Turbine Inc., the company that brought you guys MMORPGs such as The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar, Dungeons & Dragons Online, and Asheron's Call, has been selected by AlwaysOn as the winner of the Northeast 100 Top Private Company Award. Read the full details after the jump!

Some people may have misinterpreted the recent findings in a recent study conducted by Dr. John Charlton and Ian Danforth. To help clear up any possible confusion, Charlton recently released a statement explaining the aim of the study, which links gamers' addiction with some traits exhibited by those who have Asperger Syndrome. For more information, you can read our full article after the jump.

A new lord is in town and his name is Jim Crowley. The former COO of mobile media firm m-Qube, as well as former COO of telecommunications company Network Plus, has taken the reins as the new CEO of Turbine, the company in charge of the development of the MMORPG The Lord of the Rings Online.

As for the deposed king of the proverbial realm, Jeff Anderson will still be included on the Turbine board, although his exact role is still unsure. The decision for Crowley to replace Anderson was a concerted effort to expand business and explore new revenue streams.

The Lord of the Rings Online was the company's latest effort to boost its assets. Taking its fame from the highly-acclaimed series by J.R.R. Tolkien, the game follows the deep mythology and multi-faceted story behind this fantasy classic.

Also, Turbine added Craig Alexander as VP of Product Development and Walt Yarbrough as Executive Producer. Hopefully, this new corporate shuffling can step up the already considerable medals in Turbine's trophy case, which include other online games like Asheron's Call and Dungeons & Dragons Online: Stormreach.

It's relatively common nowadays when people refer to MMOs, they immediately think about World of Warcraft or the MMO-king has-been EverQuest. But the first pioneers of MMO gaming know that the virtual worlds available online never started as a glorious 3D game. The first MMO was a MUD.

Short for multi-user dungeon, the MUD was the first online interactive community that offered virtual worlds, without the graphics. Until the likes of Microsoft's Asheron's Call, the MUD was preferably text-based. Worlds were described through words, and those words sparked imagination. Dungeons & Dragons was most enjoyable on a MUD.

It was in this respect that Dr. Richard Bartle, co-creator of the MUD, spoke about imagination being key to the success of the massively-multiplayer online game in a keynote speech at the 2007 Indie MMO Game Development Conference. To him, it wasn't enough that everyone followed the typical (orthodoxical) path toward fantasy-based realms that are threatened with apocalyptic destruction.

Telling Indie MMO developers how to succeed in the industry, Bartle emphasized that games that strive to be "amazing" never last forever. Aside from bringing new ideas to the MMO gamer's desktop, imagination also invites new ways of circumventing the current "World of Warcraft" title from keeping the MMO throne forever.

He is hopeful of the current generation of developers, who are in touch with creativity rather than orthodoxy, because "designing virtual worlds is fun." He stresses that similarities in games are unavoidable, but the way those ideas are presented are often different than competitors' ideas. Bartle said, "the details will be different. Dark Age of Camelot is not the same as Avalon, even though they're both set in Arthurian Britain."

He also wants developers to know that games don't have to be bleeding edge in graphics. "Don't worry about not having state-of-art graphics. So long as what you've got is professional, it doesn't have to be amazing. And even if it is amazing it won't be for long, because other peoples' will be better than yours," Bartle wisely said.

The "dinosaur in virtual world history" requested at the end of his speech that the new independent game developers rise to the occasion and put Bartle, the dinosaur, to rest.

Turbine Inc. has finally announced that the much-anticipated free trial for Asheron's Call is now live, so make sure you tell your friends and let them experience the game firsthand. You can sign up for it by pointing your browsers over to trial.ac.turbine.com. Just follow the instructions there and you'll be up and running around in the Asheron's Call gameworld in no time.

Long-time Asheron's Call players will recall that there were a few issues that dampened down the enthusiasm for the last Asheron's Call free trial. Well, according to Turbine, a new restriction has been put in the housing system which requires a character to purchase any form of housing. provided that it has been on a particular server for more than 15 days.

Since the free trial lasts for only 14 days, you won't be able to purchase housing if you're on a free trial account. Pretty good, eh? If you're really gung-ho about making the purchase, you can go ahead and purchase housing under the rules that are already in place once the 15-day trial period is over.

Buy: [Asheron's Call: Throne of Destiny]