A version of puzzle game favorite Bejeweled will be offered as an add-on for Blizzard’s massively multiplayer game World of WarCraft.

Publisher PopCap Games created the official version after it became aware of the popularity of unofficial clone Besharded being used in the game. According to a report on consumer website Joystiq, PopCap tapped Besharded creator Michael Fromwiller to create an official version of the game.

The application was originally intended to kill time during long raids, farming sessions, flights, and other only semi-interactive activities. The add-on will be offered free of charge, and has apparently been developed after only limited contact between Blizzard and PopCap Games.

The add-on offers classic, timed, and "flight" modes, a customizable user interface, and a persistent high score table. A Bejeweling "tradeskill" also ranks up with player’s achievements.

[The preceding article by David Jenkins originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

Social network and virtual world Habbo (formerly Habbo Hotel) began in Finland in 2000 and has since grown to a worldwide community with over 100 million avatars registered and over eight million unique visitors monthly -- heavily biased to the teen demographic, but with an even split between males and females.

Gamasutra's Christian Nutt talks to Jeremy Monroe, director of business development at Sulake about the challenges of creating, integrating and marketing brands to a diverse, worldwide community of teens.

Is creating opportunities with brands that fit with the audience something that you consider to be really key to...

Jeremy Monroe: It's critical. Actually I think it's something that is at the forefront of our brains when we go into a partnership. Not only does the company, but the property that they want to bring into the community -- does it fit? And we are willing to say no, if we don't think it's a fit. We do a lot of activity, like with Global Habbo Youth Survey, which is our market research, about what the community is interested in, how and where they're spending their time. What brands are interesting or cool to them, and what brands aren't. And what movies are interesting to them, what genres are interesting to them.

We take that data, and it's really the basis for how we approach potential partners, prioritize those partnerships, and prioritize the type of properties that are coming into the hotel.

With Mythic's three-years-in-development Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning having shipped last Thursday and going up against Blizzard's mighty World of Warcraft, studio co-founder and lead designer Mark Jacobs is confident about his game's prospects.

"We're not saying we're going to beat [Blizzard], but we're not afraid of them," Jacobs tells Gamasutra as part of an in-depth interview published today. "We have our own hook; that's [realm versus realm combat], and we're pushing it and we're pushing it, just as we're pushing other innovations in the game. Blizzard is number one; we don't mind being number two, especially if it's a competitive number two. I can't worry about that."

The designer drew a parallel between launching Warhammer in 2008 and launching the company's previous MMO Dark Age of Camelot in 2001, at the time going up against Sony Online Entertainment's then-juggernaut.

"We were facing a similar situation," he recalls. "The big guy on the block was of course EverQuest. Ultima [Online] was of course doing very well, as was Asheron's [Call] -- not as well as Ultima and certainly EverQuest, but it was a competitive game... Obviously, we did quite well. We didn't beat [Sony]; we never said we would. But if you look at our numbers, we did really, really well."

But Jacobs also believes that an independent studio like Mythic was in 2001 would not have that same ability in today's MMO market. Now, his company has the considerable backing of new owner Electronic Arts -- and those kinds of resources are necessary to compete in a post-WoW world, he says.

"Back in 2001, you didn't have to spend anywhere near the amount of money you do on an MMO now," he points out. "Look at what we spent on Camelot: $2.5 million developing it, $650,000 in marketing it. You couldn't spend that on a triple-A MMO now if your life depended on it! You just couldn't! It would get you nothing in terms of content."

For that reason, Jacobs sees a hard road ahead for smaller companies like Funcom, which earlier this year launched Age of Conan.

Regarding Mythic's latest effort, Jacobs claims it has "the smoothest launch" of an MMO to date, as well as already besting Camelot's highest concurrent-user numbers by 50 percent.

"When you also look at our downtime -- only one patch in almost seven days -- that's a pretty tough record to beat when you look at the launches of every other MMO, including WoW," he says. "Especially WoW."

Jacob's comments came as part of an in-depth Gamasutra interview in which he deals with a multitude of other subjects around the PC MMO's launch.

[The preceding article by Chris Remo originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

"I’ve found that with these massively multiplayer games, you’ve never learned it all -- you keep learning," says Mike Goslin, president of Disney Online Studios. Goslin was at the Austin GDC to discuss the company's newest MMO, Pirates of the Caribbean Online, and the lessons learned.

Goslin started at Disney at Walt Disney Imagineering, working on virtual theme park rides, specifically Disney Quest, a "theme park in a box," as he called it. The most popular ride was apparently Pirates of the Caribbean.

"The most important thing we learned was that everybody loves being a pirate," he says. "Grandmas, little girls, everybody gets on there and has a good time."

While Goslin wasn’t able to reveal the subscription numbers for the Pirates of the Caribbean game, he did impart a number of interesting statistics, including:

- 104 million ships sunk
- 5,445 cumulative years of play
- 2.7 billion gold won in blackjack minigame
- 4.2 million male pirate avatars
- 1.3 million female pirate avatars

"Movie games tend to suck," Goslin admits. "That’s because a lot of money gets tied up in the license, and there are milestones for a movie, and things like that."

Many MMO developers are moving away from large packaged releases and toward the web as a platform for development -- including Raph Koster of Areae, Dan Ogles of Conduit Labs, and Scott Hartsman of Ohai. But why?

The group convened at Austin GDC to discuss. Ohai CEO Susan Wu brought some of the confusion about the evolution of the online marketplace to the forefront when she asked the panelists: "So what's the difference between a social game, a multiplayer casual game, and a social MMO?"

Ogles suggested that "the term 'social game' is largely meaningless," while Hartsman discussed a conversation he'd had with other developers.

"We came up with 10 different attributes that 'casual' means, whether it's budgetary, time of gameplay, ease of gameplay," Hartsman said. "What I am all about is trying to make accessible games, and that doesn't necessarily mean shallow."

Koster pointed out that keeping in mind how web users engage with services is more important, in this space, than defining games in a traditional way. "Those terms all suck, don't they?" He said.

"The big thing is that, on the web, you do see different definitions than you expect to see in the game industry for 'social' ... it's asynchronous... the engagement is there... but it's a different definition of 'social' or 'casual' or 'immersive'."

When it comes to focus testing, the recent climate has favored evaluating the process closely to ensure it's done at the right time -- beginning focus testing too early can compromise a developer's vision and clutter the pipeline with too much feedback too early.

But working on LEGO Universe, NetDevil's bucking the trend -- it's been focus testing the online world for two and a half years, using the same group of 19 kids and families from day one.

LEGO Universe lead producer Ryan Seabury favors a broader term for the process -- "consumer testing." And as part of the wider-lens view, he says that who you have conducting the test process makes a big difference.

"You need experts that know how to set up the research the right way -- people that know how to ask the right questions," he says. "Just bringing people in... isn't going to be useful. That's one big thing I think a lot of people mess up on."

And it depends on the interpretation, too. Others, says Seabury, take the result of focus testing far too literally. "You have to read between the lines and trust your gut," he advises. "Early focus testing, if misinterpreted, can take you in a bad direction."

Following the recent announcement that Microsoft-owned Age Of Empires creator Ensemble Studios would close after the completion of Halo Wars, Gamasutra has discovered that a now-canceled Halo MMO was in development at the studio, unearthing prototype UI and level screenshots of the Ensemble-developed project.

The prototype art, which was at one point made available on an Ensemble-linked online artist portfolio website, further confirms previous rumors that the studio was working on an MMO based on the Bungie-created sci-fi franchise.

Notable, rumors reported in Game Informer magazine in early 2006 claimed that Bungie and Ensemble were teaming up to make a Halo-themed MMO. And, although it was not clear that it was Halo-specific, websites such as 1UP did point out that Ensemble was hiring for an MMO project as early as April 2006.

The title seems to have been in development in 2006 and some of 2007 -- though it's by no means clear that it was the only MMO-related title in development at the studio at that time.

What is clear, however, is that Ensemble's Bruce Shelley mentioned in a June 2008 blog post that they "...set up three prototype teams out of the staff of a major project that we cancelled. After six months of very interesting work, we have now stopped two of those prototypes, with one getting more time to demonstrate the value of its concept."

"I HATE GOLD SELLERS WITH EVERY FIBER OF MY BEING," writes Mythic Entertainment co-founder Mark Jacobs on his blog -- caps lock his, after the statement typed plain was "not strong enough."

"I’ve been waiting for the day that WAR launched so I could have the absolute pleasure of instituting policies to make their lives more difficult so we could drive them out of WAR," says Jacobs.

Jacobs says that since Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning launched on September 18, "we have been banning these jerks like crazy. As of Saturday Night, we had banned about 400 of them."

He says WAR has a "strike team" dedicated to removing gold-selling spammers from the servers quickly, and even employs a "public ban message" that gives users a special message to let them know whenever a user has been banned.

"We will continue this policy and expand it to the other servers. We are in for a real fight against these bottom feeders and it will be a long and costly battle but it’s one we are going to take to them and this is only the first step. After all, this is WAR," says Jacobs.

He also says gold sellers have offered him "a piece of the action both personally and corporately" to "turn a blind eye or help them in their actions," and that he told them to "go to hell."

[The preceding article by Leigh Alexander originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

Ankama Games, developer of Dofus, has announced a new server for the flash-based MMORPG, the "Heroic" server, created to "perfect" the game's mechanisms and including new game rules such as permanent death.

A popular method of playing in many RPGs (such as Diablo II) in Dofus when players die their opponent will be able to take their items, and their dead character will rest in the "Cemetery of Heroes" -- an online worldwide ranking.

Other game rules have been adapted for the server, with skills levelling up quicker and profession experience also gained more quickly.

"Both beginner and experienced players will find in this brand new game mode a challenge that matches their expectations," said an Ankama representative. "Ankama would like to take this opportunity to welcome its first courageous subscribers!"

Server-based game publisher and developer Trion World Network closed a $70 million Series C funding round co-led by Act II Capital and previous investors, including Trinity Ventures, DCM, Time Warner, Rustic Canyon, and Peacock Equity.

This latest round of funding brings the company's total capital raised since its inception to $100 million. Trion was founded in 2006 by former Electronic Arts veteran Lars Buttler and Might and Magic series creator Jon Van Caneghem, and has established offices in Redwood City, San Diego, and Austin.

Delivering what Trion calls "server-based games," which will be compatible with broadband-enabled PCs and PlayStation 3 systems, the company's Trion Platform will provide users with a client that handles I/O and rendering, while dynamic content is stored on servers and fed to the clients as needed.

Trion's games will initially be delivered via download, retail, and other distribution methods. Different "channels," which are essentially different game titles, will be maintained on Trion's server, and deliver that dynamic content to users depending on which "channel" they engage with.

The company has so far announced two titles currently in development and set to be published by Trion in North America and Europe -- a fantasy MMORPG helmed by chief creative officer Canegham and an MMO co-developed in partnership with NBC Universal’s Sci-Fi Channel.

Buttler, who serves as Trion's CEO, says that this latest funding represents a continued vote of confidence in the company's technology and approach to interactive entertainment. He added, "This signifies a shift away from static retail products and towards games as dynamic services, which will be simulated increasingly 'in the cloud.'"

[The preceding article by Eric Caoili originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

Right now, the MMO industry is in flux, with much discussion over whether the subscription or free-to-play model is the correct one for ongoing projects. When you figure in the world market, things get even more complicated.

Gamasutra was at a panel at last week's Austin Game Developers Conference which featured Robert Ferrari (VP Business Development, Turbine), Hilmar Veigar Petursson (CEO, CCP), Nicolay Nickelsen (VP, Business Development, Funcom), Min Kim (VP of Marketing, Nexon America Inc.), and was moderated by Jessica Mulligan (COO, ImaginVenture SA). It delved into the complexities of the two models -- how are they performing, and what do users want this year?

Can one business model work in the west and the east? Nexon's Min Kim, coming from the massive success of Maple Story, said, "Yeah, we do feel it's possible to have one business model... but I feel you have to tailor it to both sides. We're finding more and more that business models are not exactly the same -- but they're very similar."

Nickelsen, on the other hand, believes it "depends on the game." And Petursson noted that it's not just the location of your players that matters -- server tech is a consideration, too.

"Since EVE Online is centrally hosted in London for all of the world, we have to have multiple business models that work on the same server," Petursson says. "You have to build multiple different business models people can choose... it's part of the game designer's toolset in building a complete service."

Lizard Interactive has announced that they are to host an event for new registered players of their fantasy MMORPG, Sho Online, in association with MMO services provider MMOsmart.

New registered users who sign up before October 6, 2008 are to receive 200 free points for the Sho Online Item Shop points to purchase in-game items, such as accessories including masks, hats and talismans.

Korea-based Lizard Interactive created Sho Online as a "lore-driven" MMORPG – it is based on one of the four Chinese tales in a novel called the Fengshen Yanyi, written in the Ming Dynasty and based on real historical events.

"The Sho Online community is growing in leaps and bounds," said David Markowitz, producer of Sho Online at MMOsmart. "With this event we wanted to show new players our appreciation as they join this great community. They have a lot of great content to look forward to in Sho Online."

Beckett Media has announced that issue 15 of their MMO magazine Beckett Massive Online Gamer is to include four exclusive in-game items for Warhammer Online, EverQuest 2 and Mabinogi.

The Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning in-game item is the "Vanquisher’s Emerald Band" which offers +2 to all stats, plus a special effect that gives players a chance to inflict additional "corporeal damage."

The EverQuest 2 in-game item is a Limited Edition Guild Hall Statue, and Mabinogi players can receive a Cat Club weapon and Special Cat Earmuffs.

The first 1,000 people to subscribe online will also be emailed an exclusive key code so that they can obtain their exclusive item immediately.

“This is one of our most exciting issues of the year and our readers benefit from this opportunity to upgrade their characters,” said Doug Kale, Editorial Director of MOG.

Of the 1,541 girls surveyed, over half of the girls surveyed claimed that they are devoting more time to playing video games and using consumer electronics now than they did in the previous year.

The report shows that though girls age 9 to 12 still prefer to play with traditional toys over games or electronics, the number of 'tweens migrating to computer and video games is increasing.

According to the study, girls age 6 to 8 are also spending more time in 2008 with virtual worlds, attracted in particular to their social elements, as well as board games and arts and crafts.

"Girls, in general, are famously social creatures," says NPD Group analyst Anita Frazier. "The growth in use of social networking and virtual world websites by girls is a natural extension of this core value which needs to be recognized by manufacturers who count girls as primary market for their goods and services."

[The preceding article by Eric Caoili originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

Latina-themed virtual world for tween girls Hip Chicas has announced that it has opened registration for its beta trial.

The first 100,000 people to register for the Hip Chicas beta are to receive a Hip V.I.P. membership as a reward, as well as unique online badges within the world.

In Hip Chicas, registered members follow the Hip Chicas -- five Latina characters from different parts of the U.S. that are in a popular band on tour. Their mission while on tour is to "Help Improve the Planet" at each stop.

Registered members will be able to navigate from place to place using an interactive map of North and South America and visit places such as Mexico, Los Angeles, Puerto Rico, New York, Cuba, Miami Beach, the Amazon or the Everglades. They will be able to choose between a moderated open chat and canned multi-lingual chat, which features a “chat translator” that allows members to use multiple languages to communicate with each other in real time.

“Hip Chicas is a brand for the 21st Century, updated for a digitized, multi-screen and multi-lingual world, in order to be everywhere the audience is,” sated the creator of Hip Chicas, Lazaro Fuentes. “We are proud of our efforts and feel confident that it will meet with the parents’ approval, and most importantly the users’. That is a must if you are going to succeed in digital media today.”

Over 500,000 new players registered for new massively multiplayer online title Warhamer Online: Age of Reckoning in its first week, developer Mythic says.

WAR launched simultaneously in North America, Europe and the Oceanic territories. Mythic says the game's strong launch week makes it publisher Electronic Arts’ most pre-ordered PC title -- and the fastest-selling new MMO of all time.

Earlier in the month, Electronic Arts announced it had sold 1.5 million units of the game to retailers in the launch territories, making WAR the first MMO to open its servers simultaneously in all three regions. Shortly after launch, Mythic also banned 400 "bottom feeding" users for selling gold.

"In just one week, we have a half a million people playing WAR online, and the ranks of Order and Destruction are growing at a record-breaking pace for a new MMORPG," says Mark Jacobs, co-founder and general manager of Mythic Entertainment.

"We spent years working to provide players with the most stable, epic, and polished online world we could, but it is the players that have truly brought the Age of Reckoning to life."

Although the game courted controversy for failing to credit all those developers that have been involved in its long gestation, the IGDA (International Game Developers Association) yesterday praised Mythic for its plans to address the situation with an online database.

[The preceding article by David Jenkins originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

Defining the future of virtual worlds is difficult when clear guidelines for what they are and what they can do have not really been established -- hence, the formation of the Virtual Worlds Roadmap Special Interest group, which plans to have its first formal workshop next month in the San Francisco Bay Area.

The group, which is formed by high-placed members from a variety of technology companies, aims to meaningfully define what is required from virtual worlds in a variety of social and technological contexts, hoping to grow the nascent space beyond just a group of children's online hangouts (like Habbo Hotel) and game-related MMO applications (such as World of Warcraft).

In a Worlds in Motion Summit session at Austin GDC named 'The Future of the Metaverse', The Electric Sheep Company CEO Sibley Verbeck summed it up: "the vision for virtual worlds is much broader than games."

Though no truly 'mainstream' virtual world applications have yet debuted, Samsung Electronics technology vice president Victoria Coleman explained that her "personal frustration, and I think all of us share that, is that we see a huge potential in virtual worlds and we so many people not getting it, somehow. Somehow we have not found, yet, that vocabulary to make it clear to the wider community."