Possibly the best MMO around.
http://www.eve-online.com/
EVE Online is a paid subscription based MMO, spaceship focused trading or battling, enormous (and when I say enormous, I mean it could take days to get from one end to the other of the entire currently available space).
A plethora of spaceships (Well over 80 different ships ranging from miners, haulers, fighters, battlecruisers, shuttle, all rounder. Each ship has it's own intricacies to balance), ammo types (Over 200 ammo types including catergories like shells, rapidfire rounds, rockets, mines, EMPs, trackers), thrusters, add-ons to increase warp or power core, jammers for use in dogfights, cloaking devices and ALOT more.
The economy system is gob-smacking; if you've got the right tip off that a spacestation is selling some rare ore for dirt cheap, you can buy alot of it, travel for maybe 20 minutes and then sell the stuff on for 200% profit.
No boring level grindstoning either. To advance a skill (your default set of skills depends on what path through education you selected whilst creating your avatar, which may I add is more than extensive to tailore to anyone's needs) you simply select it from the list, and it begins learning/advancing it. It then displays how long is left until it's completed.
You can still do whatever you want whilst learning a skill, it doesn't interfere at all. But the higher level the skill, the longer it takes. You can pause them and switch to other skills midway through learning one. And it carries on learning the skill, even when you're not playing.
One of the main draws to EVE Online is also the coroproations. These act like clans or guilds like you'd see in any other game. On the whole, spacestations (where you dock your ship, buy and trade, carry out NPC quests and refine collected ores) are usually NPC controlled. So each corporation is held on a spacestation with many others.
Of course there are player controlled space stations, but they remain out in deep space where it's rougher and tougher. They are constantly being assaulted and defended by the big corporations. It's a sight to behold a clash for a player controllable spacestation. It's a status, it's a home.
Stick ontop of that a reasonable subscription fee (£6.80 if you pay by single month or £5.60 on a 6 month subscription) and drop dead gorgeous graphics (they say it's impossible to take a bad screenshot in EVE Online. I've yet to see that be proven wrong. Planets glow (they can't be landed on), asteroids float in belts, the suns of constellations flare and the engines from your ship spark) and you have yourself a slow burning, amazingly complex and rewarding game.
Be warned though, it takes patience and time to get the most out of it. If you've a two PC setup, leave this running on one and then do whatever you want to do on the other.
Also, consider the option of funding the subscription fees by selling ISK (EVE Online currency) to sites like
http://www.ige.com/sellcurrency.aspx
To give you an idea of how long it takes to earn 50 Million ISK (the site linked will currently pay £15 for 50 Million ISK), I was able to make 5 million ISK, after playing it for a week and had got myself a good mining ship and levelling my mining up more, in around 2.5 hours. Some people earn their money through this ways for god's sake!
Anyway, if you couldn't be arsed to read that, here it is in short:
Lots of space, lots of items, lots of things to do, massive economy, grand battles, organised corporations and gorgeous visuals.
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