Roads! You use them to get from place to place. The same is true in Wurm Online, where the latest patch has added a whole new highways system to the game on PvE servers. Players can use the highways to link multiple locations with paved tiles that cannot be destroyed, ensuring that you can travel hither and yon freely rather than wandering in the wilderness and getting eaten by a bear.

So this is good news for everyone other than the bear. Bears are probably less happy about this.

The patch also adds in new fences and parapets and a new crate rack feature, along with some new creature movement fixes for avoiding water (which may or may not mollify the bear contingent). There are also the usual bug fixes and client improvements, so that’s all good even if you have an ethical opposition to highways. The new system should make highways easier to craft and use, though, so go ahead and make your highway and call yourself Eisenhower.

Combat is the primary focus for this week’s update to The Black Death. The not-at-all-depressing sandbox decided to jettison parrying in favor of blocking, saying that the latter felt more fun and responsive. Depending on the weapon or shield used to block, a certain amount of damage will continue on through to the player.

Due to this change, the team discovered that some weapons were causing one-shot kills even though blocking, which wasn’t desirable. So the devs tackled that, ensuring that there would be at least “some back and forth” in each fight.

Another aspect of combat that was addressed dealt with tagging players on the noggin: “To reward skilled players, headshots are even more essential to winning a fight. A player wearing full plate but no helmet can be killed with a low tier weapon in a few strikes to the head, so be careful and remember to craft or buy the best helmet possible when dealing with other skilled players.”

Is there any shame in throwing a birthday party for yourself? Not if you invite everyone and make it hecka fun, we say! Ultima Online has kicked off its 20th anniversary event this week, welcoming everyone to celebrate the 1997 MMORPG and all that it’s accomplished over the past two decades.

The event arc is called The Shattered Obelisk, and it will be rolled out in five parts over the next two months. It should be noted that once the fifth part arrives on September 28th, you won’t be able to access the previous four — so don’t dally!

“The Shattered Obelisk includes activities for group and solo play, challenging quests and puzzles, new areas of the world to explore and a continuation of the saga that is Ultima Online,” the team posted. “Along with the in game features and fiction that are part of Publish 98, we have exciting new fiction that will be posted on UO.com as well as support events held by our event moderators.”

Along with the in-game events, Broadsword is hosting a real-world party as well, one marred by an apparent rash of threats — which the studio says it won’t tolerate.

“As most of you are aware we have had players threaten other players that are coming to the 20th Anniversary Party. We treat these issues incredibly seriously, and all harassment pages, including threats, are logged on the server. We then forward these logs as a potential threat to law enforcement, who will follow up to the fullest extent of the law. Please know we do not take this lightly. For all of those that are worried regarding the 20th Anniversary Party the issue has been resolved and you should not have any concerns regarding your safety.”

This is just your weekly reminder from CCP that EVE: Valkyrie wasn’t a figment of your imagination, it still exists, and please for the love of all that is holy, buy it already. Please.

Oh, and it’s also a major announcement that Valkyrie — a multiplayer sci-fi fighter spin-off of EVE Online — is preparing to ditch the expensive requirement of a virtual reality headset. That’s right: Come September 26th, you won’t need a VR headset to play this VR game.

This is thanks to a new version of the game called EVE: Valkyrie — Warzone, which allows both VR and non-VR players to battle together on the same server. The Warzone update will also introduce a new generation of ships, add a mod-based progression system, include “ultra” abilities, trot out more maps, raise the rank cap to 60, toss in mouse-and-keyboard support, and more.