The circle is now complete. With Turbine's release of Lord of the Rings Online: The Shadows of Angmar (LOTRO), the Massively Mutliplayer game figuratively eats the tail of its originator in ouroboros-like fashion. Tolkien's work begat Dungeons and Dragons, the PC gaming market, CRPGs, and finally Massive games, and last month's release of LOTRO beautifully reconnects the future with the past. Replacing dice-wielding friends around a table has even, wonder of wonders, been done well. Polished gameplay and cutting-edge graphics abound; In direct contrast to the lackluster response to Turbine's other MMOG, Dungeons and Dragons Online, Lord of the Rings Online has had an overwhelmingly positive reaction from fans. Read on for my notes from the experience of trying on Hobbit feet for a month, and a few words about why LOTRO's quality is notable and highly encouraging.

Gamasutra reports that this year's GDC Austin (formerly the Austin Games Conference) will feature a pair of distinguished and very different speakers. "World of Warcraft father Michael Morhaime and creative leader behind Habbo Hotel Sulka Haro will each present a keynote lecture for the Online Games Track at the 2007 Austin Game Developers Conference. The two online entertainment innovators will draw on their experiences revolutionizing the way people interact in virtual worlds to motivate the online game development community to break boundaries and strive to create better games." The online-focused event is slated for early September this year, and the inclusion of a gent from Habbo indicates that titles other than just the AAAs are likely to be under scrutiny.

Eurogamer reports that applications for the Warhammer Online Beta are now open on the official site. The Beta will be open for both American players as well as folks in the EU, and each have their own site available for signup. We had a chat with the Warhammer team late last year, which should give some insight on the game. Eurogamer as a hands-on preview available from January, if that's more your thing. "'Empire is a world about the End of Days,' bellows Paul [Barnett]. 'A world on the brink of extinction. No matter what they do, the Humans must keep fighting or they'll all die. Breed and fight, expand or die, that's all they can do.'"

id Software has announced that, powered by the 'magic' of a new Carmack-crafted engine, an entirely new franchise is on the way. GamesIndustry.biz reports that the venerable FPS development house is hard at work on a completely original game. Without ties to Doom or Quake, the company hopes to begin moving in some new and interesting directions. "Id's last major internally developed title was 2004's Doom 3, which utilized new technology created by Carmack. In the interim, id's technical director has been heavily involved in bringing games onto mobile, including Doom RPG and Orcs & Elves. 'Our first task at id is as a single studio developer,' [Todd] Hollenshead continued. 'That's really where everything spawns from. Because John Carmack is a programming genius, who in my opinion is unequalled in video games today, he makes a great technology that we can use across a wide range of applications and different games within our suite of franchises. The new stuff that we're working on does have a brand new engine that John has been working on, actually is still working on today. We can't really talk any details about it; we'll see about when the timing is right for an announcement. We like to be able to talk about stuff that we can show at the same time and it's not really ready to show yet.'"

Last Friday, we discussed serious allegations leveled against CCP by players of the game. The comments on the discussion were lively, and pointed. Perhaps a bit too pointed, as CCP's internal affairs investigation claims that a plot to smear the company with false accusations over the long holiday weekend was behind the flurry of online activity. "The objective of this scheme was to permanently paint CCP as a biased and corrupt company that favors a select group of players over the rest of our community. In this particular case, instead of receiving notification of a possible problem and sufficient time to examine and address it, we faced a coordinated and hostile attack executed on our forums, Digg, Wikipedia, Slashdot, and other outlets at the beginning of a three-day weekend. We believe this speaks volumes of the intention of the person(s) responsible for orchestrating this scheme. Verification of this can be readily found on the forums of the people responsible--or at least could, the last time we looked." Scott Jennings over at Broken Toys points the finger at the Goon Fleet corporation, an organization based out of the Something Awful forums. As I noted in the original post, the evidence presented on both sides is challenging to verify independently. Take everything you read about these events with a grain of salt.

CVG is reporting on comments made by Obsidian CEO Feargus Urquhart. In an interview with the site, he points out that traditional PC RPG developers are in danger of permanently losing out to the developers of Massively Multiplayer Online Games. "He believes it's key that developers of non-MMO RPGs look closely at what the genre offers over MMORPGs to ensure the RPG genre doesn't lose out to the increasingly popular massively multiplayer online world. 'I think those of us that make non-MMO RPGs need to look at what a single-player/small multiplayer RPG can do that MMOs can't and spend our time and effort on those things', Urquhart said. "

Last month, Turbine's Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar went live in what was arguably the most well-received launch for a Massively Multiplayer game since World of Warcraft. The game soared to the top of the retail charts, and has been a breath of fresh air for gamers looking to get a taste of something just a little bit different and a little bit hobbity. Today, you have the chance to ask Turbine's CEO Jeff Anderson questions about the process of creating the game, the Tolkien license, and new content we'll see in Middle Earth in the coming weeks and months. One question per comment, please. We'll take the best of the lot and put them to Mr. Anderson in a phone interview later this week. We'll post his responses as soon as we can, so make sure to get your question in today if you want it to show up in his response.

Ariastis writes "An open letter, posted by former EVE Players, levels some new and serious accusations against CCP, the makers of the EVE Online MMOG. In the letter, chat logs & event timelines, along with description of in-game events from CCP-Approved reporting users, describe how most of the big role-playing events are rigged to favor specific alliances & players by CCP. More disturbingly, these users also appear to have CCP employees 'on call', ready to step in on behalf of the favoured players and alliances within the game. CCP reaction is member-only, but a forum thread has been left open to discuss about it." It should be pointed out at the moment all of the evidence put forward is circumstantial; take with a grain of salt. The issue of corruption in EVE was addressed in our interview with Magnus Bergsson at GDC.

IGN translated an article discussing a financials meeting recently held by Final Fantasy creator Square/Enix. According to company president Yoichi Wada, don't expect FFXIII until next year. At least. "'It will still take a bit more time. At the very least, [a release] this fiscal year is definitely out of the question.' Japanese is known for being a pretty vague language, but Wada's words were pretty clear. No FFXIII in Japan until some time after March 2008. Let's hope Square Enix starts the translation before development finishes up." The implication there, of course, is that if we follow the trend from FFXII the U.S. may not see the game until Winter 08, or even early 09.

Sanya Weathers, known for many years as Tweety, was the Community Manager for Dark Age of Camelot essentially since that game's launch. Known throughout the games industry as truthful, caring, and innovative, she almost created the position of Community Manager out of whole cloth. Many elements of Massively Multiplayer communities we take for granted today originated at Mythic in Sanya's hands. Now doing work freelance, she has time to blog about her experiences keeping Massive gamers happy. It is entitled Eating Bees, after a Penny Arcade strip on the subject of forum management. So far she has two posts up, one looking at what professionalism looks like in the position, and a hilarious fictional day in the life for a CM. "Bob forwards Gertrude's email to Jake, a programmer. Jake is not the one who coded the original element on which Gertrude's system is based. THAT guy, Wayne, is somewhere in the Caribbean coked up along with a bunch of strippers, where he has been ever since he cashed his FunFactory stock options, opened his own studio, and sold THAT one to MegaCorp for millions of dollars. Wayne was also a self-taught genius who adhered to no known coding formalities and whose comments were in haiku. Since Wayne left, approximately two dozen programmers of various levels of ability have added layers of complexity. Jake is very young and enthusiastic, but his joy at finally being in the gaming industry is starting to dim from coping with a ten year old pile of what is called "spaghetti code.""

grayblob writes "BioWare is holding a World Design Contest to find talented level designers to work in Austin on their first MMORPG. To enter you must create a module with a 20-40 minute playtime in the NWN1 toolset. The module should include 'a cut scene, intricate puzzles and interesting NPC behavior.' The contest ends July 20 and like the writing contest doesn't guarantee employment for the winners."

Visceral Monkey writes "In the wake of SOE's purchase of Sigil and Vanguard , there are a number of questions to be answered. The commentary site F13, purveyors of usefully cynical opinions, have a pair of fascinating interviews on the subject. The first is an anonymous discussion with a former team member, laying out the working conditions at Sigil prior to the end. The second is a talk with Brad McQuaid, one of the men behind EverQuest and the captain of the debacle that is Vanguard. Both interviews highlight the nepotism, incompetence, corruption, and evasion that were the last day of Sigil Online Games."

The rumours have been around for months now, but Tuesday Sony Online Entertainment confirmed that they had purchased Vanguard and Sigil Games Online from its investors. Nearly everyone on the Sigil team was laid off with around 50% of the outfit slated to be hired back, so that work can continue on the Massively Multiplayer Online Game. The game will continue running under the auspices of SOE, as announced by company CEO John Smedley in a forum post on Tuesday. Rumours that Brad McQuaid (keeper of the Vision behind Vanguard) has not seen been in Sigil's offices since last year has only exacerbated fan reaction to this announcement. It remains to be seen if SOE can undo the damage that the last five months have done to the Saga of Heroes community, and the game itself.

Yesterday was Square/Enix's annual media party, and there were a couple of interesting announcements. Game|Life's Chris Kohler was there, and reports on the most interesting announcement: a Final Fantasy XII re-envisioning entitled International: Zodiac Job System. The title will feature the same story, a further-refined combat system, and a series of 12 separate license boards. Each board corresponds to a traditional FF 'job', like Monk or Red Mage; at the moment there is no plan to release it in the states. Other announcements include word that Star Ocean will get the remake treatment, with the first two games coming to the PSP sometime in the future. They are also working on a next-gen Star Ocean 4; no details about that. Crystal Chronicles for the DS drops in August in Japan, no US release date was given. Finally, screenshots and videos of The Last Remnant capped off the event; we talked about the game earlier this week when it was announced.

Several readers sent in links to the BBC, which has picked up news of a German investigation into child pornography in Second Life. A German TV station captured images of two avatars, an apparent adult and an apparent child, involved in sexual activity. The station also said they had infiltrated a ring trading real-world child porn in SL. SL creator Linden Labs is cooperating fully with the investigation, they write on their official blog: "Our investigations revealed the users behind these avatars to be a 54-year-old man and a 27-year-old woman. Both were immediately banned from Second Life." The German prosecutor's office hasn't responded to Linden's offer of help in identifying the real-world traders.

1up is reporting on content from Game Informer magazine from this month, talking about Square's next big non-Final Fantasy RPG. Entitled The Last Remnant, it sounds like an interesting blend of the old and the new. While the action will stick with traditional turn-based mechanics, several elements reflect the changing landscape of the games industry. Square/Enix intends to release the game worldwide, localizing the game to an English audience as the game is created. Additionally, the game will have two selectable protagonists: one is to be a traditional heroic Square character, and the other more of an anti-hero for the American market. "The Last Remnant's been designed on Unreal Engine 3, and we should see the first official media come from [Square/Enix's announcement party] on May 12 and 13. Going with Epic's technology isn't too surprising considering the company's emphasizing the focus on Western gamers ... We don't know much about combat, but it's turn-based, more action-oriented and has a cinematic flair."

The BBC has up a short piece on the hopes of game developers and investors to 'beat World of Warcraft'. Representatives for the upcoming Age of Conan, recently-released Lord of the Rings Online, and Star Wars Galaxies all discuss what it's like competing in a post-WoW world. Funcom game director Gaute Godoger has a point when he says, "The industry so needs competition to World of Warcraft ... We need other strong games that can make people understand that there's more to it than WoW." The article discusses some of the features each of these games offer that differ from WoW, and theorizes a bit on where the MMOG genre will go next.

There is an good video on NPR about how real human reactions translate to the virtual world. It's interesting in view of the question posted here about rape in Second Life. The video covers a little experiment in SL where a reporter gets together with a psychologist to see if some unspoken human rules apply in the virtual world — such as staring or standing too close to someone. Perhaps surprisingly, in this world where you can be or do just about anything, you can't break these unspoken rules with impunity.

GameDaily Biz is reporting on the project that Ken Rolston moved to Big Huge Games to do. The RPG project will be helmed by the former Oblivion designer, developed by BHG, and (it's now been announced) will be published by THQ. Slated for the 360, PS3, and PC platforms, few other details are available about the project. Just the same, the article contains an interview with Tim Campbell, VP of Business Development, THQ, and Big Huge Games' Tim Train and Rolston. "BIZ: Ken Rolston, you're a legend in the RPG field, both electronic and paper-and-pencil. Where would you like to take the genre next? What innovations can we expect? Rolston: I'm actually a pretty conservative variety of visionary. In addition to our brilliant but secret central premise, and the addition of four or five original amazing major features and implementations we can't Wait to Reveal at a Later Date, I just want to make everything... story, characters, exploration, themes, setting, interactivity, entertainment, world class whacking and looting... just a little more perfect in every way."

An anonymous reader writes "The online Java-based fantasy MMOG Runescape has reportedly surpassed 1 Million paying subscribers. Gamasutra has a Q&A article with the Jagex co-founder and lead developer Andrew Gower about the UK-based firm's success. 'Counting roughly 4.6 million who play the free version of the game, RuneScape has more than 5.6 million players, says Constant Tedder, managing director of Jagex. As such, it represents credible competition to the big kahuna, World of Warcraft, which has topped 8 million paying subscribers. Part of the secret, Tedder said in an interview, is that the game doesn't take itself so seriously. In one recent event, players could transform themselves into penguins and infiltrate the penguin army to see what they were up to in the penguin underworld. The game has been growing largely by word of mouth.'"