Top MMOs of 2014 to Look Out For .

2014 is upon us! I hope you’ve had a wonderful end of year celebrations and an amazing Christmas, and I wish you all of the best of the New Year! Now that’s out the way, let’s take a look at some of the great games you’ve got to look forward to this year!

I’ll start by saying that this year looks to be an incredibly interesting and polarising one, and it’ll be intriguing to see who is standing at the end of the year and what games have fallen through the cracks, so to speak. But enough of that, let’s look to the future with blissful positivity and curiosity.

Destiny

Bungie, the creators of Microsoft’s flagship franchise Halo, are setting their sights on the MMO space…or are they? It’s all be a bit confusing as to what Destiny is as Bungie seem to be very careful in their definition of the game, referring to it as a “shared-world”, as opposed to fully fledged MMORPG.  What exactly this means for the game and how it’ll all come together is unknown.

We saw at Sony’s E3 press conference that you’ll be able to group up with team mates and that additional players will be able to join your game for events, the game uses in-game matching making on the fly to group players together, as well as interesting loot system. But many questions still need answers, which is the reason Destiny is no. 1 on this list of MMOs you should be looking out for in 2014.

Wildstar

Wildstar excited me before 2013. It looked like a nice combination between the fresh and familiar, with a gorgeous cartoony art style to boot. Then they announced the pricing structure. It’s a subscription based game however players can also buy their subscription with in-game currency, much like Eve. It sounds all very interesting however I was kind of hoping for a buy-to-play model considering the game was being published by Guild Wars 2 publisher, NCSoft. But alas we can’t always get what we want, can we? Whether or not a lot of people are put off by the subscription remains to be seen.

The game still looks fantastic though, with its action based combat and its personalised homes. The humour that has come off in the trailers is very promising and it is one which I hope will appear in the game. Wildstar is one to keep on your list because it could either rock everyone’s socks off…or just fizzle out. Naturally I’m hoping for the former.

League of Legends

Yes, yes, yes, I know…why is League of Legends on the list, it’s been out for years. LoL achieved so many things last year becoming the most player video game in the world and boasting huge eSports viewing figures, that I can’t wait to see what happens this year. A pre-season patch for 2014 has already been released and with Riot’s LCS starting up in just over a week I can’t wait to see what the developer has in store for us.

Elder Scrolls Online

This is a doozey. Some people are excited, others are the complete opposite and then there are people like me who are just kind of on the sidelines waiting to see what happens.

The reasons why you should be keeping an eye on the game are obvious. It’s a big IP, it’s had lots of money throw at it and the project’s lead is Matt Firor, who was in charge of the MMO Dark Age of Camelot. There’s a lot to look out for.

On the other side the game looks bland and boring and the battle system, even with the integration of the first person perspective, and looks like it has no relevance to the Elder Scrolls franchise.

Of course whether or not this proves to be the case is one thing and I’ll be keeping an eye on the game in 2014!

Tom Clancy’s: The Division

Even though the famed author died last year, Ubisoft has no intention whatsoever of stopping its hit Tom Clancy’s series. This is a good thing because I personally love the Tom Clancy games! The Division is the first MMORPG made exclusively for the next generation of gaming consoles. Set in a sci-fi adaptation of the real world, it looks to combine typical MMORPG features with the great controls of a Tom Clancy third person shooter. The Division has a persistent world and looks to shake up some of the usual conventions of the MMORPG.

Ubisoft has been constantly reminding us about its end of year 2014 release for both Xbox One and Playstation 4 and after an internet petition it was announced that the game is coming to PC to! There is still a lot to learn about the latest Tom Clancy game, and I’m really looking forward to finding out about all of its features.

Everquest Next

There is only one reason why Everquest Next is so far down on my list, and that’s because I’m unsure about whether or not it’ll actually be released in 2014. Everquest Landmark, the free-to-play Minecraft-type building game, is due for release in summer 2014, so I’d be surprised if Everquest Next came out at the end of the year. But still, I am incredibly excited for the Everquest Next and I can’t wait to hear what news Sony has for us in the coming year.

If I’m allowed to make a prediction, the game will come out on the Playstation 4 the same day and date as its PC release…whenever that’ll be.

Guild Wars 2 Expansion(???)

Whether or not Guild Wars 2 will have an expansion remains to be seen with ArenaNet being very coy about any such thing. Whilst the developers have gone on record to say there won’t be an expansion to GW2, claiming that they’re working on the bi-monthly Living Story content instead, I’m not too sure if I believe them or not.

Either way it’ll be a very interesting to see what the Living Story content will provide. It’s been a bit of a miss so far, with players complaining about a lack of an in-game explanation of the content and a weak story to accompany it, however hopefully 2014 will be the year that ArenaNet can change things up.

Shroud of the Avatar

Richard Garriott’s (creator of the Ultima franchise) first PC game in a long, long time, is the Shroud of the Avatar (SotA) which is a single player and multiplayer open world RPG which includes housing and a variety of old-school RPG mechanics.

SotA has been completely crowd funded, which is odd considering how much money Richard is swimming in, with the first part of the game due to be released in 2014. It’s another Kickstarter success story and thus will either fall on its head or be the coolest thing in the universe.

Trove

Being dubbed as a “sandvox” game and created in much the same vein as Minecraft, Trove looks to unify MMOs persistent nature with that of Minecraft’s awesome building mechanics. Oh and it’ll also be free-to-play. The game will also allow for “player houses”, separate sections of the game world which can’t be modified by other players. It all sounds very interesting, however it reeks a bit too much of a Minecraft clone. Whether or not it can bring anything truly different to the table, we’ll have to see.

Undead Labs MMO Game

Undead Labs, the creators of PC and Xbox 360 game State of Decay, has long had an MMO in the works which looks to create the ultimate zombie apocalypse game. We don’t really know an awful lot about the game as yet however after the success of State of Decay it’ll be very interesting to see how the MMO plays. Oh and did I not mention that Undead Labs is headed up by one of the founders of ArenaNet? Yeah, we’re in for a good ride.

Those are just some of the games that I am personally looking forward to this year. I wish everyone the best for the New Year! I hope you have a successful and wonderful New Year!