Given the huge popularity of some social games on Facebook and MySpace, it was inevitable that scammers and spammers would start digging up ways to abuse the system. Deceptive advertising is part of the problem. One common scam offers in-game currency for filling out a survey and requests a mobile phone number the results can be texted to. The user then finds themselves with a $10/month subscription billed to their phone until they cancel. Sometimes details about these charges are buried deep in Terms of Service that people rarely read. A recent TechCrunch article examines the problem and the implications it has for honest game developers in considerable detail. At least one of the industry leaders, Zynga, has responded by cracking down on some of these scams, but if social game currency ends up anything like MMORPG currency, things will likely get worse, so be careful with your phone and credit card numbers.

• More: Protecting Your Game Passwords

Cryptic Studios has set a release date for Star Trek Online, confirming rumors that it will be available early next year. The game will launch on February 2 2010 in North America, and February 5 2010 in Europe. Closed beta is currently underway and they are still accepting beta applications on the official site. Here are some recent Star Trek Online screenshots.

_{Image © 2009 Atari}

Nope, it's not a game - it's a new way to voice chat while you're online. Blabbelon is a Web-based voice chat solution hoping to supplant popular programs like Ventrilo and TeamSpeak. Unlike the latter services that require the host to run a server, Blabbelon simply requires you to log onto their site and create a room (or a "Blab"), which other users can then join. It's free and uses a push-to-talk system that can handle thousands of chatters. Blabbelon also employs Skype's SILK super wideband audio codec, so the sound quality should be quite good. The press release is available on Business Wire.

The market for fantasy MMORPGs has become quite crowded in recent years, with scores of free titles flowing out of Asia on top of a flurry of North American and European efforts. Some of these games garnered considerable interest at launch, but they haven't been able to turn that into ongoing success. Aion is NCsoft's lastest offering in this genre, building on their vast experience with earlier MMORPGs such as the Lineage series.

_{Image © 2009 NCsoft}

There has been a steady trickle of details about Star Wars: The Old Republic coming from the official site, and the latest class to receive the "HoloNet" treatment is the Jedi Knight, which is bound to be a favorite. The video clips show off some of the Jedi's combat moves, like the Force Push and the, uh... Lightsaber Boomerang? I've also posted a few new screenshots of this upcoming MMORPG.

_{Image © 2009 Lucasfilm Ltd.}

If you've been hankering to explore your alter-ego as a superhero in Champions Online, this weekend is your chance to do it for free. Cryptic is offering a free weekend of the game to anyone who wants to give it a try, in celebration of Halloween and the release of their Blood Moon content patch. The event runs from 10 a.m. October 30 until 10 a.m. November 2 (PST). You'll need to register on the official site and download the game client to play.

Blizzard has answered an extensive list of questions about Cataclysm, the next expansion for World of Warcraft, which they collected through their Twitter page. The transcript is available on the official WoW forums, and answers about 40 user submitted questions about what lies ahead for the game.

There's a good interview with Marty Stratton, Executive Producer of Quake Live, over on Bethesda Blog. They discuss their goals in making this free game, some of the challenges they face, and where it may be going in the future. It certainly has made jumping into an online match for a quick fix extremely painless. If you're a fan of 90s-style multiplayer shooters you owe it to yourself to give it a try. There are training arenas with AI opponents for anyone that needs to brush up on their twitch skills.

Online shooter fans are up in arms after learning earlier this week that the PC version of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 will not have the customary dedicated servers used by previous games in the series. Multiplayer games will instead be managed with a central matchmaking system in much the same way as it is done on consoles. This means that online games will be hosted on one of the player's computers, rather than on a server that doesn't have local players on it. This has a number of drawbacks, including interuptions when the host player quits the game, unpredictable latency, and support for fewer players per match. It also means that the community's abilities to mod the game to suit their tastes will be sharply curtailed. As you can imagine, an online petition has been started and it has already soared to over 100,000 signatures. If that translated directly into game sales, it would be somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 million dollars.

So what is behind Infinity Ward's decision to do this? Well, dedicated server systems aren't perfect, and it's not always easy to find a match with people of your skill level that is free of cheaters. They want to improve the multiplayer experience for casual players that don't want to spend time finding a server that suits them. A more detailed explanation has been posted on Robert Bowling's blog.

As the bulk of Modern Warfare 2 sales will be for consoles in any case, it may be that PC gamers have become a low priority, but I'd wager that this is a bad decision. A better approach would be to stick with dedicated servers, but provide a better server browser with more robust filtering. How about offering a dedicated server option as well as a peer-to-peer matching service? With a little ingenuity, I don't see why the needs of both the hardcore competitive players and the casual types can't be met. Hopefully we haven't heard the last of this.

This free Flash game puts you in charge of a railroad system, and you have to control switches, turntables, and repair cars to get the train home on time. Trains involves a variety of puzzle-like challenges, such as bandits that will attack your train and bridges that can only support a limited number of cars. There are 21 levels, it's controlled entirely by mouse, and it's a fun distraction for people of all ages.