Id Software announced that it will use GNi's "Infrastructure as a Service" (IaaS) hosting for the forthcoming online release of Quake Live, its free-to-play multiplayer PC first-person shooter based on the Quake Arena games.

Formerly known as Quake Zero, Quake Live and its corresponding community will be available through Quakelive.com, offering friends lists and communication, player skill matching, sponsored events and tournaments, stats tracking, and the game itself through the site. The game is currently in its Beta testing phase.

On online games alone, GNi's infrastructure supports over 20 million users, with nearly 500,000 concurrent connected users at peak, across more than 27 titles. The company's IaaS hosting solutions are designed to help companies eliminate the need to purchase servers, software, data center space, or network equipment themselves, enabling them to release new games online without a large-scale infrastructure investment.

“GNi has significant experience in the hosting of rapidly-scaling online games which solidified them as an excellent choice to host Quake Live," says id Software CEO Todd Hollenshead.

He continues, "The back-end systems and infrastructure are critical elements in reliably delivering Quake Live’s state-of-the-art web interface, and GNi’s ability to scale quickly using their Dedicated Hosting Infrastructure ensures that we always have the immediate and flexible capacity to provide our constantly expanding player base the best game experience on the web."

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

KingsIsle Entertainment has announced that its tween-orientated free-to-play MMO Wizard101 is to feature player vs. player content, with a "Wizard Arena" that allows players to participate in practice of ranked spell-casting duels against each other, though the company is keen to stress that all other areas of the world remain collaborative.

Players will be able to access the Wizard Arena from any of Wizard101's worlds, and all dueling, like battles against the world's non-player monsters, is turn-based, meaning that victory is determined by strategy and the build of the player's spell deck.

In practice duels, two teams of up to four wizards can compete against each other, either quick joining skirmishes or setting up their own teams and choosing opponents; these battles are free to all Wizard101 players. In ranked duels, playes are assigned based on a matchmaking system and can win in-game items for performing well. Ranked battles are free for Wizard101 subscribers, or by purchase by microtransactions.

"If you prefer questing or mini-games, great... you never have to duel another player," said Todd Coleman, Director of Wizard101. "But families—and a lot of core gamers that are playing Wizard101 too—are going to have a great time competing against other players in the Wizard Arena."

Another Asian MMO localizer has popped into our line of sight, and this one, Enjoymmo Games (strange capitalization choice theirs, not ours) has got in touch to let us know they've just started a closed beta for one of their titles, Chaos Online.

A free-to-play fantasy MMORPG, Chaos Online is an intriguing sort of "everything and the kitchen sink" jumble—the game is set in a "land not bound by time nor space", and so players can battle with modern technology or ancient spells, with one example given by the company that you could " cast spells while riding on a motorcycle!" thanks to being designed by as group of "insane game makers".

The game is similar to Diablo visually, using a "2.5D" engine SancoX.

"During alpha testing, players contributed a lot good ideas and we have implemented most of them into the game," said a representative of the company, "like always, we are willing to listen to our players and we are willing to make their good ideas come true in the coming closed beta!"

[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've been filling in a lot of the surprising blanks in our Online World Atlas recently, such Audition and NeoPets, so here’s the latest blank we're going to fill—Travian, one of the most popular browser-based civilization building games.

Name:Travian

Company: Travian Games

Established: 2004

How it Works: Travian is browser based and runs in HTML and Javascript. Navigation and gameplay are accomplished via mouse and keyboard input.

Overview: In Travian, users create a village on a randomly assigned plot of land, where they must use local resources to develop their village in the aim of eventually creating a world wonder before the end of a set amount of time. Players can attack and trade with other player-owned villages.

Payment Method: Travian is free to play, and earns revenue via "Travian Plus", which allows users more functionality, and the purchase of "Gold" which allows players in-game advantages.

Key Features:
- Massively multiplayer real-time strategy title
- "Always on"—players' cities are constantly working, even when they're not logged in
- Players can not only fight with each other, but perform diplomacy, forming alliances and trade agreements
- Includes a regular "end game" where after a set amount of time the game ends and a new one begins

Useful Links:
Official FAQ
Official Forums
Unofficial Wiki

We're a bit late on this news, but it's still more than worth mentioning—Gaia Online has announced that over half a million players have signed up for their browser-based MMORPG zOMG! Since the game entered open beta.

That's still a small amount of players considering the size of their full community—a remarkable seven million users are active at least on a monthly basis—but does show incredible growth for a beta stage.

In zOMG!, users battle "inanimate objects such as lawn gnomes, rubber boots and alarm clocks" through sixteen zones to collect battle rings which can be traded with other players.

“Positive feedback from satisfied players not only aids our team in modifying and ultimately perfecting the zOMG! gameplay experience; it is truly rewarding,” said David Georgeson, Senior Producer of zOMG! at Gaia Online. “After a lengthy development process, it’s almost surreal to watch players dig right into the storyline and begin realizing the game’s full potential.”

Digital advertising agency Studiocom (Barbie Girls) has announced a partnership with Paws Inc.—global manager of the Garfield IP—to allow the use of Garfield properties in Studiocom's proprietary virtual community MiniEgo.

MiniEgo might be news to you—it was to us—it's the virtual world that Studiocom launched officially very quietly earlier this year, but was it was launched in early 2006 as a "testing ground for Studiocom's proprietary MMOC engine 'Galapagos,'" though they saw fit to launch it as an official MMO after "the children of Studiocom employees began playing on the site and sharing their experiences with their peers."

The community features all the usual sort of aspects you would expect from these kind of worlds—avatars, e-cards and real-time chat, and could be considered to be a form of competitor to WeeWorld.

The partnership is to allow MiniEgo users to interact with Garfield characters and configure their avatars with "Garfield-inspired characteristics." Additionally, users will have the opportunity to visit "virtual destination venues" from the comic strip.

Garfield's integration into MiniEgo is to be promoted on Garfield online properties to drive traffic to the site.

"We are unbelievably excited about the partnership with Garfield," said Juan Pablo Gnecco, CEO, Studiocom. "Brand integration with an existing virtual world is a great value proposition for brands looking to capitalize on the popularity, engagement and brand immersion factors of online environments, without the full development costs. For us, this project is doubly rewarding as it allows us to integrate an iconic character into an environment that's near to our hearts, and give something back to the users who, in a sense, started it all."

Open source data warehousing company Infobright has announced that Sulake (Habbo) has selected the company's software—Infobright Enterprise Edition—for its data analysis. The software is intended to accelerate the analysis of the data produced by the over ten million regular unique visitors within Habbo.

Sulake opted for Infobright’s solution "because it offered the performance needed along with a full-feature set and a low total cost of deployment" while fitting with the company's existing infrastructure, based on Linux, MySQL, and Java toolchains.

Data comes from the 32 countries across six contintents that host Habbo communities.

“We work in an environment which changes constantly and we drive that change by rolling out a substantial upgrade to the product each month. At that pace of development, getting feedback on results in less than 24 hours is crucial to success,” said Osma Ahvenlampi, chief technology officer for Sulake. “Unfortunately, our existing infrastructure couldn’t adapt with our growth pace. Ad-hoc queries were too slow, introducing new metrics was cumbersome, and changing the system was too costly. We needed more speed and simply throwing more hardware at the problem wouldn’t be enough.”

Cyan Worlds’ Myst Online: Uru Live will become an open source title, allowing users to modify the game’s code and assets however they wish and to run their own servers.

Myst Online began life as the multiplayer component of Uru: Ages Beyond Myst, but never progressed beyond beta testing with original publisher Ubisoft. Turner's subscription gaming service GameTap was the next to pick up the title, officially launching it in February 2007.

The game lasted a year with GameTap, and was then closed down for "business reasons"in April of this year. Cyan was able to acquire the rights to the game, and planned to resurrect it on its own servers with new content. However, this plan was abandoned in October after a major revenue stream was "disrupted".

Now, Cyan Worlds CEO Tony Fryman confirms that "Cyan has decided to give make MystOnline available to the fans by releasing the source code for the servers, client and tools for MystOnline as an open source project."

"We will also host a data server with the data for MystOnline. MORE [original emphasis] is still possible but only with the help from fans."

"This is a bit scary for Cyan because this is an area that we have never gone before, to let a product freely roam in the wild. But we've poured so much into Uru Live, and it has touched so many, that we could not just let it wither and die," Fryman added.

"We still have hopes that someday we will be able to provide new content for Uru Live, and/or work on the next Uru Live.

According to Fryman, the open-source release will be accomplished in stages, with the first due "very quickly". Few other clues were given as to Cyan’s current projects, following the layoff of around 50 employees in the wake of SouthPeak Interactive’s acquisition of Gamecock Media Group –- Cyan’s primary client.

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

Nexon has recently been making a major push into the North American market after success with localized titles such as MapleStory, Audition (including the decision to develop the title Sugar Rush with Vancouver-based Klei Entertainment—interviewed previously), and the Korea-based development of Combat Arms, the company's first FPS has been led by an aim to reach North American consumers as much as Korean.

Worlds In Motion talks to Nexon America's Min Kim and Herb Yang about the title, the differences between the markets, and the individual design decisions during the process of development.

Combat Arms was released first in Korea?

Herb Yang: Yeah, I think they launched about three months or so ahead of us.

Min Kim: This was different because usually we release something, and then way later we release it to the States but we identified this right away and then we started modifying and localizing it as soon as it came out.

HY: So, we actually have more content in some respects, than they do. We have new content that they haven't seen yet, but they have some extra maps and stuff like that.

Was this process at all accelerated by Battlefield Heroes?

Min: No. We were actually planning on it before.

I know it's an extremely different focus because they're trying to make a casual title and you're trying to make something a bit more...

MK: Core.

Funny we should mention a competitor to WeeWorld, actually, because the company has announced that over 25 million WeeMees have been created worldwide—more than the population of Saudi Arabia.

According to statistics from comScore, WeeWorld grew faster in the United States than its competitors in terms of unique visitors (60 percent), total minutes spent on the site (400 percent) and total visitors (200 percent).

WeeWorld users spend an average of 135 minutes per month in the virtual community and 90 percent of new users result from word-of-mouth.

"What drives so many users to WeeWorld is the universal appeal and iconic image of the WeeMee for all demographics, regardless of age, race or gender," said Lauren Bigelow, General Manager and SVP of Marketing for WeeWorld. "What keeps users coming back is the continuously evolving experience. There is always something new to explore, whether it is a new game to play, a new place to visit in World or a new item to accessorize their WeeMee or Room."

MMO community Aeria Games (Last Chaos, Dream of Mirror Online) has announced that it is to "gift more than $5 million dollars to its valued community"—which sounds insane and unlikely, but when you see what they're actually doing, which is giving every single member of its community a "surprise amount" of virtual currency it makes a little more sense.

Users will receive special codes via e-mail to redeem for Aeria Points, which can be used to purchase items in any of the company's free-to-play games. And if this still strikes you as particularly generous, it's well worth noting that according to their own data, Aeria Games' community numbers more than five million members to date, which means they could be handing out as little as a dollar worth of virtual cash per user.

Still! A piddling amount of free money is better than no money, I'm sure many users would say.

Aeria Games has over ten MMO titles currently on offer, and have promised that a "minimum of ten more" are to be launched in 2009—including the eagerly anticipated Shin Megami Tensei: Online, currently in closed beta.

One of our commentators noted our news post covering Gaia Online trumpeting its record users was terrifically ill-timed, because despite that kind of news, the company announced that this week it is laying off 36 employees (or accordingly, 13% of its workforce)—sixteen of which were full time and twenty of which were contractors.

According to a blog post from the company, the layoffs are the result of "the huge downturn in the economy" requiring "staff reductions and other operating cost cuts as [they] head into an uncertain 2009."

"While we are still anticipating a healthy upcoming year, we're going to grow less than we originally expected," the post continues, "and we have to adjust costs to reflect the new realities."

The post concludes that the company has "raised a lot of money from investors a few years back"—indeed, as recently as this July—and as a result does "not need to make as deep a headcount reduction as most other internet companies."

[Over at big sister site Gamasutra, we've just opened nominations for the 2008 Choice Awards, so if you're a developer and would like to vote on the best games of the year, with winners showcased at the big GDC ceremony in March - now's the time.]

The 2008 Game Developers Choice Awards has now opened nominations for the best games of 2008, with awards given out at GDC 2009 and Gamasutra members able to help decide nominees.

Next year’s 9th Annual Award Ceremony, will be hosted on March 25th, 2009 in the Esplanade Room in the South Hall of San Francisco’s Moscone Center, as part of Game Developers Conference 2009.

The Choice Awards, the most prestigious honors in video game development, are now available for you to nominate, after logging on with your main Gamasutra.com user ID. (You can register for free if you do not currently have one.)

The Game Developers Choice Awards recognizes excellence in the art of game creation in any genre or platform. Last year's event saw Valve's Portal the recipient of three major honors, including Game of the Year, with three awards also going to 2K Boston/2K Australia's BioShock.

The 2009 award categories currently open for nominations until January 5th, 2009, are:

Casual MMO developer Three Rings has announced the winners of their contest, "Design Your Whirled"—run in association with deviantART.

The contest asked deviantART members to create the best individual or multiple rooms for Three Rings’ new player-created virtual world and Flash game development platform, Whirled. Winners included user Pareia, awarded a Macbook Pro; Omer, awarded a Wacom drawing tablet; five honorable mentions received Whirled t-shirts and stickers.

In Whirled, players can design their own rooms with items of their own creation or those bought from the Whirled shop. Based on the popularity of the first contest, Three Rings is now accepting entries for the second “Design Your Whirled” contest.

“We received so many amazing entries for the ‘Design Your Whirled’ contest that it made judging very difficult,” said Daniel James, CEO, Three Rings. “Due to these incredible results, we will repeat the contest every month; look out for more great prizes in December!”

MMO publisher and operator Outspark has announce the upcoming release of a new MMORPG, Wind Slayer.The first title announced since Outspark launched its new portal, Wind Slayer is to feature "blazing fast, side-scrolling 2D action in a combat system that rewards precise control and timing."

Wind Slayer includes player-versus-player modes along with the usual character customization and chat, and is to enter closed beta in early 2009.

Outspark has also announced four new holiday themed quests for one of their most popular MMORPGs, Fiesta, with the world's major cities decorated festively and holiday themed items available to be found.

"Outspark prides itself in selecting games that fit into a wide variety of styles and genres to create a virtual playground accessible to gamers of all types," stated Paul Thind, CBO of Outspark. "Wind Slayer's cool graphics, fast-paced gameplay and unique features, like the mentoring system, are sure to offer our community endless hours of challenging fun."

San Jose-based online game publisher, GamesCampus has announced that it is hosting an in-game holiday charity event through its golf MMO Shot Online. GamesCampus is to donate 100% of the proceeds from the sale of two custom in-game Shot Online items to the SOS Children's Village organization.

From December 22 through December 28, 2008, players will be able to make donations to the SOS Children's Village by purchasing SOS Children's Village golf balls and Children Love t-shirts for $1 each from the game's item mall. All of the proceeds from the charity event will be donated to the SOS Children's Village.

Players who purchase both the SOS Children's Village game balls and Children Love t-shirts will also qualify for a special drawing for additional prizes, with one winner receiving an adaptable clothing set including shirt, pants and a hat, and three more receiving "lucky mystery prize boxes."

"During this rough economy we are glad that Shot Online's donations will be able to help children in need," said David Chang, Executive Vice President of Marketing and Business Development for GamesCampus. "We invite our players to come and join in this season of giving, while also enjoying some special offers and gifts from GamesCampus as a way of wishing everyone a peaceful and happy holiday season."

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 Rockstar San Diego, Mind Control Software, Namco Networks America, ArenaNet, 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:

Acclaim Games has announced the launch of Knight's Blood, a browser-based, free-to-play MMORPG, developed by the Germany-based RedMoon Studios.

The game is part of Acclaim’s strategy to offer more browser-based game experiences, and in the game players take the roles of knights in a fantasy land, choosing an allegiance to good or evil—as a Knight of the Light or a member of the Horde of Darkness—and can invest gold in training their characters or buy equipment including weapons, armor and amulets.

Players can purchase items and additional in-game currency using Acclaim's micro-transaction system, Acclaim Coins.

"Swear your oath of knighthood and choose your own destiny and allegiance through the decisions you make in-game!" said an Acclaim representative. "The decision rests in your hand!"

Toronto-based MMO publishers Wicked Interactive and G4Box have announced today that Wicked Interactive's Suba Games platform is to host G4Box MMORPG Metin2 as well aas its upcoming online FPS, Cross Fire.

The agreement means that a new unified login system will allow players of G4Box titles Metin2 and Cross Fire will receive access to all Suba Games properties, including ACE Online and Priston Tale, and vice versa.

Additionally, G4Box games and Suba Games titles now share a unified currency and community space. Despite these facts, G4Box and Wicked Interactive are to remain separate corporate entities.

As a result of the agreement, the Metin2 website is to be redesigned.

"We are excited to welcome these two G4Box properties into the Suba Games library of titles," said Stanley Yu, Chief Executive Officer of Wicked Interactive. "The Suba Games platform maintains an impressive lineup of MMORPGs to which we feel Metin2 and Cross Fire are worthy additions," added Howard He, Chief Executive Officer of G4Box.

MMO community OGPlanet has announced a spate of different promotions that they're running in their fantasy golf game Albatross18.

To celebrate the upcoming fourth anniversary of the launch of the title, OGPlanet is to offer all players a 20% off coupon that can be used when purchasing in-game items and currency from their cash store.

Additionally until December 25th to celebrate the festive season players can win special prizes by finding the "Albatross18 Santa" who is hiding in the game's social areas, and by finding holiday stockings while playing on the greens.

Finally, in simple celebration of the fact it's winter, they're giving away special in-game winter golf balls called "Snow Phoenixes" to every player who logs in until January 8th.