Well, this one is peculiar:
Massively: Come frag Massively in Planetside!
In which the various writers and staff of the Massively online magazine thing go on a jolly company outing to Auraxis. I can only assume that this is some kind of disciplinary measure, ("Right! You're all going into Planetside, until *someone* owns up!"), given the wide diversity and breath of games in which the Massively-ers play and write. Some of those folks have only ever played Second Life! Oh the humanity!
The event looks to be partnered with SOE in some fashion, and the hapless Pro-Bloggers look to be getting some help; they'll be playing as the sinister 'Black Ops', a vaguely talked about 'Fourth Empire', designed in as a kind of pseudo-NPC GM-Event enemy-to-all team, quite probably deliberately over-powered compared to the normal grunts of the usual three empires, but limited in number. An excellent opportunity to shoot popular MMO journalists in the face, kinda!
The event takes place this Saturday (14th June), at 6pm EST (Which is 11pm in the UK), on the newly merged together Gemini US server, and the above link has details on how to take part, including how to get a free trial of Planetside for the very purpose.
Massively-Massacre aside, this may also be a last great opportunity to see what a really busy, as intended, continent lock overland battle looks like in there, what with this fortuitous combination of rare publicity, liberal free trials, and recent server merge all conspiring to bring numbers up to levels not seen since launch, if only for one night - truly Massive FPS battles.
As a bonus, for one night only, anyone going along will also get the opportunity to shoot Van Hemlock in the face also! As it will be an 'off-week' for our podcast, both myself and my Producer/Cohost will be heading in there, mostly to stalk and harass a particular Internet Celebrity, but welcome greetings, squad members, and 150mm Tank Shells IN THE FACE with equal enthusiasm!
It'll be a brand new Station Account for me, and indeed, for most of the visitors that night, so if you are popping along for a robust game of Plasma Grenade Cricket, I'd recommend getting the download done, and a few warm up sessions before Saturday night, just to give yourself a few Certs Points to play about with, allowing access to a few different bits of equipment. I'd recommend getting to BR5 or 6 ahead of time, which can mostly be done purely on the Virtual Training Ranges, without even fighting.
More details for the very new can be found on the sidebar, in my Planetside Boot Camp category, which I'd recommend a quick skim through, unless of course you write for Massively, in which case, no peeking! No, U Can Not Haz Strategy Guidez.
(I'll edit-add team and character names once we've got set up...watch this space. And even if you end up on the same team as us, you can still shoot us in the face anyway! It takes quite a few Team Kills before enough Special Magic Red XP is gained to make the gun stop working!)
Edit: Er...something of a change of plan. I will indeed be playing during the event, as 'VanHemlock', but seem to have been drafted and will now be batting on the Massively team sheet, which I guess means that everyone gets to shoot me in the face without fear of Special Magic Red XP. That'll teach me for being so smug and sarcastic, I guess...