MMO Week in Review: FFXIV in Berlin, Black Desert in SoCal, and Jimothy saturation

Meta MMORPG News It’s been a big week for both major MMO games and lil indies sneaking in around the corners too. Among the bigs, we got all the new details from Final Fantasy XIV’s Fan Festival in Berlin, plus our own Carlo attended Black Desert’s Heidel Ball in California, and Aion 2’s began selling founder packs. Meanwhile, SEED actually made it to early access, DDO’s Terror of Demogorgon expansion rolled out, and the whole genre is riding the Jimothy train and absolutely will not be getting off it. Become a Patron Read on to catch up with the very best of this week’s MMO news and opinions today as every Sunday ( since 2010!) in Massively Overpowered’s Week in Review! THIS WEEK’S TOP STORIES Final Fantasy XIV Fan Festival in Berlin reveals the new tank job, new areas, and a new FFVII raid - The middle is the hardest place to be for a Final Fantasy XIV fan festival. After all, director and producer Naoki Yoshida has to reveal a whole bunch of elements of… Aion 2’s founder’s packs go on sale – here’s how much they cost and what they offer - Earlier this week, Aion 2 detailed how its five day head start would play out for those who buy into the MMORPG's founder's packs, but we didn't know when those packs wold… MMO society life sim SEED arrives in early access today after nearly a decade of development - MMORPG "society life simulator" SEED - not to be confused with the other MMO called Seed that shut down 20 years ago - is officially rolling into early access today… Dungeons & Dragons accidentally unveiled a World of Warcraft collab ahead of schedule - Say, World of Warcraft fan, would you like to play a character in Azeroth using the TTRPG system of Dungeons & Dragons? Sure, both of these properties have crossed streams before, but… The Guild Reunion Movie: Ren Faire’d has already funded on Kickstarter with over $2.5M in less than a day - When Felicia Day first announced that she was planning a reunion movie for the 19-year-old webseries The Guild back in March, there was a bit of consternation over whether the… Dungeons and Dragons Online’s Terror of Demogorgon expansion launches today - Dungeons and Dragons Online adventurers are called to descend into the game's famous Underdark once more, as today the Terror of Demogorgon expansion added more "sprawling grottos, fungal forests, and… Blizzard fired the World of Warcraft staffer caught cheating with Death Touch (and actioned some of the players too) - Earlier this week, we covered the emerging story that a Blizzard staffer was caught helping a World of Warcraft Mythic+ group cheat their way to victory, exposed by players digging… The Guild Wars 3 story pitch sees players holding the line against greedy industrialists who exploit the magical wilds - ArenaNet is pushing ahead with its Guild Wars 3 teases this week, this time with a dev diary about the upcoming MMORPG's story courtesy of Aaron Linde. In GW3, Linde reminds… Elder Scrolls Online’s Microsoft-induced ‘capacity’ issues bring an end to the web version of its cash shop - Elder Scrolls Online's community was already bracing for the worst following Microsoft's devastating and (we'll say it again) ludicrously stupid layoffs to a team more than pulling its weight in… Casually Classic: WoW Classic shows how Blizzard got combat right from the start - As I write this, it's the middle of July 2026, and I feel as though I'm floating in a limbo when it comes to WoW Classic. The entire community's eyes… Legends of Aria reboot LOA Eternal has officially opened playtesting to all previous backers - Last month we wondered whatever happened to Legends of Aria Eternal, the rebooted version of the original Legends of Aria sandbox MMORPG that's being operated by original lead dev Derek "Supreem" Brinkmann. At… Why I Play: Palworld gives us the weird, uncomfortable reality of a mature Pokemon title – on purpose - I started playing Palworld when it was pretty early in its development cycle of early access, but I bounced off it as I was getting into the higher levels because I… Ragnarok Origin Classic has launched in the Americas on PC and mobile - Ragnarok Online is one of those MMO franchises that'll give you a headache trying to keep track of its legion of sequels, spinoffs, ports, and relaunches. Now you can add… LOTRO Legendarium: Even more helpful tips to assist in your Middle-earth journeys - Today I was sitting here thinking about writing yet another spate of ideas how Lord of the Rings Online could actually promote its dungeons and make them more accessible to… Path of Exile 1’s Curse of the Allflame arrives today with a new challenge league and Scion Ascendancy class - Path of Exile's July content update goes live today as it pits players against the "horrors of the deep" in Curse of the Allflame. [AL:POE]This expansion "introduces a new challenge… MMO Business Roundup: GTA 6’s union meeting, EA’s Saudi sale, and Steam’s wishlist updates - Welcome back to another roundup of MMO and MMO-adjacent business news. And for once, we're pretty pleased to report that (some of) the news is semi-positive! That's not exactly glowing… Fight or Kite: Flawed Tactics is an autobattler that blends tactics, deckbuilding, and a unique self-balancing system - Here comes another autobattler for the pile! Only this time we’ve got deckbuilding and balance system in place that enables the meta to constantly adjust without becoming entirely stale and… ‘We’re not walking away from Starseeker,’ System Era says as it reworks the Astroneer sequel’s roadmap - Astroneer and its spinoff Starseeker have both been treated to updates this week. Let's start with Astroneer first, as its July patch is pretty granular and once again returns to… Massively Overthinking: Which MMOs are a lot more popular than most people realize? - Earlier this month, amid all the concern over Elder Scrolls Online's fate, I saw a mainstream website underplay the game's success and importance in the genre. I'm not gonna call… MMO Business Roundup: CliffyB is back, a crackdown on Steam criming, and Palworld’s 30.5M sales - Welcome back to another quick roundup of games industry news that's relevant to MMO and multiplayer fans. Abandon hope, all ye who enter here, etc. CliffyB is back and giving… OARPG Grim Dawn’s biggest – and final – expansion, Fangs of Asterkarn, is live today as Crate eyes new projects - Crate Entertainment isn't holding back with Grim Dawn's big expansion, Fangs of Asterkarn: In its release memo celebrating the launch today, the studio literally calls the expansion a "love letter… Vague Patch Notes: MMORPG guides are your friends - You know what I enjoy when I'm starting a game that already has an established culture? Looking at guides. I'm not joking around here; I relish it. When I get… Albion Online’s world will be beset with dragons come August 31’s Dragonfire update - We're finally getting more details on the big Albion Online dragons update this morning: It's called Dragonfire, and it's launching on August 31st. "This update unleashes one of the most-coveted… SpiritVale apologizes for a rocky launch as it works to hire a backend dev and fix its auction hall - We noted yesterday that indie MMORPG SpiritVale has been having a very uppy/downy launch week. Since its July 15th release, Baikun Interactive has seen an impressively large playerbase surge, peaking… World of Warcraft fans demand consequences for Blizzard staffer seemingly caught cheating in-game - A fresh scandal is breaking out across the World of Warcraft scene today as a Blizzard staffer has apparently been caught helping someone cheat in the game. According to the… Microsoft is apparently reneging on its promise to bargain with laid-off Bethesda Montreal devs - How much worse could the Microsoft nightmare get? Apparently, it now includes lying to layoff victims and potentially violating labor laws. According to the Bethesda Game Studios union, the same day… A PvP holy war has broken out in the Wilderness of Old School RuneScape - Sometimes when an MMO dev claims its PvP sandbox will encourage "emergent gameplay," it's shorthand for "we don't feel like designing anything." In the case of Old School RuneScape, however,… Nintendo thinks it needn’t refund buyers with tariff refunds because they got ‘what they bargained and paid for’ - With all of the international headaches, it's easy to have forgotten that this past spring, the current U.S. administration was facing a lawsuit from Nintendo over the government's unconstitutional use of… Perfect Ten: The first 12 MMO expansions ever released - When we look back at MMORPG history, we tend to focus on the more notable game launches and less on the expansions that helped to flesh out those titles. Heck,… Conan Exiles has launched the first chunk of Legacy of the Giant-Kings with new story and QOL - At the end of June, Funcom and Inflexion announced a major series of free updates en route to popular survivalbox Conan Exiles. As of this week, the first one has… Guild Wars Reforged fixes Steam login on mobile and begins testing new consumables - When Guild Wars 1 - aka Guild Wars Reforged - officially launched on mobile for real and for true back in June, there was but one catch: It wasn't possible… Lord of the Rings Online drops its PvP-centric Update 49 with the new Angmarim Sorceress class - We'll put this as plainly as possible: If you're not into Lord of the Rings Online's niche PvP (or "monster play") scene, there may not be a lot for you… Indie MMORPG SpiritVale sees 20,000 concurrent players as the dev fights economy-wrecking bots - If you're the kind of person who sees an indie chibi MMORPG launch and thinks, "You know, I should go find a way to exploit that game, maybe even do… Choose My Adventure: Some mental blocks start to surface in the hard reset of Destiny 2 - Have you ever had those games where you realize they're uninstalled but you haven't visited them in a while, wondered why it was you wiped them from your drive, reinstalled… Stars Reach says it’s ‘an update or so away’ from early access, promises ‘big chonky updates’ in the future - Sandbox MMORPG Stars Reach really is just about to move into its next major stage of development: That's the takeaway from the latest developer livestream, which outlines some of what… Electronic Arts wants a world where in-game advertisements are standardized across the industry - This may not be bad as the time when then-Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello suggested gamers pay real-world money to reload their in-game guns, but we have to admit that… MMORPG fans plead for in-game Jimothy pets after devs create mock-ups of the viral critter - If you've been on social media for any length of time, you probably are familiar with the viral sensation that is Jimothy, a raccoon in Seattle, Washington, who has a… Wisdom of Nym: Bold predictions for Final Fantasy XIV’s second fan festival - At the time I type this sentence, we've got a week to go until the next fan festival for Final Fantasy XIV, and this time I don't think the majority of… Marathon’s game director resigned from Bungie for ‘something new, somewhere else’ - It's only been just under a month since Sony laid off devs at Bungie and its studio head stepped down, yet the bad news continues to come out of the shooter… Here’s how Aion 2’s five-day head start will work, from servers to auction houses to party play - Assuming you're the sort of person who is not repulsed by the monetization model of Aion 2's global launch, then you might be wondering just how its early access (aka the five-day… Guild Wars 2, World of Warcraft, and AQ3D confirm that Jimothy pets are incoming - Earlier we reported on how MMORPG developers and fans had collectively caught Jimothy fever, which would be a weird sentence to read in any other timeline; the viral racoon from Seattle,… Camelot Unchained is extending its usual time-limited early access to ten days as a result of server issues - If you were hoping to hop into last weekend's "early access" testing round of Camelot Unchained, you were sorely disappointed, as login issues cropped up that forced Unchained Entertainment to take the servers… Desert Oasis: Liveblogging from Black Desert Online’s Heidel Ball - Hello, this is MOP's Carlo reporting to you live from Black Desert Online's Heidel Ball! What is the Heidel ball? Well, it's the game's one of two major roadmap announcements,… THIS WEEK’S CASTS & STREAMS Massively OP Podcast Episode 573: Project Demogorgon The Stream Team: The birth of a Project Gorgon pyromaniac The Stream Team: The Doctor resurrects an old Klingon storyline in Star Trek Online Undiscovered The Stream Team: Pineapple choya racing and tropical transformations in Guild Wars 2 The Stream Team: Squashing No Man’s Sky’s Swarm The Stream Team: Seeing what Wayfinder is all about The Stream Team: All aboard EverRail Every week, get caught up on the MMO genre’s latest news and Massively OP’s best content in our MMO Week in Review! Want more roundups of content? Try Friday’s Betawatch for MMO testing highlights, Saturday’s Make My MMO for MMO crowdfunding updates, and Sunday’s The MOP Up, which mops up all the bits of news we didn’t cover anywhere else.