Two weeks have gone by and the news on the MMO front is still lacking. Oh well, I’m here to give you my impressions on what I did manage to dig up, so let’s jump right into it. Be careful, though, it’s a shallow pool.

This week: The Lich King goes Alpha, Square/Enix is bringing the MMOG to mobile phones in Japan, and LotRo players will soon be able to start hanging fish trophies in their houses.

If there is one thing World of Warcraft players are looking forward to, it’s the upcoming Wrath of the Lich King expansion. The expansion will bring a brand new zone to the world of Azeroth, raise the level cap to 80, introduce a new profession, and give players a new Hero class to play around with.

That’s all fine and good, but the question on every one’s lips is, “When is it coming out?” Well, we can rest easy that it’s now confirmed that the expansion is coming along well, since it has entered Alpha testing. While that doesn’t mean much for the release date, it tells us that the basic framework of the game has been laid out and playable. If all goes well, we’ll probably be wasting more of our lives, come this Christmas. Speculation FTW!

On the other side of the coin, Square/Enix’s reach knows no bounds. They’ve released games for just about every single platform known to man, and probably some known only to aliens.

I know those Martians are rocking some classic Final Fantasy IV.

While their previous endeavors aren’t especially surprising, their latest announcement has some people scratching their heads. Later this year, Square/Enix will be releasing a game in Japan called Ellark for mobile phones, and it has been labeled as a “Mail Play Game” that will essentially use text messages for communication between players. I have just one question. Why? Seriously, is this really needed? The game will be free, and revenue will be made with micro-transactions. Let me just say that if you play this and pay any money into it, you are dead to me.

Let’s move onto something a bit more interesting, but still not very useful. Book 13 for Turbine’s Lord of the Rings: Online has entered the Test Realm, and some interesting information has surfaced from those looking to partake. Book 13 adds a hobby to the game in the form of Fishing, so you can spend your free time playing an MMO and fishing.

That’s right… Fish Trophies!

I’ve spent many hours of my life in WoW fishing and I regret every minute of it. In WoW, we don’t have player houses, meaning that we can’t take the fish we catch and put them up on the walls of our house to show to other players. LotRo will let you can have fish trophies. Take that Blizzard! There’s no better way to entice that little Hobbit you’ve been chasing around Middle Earth, than showing her that fish above your bed that’s bigger than she is. Romantic!

That wraps up this week, now please excuse me, because I have the World’s Largest Mudfish to catch in Nagrand.

I wonder if Stargate Worlds will have fishing…

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