Walrus has given his own summaries and he highlited many things we have had happen this year, decided to give my thoughts on things, and would be great to hear others as well.
Combat Revision 2.0
First Anniversary Event: A Piece of Blue Sky
First-ever Free Trial
New Cinematic Style
White Hallways and Organization Constructs
Archival Mission System
Eight Storyline Episode Releases
Updated the Halloween and Winter Holiday Events
Participated in Fan Faire and the SOE Block Party
Introduced Luggables
New Forums
The Drama
Player + Community Projects
Live Events
Patch updates
So out of these or the many many ingame fixes that have been done as well as the storyline itself and the live events we have had, what have you enjoyed in MxO this year?
First I'd thought I give my own little summary about the various things...
Combat Revision 2.0
What can we say about this, for a few its the worst thing to happen to MxO (I still laugh at those people). In my eyes one of the best things this year, we had A combat system before, and it had many flaws as well as fun and challenging aspects to it, but it was not perfect and the balance was missing. The Combat Revision turned everything upside down, everyone was a noob again, and hell that was fun!
In this combat system from spending time in QA to going live we learnt a lot of things, in particular team work is essential, though not everyone again likes this and say "the Zerg" always wins, frankly the more and more you get into the this system the more you learn its possible to beat people who have numbers on you, maybe not when you are badly outnumbered but at least enough that certain abilities, load outs and tactics can very quickly help your team turn the tide.
As well as that finally attributes became more important and truly reflected how effective you will be in combat depending on the tree you choose. MxO's advantage over other MMO's was the ability to change load outs and therefore thankfully they added stat hack missions to take into account this new importance to attribute setting. Learning what to have and not to have is a great part of the thinking game involved with your load out and not like the old system of powerless or stun and you will win.
Is it all good? of course not, I would be wrong to say its a completely perfect system, there are things that can still be worked upon. I hope in the future of this new combat system we are likely to see more trees being implemented and giving new abilities to explore. Taking a look at development roundtable forums alone shows lots of new possibilities we can suggest and who knows what's in the pipeline.
First Anniversary Event: A Piece of Blue Sky
The large scale Live Events and what was told to us are a thing of the past, however everything was building to this 1 large event which had a lot of in game work put into it. I think a lot can be seen from the summary I made of the event, and people did have mixed reviews about it. I myself enjoyed this event a lot, it brought a lot of people together and a lot of team work to try and kill the sleepers, having to deal with security was a lot of fun too. You have to give props to the devs for an entire day of this event, giving everyone a chance to be a part of it and collect the frags we needed to get the rare event items, the security cap and shirt.
I think the main thing people complained about was how it was a looped event and basically killing NPC's, but it was a lot more about teamwork and helping everyone out to get the items they needed.
First-ever Free Trial
We asked for it and we got it, a free trial period giving players registering at fileplanet a chance to play Matrix Online for a limited time at no cost. This was a chance for us to hit back at the negative vibes and show the players who would join us at this time about what being a part of this game is about, as well as showing all the cool combat and possiblites.
From what I remember after the event the statistics looked good from this and I'm sure we got a nice amount of registered players after it is over, however the true numbers and figures are unknown.
We know its not something that can be done all the time, but nevertheless it was great to see this community banding together to help new players and give them a taste of what is on offer. I hope further down the line (storyline updates 
) we will see another free trial, obviously down to SOE if the last one was worth it.
New Cinematic Style
The new cinematics came with both good and bad reviews from the community, on a whole it was positive but you can't ignore the comments from players about the old cinematics.
The biggest question from people at first was "why", well it was obvious, with a downgraded Development team there was simply no one to make new cinematics with the in game engine. Up to Chapter 4 were already made pre-release and therefore after SOE took over and we lost a lot of the team the only real outcome was to use the graphics provided by Paul Chadwick. For anyone who has been reading the Matrix comics, these did bring them to life with this new style and people loved it.
We know that this new method of cinematics is here to stay and that now most the work is done by an outside studio. It's fair to say they are getting better and better and I think we are all now used to them. I personally like them a lot; however would I prefer them over in game cinematics? Well if the cinematics were made like the first few then no, but in some aspects they grab a vision of the storyline that can only truly be shown in that way.
White Hallways and Organization Constructs
Exploits! Ok no... but lets face it, we all knew about the white halls and enough people had....visited them. So we knew the existed, their true purpose was never really known so having a feature made so we can actually use them was nothing short of awesome.
The organisational constructs were already made from before game release but never added so being able to get them now IS a great feature. Ok they are just another area with some nice additional graphic features but it's the way you have to access them and use them that make them great.
After you had been in them once or twice it does get pretty repetitive but with the addition of a fighting SIM certainly added a bit more to it. I hope that further down the line more things and purpose will be added to them, this could include a room where lots of NPC's spawn giving you more a fighting challenge to doorways to special missions etc.
I'm glad these came about and add to the feel of really being inside the Matrix itself.
Archival Mission System
We wanted more content and we got it; albeit a repeat of missions we have done before, well most of us.
Being able to run every orgs critical missions is a great feature for those who want to see the story progressing through the other orgs eyes, it gives you more insight into their world without having to have their reputation to do them. That was meet with both positive and negative feedback and we can see both arguments, why should we be allowed to know their storyline, we should have to work our reputation for it. However content once you achieve many things does run low so these provide plenty of hours worth of missions to do.
The best thing about these missions is ultimately the rewards we can earn, that's why most people did them, each org having its own special item and each chapter being given a special tool as well is great. They have become something to achieve and get.
We all now look forward to the next set of archive missions and the possible rewards for them. On top of that anyone leveling has found them to be a great way to get good XP, this was not possible once they put the "1 tim2 XP and Info" rule in, but thankfully that got changed back to how they always were.
Eight Storyline Episode Releases
I'll be honest here, the storyline has only recently moved in a direction I think that has awoken Matrix again for a lot of people. We have gone through a lot of events inside the matrix but only really now is it really heating up and making us wanting for the next part.
We have seen a lot happen, Cryptos, The Kid, The General and Anome being the latest. They have had their own edge in bringing them into the storyline but only now is it really fitting togother.
As well as the storyline progressing its enabled us to meet a lot of new characters and even more now coming back into the frame, the truce is on a edge, but what are we going to expect next from the machines, from Zion and from our good buddy the Merovingian.
The main reason most of us play this game is becoming really interesting and well I think we are in for a great year ahead of us. There are plenty of rumours going around and lots of new in game additions which enhance the story.
Updated the Halloween and Winter Holiday Events
We had a great Halloween and Winter Holiday last year, but this year just blew them both away. Taking what was there and added more to it has made this years events awesome.
Zombies were great, and I think everyone loved them the most, being able to wear lots of various masks and trying to get them was a challenge and a lot of fun in doing so.
Winter event so far is awesome, new items to collect and holiday missions, not to forget Snowmen luggables!
Participated in Fan Faire and the SOE Block Party
I personally couldn't attend either of these, being from the UK, however the feedback from these were that people who attended has a lot of fun, and getting to meet and speak to the people behind the game was certainly a great thing, just as much I'm sure they enjoyed the crazy players behind the RSI's ( Sorry about Mave Walrus, he's always crazy like that in FH, you should hear TS o.O)
A great thing that came out of these events for me as a player who couldn't be there was the live radio coverage, I'd like to thank TxTurbo, Mave and all those involved in particular during the Block Party since the interviews and live coverage was awesome to listen to and hear from Walrus and Paul Chadwick himself, thanks TheX.fm!
Another good thing about these events themselves was how MxO is giving a presence around SOE and hopefully they took notice of the loyal fan base and dedicated players it has.
Introduced Luggables
In my opinion the single greatest potential item of the year.
Luggables were confusing to everyone at first, what would they be, what could it mean, however luggable is just the term to define the object, what it can be is endless. The Winter Holiday event surely has shown us the possibility now and ideas are flowing.
PvP itself always needed something extra for players who were getting bored with it and luggables just gave a great purpose to it.
Hopefully we are likely to see something like CTF in the near future in a construct designed for it, which would be great and massive new content.
The data miner tree has be re-configed to be able to track luggables which only enhances the possibilities of searching and tracking which is another great feature in itself.
New Forums + Site
I don't think we can go a year without new forums ^_^, yep yet again we had new forums thrown at us, and it hurt the community, no question about it. When the new SOE boards were added they had so many bugs it was like a insect farm on show. These bugs enabled many things as well as the posts of players / mods and devs to be seen by many. Then ensued the drama about various things. This was frankly a low point of the year in my opinion, we had lots of things being said by people, and leaks about intel and LESIG all over the place and it shock the core of this community and effected people in the process.
We have now (I'd like to believe) got past all that and the forums though still having some issues are much, much better than what they were at first, there are a few errors but its all being worked on and hopefully we are likely to see new skins added as well.
The website was upgraded too and added some great new things, from new wallpapers to video links its all good for new players to view and learn about this game, it certainly could use a lot more content, but at least its better than what was there before.
The Drama
What's Matrix without the Drama? We have seen a lot of it this year.
From the mentioned forum leaks to the various exploits and accusations its been another year of seeing many bugs get fixed once we became aware of them. Style stacking being the biggest one that was used.
All in all we have seen some interesting things in this regard, not all Drama is bad, and some of it is entertaining and keeps players involved in the community. With 3 orgs all battling to be the best, with Factions fighting wars its always going to happen but I think its important for people to remember this is still just a game and not to take things too seriously, you only effect yourself if you do so, and well you let the people trying to do that to you win. Play the game, have fun and just ignore or report any hassle, anyone causing the type of drama we don't want will eventually get caught up in their actions.
We are the players that can make the game what it is, keep the Drama friendly and I look forward to another year of battles! Fighting alongside and against people
Player + Community Projects
We have seen a lot of things continuing and new things been added into the player community, this year was a great year for Radio stations as well, TheX.fm, RMC, Split Infinity to name a few, also a project I'm still happy to be part of MegaCity Times (Issue 5 in production atm).
As well as those projects we have seen plenty of in game events from players, including major tournaments and RP player events, all which add to the involvement in game from the community, I wish I could have been part of more but I'm still glad these are about and hope that players will keep adding more and trying to expand theirs and others in game experience.
As well as the player projects the games developers have given us something to do as well, including the Video competitions and the In game advert competitions, which we are now starting to see in game. I could go into how non USA residents couldn't enter but I think enough has already been said on the forums. I certainly hope over the next year we see more competitions for the community from players and the game developers themselves and truly help bring more of these things to life
Live Events
This year Rarebit had his biggest challenge, to make Live Events run smoothly against, he was not alone and had the LESIG team to help as well, but we all know this must have been the biggest effort of work he is involved with.
The events this year have been great, we are lucky enough to see something happening every day and we are grateful for that. Making events involved the players as well as proceed in the story is no easy task I'm sure.
The events have been to involve all orgs and make them interesting and want to attend and seek out the LE characters.
If I had to say you were missing something in this, it would be having a Dev to help create more event specific items which would add to the interaction, but still great work on these. LESIG operations seems to have died down quite a bit, in particular after the leaks, I hope in the near future the talk of possibly new apps might be considered, as I'm sure new blood will certainly help in that area.
Patch updates
Throughout this year we have had many patches and game updates which have been used to fix errors ingame and introduce new features. Though rarely ever being ontime and as servers downs as we expected, however the last few patches have been up and running on schedule.
We can't forget some of the greatest features added...
Email In game
Email Non Tradable to yourself
Temp Buy Back and Red Frag drop rate increase
New Emotes /Russdance etc
NPC Evade Bug Fixed
Prop Vendors Added
/Ignore Command Fixed
Area K and NPC's changes in 01
/Commands added Inc /afk /frags etc
There are countless bug fixes and other additional corrections to mention, just go read the update notes
I could go into so many details about thoughts about these, but I think I've gone on long enough already.
I hope everyone appreciates what have had done this year. Walrus, 9mmfu, Rarebit, Dracomet, Oar, not forgetting a Dev lost to another project HCFrog and everyone else involved in the MxO team, thanks for the work you have given us this year and hope for a great 2007.
If you have any thoughts about various things I have mentioned or what has stuck out for you this year please do reply telling us about why it was a great year or what you liked the most.
