Massive Magazine
From the editors of Computer Games Magazine comes a new, MMOG-oriented, magazine: Massive Magazine. The last attempt at a Massively Multiplayer Online Game magazine didn’t work out. I’m interested to see what sort of content they’ll have, because it doesn’t seem like there’s enough news in the MMOG world to fill an entire magazine every month.
Maybe they’ll get MMOG devs to write articles Gamasutra style (Game Developer Magazine, technically), or perhaps they’ll enlist the help of commentary specialists (bloggers) to fill the pages with interesting content. Someone needs to tell Computer Games Magazine president Jayson Dubin that it’s not the “first publication dedicated solely to MMO games” though.
My recommendation, since online gamers in particular are used to instant gratification (that’s what websites are for), is to focus primarily on Previews, Reviews, and Commentary. That is to say, print format MMO blogging with the addition of exclusive Previews and Reviews.
People like reading blogs about MMOGs (that rhymes if you pronounce the acronym as a word… just thought I’d point that out). If MMOG blogs are taken to print and go through the same editing and revision process as any other article, there could be some interesting stuff in there and I’d definitely subscribe (who am I kidding? I’m going to subscribe anyway).
Edit: Apparently Raph remembered the name of the MMO magazine that launched a few years ago. Massive Online Gaming. It ran for a single issue then disappeared into oblivion. Hopefully this next attempt works out much better.
Another Edit: Just took a look at their Media Kit, and it looks like this is going to be quarterly. Okay, so four times a year of previews and reviews for MMOGs might be frequent enough, but I would still like to see it in the format I mentioned above (lots of commentary). Also, their tagline is “Your Guide to the World of MMOs.” Should I officially give up my “it’s not MMO, it’s MMOG” fight? “MMOs” would technically mean “Massively Multiplayer Onlines,” which makes no sense. I guess I better just cut my losses and use “MMO” more frequently now.
I don’t think I’ll give it up. I think that ‘G is important.
Plus, it would mean I’d have to buy a new URL.
I’m standing shoulder to shoulder with you in the ongoing struggle to keep the
G! I will shout it from the rooftops, “It’s not MMO, it’s MMOG! Dammit!”
But what about MMOs like Second Life. They’re pretty obviously not games, or at least not ‘just’ games, not any more than Photoshop is.
There are some things that get a little “blurry” at the lines, and MMO covers that a lot better than MMOG. That, and MMOG is just crying to be replaces by MMOG/RPG/RTS/…
I would argue that Second Life is still a game, though it’s more a Virtual World technically speaking (then again, most MMOGs are also in part Virtual Worlds). Second Life has all the qualities of a game, but leans more toward the Sandbox style in that players create a lot of the fun. Point: Second Life, if not a game, would be better referred to as a Virtual World (VW?) rather than an MMOX anyway. In my opinion, all massively multiplayer games work with the “MMOG” acronym, but not the “MMO” acronym (MMOFPS, MMORTS, etc. They are all MMOGs).
I wrote for MOG. Had a piece in the first issue and the cover story (SWG) for the second. It’s too bad that things happened the way they did for MOG because it really was a good concept.
Alas … what could have been — if not for “take our toys and go home” attitude on the part of PRIMArily a third party.
Just to comment on the MMO tangent, I’ve always treated it like any of the other genre acronyms. I figure if I started tacking on the ‘G’ I should start saying RTSG and FPSG as well. We have the unique issue of arguably having the VW/MMO(G?) distinction, but I’m with GG in that they still have many elements of play to them, so I’m not sure that MMO(G) doesn’t apply to all current ‘VW’s’ as well.
[...] It seems like the new cool thing to do is start up a magazine about massively multiplayer online games. This time, it’s Beckett with plans to launch an MMO magazine called “Beckett Massive Online Gamer.” I’m not going to comment on this one specifically, because I covered it with the announcement of Massive Magazine in this post. It’s both interesting to see magazines focusing on the genre and to see Beckett create this as their entry into the gaming magazine market. [...]
[...] Games Magazine, and its MMO-focused publication, Massive have both met a rather sudden and surprising end. I liked both of them, but both are no longer [...]
Computer Games Magazine, and its MMO-focused publication, Massive have both met a rather sudden and surprising end. I liked both of them, but both are no longer going to be published because its parent company, TheGlobe.com, was sued by MySpace resulting in them shutting their doors (and their magazines going away