As Mythic Entertainment’s Warhammer Online celebrates its two-year anniversary, I decided to download the “Endless Free” trial to see how far along the game has come since I covered the game in the early days of beta. Endless free is exactly how it sounds; You can download and play the trial for as long as you’d like, which is a nice touch for a guy like me that is currently playing two betas as well as a slew of games that I purchased during Steam’s big sale back in July.

Of course, the endless trial is capped at tier 1 and includes the tier 1 scenarios, but you’re going to miss out on the capital cities as well as the usual anti-spamming measures like no sending mail or using the Auction House.
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I’ve recently been playing Nexon’s upcoming MMORPG, Vindictus. This game was released last January in Korea under the name Mabinogi Heroes, and is currently in closed beta testing for the United States. The game was heavily showcased at E3 earlier this year, where I first got to try it out. It was obvious from the get go that a lot of work has been done since then as they prepare for launch later this year, followed by a launch in China most likely in early 2011.

Vindictus is actually a prequel to the Korean game Mabinogi Fantasy Life, and features some of the pre-storyline that leads up the events in that game. I would guess most of you haven’t even heard of the game, so let’s not spend too much time on the backstory.

Head on over to Voodoo Extreme 3D to read the entire first-look or continue on to view screenshots.
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Here are two rounds of skirmishes in a 3v3 “best of four” match in Stunlock Studios’ Bloodline Champions, which is currently in its third phase of beta testing. This video shows some of the in-game combat complete with my annotated commentary.

A special thanks to guys at TGN Stratics for getting me beta access to this fun game. They are currently looking for help to maintain their plethora of wikis. No, it won’t be a WoW killer anytime soon, but if you are looking for a fun pvp-based diversion, then Bloodline Champions might be worth looking into. If you aren’t sure, be sure to watch the video for a quick overview of what to expect when the game goes live.

Earlier this week, after much waiting and uncertainty, the Valve Corporation released Alien Swarm based on the 2004 mod of Unreal Tournament by the same name. For those of you that aren’t familiar with Valve, these are the guys that run the infamous Steam Online gaming service, which is pretty much the only way to get your hands on Alien Swarm. However, for the price tag of free, it is really a no-brainer to download and try this game.

Alien Swarm is a 4-man, co-op, top-down shooter. Players of the game Super Smash TV from back in the day will remember this format. The graphics are much better of course and Alien Swarm is played with a keyboard and mouse, but the familiarity is readily apparent. The controls are a little wonky at first. You use the standard WASD to move your character around, and the mouse pointer targets your gun. I don’t know how many times I’ve shot myself in the foot trying to move my guy, while fighting enemies swarming from all sides.
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Be sure to run out and purchase a copy of the latest Beckett Massive Online Gamer! I rock 10 pages of the magazine, complete with World of Warcraft Cataclysm information, Worgan coverage, and an interview with Greg “Ghostcrawler” Street.

These are the articles that came from my trip last month to Blizzard Headquarters, so while the information is a tad out of date already, it is still good stuff!