The team over at FINAL FANTASY XI Stratics has announced the winners of their contest that challenged members of the community to write their own exciting Vana'diel adventures. Would-be scribes were tasked with creating a fun-filled quest for a chance to win shiny new FINAL FANTASY XI goods. Contestants' entries are now available for your perusal, so head over to Stratics to see the result of all the blood, sweat, and tears that adventurers put into writing their own stories!

Visit FINAL FANTASY XI Stratics to read up!

During the Champions Online press event, we had the opportunity to pull Design Director and Executive Producer, Bill Roper aside for an interview about the games newly announced Player vs. Player mode. We got some great information about what players can expect at launch and in the future. Additionally we finally received confirmation that Champions Online will not be available on the Xbox 360 at launch but that the team is still actively looking into porting the game in the near future.

ZAM: First off, I'd like a bit more explanation of the three different kinds of PvP. Let's start with hero games. Can you give us a little background on what hero games are?

Bill Roper: Basically, Hero Games is the umbrella organization for both sanctioned and some unsanctioned fighting between heroes. It had a different name in the IP, originally, but the company that created Champions is called Hero Games and we wanted that to be a really cool tribute. In fact, when you see it in the game, where the Hero Game promoters are, where you go to trade in your claim points that you get for fighting, you'll see this big logo behind them. It's on the mat of one of the arenas. It's actually the Hero Games logo. We talked to them and we said "Hey we'd love to put this in as a tribute to you guys." I thought it was really cool that they were like "Oh that's awesome, that would be great!" It's a really cool nod to the creators.

The Boss Island Event is scheduled to go live in Lineage on Aug. 7 and will run through Aug. 17. If you want to check it out before then, the event just hit the test server today. Information on how to connect to the test server can be found in this thread on the official forums.

Information the the Boss Island event can be found here or after the jump. Keep an eye out for the Mysterious Old Man, the Mysterious Crafter and the Bored Looking Boy to get items such as the Carrot Key and Fancy Island Belts, or to get transported to Bunny Isle or the Boss Islands.

According to a dev blog entry posted today by CCP Soundwave, the new player experience is going to receive some updates in the upcoming expansion. As Soundwave mentions, the tutorial didn't even exist when EVE Online first launched, and it's currently in place to teach new players EVE fundamentals. Of course, as new content is added, the tutorial should be updated as well.

The first change Soundwave mentions is that the tutorial will be informing players about the importance of corporations. Also, exploration will be added as a fourth career path for players who like to poke around complexes and wormholes. Lastly, a special mission line will be added for players who have done one or more career paths. "This mission line should ultimately point you towards faction warfare, rewarding the player with enough standing to join a militia upon completion," Soundwave said.

You can read the full blog entry below.

One year ago this month, Cryptic Studios announced it had taken over development of Star Trek Online. Originally conceived back in 2004, Perpetual Entertainment acquired the rights to the IP and worked on the MMO's development for four years, until it folded in 2008. The license and some of the game's assets were then handed over to Cryptic Studios (owned by Atari), and the 'Trek community breathed a collective sigh of relief.

A few months before the announcement, news of STO's progress was getting sketchy. The game's development slowed to a crawl and left fans to wonder whether it would ever see a launch, or simply fade away as another vaporware failure. Last summer, fans finally received the news they were waiting for when Cryptic Studios announced it had picked up development.

However, STO's new developer was tasked with re-building much of the game itself, from the ground up. Launch schedule aside, the Star Trek franchise is an almost religious-like following for hundreds of thousands of fans. Considering the polarized reactions to J. J. Abrams' flashier, sexier and re-imagined Star Trek released in May, it's no surprise that many fans are wondering—now more than ever—what "flavor" of 'Trek is in store for them.

Over the weekend you may have noticed our reports about the Champions Online PvP announcement. As mentioned, we were at the PvP press event held last Thursday in San Francisco. During the event, I had the opportunity to play around with the "Hero Games" PvP feature for myself and what I saw was cooler than Bill Roper on a concert stage wearing a Luchador mask. More on that later...

So what are Hero Games? Well, in Champions Online there are three different ways to battle it out.  You can visit Stronghold Prison where you'll face an Apocalypse scenario as either a Hero or a Villain. Or perhaps you'd rather go at it in an intimate arena of the UTC (Ultimate Tournament of Champions). Lastly you can rumble in The BASH, which is essentially an outdoor zone that's not officially sanctioned by the Hero Games, where large numbers of players are matched against one another in a Free-for-all setting. In any case, you're in for a hard hitting, action packed treat that has taken Champions Online to a higher plane of awesome.

Warhammer Online Producer Jeff Skalski has written his first producer's letter to the community, and he talks about the upcoming 1.3.0b patch and gives a sneak peek into 1.3.1. Patch 1.3.0b is scheduled to launch this month and attempts to address players' concerns regarding crowd control and AoE abilities.

As far as crowd control is concerned, all immunities will persist through death; the duration of disable immunities will increase; root immunity and knockback/pull immunity will be combined; and there will be a new Renown Point purchasable ability at Renown Rank 40 that will give players temporary CC immunity. You can read more about the patch, which hits the PTS this week, in the letter after the jump.

Patch 1.3.1 will bring the second ramps in for the Keeps and will add incentives for Keeps that are defended and upgraded. "Players will receive a boost for both XP and RP, plus additional gold bags handed out for a successful attack or defense," Skalski said. Also, the Wild Hunt live event will help celebrate the game's one-year anniversary.