UGO is not the bad guy in all this 1UP sale drama, this according to CEO J Moses. "How am I a bad guy?" Moses said in a phone interview with MTV Multiplayer. From his perspective, his company did no harm to 1UP. In fact, they saved it.

It's official. Ziff Davis has sold 1UP to UGO Entertainment and has closed EGM. This was confirmed by no less than an official press release from both camps earlier today. The axe has fallen, and it's fallen hard. GameVideos.com and others take the hit as well. Full details right after the jump.

World of Warcraft''s Wrath of the Lich King expansion is sure to usher in an epic new era in the virtual world forged by Blizzard. One of the new things in this expansion is the implementation of Achievements that will give players bragging rights. Lead game designer Jeffrey Kaplan tells us a little something about it in the full article up ahead.

Uwe Boll has a lot of experience in making movie adaptations for video games - he's the guy who directed the movie adaptations of games such as House of the Dead and Alone in the Dark. Blizzard, however, turned him down when he approached them to make the World of Warcraft movie. Story in the full article.

With their strong library of annual franchises, Electronic Arts has gone out on a limb to say that games have longer lifespans today. To prove their point, EA talked about MMOs, DLCs, and their ten-year plan for the upcoming game, Spore (PC, Nintendo Wii, DS,  Mac, Mobile). More details after the jump.

MTV Multiplayer recently talked to Product Manager Jorgen Tharaldsen about the difficulties surrounding the Xbox 360 port of the upcoming MMO action adventure game Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures (PC, Xbox 360). He explains that one of the biggest problems in making the next-gen console port of the game was translating the controls from a keyboard and mouse interface to a control pad. You can read more details about what Tharaldsen said in the full article.

The virtual world of MMOs is proving to be a profitable investment, and even Harvard Business School is taking notice. The Ivy League institution recently held a panel with six of the industry's most influential members to discuss the status quo, and just as important, the future of the virtual realms in gaming as a business market. Check out what they deem to be the biggest barrier to overcome, and for some more analysis on how money culture is making even the virtual world go spinning 'round.

Now that the Italian plumber is out to go planet-hopping, more gigantic titles of intergalactic scale are coming make you feel like a star. BioWare's much anticipated roleplaying game Mass Effect exclusively for the Microsoft Xbox 360 is finally about to land on shelves, and Naughty Dog's PS3-exclusive Uncharted: Drake's Fortune won't fall behind. Meanwhile the crowds are waiting for you and your buddies to kick that gig off in MTV Games' Rock Band on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Want more? Find this week's games at the full article!

* Article originally posted Nov 19, 12:08AM

World of Warcraft players, here's you and your avatar's chance to be featured on MTV.

MTV True Life is looking for players aged 16 to 28 to feature in a showcase about how the MMORPG has affected their lives. Here's their pitch:

MTV True Life is doing a documentary for the series True Life about you in the virtual world. We want to see you and your avatars. Does your virtual avatar make you feel confident behind your computer screen? Is there something interesting or unique about your life online? Are you able to lead hundreds of people in World of Warcraft but find yourself shy in real life? Did you meet your significant other online? Is your online avatar completely different from who you are in real life? If so, we would love to hear your story.

MTV True Life is a series that follows unique and varied subcultures. Interested folk can head on over to the Read link below to get more details on requirements and submission locations. This will be another one of World of Warcraft's television events after the CBS battle event on July 29.

The Nickelodeon Kids and Family Group will be spending a total of US$ 100 million to develop new multi-player games, virtual worlds, and other similar services that will be targeting children. According to Cyma Zarghami, president of MTV Network's Nickelodeon Kids and Family Group, the network sees the potential for a previously untapped market composed mostly of kids aged 8 to 14 gaming online.

Nickelodeon's online services are designed to cater to the different age groups. Services like myNOGGIN are designed primarily for pre-schoolers; Nicktropolis and the Nick Gaming Club are for young children; and The-NGames.com for girls. These services all promised to provide safe online gaming environments, child-friendly content, and most importantly, protection against predators. These online services will be developed and released over the course of the next 2 years as part of the Networks' plans to be leaders in the casual gaming sector.

Nickelodeon has also announced its expansion of its currently existing sites such as AddictingGames, Shockwave.com, and Neopets.com. The network explains that while these sites will place emphasis on developing new virtual worlds and online games for release, they are striving to keep things very child-friendly.

"Across all of MTVN's online sites, gaming is an important original genre and we are committed to delivering fresh content to our audiences in all of our demos," said Ms. Zarghami. With Nickelodeon's current online casual games logging in almost a billion game plays a month, it's not too hard to imagine its efforts paying off.