Massively^™

Machinima book authors Hugh Hancock, Johnnie Ingram, and Matt Kelland have taken to World of Warcraft to fight a stealth law that is trying to be passed in Europe. Hidden in thick packet of telecoms legislation is a "three strikes" law that could blacklist your household IP for life if it has been deemed to be file sharing three times. It doesn't matter if it was your sister, your parents, your girlfriend, roommate, friend stopping by, or someone that "borrowed" your wifi.

Surely you would have heard about this before, right? They managed to fit it in one week before voting and there is now only one day left to fight back! On Monday, voting will begin on this legislation. However, given the short notice, many of those voting may have not even read it. If you would like to do something about this, you can find more information on the Strange Company website.

[Thanks, Hugh and Johnnie!]

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

In January, we introduced you to a World of Warcraft machinima series, Azerothian Super Villains, by featuring the five episodes that had been produced at the time. Ian Beckman is back with the sixth episode, "The Virgin Kael'thas," a humorous video about Illidan's plot to take over the isle of Theramore by distracting the leader, Proudmoore. When he realizes that there are no other options, he enlists Kael'thas, the village idiot of the group, to complete the job, but as always, there are some complications ...

[Via Warcraftmovies.com]

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

On this 232nd day marking Independence in the United States, we wanted to feature some of the patriotic videos created in MMOs. They range from quick videos showing off fireworks in platforms such as Second Life, Everquest, and World of Warcraft, to artistic videos set to Bruce Springsteen, all the way to silly safety tips from the Red vs. Blue boys. As you're planning your real life festivities this year, considering taking some time to pop into your favorite game to get in on some of the action. Happy 4th of July!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

Check out more videos after the jump!

With the 4th of July, America's Independance Day, coming up tomorrow, we want to remind everyone that even your virtual personas can celebrate! Several months ago, a group of level one Tauren warriors gathered in Undercity to let loose and go for a swim. While The Infinite Fish Crisis chose to splash around in toxic sludge, there are many ways to relax on this holiday, such as setting off fireworks in your chosen platform, or checking out the Midsummer Fire Festival, which ends soon, in World of Warcraft!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

The Vendetta Clan, of Lord of the Rings Online, has a machinima project in the works. Since it's in German, we're not sure what it's about yet, but it looks like it will be full length. Their editor, Tirethiel, has already released two trailers and a music video for it. Most short clips involving this game include PvE, or a musical instrument, but he made a huge effort to give it a polished feel, which is no easy feat. This clip from Stimme, or Voice, is one of the best LotRO scenes that we've seen come out of the MMO!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

After a tense week of mounting expectation, in which we waited for the promised big news to hit the City of Heroes multimedia forums, the Toyota Matrix Machinima Contest has just been announced. Contestants are asked to put together a video using City of Heroes and/or City of Villains, in which the theme is to be getting in touch with your dark side. After all, even heroes have a dark side of some sort, right? Videos have to be 2-4 minutes long and no more than 200 mb in size.

The Grand Prize is spectacular: 'A 2009 Model Year Toyota Matrix S model filled with a year subscription to "City of Heroes" and "City of Villains," an XBox 360, a Playstation 3, a Nintendo DS gaming console, and tons of super hero video games!' We know there's an ocean of talent out there, so we're anticipating some stellar entries from the CoX machinima crowd.

Details of the contest, along with full rules and regulations, are available at the official website.

(In order to avoid confusion created by the comments below, we would like to note that there were two fan-made videos of the event, and the one we chose to feature has music created by Orb Gettarr and Spiraling Cycling.)

If you've never been to a popular Second Life event, you wouldn't have experienced the pain of a packed sim. The number of avatars in a single sim usually gets to around 70 or 80 before people start crying of lag, ruths, and missing images. However, those wacky Metaversatility kids took to Orange Island in an attempt to set a record for most avatars in a single snapshot.

Jade Lily was shooting for 100 -- and it wasn't easy. As documented by Daneel Ariantho and Natty Foggarty in pictures, and Osprey Therian in this video, people wouldn't rez properly, floated away, and lost connection. After many minutes, they were able to reach their goal, but it took about two hours without SL before this blogger's computer felt right again!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them. Please note that due to the high volume of Second Life submissions, we would prefer submissions from other platforms.

We're subbing in for our regular machinima blogger, Moo Money, who is AFK for the next little while. Today for Cinemassively, we're bringing you a video we stumbled across recently and really enjoyed. For those who are fans of the Chicago Public Radio show This American Life, this machinima made by SuperZuck took elements from both TAL and City of Heroes and presented (the beginning of) a day in the life of an old-school hero turned filmmaker. Tasty shades of meta.

While this is only part one of the work, we are definitely interested in seeing more machinima of this nature! Paragon City holds many heroes, each with a different story, and reasons all their own. Excellent work, SuperZuck, and congrats on your first-place win in Molotov Alva's "Your Virtual Life" machinima contest! We look forward to the rest of this "episode."

Lifefactory Writer, a Second Life machinimator, has been working on a docu-narrative, Life on Life, about the virtual world. It will contain multiple vignettes, including today's Cinemassively, Virtual Africa. Little is known about the rest of the project, which will hopefully be released soon.

Lifefactory takes us on an African safari, where she befriends a meerkat and tours the non-profit sim. It appears as if she is narrating it from the point of a public speaking engagement where she tells a story. If you would like to find out more about the sim she visits in this machinima, you can visit the Africa in Virtual Worlds website!

[Via the Machinimatographers group in SL]

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them. Please note that due to the high volume of Second Life submissions, we would prefer submissions from other platforms.

(The tool that we are featuring today is a hack for machinima only. Using it could get your account banned by Blizzard. When it is released, use it at your own risk.)

One of the highlights of being part of the machinima community is being surrounded by all of these brilliant minds, scripting, creating, and figuring out ways around obstacles in their chosen platform. Mads Lund, better known as Malu05, is currently developing a tool that will literally change the way World of Warcraft machinima is produced.

While it is still in alpha testing, it can already zoom, auto-pan in multiple directions, change the size of your avatar, adjust the speed of your movement, time of day, and speed up how the day progresses, detach your camera in spectator mode, and set camera motions that you can go back to. If you're anxious to speed up the production, he is calling for participation in the AutoIt forum. We're not sure how Blizzard will react to this program, but we're jumping for joy!

[Via #machinima on Quakenet IRC]

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

Oxhorn has always produced a steady flow of machinima, but ever since he took on his job at WeGame, he's been on fire! This time, he created a parody of the old TV show, Happy Days, called Epic Raids. While noticably shorter than most of his body of work, it definitely has the comedy factor going as it spoofs the opening credits of the show. He even shows the extensive cast of bosses, including Illidan Stormrage, Kael'thas Sunstrider, and Kil'Jaeden. If only raiding were actually this festive!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

Next time that you watch a machinima, or even a real movie, think about all of the different elements that go into making the film. Most of the time, we see the video and hear the music, but there are also sound effects that enhance the production. Caruu, the sound designer for Acolyte 1.5, has posted a version of the video without music or dialogue, so that the sound effects stand out.

The result is a surprising amount of work that you probably didn't even realize went into the machinima. When you're done viewing and listening, watch Acolyte 1.5 again, and you'll gain a whole new appreciation!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

Draxtor Despres takes us on a sentimental journey through the last year of Second Life. His take on the past year includes making friends and revisiting old ones, being happy that all of the shady real world businesses finally abandoned us instead of pushing their products on us, and hoping that the parents, Linden Lab, will take care of their growing child. Our very own Tateru Nino recently did the same thing on the SL side of Massively with her ten-part Year in Review. Be sure to check both out!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

Over on our sister site, WoW Insider, Gnomechewer is a crowd favorite. He is known for releasing outstanding, funny, creative World of Warcraft machinimas in increasing frequency. However, we never thought that we'd post two new releases over two sites on the same day because we couldn't keep up with his production schedule!

The Interrogation focuses on an undead scout that is captured by the Scarlet Crusade, and then debriefed. The events in this WoW video take place in the kidnapped Horde's mind while the interrogation is taking place. While Gnomechewer doesn't necessarily think that this particular short film stands up to the rest of his work, we'd have to disagree!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

Second Life has proven to be an extremely popular platform for machinima production. However, sometimes it's just used to complement videos made in engines that don't involve human interaction at all. Such is the case with HypoHeretic, created by The Martin Brothers in iClone.

When John Martin III spoke on the machinima track of the 2007 Second Life Community Convention, he met a musician there, Kirsty Hawkshaw. Kirsty is a popular artist, with a dance track that is currently charting in the UK, and a long history of working with some very famous DJs! Together, they collaborated on a music video about a cyborg obsessed with meeting a virtual celebrity.

[Thanks, John!

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.