When the developers at Runic Games announced the Torchlight franchise last year, the MMO industry anticipated that something special was about to happen. The startup company was founded by more than a dozen shining-star RPG developers and game designers, so it didn't come as a huge surprise that the single-player Torchlight received widespread acclaim after its release in late-2009.

Last week, the gaming industry recognized Torchlight's unrelenting influence yet again, when Runic Games won both the Game Industry News’ "RPG Game of the Year Award" and the Game Developer’s Conference "Choice Award for Best Debut" on March 12. But could this be just the beginning of what's to come? As we reported earlier, Runic Games' single-player RPG is only a precursor to the upcoming Torchlight Online, a full-blown MMO based on the same IP that swept the awards last week. Now, more than ever, we're keeping a watchful eye on Torchlight Online, which could become one of the most-anticipated MMOs of 2010.

A small hotfix was pushed live today. From the patcher:

*** Hotfix ***

- Karl Kranigan will now give rewards to folks that happened to get themselves killed while defeating his Behemoths if they ask him for a [reward].
- Fabled monsters should no longer spawn in the classic monster missions.


- The EverQuest Team

After a weak "soft launch" in December, Alganon is headed for a huge makeover, according to new Quest Online President Derek Smart. Quest went through a major shakeup that brought Smart in and saw founder David Allen leave.

GENERAL

• Brawler Focus: Stances red adornments have been restored to their original values.

BATTLEGROUNDS

• Fixed an issue that would cause some players to become stuck when returning home from a battlegrounds match.
• It should no longer be possible to cause your character to become stuck by spam-clicking the cloud mounts in Smuggler’s Den.

It's that time of the year again. The moogles of the MHMU are hard at work preparing a treasure trove of eggs to be delivered to all adventurers ready to receive such an egg-celent prize. What new items will be available for those that accept the hunt you might ask? Only the dilligent workers of the MHMU know for certain, but it's certain to leave anyone willing to take on the challenge to obtain them left in an eggs-hilarating mood. The Egg Hunt begins on March 25th, so make sure you're not left with egg on your face by taking part in the festivities!

Discuss this on the Zam Forums!

Here at ZAM, all of the staffers are pretty much your standard MMO players; we have our favorite games, and we defend them with a passion. So when we were offered the opportunity to host the nominations for LFG Expo's MMO Developer Awards, we couldn't resist helping out because there's no better way to defend your favorite MMO than to get it on the ballot for an award.

So without further prose from the editors, we offer you a few polls to go and check out, each of which has a full selection of MMOs for you to choose from as best in their particular category. Whatever the results, at least you know you've made a difference!

A small hotfix was pushed live yesterday:

*** Hotfix ***

- Karl Kranigan, while in his hideaway in the Freeport Sewers, will now answer your hail more than once in case you missed what he said the first time.
- Added a lifespan limit to Summoner Neitkos' adds.
- Fixed an issue where the Animated Lava could potentially have no loot when killed.
- Blood Raven adds should no longer hover over the corpse of the dead Mistress of Pain.
- Sergeant Deepwater's adds should no longer remain indefinitely.


- The EverQuest Team

Daevas rejoice at the new GM event coming to Altreia! This time around, in the spirit of St. Patrick's Day, players will have the opportunity to don green in order to scam a near-sighted Leprechaun, Fergus McGreedy, out of his hard-earned wealth. We're not entirely sure how this falls under the "spirit" of St. Patricks Day,  but apparently Shugo bankers have been working day and night to get their hands on Fergus's money and, just recently, they've managed to find the correct tax loophole that they can exploit to get his cash. Of course, Fergus is also aware of the Shugo's clever little tactics and he has decided that the best course of action here will be to give some of his cash away to his fellow leprechauns.

Unfortunately for Fergus, and fortunately for Aion Daevas, Fergus has also managed to lose his glasses - without which he's pretty much as blind as a bat. In this way, Aion players will have the opportunity to grab some green dye for St. Patricks day in order to disguise themselves as Leprechauns to talk to Fergus in the Apellbine and Dionysia taverns of Pandaemonium and Sanctum, respectively. But be careful! Apparently Fergus also has the ability to bring past memories to life, and if he decides to regale all of you Daevas-disguised-as-Leprechauns with his previous adventures, who knows what will happen!

If, however, the thought of gaining access to Fergus' leprechaun treasures has you eager to get going, regardless of the dangers, then Fergus will be in the Apellbine and Dionysia taverns of Pandaemonium and Sanctum on Wednesday (March 17, 2010), sometime between 5:30 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. CDT. For players in other time zones, that's 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. in EDT and 3:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. PDT. You can also check out the full story of Fergus after the jump!

Y'all are cordially invited to the next exciting EQII ZAM Developers Chat!  This is the chat that was postponed a couple weeks ago.  We've saved all the questions sent in advance, so there's no need to send them again!

• Thursday, March 18, 5:00pm PDT
• In the #EQ2 channel on ZAM IRC
• General chat during the actual event will be in #EQ2FFA

New to Allakhazam IRC?  Instructions here!  Or use EQ2Wire's EQII ZAM Chat portal.

Here is a handy Time Zone Converter, already set to Pacific time, to help you plan!

In Dungeon Fighter Online's latest update, they've introduced new "awakening" job advances for Grapplers, Rangers, Blade Masters and Summoners over the level of 48. Players who meet the pre-requisite level will need to advance through a series of Awakening quests in order to achieve their new advancement, and with each awakening comes a new "awakened" ability and passive for the player.

In addition to adding these four new awakenings for players, the DFO team is also launching some special events to commemorate it. Right now, any player that creates a new class in DFO will receive 10 Life Tokens instead of the customary 5, and upon advancing to their new subclass (at 18), players will be receive a congratulatory gift box, which contains 15 Remy's Touch and 10 Mana-Aids. As well, anybody who enters a dungeon with one of the four classes that received awakenings (Blade Master, Grappler, Ranger and Summoner) will receive a bonus of +10% experience for parties of two and a bonus of +20% experience for parties of three and above. Finally, anyone who completes their Awakening quest will also receive an exclusive title which grants +100 HP, +100 and a +10% movement speed bonus in town, as well as be entered into a random draw to win a "Kaleido Box," which shuffles and adds new stats to a pre-existing item.

All in all, it looks like a good month for DFO players, and congratulations to all of the new Grand Masters, Dervishes, Desperados and Gaias who have "awakened" beyond their normal classes!