MMO developer Red 5 Studios announced that former president and CEO Mark Kern is stepping down from his positions to serve as Board chairman and chief creative officer.

Formerly a team lead at Blizzard Entertainment, where he helped develop titles like World of Warcraft and Diablo II, Kern co-founded Red 5 in 2005 with the intention of creating massively multiplayer online games.

Michael Weingartner, previously the company's vice president of Engineering, will take over as president and CEO. He joined the company in March of this year and previously held executive positions at Oracle, HP, and Talking Blocks.

While Weingartner will now manage the studio's day to day operations, Kern will be responsible for the overall creative direction of Red 5's currently unannounced project and future games.

The company is backed by an $18.5 million investment from Benchmark Capital and Sierra Ventures, and has signed a deal with Korean-headquartered publisher Webzen for the exclusive worldwide rights to publish and distribute its first title.

"We founded this studio with one goal in mind: make the ‘next big thing.’ In my new role I will be able to focus more closely on my true passion, which is game development," says Kern. "Michael Weingartner’s talents are well suited to help guide the company to its new phase of growth and opportunity."

[The preceding article by Eric Caoili originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

Following reports that it had laid off a portion of its U.S. customer service and QA staff for titles such as PC MMO Age Of Conan, Norway-based Funcom confirmed that it did cut an unspecified number of employees.

"We did have some staffing cuts at Funcom this week as well as new positions opening in the organization as part of our ongoing cost based efficiency and performance initiatives that are vital to any business," said Funcom in an official statement posted by MMO news site Ten Ton Hammer.

The company, which has its U.S. offices in Durham, North Carolina, recently reported revenues of $18 million for its third quarter, largely propelled by subscriptions for MMO Age of Conan released in May of this year.

Though Age of Conan claimed a user base of 415,000 as of August, Funcom noted that the average subscription period has been lower than expected, leading to a reduction in subscriber levels.

It's believed that this underperformance of Age Of Conan compared to expectations, alongside a relatively lack of other major titles (with only the much older Anarchy Online still in operation by the firm) led to the downsizing.

[The preceding article by Eric Caoili originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

MMO community Aeria Games has announced a suite of updates to one of its titles, Last Chaos, including interface upgrades and new pet classes.

The new interface includes "intuitive design, new colors" and new features for "character customization, game play, and social networking," while the new pet classes are a cat and mouse-like creature dubbed Scra-Chi and Ichi(!).

Improvements include a more organized inventory screen (including tabs), a more detailed character screen and clearer information on what sub-server the player is currently on, allowing them to more easily get in touch with players on the same server.

"The majority of new features delivered had been heavily requested by the Aeria Games community," said a representative, "and were suggested for development by the Last Chaos team."

Artix Entertainment has announced the website of its browser-based MMORPG called AdventureQuest Worlds, launched just over a month ago, is getting 400,000 unique hits per day (12 million per month), a number which, according to their release, "compares favorably with Blizzard’s World of Warcraft’s recently announced 11 million subscribers. "

This comparison isn't (entirely) successful, of course, as their founder, Adam Bohn, notes that "Of the unique visitors to our website, about 33% of them have an active account.”

Which is still fairly impressive, of course, especially when they note that previous to the launch of AdventureQuest Worlds they once hit an all time monthly high of 17.6 million unique hits.

Discussing the numbers, Bohn cited several reasons for their popularity—“First is customer loyalty. We’ve worked hard to build a very loyal and sizable player base who followed us into the online world when we released AdventureQuest World,” said Bohn. “Second is the combination of quality games and the fun factor. The third reason, which we think is unique in the world of MMORPGs – including browser-based MMORPGs—is our commitment to updating every one of our games every week., which is the hallmark of all Artix games. We’re proud of our consistent track record of listening to our players and responding quickly to their input.”

Square Enix has announced the development of three upcoming downloadable "scenario expansions" for MMO Final Fantasy XI. The creation of the expansions is being led by Masato Kato, the developer behind the story and scenarios of the original Final Fantasy XI and its first expansion pack, Rise of the Zilart.

The expansions are to be available exclusively for online purchase through the PlayOnline Viewer simultaneously for all Final Fantasy XI platforms worldwide.

The first expansion, entitled A Crystalline Prophecy: Ode of Life Bestowing, is to be released in spring of 2009, with the following two expansions A Moogle Kupo d’Eta: Evil in Small Dose and A Shantotto Ascension: The Legend Torn, Her Empire Born, currently undated.

Final Fantasy XI retains a community of 500,000 subscribers (with 1.7 million player characters) split across three platforms—Xbox 360, Playstation 2 and PC—across which players of all formats can interact.

[Each day, Worlds in Motion will be taking a closer look at individual virtual worlds. We'll start with a nuts-and-bolts overview, then move on to an in-depth tour, to be followed up with a conclusion-- all with the aim of bringing you all the essential info and details on each world in the rapidly-developing virtual landscape.]

We thought we'd look at one of the strangest browser-based MMO titles we've seen yet—Trukz, a persistent browser-based trucking simulation (really).

Online game microtransaction/virtual trading platform PlaySpan picked up $16.8 million in a new investment round, and the company plans to use the funds to expand into Europe and Asia, with a view to signing new deals.

PlaySpan provides publishers and developers with a platform for managing secure micro-transactions, virtual goods sales, global alternative payments, and peer-to-peer trading. Its platform is currently live in games such as K2's Global Mu Online and Gala-Net's UpshiftStrike Racer.

With its PayByCash subsidiary, the company offers over 70 payment solutions, including its prepaid Ultimate Game Cards, in more than 180 countries. The platform currently supports over 200 games from publishers such as Gala-Net, Ntreev, Outspark, and CCP.

Along with its $6.5 million raised in September 2007, PlaySpan's total funding now comes close to $24 million. This most recent round was led by Easton Capital Group, Menlo Ventures, Novel TMT Ventures, STIC, and other undisclosed investors.

"Online games publishers and social media application developers are looking for new sources of revenue beyond traditional advertising and subscriptions," says PlaySpan founder and CEO Karl Mehta. "We are enabling a new business model in the form of micro-transactions for users that prefer the pay-as-you-go model."

He continues, "It is a testament to our market-leading position, demonstrated growth, and the long-term potential of virtual goods and micro-transactions that we have raised a significant round in spite of the current economic climate."

[The preceding article by Eric Caoili originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]

A round-up of the news online free-to-play gaming community OGPlanet has forwarded us recently:

To celebrate Thanksgiving, the MMO fighter Rumble Fighter is to feature roast turkeys are to be spread across the game's maps until December 17th. Players who pick them up will be able to win prizes including "a Native American-style Spirit Headdress or a Red Spirit Feather."

To celebrate post-Thanksgiving shopping, players who purchase the company's cross-game currency, Astros, or redeem either an Ultimate Game Card or an OGPlanet Game Card on November 28th will receive an extra 10 percent. In addition, every player who redeems an OGPlanet Game Card on November 29th or 30th will receive bonus Astros based on how many hours they spend playing OGPlanet games on those days, and each of OGPlanet's four games will be offering bonus items with many item purchases.

And finally, the site has added new zones to its MMO side-scroller La Tale, with a new city, Ves, inspired by Indian culture and architecture; Orca Beach, the Jungle, and the Ruin of Ktuka.

"The diverse new zones being added to La Tale give players even more to do and see," said Ross Park, La Tale producer. "Each individual area has its own unique look and feel, and players will find themselves completely immersed in their new surroundings."

Online game publisher GamesCampus clearly isn't going to stand by and let its competing communities like OGPlanet get one up on it with Thanksgiving promotions, so they've similarly announced several themed events and savings promotions:

For all pre-paid cards redeemed until the end of the week, players will receive an additional 20% bonus in-game cash.

In Asda Story, certain items are to be buy two get one free or available at discounted prices, and "Giant Turkey monsters" are to be dropping holiday items across the game. Xiah Rebirth is to similarly feature item discounts (such as buy two get one free or buy three get two free).

Finally, Shot Online is to offer discounts on Autumn clothes, "Gold Boxes" and "Experience Boxes."

Live Gamer—the company behind the publisher-supported marketplace for clients such as Sony—has announced that it is to provide marketplaces for Icarus Studios and their virtual world/MMO game publishing platform; Acclaim Games, GoPets and IAC’s Instant Action.com.

The Live Gamer Exchange marketplace is to be pre-integrated into the Icarus platform, allowing Icarus and media/publishing partners to enable real-money-trading of characters, coin and items within their MMO games and virtual worlds' titles.

“Live Gamer and Icarus Studios share a common goal to support emerging revenue streams and reduce development costs of online games,” said James Hettinger, CEO of Icarus Studios. “The Live Gamer Exchange marketplace provides our partners with the industry-leading, player-to-player trading solution pre-integrated, so they can provide a safe, secure and structured marketplace to meet the enormous consumer demand for RMT.”

GoPets are to be the first to enable the upgraded Live Gamer Exchange with a closed beta starting immediately. It will be followed by December beta releases of several games from IAC’s InstantAction.com, including Fallen Empire: Legions, Rokkit Ball, Think Tanks and Marble Blast Online. Acclaim's free-to-play MMO, 9Dragons is slated to begin its beta in the first quarter of 2009.

The announcements coincides with Live Gamer’s unveiling of its newly upgraded Live Gamer Exchange platform.

“A legitimate, safe and secure RMT marketplace not only enhances the satisfaction of our users, but also creates a virtuous cycle between the primary and secondary markets,” said Howard Marks, Acclaim Games CEO. “From the beginning, Live Gamer understood the unique needs of a publisher launching titles with overseas developers and worked closely with both parties to make it happen.”

We've been passed along some news from a company that we'll admit we've never heard of before, Nvinium Games, relating to their (similarly unknown to us) text-based MMORPG, Unforgiven War.

Unforgiven War is a free-to-play browser-based MMO where players take the role of a soldier in a global war. From our brief time with the game is seems pretty complex and highly dependent on players interacting with each other, so is certainly another interesting example of the kind of niche MMOs (like Trukz) that we've been discovering recently.

Anyway, they've let us know they're running "Admin Wars" an event where players must battle the team of admins, designers and artists behind the game, for the chance to win from a prize pool of $15,000 in prizes such as Xbox360s and PS3s. Prizes are to be awarded in categories including most kills, highest points to a Platoon and greatest XP earned.

The event is to run until December 16th.

Some fairly massive (well, in our opinion) news from the world of Habbo that might have crossed your path already—as of this week, Habbo's UK service is now offering a "dual currency" economy.

What this means is that the world, which previously only offered "credits" which had to be purchased with real-world money, now also offers a currency known as "pixels" which are earned by using the world regularly (and for extended periods of time) and by performing achievements.

This system is currently being piloted only in the UK, but will be offered in other countries in future if it is considered a success.

In his (surprisingly low profile) blog post announcing this, Habbo lead concept designer Sulka Haro said, " The user feedback is of course mixed, but given the ratio of positive vs negative comments, I think we'll get pretty good overall rating in the final evaluation of the release," adding that he'd " like to thank everyone who's participated in the GDC 'Free to Play, Pay for Stuff' round tables" as he was "fairly sure this would not have happened without those sessions."

Sony Online Entertainment has announced a long-term licensing agreement to allow the Topps Company to create a physical trading card game based on their upcoming free-to-play MMO Free Realms.

The physical trading card game is to "complement the digital trading card game playable within Free Realms".

The digital version of the Free Realms Trading Card Game is to ship with Free Realms at launch, while the Topps products are to be available in Spring 2009. Topps are to offer a "Passport to Free Realms Starter Pack" that includes Free Realms physical and digital items and 11-card booster packs which include a digital item card in every pack.

Over 200 cards are expected to be available by the time the physical game launches in the spring.

“Our online trading card games have been hugely successful, and the chance to take our digital trading cards into the physical world with an industry leader like Topps is a fantastic opportunity for us as a company,” said John Smedley, President of Sony Online Entertainment.

Director of PlayStation Home Jack Buser claims that the release of the frequently delayed, PS3-defining virtual world is now "imminent"—to come before the end of the year—and so Worlds In Motion sat down with him to discuss the future potential of the world and the challenges it will face, and despite third party influence, "community first" are his watchwords.

If we boil PlayStation Home down to its essence, what do you really see it as?

Jack Buser: We really consider Home a "3D social gaming community." A place where our community can go and meet their friends, meet new friends, visit themed public spaces… Create a custom avatar and virtual space, but the crown jewel of our service is the ability to jump from home directly into our online games together.

This is a seamless integration; you can fully set up your online game within the world, wander about and find your friends or find some new people and then jump into the game as you've set it up with them; bypassing all those in-game configuration screens, and once you're done you just jump back into Home.

And this is part of the PlayStation Network, which is free to use. It doesn't cost anything more. For the users who want to stand out there will be microtransactions; you'll be able to buy virtual items or even premium virtual spaces.

In this round-up, we highlight some of the notable jobs posted in sister site Gamasutra's industry-leading game jobs section, including positions from 2K Marin, Insomniac, Recoil Games, Relic Entertainment, NCsoft and more.

Each position posted by employers will appear on the main Gamasutra job board, and appear in the site's daily and weekly newsletters, reaching our readers directly.

It will also be cross-posted for free across its network of submarket sites, which includes content sites focused on online worlds, cellphone games, 'serious games', independent games and more.

Some of the notable jobs posted in each market area this week include:

Gamasutra.com - Game Industry Jobs

2K Marin: Systems Designer
"2K Marin is looking for a dedicated, passionate and personable Systems Designer to join the team working on Bioshock 2. As a Systems Designer, you'll be the man in the middle of the million moving parts that transform high-level gameplay concepts into concrete player experience (and back again). "

Insomniac Games: Programmers - North Carolina Office
"Insomniac Games, an independent videogame developer ranked among the top 10 best small companies to work for nationally and locally, is opening a North Carolina-based development studio. Our NC studio will blend our experience and proven track record of hits with the tenacity of a start-up. Expanding to the Triangle also allows Insomniac to maintain an ideal size in Burbank while offering an East Coast alternative to attract and retain the best in the industry."

Recoil Games: Lead Programmer
"RECOIL GAMES and RADAR GROUP are co-producing EARTH NO MORE, a groundbreaking original IP action-adventure game for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC. We are now looking for a LEAD PROGRAMMER to become a key member of the company. Setup by industry veterans, we are an English-speaking team spanning seven nationalities based in Helsinki, Finland, a country known for its high standard of living, beautiful nature and a modern way of life."

Relic Entertainment: Senior Tools Programmer
"At Relic Entertainment we are developing an original game for PS3 and Xbox 360 and continue to build on our history of award winning games - games like Company of Heroes, Dawn of War, and Homeworld. Experience freedom of creativity and know your contribution is valued and recognized by the Relic team and also by gamers and industry experts around the globe."

WorldsInMotion - Online Game Jobs

NCsoft NorCal Studio: Powers Designer
"NCsoft is looking for talented individuals to be a part of the world's leading developer and publisher of online PC games. Makers of the world's most popular online game franchise, Lineage, NCsoft has also created many other award winning and groundbreaking products such as City of Heroes, Guild Wars, Richard Garriott’s Tabula Rasa, Aion and Dungeon Runners in addition to various casual games via its game portal, PlayNC.

GamesOnDeck - Mobile Game Jobs

Nokia: Director Of Engineering - Games
"Services & Software will play a leading role in shaping Nokia’s growth and transformation, generating new revenue streams based on software and services. The Services & Software Unit’s portfolio of services creates opportunities for people to connect to each other and the things that matter to them."

To browse hundreds of similar jobs, and for more information on searching, responding to, or posting game industry-relevant jobs to the top source for jobs in the business, please visit Gamasutra's job board now.