Posted on July 31, 2008, Shawn Sines zOMG: Gaia Marries Social Network with MMO

Gaia Online has announced a new name for the Official Gaia MMO. zOMG as it will be known is partnered with the Gaia Social Networking allowing Gaians to explore their virtual world.

The world is not composed of only combat-oriented challenges. There are many ways to play in this world, whether doing favors for characters in the world, playing games, meeting at dance halls or in towns, watching movies together, meeting to race cars, or just simply exploring the landscape.

Where else can you team up to fight a huge stone dragon…and then kick back your heels and watch a full feature film with your friends in a virtual theater? This is a world like no other you’ve experienced. Come try it yourself. You just might find yourself with a new home.

For those who enjoy the combat aspect of MMOs, avatars will equip skills and powers by wearing battle rings. You can wear one on each finger for a total of eight at a time. There’s no limit on your ring inventory space allowing you to exchange them if needed. These rings can be traded, bought at the marketplace and dropped by monsters.

zOMG is Free-to-Play and requires no download. If your curiosity is aroused, head on over to the Official Gaia MMO website.

The first MMO and Social Networking pairing I ran across was the upcoming Hello Kitty Online MMO and SanrioTown. At this time HKO is still in closed beta, and there’s no word on how far into development zOMG. It seems like a race between the two to be first.

I’m actually looking forward to seeing how this works out. It often seems to me that it would be a lot easier to get to know potential team mates on a social networking site, then transfer those alliances over to the MMO. There’s no word on guilds but I imagine it would also be much easier to run one on a SNS than on the MMO. However theory and virtual reality are often two very different situations.

via Gaia Online