The team at Massively is pretty happy to see that Realtime Worlds has broken radio silence with All Points Bulletin, first with the E3 2009 announcement and a video podcast, and now with some in-depth interviews about the urban crime game. Gamasutra's Christian Nutt recently spoke with APB lead designer EJ Moreland about some of the elements that could make this game different from most anything else presently on the market.

The game is clearly a departure from some of the conventions and game mechanics typical of an MMO. The game's emphasis is on dynamic action; Moreland describes APB as "an online action game with persistence." And, of course, there's that incredible potential for customization they've shown off.

Not one, but two MMOs are to come out of Realtime Worlds, the Scotland based developer of All Points Bulletin. Even more intriguingly, this second MMO is actually the company's original MMO project!

According to Realtime's CEO, Dave Jones, during his keynote speech at GameHorizon, their original investment drive of 30 million dollars was actually for their new product, this unnamed MMO. However, due to the ambitious nature of the project, All Points Bulletin was moved forwards in the production list to give the company a solid foundation before moving onwards.

While all details of this next project remain a mystery, Jones has said that the company is very excited to move fowards with this next project, their original MMO project. While we can't first hand attest to how ambitious this project is, we believe that actually moving your project backwards just so you can get another MMO out first really says something about how ambitious the project is.

The upcoming criminals-vs.-vigilantes game All Points Bulletin holds the promise of being an absolutely chaotic rampage, where a hundred players lay waste to a sprawling urban environment. While that *seems* like it would be fun, for a while anyway, even the most destructive gamer incarnate of Jack Thompson's personal antichrist will ultimately grow tired of blowing stuff up. Fortunately, that's not what APB is going to be all about.

In fact, a closer look at this game can makes us wonder: Is it really possible to compare the unbridled carnage and hot coffee of Grand Theft Auto with the gameplay of ABP? Not really, according to Realtime Worlds creative director Dave Jones, who spoke about APB with Chris Kohler from Wired's GameLife blog. Jones told Wired, "There's nothing to compare it to, but that's kind of what we try to do with our games."

Things were very quiet on the All Points Bulletin front for quite some time, but now we're seeing why. Realtime Worlds has been busy, and since E3 2009 the APB team at Realtime Worlds has revealed a ton of info about their upcoming game. Massively interviewed APB lead designer EJ Moreland who gave us some perspective on what the title will be like, but we're always looking out for more info. On that note, the All Points Bulletin game site revamp was accompanied by a new series of video podcasts, the second of which is now out.

This second All Points Bulletin video podcast "E3 and Beyond" has Chris "Deum" Collins from the APB community team speaking with lead gameplay designer Jesse Knapp about the game's extensive customization options, and is in two parts. Actually it's largely a montage of the E3 customization videos with commentary from the APB devs, where they answer questions posed to them by the game's fans. It's a great look at what's possible in the game and we highly recommend you give it a look. However, if that's not enough to get you to check it out, we've got two words for you: Suicide Girls.

We've got YouTube embeds of both parts for you below the cut. Have a look:

Back in April we were starting to worry about APB because we hadn't seen or heard anything new about the game in a while. Thankfully, the information is starting to flow again due to E3 and an impending "early 2010" release date. GamesIndustry recently caught up with Realtime Worlds' Creative Director, David Jones and he had a lot of interesting things to say.

You won't learn anything earth-shattering about APB, but this interview gives us a good look at one of the leading forces behind the MMO (darn that pesky label). Given the global economic downturn, David feels his studio needs to focus now more than ever because there's not much chance of raising more venture capital. He's also very happy about the publishing partnership with EA because he feels they'll be able to help build APB a strong marketing presence at retail. Maybe the loaning of Paul Barnett is icing on the cake?

For all of you hoping for closed beta, you might be waiting a little longer since APB is still in an internal testing phase. For all of you worrying about a F2P/RMT business model, your fears can probably be eased since David feels that an online distribution strategy is "maybe pushing the envelope too far" for APB.

The guys from Realtime Worlds have been too busy firing their 'gats into the air and driving around in circles to notice that they were still hiring during the recession where UK unemployment has soared.

The developers of All Points Bulletin are now the proud employers of over 250 people, and they're still hiring for over 40 more positions. To compensate for all of their new crew members, the developers has just recently purchased another 8,000 square feet of offices to add to their already sizable 26,000 square foot establishment.

So way to go Realtime Worlds. Show the economy that you're willing to mess with it all you want. If you ask us, we think you should drive your cars over it a few more itmes -- it needs to learn a valuable lesson.

Electronic Entertainment Expo 2009 proved to be a significant event for the gaming industry once again, with a fair amount of news and announcements related to MMOs. Massively was there on the ground for E3 this year and we've been putting up breaking announcements, interviews, and hands-on previews throughout.

Given how much info came out of E3 on Massively, here's a roundup of our coverage, day-by-day. Be sure to check out the rest after the jump as there's plenty more content, plus you'll find E3 galleries for these games as you click through. To cap it all off, we've also put together an E3 2009 wrapup video for you at the end of this post. Read on to see where the MMO industry is headed in the next year and beyond!

• Star Wars: The Old Republic world's first fully-voiced MMO

• Final Fantasy XIV announced

• Jumpgate Evolution releases E3 trailer

• EA to publish All Points Bulletin in 2010

• PlayStation Home hits 6.5 million accounts

• Trion World Network unveils Heroes of Telara

• Massively's day 1 video from the E3 floor

Ever since it was shown at GDC last year, All Points Bulletin has been one game that both MMO and shooter players alike have been following closely. During E3 this past week, Realtime Worlds, the Scotland-based studio headed by Grand Theft Auto creator Dave Jones, announced that the massively multiplayer crime-themed game will be published by Electronic Arts.

After getting a close look at APB's detailed customization options during a demonstration at E3, I spoke with lead designer EJ Moreland, whose past work includes EverQuest II, Star Wars: Galaxies and Ultima Online. During the interview, Moreland talked about the importance of having players feel unique, being compared to Spore and the possibilities in APB's future.

Just from what we saw at E3, we know that Realtime Worlds' All Points Bulletin isn't your typical MMO. After I checked out the crime game's expansive character customization and grilled lead designer EJ Moreland about it, he also talked about a variety of topics, like how the terms "MMO" and "PvP" don't apply to APB, the MMO elements the game has, how some Crackdown fans might be disappointed and, of course, competing with the "800-pound gorilla" that is World of Warcraft.

There's been a lot of speculation about All Points Bulletin, the upcoming game from Crackdown developer Realtime Worlds, but at a closed-door demonstration at E3, we were finally able to take a good look at the game with lead designer EJ Moreland. And while many MMOs have detailed character customization, we've never seen anything quite like this.

During the video presentation of the game, Moreland said that the developers were focused on "the three C's" -- creativity, conflict and celebrity. The heart of APB is giving players the maximum flexibility to create what they want. Using the same customization tool that the developers use to make the thousands of NPCs in the game, players can modify their characters in a myriad of ways.

We've completely zerg rushed E3 2009, attending press events, demonstrations and sure, hitting some parties as well. But we've also gone out and interviewed the people behind the games that will be arriving on the MMO scene in the next year and we've got a lot to tell you in the coming days.

As the constant hustle of E3 2009 came to a close yesterday and the swarm of game journos scatters, now is when we really shift into high gear; Massively's content over the next few days will feature loads of info and interviews fresh from E3. We'd say to keep your eyes open for it, but honestly you won't be able to miss it. For now though, here's a quick roundup of yesterday's coverage:

• Star Wars: The Old Republic demonstration

• Paul Barnett and the Suicide Girls present All Points Bulletin

• Ether Saga Online set to go live this month with world bosses

• Massively looks at Perfect World International: Age of Spirits

• Jade Dynasty at a glance

• Dungeon Fighter Online impressions

Still hungry? We've also put together galleries for these MMOs after the jump:

At E3 this entire week, EA is promoting their biggest and brightest new titles at their enormous booth in the LA Convention Center's South Hall. This includes two titles we're excited about: SWTOR and APB. To help promote APB yesterday, EA's Paul Barnett got the crowd hyped up for the game with some free t-shirts and a couple Suicide Girls to help toss them out to the audience.

On top of this, APB's Dave Jones was interviewed by Paul on the stage, and two short trailers were shown. The first one was basically what we saw last year, showcasing the amazing character customization options available in the MMO. Yet, we were also shown some in-game footage with characters created by the APB testing community basically, the new trailer we showed you earlier in the week). You can check out our shaky-cam footage of the event right after the jump below.

E3 2009 is turning out to be quite a show this year and Massively is right in the middle of it all to report on the MMO news. We got a head start on E3 and reported a bit on what's happening before the Expo officially kicked off and it looks like we'll have plenty more to share with you before E3 is over. Here's our recap of day 1 in MMO news from Electronic Entertainment Expo 2009, and be sure to click through to the E3 galleries we've got after the jump.

• Star Wars: The Old Republic world's first fully-voiced MMO

• Final Fantasy XIV announced

• Jumpgate Evolution releases E3 trailer

• EA to publish All Points Bulletin in 2010

• PlayStation Home hits 6.5 million accounts

• Trion World Network unveils Heroes of Telara

Boatloads of screenshots after the jump!

The announcement of EA handling APB's marketing and distribution was a pretty big one for Realtime Worlds, and creative director Dave Jones was on hand at EA's press conference yesterday to speak with Gamasutra about the game, the company, and the developments of APB.

Game wise, Dave has spoken a bit further on how the law vs. criminal battles will work out for the game. Criminals will be able to battle against criminals, but enforcers will never find themselves matched against one another. This will open up the possibility of multiple front wars with other criminal factions, rather than a simple two front game.

Also, the game will feature large scale battles as well as "metagroups" where the game determines balancing for players who are doing exceptionally well. Dave's example was a group of 5 elite players might be matched against 15 normal ranking players, just to give the elite players a thrill and the 15 a chance against these 5.

The full interview with Gamasutra goes into the company itself, partnering options, as well as more info on APB itself.

We knew that Realtime Worlds, the company behind the urban crime MMO All Points Bulletin would have something to announce and show at E3 2009, we just weren't sure of what to expect. That announcement came today at the Electronic Arts press conference. Imagine our surprise when Realtime Worlds creative director Dave Jones (who you may know as the creator of GTA and Crackdown) appeared on stage to announce that EA will be publishing All Points Bulletin. The announcement was followed up with a rather stunning trailer, depicting all manner of urban badasses. Tattoos. Fast cars. Lots of guns. Criminals and Enforcement fighting for the streets in a vast, open urban environment. The game will accommodate 10,000 players per world, divided into 100 player district maps. If you're a fan of games like GTA and Saint's Row, you will be blown away by All Points Bulletin.

All Points Bulletin has a newly revamped site, with screenshots and a game features page, and now hosts an APB video podcast from the developers. The game is slated for a PC release in early 2010.

Update: Want to see more? Flip through our E3 2009 APB gallery and check out the game trailer below the cut.