Massively^™

When gamers passionate about their MMO of choice form a close-knit community of bloggers, it provides a collective window into the game that readers wouldn't be able to get from the major sites alone. A prime example of this is the very active EVE Online blogging community brought together by our friend CrazyKinux, where EVE's players contribute opinions, tips, even tutorials on a daily basis. Given how successful this has been with EVE Online, why can't MMO gamers rally around another title?

It's possible that the next blogging community focused on a single MMO title will be based around Warhammer Online. The WAR-centric blog "Wizards & Wenches" has put out a call to the game's player base in WAR: Age of Blogging. They're declaring January '09 to be the WAR: Age of Blogging month, and encourage any Warhammer Online players with something to say to jump in and start writing, even first-time bloggers. (For those who are relatively new to blogging, there's some support to be found at Blog Warhammer where they can help you get set up with a blogging platform like WordPress or Blogger.)

Massively wishes the new Warhammer Online bloggers the best of luck, and we'd love to see the player community build something that turns out as well as The EVE Blog Pack. If the prospect of joining the ranks of the WAR bloggers has caught your interest, be sure to see the announcement post over at Wizards & Wenches for more info on how you can get involved.

---

	WAR has gone 1.1! Check out our full coverage of the 1.1a patch, along with our interviews exploring upcoming content and the open RvR changes. Plus, don't miss any of our ongoing coverage as Massively goes to WAR!

Traditionally, official game forums have been a place for the community members and leaders to get together and discuss their issues with the game, both good and bad. Lately, many game developers have made the decision to skip the forums and let the community sort itself out in that regard. This has allowed players to form their own social groups based on specific aspects of their favorite game, and hence develop forums centered around those shared areas of that game.

However, more and more developers are turning to this new-fangled blogging thing that we've heard so much about. Cuppycake, while being an example of this herself (although she was a blogger long before she was the Community Manager for Metaplace), makes some excellent points regarding the right and wrong way for developers to blog about the game they're involved with. The biggest example of this is with Mark Jacobs' recent blog post regarding the EU WAR beta public outrage. Was Jacobs' post appropriate, or is something like that better handled by a trained PR department?

When you think of Warhammer bloggers, folks like Syp, Keen, and the guys at the Greenskin probably come to mind first. Then you'd probably think of Josh Drescher and Paul Barnett, two of the WAR team heads who have longstanding blogs themselves. Just recently added to the ranks of Warhammer bloggers is none other than Mythic's head honcho himself, Mr. Mark Jacobs. Jacobs has hung out his shingle at a site entitled Online Games Are a Niche Market, a reference to a bad conversation he had with AOL execs back in the day. Hard to believe AOL could be shortsighted about anything.

He's already put up several interesting posts, which we think are well worth checking out. He reiterates and expands on some of the comments he made in his MTV article when discussing the role of WAR's success or failure in the market. He also directly answers questions from commenters in not one but two posts. It's great to see a busy guy like Mark getting into the trenches to address fan questions; perhaps you've got one for him as well?

---

	Did you enjoy this? Make sure to check out all of our previous Warhammer Online features, and don't miss any of our ongoing coverage as Massively goes to WAR!