LOTRO had quite a bit of hype behind it on launch, but never really took off (wasn't sufficiently different from WoW to make an impact ...)

What makes you say LOTRO didn't really take off? Multiple expansions later, it's still a very cool game with tons of players (though Turbine doesn't release subscriber numbers). If you mean that it isn't as popular as WoW, I'm sure you're right. But with 11 active servers (including decent European presence) and a 4 year run so far, I'd argue that it definitely "took off".

Eve Online has this trait - you are partly your "character", and partly the ship you happen to be flying.

Don't get too excited about those names - broad names for patents like that are commonplace and typically have no deep meaning. It's the "claims" section of the patent that really matters.

Lots of patent titles look like "Cellular Handset with a Keypad" or "Computer System with Removable Media", without any broad claims at all. Just an odd naming convention. :)