SOE and Blizzard veterans form a new MMORPG super-studio

News
By
published

Okay, so we probably don't have the tech to put an MMORPG into your MMORPG yet, but we can herd up a bunch of veteran MMO developers and squish them together into a new studio. That's what some former Sony Online Entertainment and Blizzard employees have done, coming together to form the super-hot Molten Games .

Based in San Diego, Molten broke their silence with an announcement that it's currently working on the next Next Big Thing in MMO-land—a free-to-play, triple-A online PC game, backed up by a multimillion-dollar investment from Korean publisher NCSoft.

According to GamesIndustry.biz , the team comprises names such as Paul Della Bitta, former Blizzard director of community development and eSports, and former SOE lead designer Blaine Smith. They say that they remember dev studios from "back in the day," and they're going for a similar work-hard, play-hard approach.

No word on what Molten Games' first project will be, but CEO Jungwon Hahn promises, "We're going to create something epic... better than anyone else in the industry."

Katie Williams
Latest in RPG
Avowed art showing companions having a picnic together under sunny day
All the Avowed ending choices and epilogue-affecting decisions
The creepiest guy leans in front of an NPC mid-conversation in Starfield.
Starfield promises it still exists as silence drives fans to space-madness, but it mostly just annoys everyone: 'They are deliberately choosing not to communicate more'
Dry Devil holds a torch and grins.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2's upcoming 1.2 update has a ridiculous 34 pages of patch notes
An image of toasted bread with dripping, melted cheese on top, from Monster Hunter Wilds.
Monster Hunter's food looks so tasty it's apparently driving up demand for cheese naan in Japan
Dark and Darker - A player swings a sowrd at a mummy in a torchlit dungeon hall
Dark and Darker delisted again, this time from the Epic Games Store
A man shouting while waving his sword in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2.
Baldur's Gate 3 and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 show that the future of RPGs is in games way more ambitious, weird and unexpected than anything Bethesda and BioWare have to offer
Latest in News
Doom: The Dark Ages art
The sickest gun from Doom: The Dark Ages' trailer is called the 'Skullcrusher' and does such horrible things to demons, the game's lead dev boasts id has 'the best gore in the industry'
Monster Hunter Wilds palico
The next Monster Hunter Wilds update is set to launch on March 10 and will ensure that when you chop off monster parts, the right monster parts get chopped off
A pack of real life Balatro cards.
The official Balatro Timeline documents the history of 2024's biggest game as its developer went from 'obsessed' with making it to 'shocked' at the reception
the next battlefield
Battlefield playtest gameplay is leaking all over the internet, and fans seem cautiously but genuinely excited: 'Okay, we might be back'
Milla Jovovovovovich pointing a sawed-off shotgun at something offscreen, presumably a monster or zombie or something
The Resident Evil movie reboot bidding war is over, and the winner is… Sony, who did every one of those other pretty terrible Resident Evil movies
Judge Dredd promotional image in Warzone
Half-a-dozen 2000AD games were in the works before fizzling out: 'The games you get to see are a tiny representative of the number that get started—sadly'
More about rpg
Avowed art showing companions having a picnic together under sunny day

All the Avowed ending choices and epilogue-affecting decisions
The creepiest guy leans in front of an NPC mid-conversation in Starfield.

Starfield promises it still exists as silence drives fans to space-madness, but it mostly just annoys everyone: 'They are deliberately choosing not to communicate more'
Wordle answers

Today's Wordle answer for Saturday, March 8
See more latest
Most Popular
Wordle answers
Today's Wordle answer for Saturday, March 8
Doom: The Dark Ages art
The sickest gun from Doom: The Dark Ages' trailer is called the 'Skullcrusher' and does such horrible things to demons, the game's lead dev boasts id has 'the best gore in the industry'
Monster Hunter Wilds palico
The next Monster Hunter Wilds update is set to launch on March 10 and will ensure that when you chop off monster parts, the right monster parts get chopped off
A pack of real life Balatro cards.
The official Balatro Timeline documents the history of 2024's biggest game as its developer went from 'obsessed' with making it to 'shocked' at the reception
the next battlefield
Battlefield playtest gameplay is leaking all over the internet, and fans seem cautiously but genuinely excited: 'Okay, we might be back'
Milla Jovovovovovich pointing a sawed-off shotgun at something offscreen, presumably a monster or zombie or something
The Resident Evil movie reboot bidding war is over, and the winner is… Sony, who did every one of those other pretty terrible Resident Evil movies
Judge Dredd promotional image in Warzone
Half-a-dozen 2000AD games were in the works before fizzling out: 'The games you get to see are a tiny representative of the number that get started—sadly'
Killing Floor 3 screenshot
Following a disastrous beta test, Killing Floor 3 is delayed less than three weeks before launch: 'We've realized we missed the mark'
A close-up stylized photo of a silicon wafer, showing many small processor dies
Intel is still using TSMC for 30% of its wafer demands: 'We were talking about trying to get that to zero as quickly as possible. That's no longer the strategy'
Cheese platter with camembert, walnut cheese, gorgonzola and taleggio
I've never wanted a keyboard with cheese keycaps and a little mouse on it until I saw this one