Jagex has made tons of large, new updates for Members and FreePlay users alike.

Many core aspects of RuneScape have changes, hopefully for the better. I’m excited, and you probably will be after seeing all the changes.

First of all, the Dual Arena is now available for Free Players. What’s that? It’s the sound of millions of FreePlayers cheering.

Second, everyone gets more bank space! Members get 32 more slots, and FreePlayers get an additional 8.

Wilderness Changes

• The wilderness is now 40% of the original size, and PvP is no longer available in the entire place. Instead, it’s now broken into several arenas with various minigames available. The rest of the wilderness is filled with nasty NPC (Revenants, as they’re called).
• PKing is done in the Bounty Hunter arena. When you enter the arena, you are assigned a bounty (a random player in the arena) that you must kill. You can attack players who aren’t your bounty, but you will be given a 3-minute penalty and must stay in the arena for the duration. Upon entering the Bounty Hunter arena, you are automatically given a skull above your head. Bounty Hunter is only available on certain worlds (members and non-members).
• You can now only bring items that Jagex deems appropriate for Wildy use. That means weapons and food mainly. This is to prevent real-world trading and item loss.
• Clan Wars is now available for FreePlay users.

Read more.

Item/Trade Changes

• In an effort to prevent scamming and real-world trading, Jagex will be placing a limitation on the trading system. “Unbalanced trades” exceeding a 3,000gp limit will no longer be allowed after the first week of January.
• When you drop items, they will only become visible to other players if their value (market value) is below 3,000gp.
• When you die in RuneScape, you leave a gravestone to protect your items for a time. The gravestone will only last a few minutes (longer if you upgrade the gravestone of if another player repairs it for you), giving you time to run back and reclaim your items. You must buy a stone from Father Aereck in the Lumbridge church (after completing the Restless Ghost quest). Gravestones do not work in the Bounty Hunter arena.
• The party room is now available to FreePlay users, as a replacement for drop-parties.

Read more.

Jagex sure has made a lot of big changes. Several things that were previously Members-Only are now available to everyone! Now, that’s progress. RuneScape is starting to get more fun than ever.

This is a bit of a coincidence, actually. I was just thinking about sending in a suggestion that some older Members-Only things be made available to FreePlay users. I thinking more along the lines of quests, or other smaller features…not Duel Arena/Clan Wars/etc! Well, great job, Jagex! Disney could learn a few things from you…

Trading just got easier…and more profitable.

RuneScape’s Grand Exchange auction house has been finished, finally. You can place an item up for sale, pick your price, and wait. You can play RuneScape…or log out and do other things while you wait for the item to be sold. You can buy anything up for sell using a handy search tool.

Also introduced are Armor Sets, boxes containing entire sets of armor…so you can forget hunting for an entire set of gold-trimmed Rune armor!

“The beta ends…and the revolution begins.”

By November 1, the Pirates of the Caribbean Online MMORPG will be live for all to play. You can play for free, but paying “premium” members get more (of course). The downloadable client will be available in Mac and PC formats, so sharpen your cutlasses and all that. Get ready for some serious fun.

The pricing scheme for Pirates of the Caribbean Online has been announced. According to the released information, the Premium accounts, which offer more features than their free counterparts, will cost $9.95/month.

According to Disney, Premium accounts will feature “bigger and better ships,” the ability to create guilds, “expanded PVP combat,” and “expanded quests.” Just how much will free player get? What ship classes will be locked to free accounts? What quests won’t be available?

Hopefully Disney won’t be overly-cheap on the freeplay feature set. Too often free users are totally neglected in MMORPGS, rarely seeing anything new, or not having much to do at all.

Back in the early ’90s, ID Software released Doom, a truly revolutionary software title. It was one of the first Shareware game titles, and it’s graphics were amazing (not anymore, though ).

Today, they’re still doing some impressive work. With their upcoming game “Rage,” they do more than just introduce new graphics technology.

The new “tech5″ game engine not only aids developers in porting their games to other platforms, but it can render “massive outdoor environments and make them look glorious down to pixel level without any performance issues.” The game “Rage” will also introduce some “stuff that would surprise people,” adding some innovation to the current (boring) first-person-shooter genre. Hopefully this game will get some more creativity into the gaming industry. People are getting tired of the same old games repackaged with new stories!

On July 16th, phase one of the Pirates of the Caribbean Online beta testing will be concluded. After that date, the game will go offline until September ( ), when phase two of the testing will begin.

In the meantime, the following will happen:

• The developers will fix a ton of bugs, improve things, and build a new version of the game system.
• The website will be overhauled (hint: no Flash!).
• We will get frequent updates from the developers.
• There will be some community contests.
• Screenshots, etc.

Hopefully there will be no phase three of beta testing, and the game will be launched by the end of November.

What’s more fun than watching Pirates of the Caribbean? How about playing it? Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean Online, which will be launched in May, fills the Pirate MMORPG niche finally. Originally scheduled to be released at the same time as the Dead Man’s Chest, POTC Online was moved forward a year. It is supposed to be released around the same time as Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World’s End. Excited? Being a beta tester for the game, I can fill you in a bit.

In POTC Online, you create a character by dragging sliders to set your build, height, skin tone, clothes, eye color, nose size, and dozens of other settings. Your avatar is very customizable. Having created your character, you and Jack Sparrow break out of prison. Jack vanishes and directs you to an inn. The innkeeper teaches you a bit of how to get around, and then tells you to go to Port Royale with Captain Bo Beck. You get on the Captain’s ship as he’s about to shove off. Cpt. Beck teaches you the basics of firing canons…just before Jolly Roger shows up. (more…)

The trailer for the 5th Harry Potter game is now available. You can watch it here. The game will be available for XBox, PC, Playstation, Wii, GBA, PSP(?), and Aspyr will probably port it to Mac eventually. On the Wii version you use the Wiimote as a wand, doing various motions to cast different spells. There will be 13 spells which will be used for dueling and interacting with your environment (you can levitate and blast nearly anything). For screenshots of the game, you may want to look at the Site of Requirement Gallery.

From what I’ve heard so far, this game will be far better than any of the previous games. You will be able to play the basic storyline, but there’s also an “Endless Day” function where you can explore Hogwarts and do things for a long time. Electronic Arts claims that mode may entertain you for weeks. We’ll see about that.