Daily Blogroll

As near as I can tell, nearly 900 people came to this blog yesterday just to name the Marleybone builder turtle in Wizard 101. That’s fantastic! There’s still a bunch of time left, and as long as the contest is going, there’s going to be a big button over there on the right leading to the post since, this being a blog, stuff scrolls off the front page almost immediately, and the Name the Turtles contest is already buried under THIS post, and a long, long comic about two hobbits discussing how cool a X Files MMO would totally be. ...

I am SO EXCITED today! Last week, KingsIsle, developers of the wonderful MMO, Wizard 101, asked if I would be interested in participating in a little contest to help promote their new player housing. Players will be able to buy homes based on themes from each of the five worlds in game – Wizard City, Krokotopia, Marleybone, Moo Shu and Dragonspyre. The vendors for these homes are going to be industrious builder turtles, who will exchange piles of gold for the keys to your new home. The names of these turtles will be determined by the players, and the readers of West Karana who also play Wizard 101 will be naming the turtle for Marleybone, which is my personal favorite world. ...

Welcome to the Sunday Web Log! When’s the new EverQuest server coming? The rumor mill has it that the 51/50 server – new characters start off at level 51 with 50 AAs – is in the bag. Others assume that SOE will be opening a new progression server, and have reactivated their accounts in order to start over. As near as I can tell, nothing has been announced yet, but it seems likely that we’ll be able to play on the new server, whatever kind it is, in June. Oh, and EQ players? You voted two frogs in as Mr. and Miss Norrath of 2009? I mean, grats to Kannak and Molleah but … frogs? ...

Interested in playing a little game called Free Realms? They’re letting ANYONE in. They let ME in, right? If you haven’t gotten a key, and want to try out the Next Big Thing, head on over to http://www.freerealms.com/index.vm?cid=1054126 and sign up, first thousand get in (via @freerealms). Odds not good enough for you? USA Today has 20 thousand keys to give away (via Grimwell). Why exactly can’t we talk about this game? This sounds so much like an OPEN beta. ...

Play Wizard 101? Want a rare treasure card? Calamity Boompants will be on the Pixie realm, in Area 1, between 2 and 2:30 PM CST with cards the likes of which you won’t often see. Just, you know, don’t be standing behind her when her Boompants have a Calamity… It’s hard to go anywhere on the web these days without running into some breathless enthusiasm for Twitter. CNN and Ashton Kutcher squared off to see who could get a million followers first. Today, talk show host Oprah Winfrey will have Ashton Kutcher on her show and Twitter live, on the air. Thousands of Twits are spending a lot of time trying to figure out how to use Twitter to extract money from you, the casual Twitter user. Why is Twitter suddenly more in the news than Facebook or MySpace (anyone remember MySpace?) ...