It seems to be the time of year where we’re all waiting for things in our various games. The only exception (for me personally) at this time is EQ2, which has been abysmally quiet. The server merges have not taken place and aside from the push of the market place there wasn’t even a celebration in game for Thanksgiving. I suppose technically we are waiting on Frostfell to begin, but since this is a typical in game holiday I’m going to exclude it from the list. So. What are we waiting for?
LotRO – the November update which is (I believe) scheduled to take place today. This is going to introduce tasks, a whole slew of crafting changes (including farming), a barter wallet, class consumables, new mounts, new dye, and numerous other changes and goodies for players. Personally, I’m excited. I’m not a fan of the new shop window that will appear in the crafting panel and I’m not fond of how games are pushing their stores towards players who already pay the monthly subscription fee (it should be omitted if you have a subscription imo) but in F2P games this seems to be the new norm.
EVE – Incursion. While the really cool bits like the new character creator and sansha incursions won’t begin until January 2011, there are changes happening before then as well. (Scheduled at this time for November 30th). The learning skills are being removed and any points you’ve spent towards them are being reimbursed. There are new story line courier missions. There are numerous UI changes, camera changes, and ammo changes. New ships are being added. There is another patch coming just before Christmas which has very little details, and then the major incursion changes in January. Excited? Of course!
WoW – Cataclysm. Releasing December 7th we have already been privy to a whole bunch of changes. It would be impossible for me to list them all but a few that stand out are the class / race combo changes, hunters being able to tame foxes, lower level dungeons having the quest NPC’s added to the actual zones instead of you having to track them all down, of course there are the actual zone changes with the Shattering. Living through a cataclysm is great. It’s certainly not the first time one has taken place, but I do enjoy the entire world changing. There were new factions added and players have been busy dungeon grinding to raise them up. With those new factions came new mounts, and lets not forget the awesome Plants vs. Zombie tribute sunflower pet where you actually have to play a version of plants and zombies in game.
Wizard 101 – Gardening. Tipa has been posting her progress on the test server and I have to admit, it looks like fun. While I don’t play wizard 101 nearly as often as I’d like, I’m still a fan of the game and its unique combat style. I love seeing these types of updates, and I’m interested in diving right in and starting my own garden. I still haven’t even checked out Celestia, or any of the worlds after Krokotopia (Marleybone, Mooshu, Dragonspyre) but that is more of a lack of time then anything else.
The holidays are just around the corner and most of these games will also be adding some sort of winter update (including pretty much every single other MMO out there). I tend to avoid the real life holiday crowds as much as I can (I was diagnosed with agoraphobia and it makes things difficult) and look forward to partaking in these virtual celebrations. Of course much of the month will also be taken up with family festivities so you may see a dip in posts, but I’ll do my best.
Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!
stargrace 
