There are a lot of different ways to enhance and better your gear in Aion, and I wanted to go over them briefly for players so that you could see what those differences were. After all, when you're constantly looking over your shoulder trying to make sure that you're not about to be killed, it's always best to be at the top of your game, whether you're doing some PvE questing, or PvPing in the Abyss.

World of Warcraft community manager Eyonix has posted a preview of the talent tree mastery system being introduced in the game's third expansion, Cataclysm, scheduled for release later this year. WoW's talent tree, which allows players to customize their characters' abilities to suit their own play style and chosen role, is such a key feature that any major enhancement (especially an expansion that changes the level cap) would automatically affect it. But in the past, changes to the talent tree mostly meant adding new talents or getting rid of or replacing old ones. This time around, Blizzard is introducing passive bonuses that are granted to you as you continue to spend points in a particular tree.

Three months ago, Blizzard commemorated the fifth anniversary of the release of World of Warcraft with a special web site that invited fans to send in images of themselves holding either a Horde or Alliance symbol, which would be incorporated into a giant mosaic image. The mosaic's been revealed, piece by piece, as the images have come in and, now, with 20,000 images in house, Blizzard finally unveiled the entire mosaic:

December saw the release of Underfoot, the 16th EverQuest expansion (wow!) and now Sony Online Entertainment is preparing to roll out another zone to add to the expansive area of the game. Not only that, but if you log in before March 31, you can claim an exclusive Gnomework Mercenary Skin (there's a different type for both healers and tanks) so that your mercenary can wander Norrath in style. Here’s the official description from SOE:

Sony Online Entertainment has announced that its annual celebration of its games, Fan Faire 2010, will take place Aug. 5-8 at Bally's Hotel in Las Vegas. Highlights of the Fan Faire will include special announcements and sneak peaks of upcoming SOE titles, in-game tournaments, live, game-themed competitions and quest, developer forums and roundtables giveaways, and other fun events for fans of all of Sony's online games. For more information, visit the Fan Faire web site .