MMORPG News: New Upcoming MMORPG “Atlas”, ESO Free to Play, Crowfall Alpha, BDO New Class

Let’s kick this off with something.. stupid. Ridiculous. Asinine. Echo of Soul, an MMORPG published years ago by Aeria Games as a free to play title is being relaunched onto Steam. Okay. Doesn’t sound too bad so far.
Stay with me though. Echo of Soul is being released onto Steam in an Early Access state. Yes, the MMO that has been publicly playable by anyone and everyone in English for years now, needs to enter Early Access.
Here comes the kicker – Echo of Soul is not launching as a free to play title.
Instead, the game is launching as buy to play at $8.99 – but don’t worry, it’s got a super duper incredible special on right now that allows you to get it for $5.39 – this is for a limited time only!
So yeah.. that happened. Anyone else remember what happened to Elite Lords of Alliance and its rebranding to Warlords Awakening? Yeah, they’re buy to play and have an average of 100 players online at any given time.
Please, publishers… if nobody wants to play the game when its free to play.. who would opt to pay money to play it instead? I just.. what?

This is what I wanted to see after Echo of Soul’s fuckup: A new pirate-themed MMO that can hold upto 40,000 concurrent players is being developed by Studio Wildcard.
Studio Wildcard is known for their highly successful, if not terribly buggy survival game ARK: Survival Evolved.
The MMO is actually launching onto Steam in Early Access on December 13th although if ARK is anything to go off of.. it’s likely Atlas will remain in Early Access for a solid year or two before finally launching.
The MMO is being touted as an “MMO On the Grandest Scale”, offering players a world 1,200 times larger than ARK’s allowing players to explore every inch of the globe simultaneously.
The game, much like ARK will support an official server and modded servers for players that would prefer not to play alongside large numbers of other players.
In Atlas players will be able to fully construct their very own ship – plank by plank, captain your own crew comprised of other players or AI controlled NPCs, engage in PvP, master a large selection of skills and disciplines, claim territories and tame creatures.
I will say.. I’m very excited, if not.. remaining very cautious, at the same time.

This isn’t really pertaining to any updates in specific, rather, it’s just to congratulate Warframe on the success it’s experiencing right now.
It hasn’t even been a month since its launch onto the Switch and Warframe is already sitting at over a million downloads by Switch players. That is incredible – and further goes on to prove that this is the kind of game players want, cross platform.

Every week I seem to have another segment where I mention “If you thought X game was dead.. then you were right! Haha!” The same applies to this week when Kritika Online, a game I’m sure you’ve already long since forgotten about received a large content patch.
The patch brings with it three new Challenger Zones, a new pet-using Archer class, a free character slot for players to actually play the new class on and completely overhauled end-game.
So if you were ever curious of the game.. or want to come back, now’s your chance!

You may or may not have heard about this little indie game called Planet of Peacecraft. It’s an MMO that shows you how two very different, very contrasting factions can put aside their differences.. and work together for a-
Okay, I’m fucking you.
In just a couple days, Blizz will be releasing World of Warcraft’s new Tide of Vengeance content update and regardless of whether or not people are excited.. I am. I just came back to WoW after an 18 month break and this time got my wife, MrsStix involved.
We’ve been having an absolute blast exploring the new regions, experiencing the new story, seeing the new gear, doing the new dungeons and.. well, just playing the game. So seeing that Tides of Vengeance is right around the corner just whets my appetite.
Tides of Vengeance brings with it various updates including new Island Expeditions, the new Gnomeregan Pokemon dungeon, new Heritage Armor for the Blood Elves and Dwarves, which by the way.. looks incredible.
I’m hoping the Human’s get there’s soon because I main a Human. Always have.
The new story-related Battle for Darkshore Warfront, Faction Assaults, World Quests, a new War Campaign chapter, Profession updates, Azerite Armor updates.. and you know what? It’d be better if you just went ahead and watched the official video.
Finally, Blizz officially announced the Normal and Heroic Battle of Dazar’alor raids will become available on Jaunary 22nd. Mythic Dazar’alor’s first raid wing will launch a week later, with each additional raid wing becoming available every two-weeks.
If you play WoW and would love to play with us, we play on Stormrage and have plans on opening up an MMOByte guild in the near future.

Path of Exile’s latest update, Betrayal hit their servers on the 7th. While the patch was accompanied by a plethora of issues, the developers managed to take immediate measures to not only address, but also explain what had happened.
According to Grinding Gear Games, Betrayal is actually their largest expansion to date. The update brings with it four new Forsaken Masters, new skills and player archetypes, a revamped Hideout system, overhauled Master Crafting, the creation of a new Atlas of Worlds, and introduced many new skills, items and maps.
Finally, Betrayal introduces the Betrayal League which will provide players with the ability to investigate and influence the “Immortal Syndicate.”
Xbox One players will be able to play the update on the 10th with PS4 players having to wait until sometime next year. Sorry my Playstation brethren.

Black Desert Online is rolling out their new Archer class next week and in preparation for that, Kakao is allowing players to create their new character ready.
While he will be unplayable right now, as soon as the patch goes live players will be able to log in and begin their journey as the new ladyman class.
I will have my first impressions of the new Archer class up within the next two weeks after I play through him enough to have an accurate gauge on him, so be on the lookout for that!

Trion Worlds have announced that they will be launching subscription-based premium “progression servers” for Rift under the title, Rift Prime.
Rift Prime will have a level cap of 50, and will be removing supply crates, boosts, equipment and bags from the in-game store, removing a lot of the complaints regarding pay to win.
Rift Prime will launch on March 7.

The team behind Dauntless are bringing the season’s joy to players in the form of new in-game events, a new behemoth and.. well, it’s a Christmas event and a content updated combined into one.
It doesn’t add a whole lot but it should be both fun and entertaining for players to partake of nonetheless.

We finally have news on Crowfall and their progress with the game! The team behind Crowfall announced that they are in the final phase of pre-alpha testing and will be moving on to alpha testing in the near future.
The game will likely undergo various stages of alpha testing before moving on to various stages of beta testing so we’re still a long way off yet, but hey.. at least they’re moving on to actual alpha testing after so long!