons.com offers up personalized instruction that will bring your skill up to a "professional level." Now, if there was a such thing as a professional raid leader (I'd be happy) then that last statement would make sense. But at this time, no one is willing to pay us to kill mobs, so there isn't anything professional about it. Heck, perhaps we should just start a mercenary organization to help people complete quests and slay mobs. (Hey! My idea! No stealing it!) At this time, Gaming Lessons can only train you in Halo and Halo 2. The rest us will have to wait to become professionals.
1John Smedley, President, Sony Online Entertainment
John Smedley is President of Sony Online Entertainment and co-founder of Verant Interactive, Inc. He has over 12 years of experience in the gaming industry. Mr. Smedley's start in the gaming industry began in 1989 when he worked as a programmer for ATG. Shortly after developing his first game (QIX) for the Apple IIe, Mr. Smedley founded and his own company called Knight Technologies. At Knight Technologies, he developed various contract games like Double Dragon (Atari Lynx), Dirty Larry Renegade Cop (Atari Lynx) , Qix (Atari Lynx) , Keys to Maramon (Amiga) and Kawasaki Carribean Challenge (SNES). Mr. Smedley also served as Director of Development for five years at 989 Studios and began a PC Group that evolved into Verant Interactive, now Sony Online Entertainment.
2The Escapist covers gaming and gamer culture with a progressive editorial style, with articles and columns by the top writers in and outside of the industry. A weekly publication, its magazine-style updates offer content for a mature audience of gamers, entertainment enthusiasts, industry insiders, and other "NetSet" readers.
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