The MMO Notebook

Posts Tagged ‘Everquest’

Perhaps the most famous and most persistent resident of Qeynos: Fippy Darkpaw

The guild leader gives his troops an encouraging sign while standing next to the North Freeport bank.

Here we are battling a Griffawn in North Karana. We had just journeyed to Freeport and bought full sets of banded armor. We felt very uber! (circa 1999)

–Wolfen

Every now and then I post a nostalgic screenshot from my gaming days of old. Here’s one from 1999 in the South Karana zone.

If you happen to roam around the MMO blogosphere and news sites, you might have seen some hints and whispers about the possibility of Everquest 3 being a reality.  Some say that has been in production for years while others think it will never be made. People seem to be split on the idea of Everquest 3 seeing the light of day. Personally, I would welcome another Everquest title into the marketplace, but only if it was created in a certain way.

I have mentioned before that the original Everquest is and always will be my best gaming experience of my life. Be that as it may, I can’t see myself ever returning to Everquest, even though I have friends who would like to see me return. The reason is game mechanics. Back in 1999, Everquest was the best game you could play. During those early years, the game played mostly as you thought it should. Due to the lack of other MMO games on the market, we gamers did not have a large frame of reference as to how things could be done.

Other games did eventually come on the market, with Everquest 2 being one of them.  It met with lackluster success at best. It did improve many things over the original version, but it also left many things to be desired in gameplay and UI experience. It took World of Warcraft to show all of us how an MMO can be done right.

If Everquest 3 is indeed on the horizon, I would like to see it play like a cross between WoW and Lord of the Rings Online. Give us a UI that blows our socks off. One that is super simple to start using yet easy to delve into the deeper parts of what is possible. I would also like to see the game go in a much different art direction than current Everquest games. The environment does not need to always look super-realistic. I want the designers to use their imagination and surprise me. Show me something that has not been done before and let me see it without needing to buy a new computer to experience it.

Everquest 3 should take me back to its roots. Don’t take me to a future reality or magically transport me to a moon. Show me the “old west” of Norrath, one that I envisioned in my mind as the game taught me about the Combine Empire. A world more barbaric and yet more civilized at the same time. In other words, show me the lore I have only read about and never seen.

Is there room on the market for another Everquest game? It is difficult to envision three Everquest games operating at the same time. Original Everquest turned 10 years old this year. It obviously is still making a profit or Sony would not keep it running as long as it has. EQ 2 has more subscribers, which one would think brings in more money than EQ 1. Should Sony shut down EQ 1 to make room for EQ 3? It is a tough call, but as they say, it all comes down to money. Just how profitable are these older games? Would a new version generate more revenue?

I hope that Everquest 3 will be released. I also hope that they do it right. Only time will tell.

Today marks the 10th anniversary of the game that changed the MMO world.  It is difficult to believe that it was more than 10 years ago since I first logged into EQ’s beta server, and in doing so, changed my gaming world forever.  I have said it before, but no other game gave me such enjoyment and satisfaction.  Playing Everquest introduced me to an amazing game world filled with amazing people, both good and bad.  I still enjoy many of the friendships that began while playing EQ.  The accomplishments, failures, good times, and bad all add up to the best times of my gaming life.

Sony is celebrating this anniversary with special events, media, and stories.  You can see what they are offering at the official 10th anniversary site.  Check it out if you feel the need for some good ol’ nostalgia.  As a bonus, here are a few old school Everquest screenshots of my own.  Click the thumbnails for a larger version.

My 17″ Macbook Pro finally arrived and I now have it setup the way I like it.  It has been a long wait, but I can now get back to gaming.  I decided to start with Lord of the Rings Online.  Since LOTRO requires the Windows operating system, I had to setup a dual boot configuration on the Macbook Pro.  I decided to install Windows XP, even though it won’t use all 4GB of RAM that is available to the machine.  The game runs great on high settings at 1920×1200, even though the 9600GT 512MB video card isn’t all that great of a card these days.

I have a level 37 Champion on the Windfola server, but I decided to start fresh, so I rolled up a human Guardian that I named Strongg.  I wanted to try out a class in the game that I had not played yet and Guardian was one of them.  Humans start in the Archet area, so my game introduction had me escaping from a cell and then helping a Ranger named Amdir to rescue some kidnapped hobbits.

Once the introduction is complete, I found myself in the town of Archet, eager to find some quests and get to work.  I didn’t have far to go.  Amdir was wounded in the battle, so I had to help him with defense of the town.  The first few are you typical newbie quests that have you go out and kill wolves and boars so that the town’s sheep are kept safe.  Once those are done, I was sent to a hunter’s lodge where some things needed to be done.  Seeing this lodge brought pangs of nostalgia to my heart because the lodge reminded me of my beloved Everquest’s Surefall Glade and the lodge that can be found there.

One of the farmers outside of Archet had a boar problem that he wanted me to help him with.  A boar named Old Bloodtusk needed to be killed.  I remembered this boar from the time that LOTRO first went live.  There was a line of people waiting to kill this boar and each time he appeared it was a general free-for-all contest.  This time, however, there was not another player in sight and he was waiting for me when I arrived.

After running several other quests, none of which were very challenging, I came to the last quest in the “game introduction” line.  Brigands were attacking Archet and I had to help Amdir defend it.  The town was in flames when I arrived and it was filled with battle.  I worked my way through the town, finally arriving at the final showdown, which culminated in a fight with Eogan, a servant of Angmar who was responsible for all the problems in the area.  I dispatched him with ease and ended the quest line.

Bash da Bashers!
(Click for larger version)

Yeah, I am still waiting for my new computer to arrive. Not being able to play any game for more than a month is making my fingers itch.  I have, however, had plenty of time to think about what games I want to play going forward.  I am a litle torn on the subject.

My World of Warcraft subscription is still active, even though it is not being used right now.  The easy road says to go back to playing it, but I am getting urges to play other games.  I have a lifetime subscription to Lord of the Rings Online, a game I have not logged into for a long time.  The urge to play LOTRO has been heightened lately by the fact that I have been listening to the LOTR audiobooks again.  I do this every couple of years because I love the books so much.  My only complaint with LOTRO is that I grew weary with all the quests, but if you are not questing, you are wasting your time.  The experience gained from grinding mobs is a pittance compared to what you receive from a quest.

Another option is the Sony Station Pass.  As you probably know, the $30 a month Station Pass allows you to play any of Sony’s MMO’s that you own the software to.  Everquest will ever be my first MMO love.  I played Everquest 2 for awhile, but none of my friends followed me there, so I gave it up.  I also played Pirates of the Burning Sea for a short while.  It grew stale fast.  Star Wars Galaxies is another that I played from launch, but the game destroying NGE update had me running for the exits.  I tried Vanguard again, but as I mentioned on this blog earlier, it still is way too buggy for me.

It could be because I am older now, but nothing in the MMO space gets me very excited these days.  After playing so many of them, it all seems like I’ve been there, done that.  I don’t see much innovation anymore.  Are all the great ideas used up?  I don’t think so, but you can’t tell that from the latest crop of games to be released.  Conan, Warhammer, and Darkfall are more of the same tired ideas that have been used over and over again. The only thing that sets Darkfall apart is the fact that it is so hardcore that most people will never want to play it.

So what is a veteran noob supposed to do?  I think I will start from scratch in LOTRO and see how it goes.  I still need to decide if I stay with WoW or go with the Station Pass.  My computer isn’t due for another couple of weeks, so I have plenty of time to decide.

I mentioned in a previous post that one of the things that can make an MMO truly great is the community that builds up around and in the game.  If game developers can make it so that players want to communicate with each other, and make it very easy to do, then you add an additional draw that keeps people coming back for more.

There is not a single game out there that has it right.  That is not to say that some don’t try, but their attempts have been half ass and weak.  You will see announcements from companies stating that they care about player-run events and that they fully support them, but those good wishes disappear after a couple of weeks and things fall back down to the status quo.

Now Sony has decided to help support player-run events.  This comes about 10 years too late, but what can you do?  I saw this post from Massively, which points to the official announcement, that tells players to run more events and they will come up with more ways to support them.  This probably sounds great to guilds who like to do such things, but I have no doubt that just like in the past, these things will fade away with nothing of substance coming from the game developers.

Speaking of events, some of the neatest moments in my Everquest career was participating in GM run events.  Some of them that followed the lore and made sense game-wise were great and got people talking.  The problem was that the GM events were few and far between, and just like you would expect, eventually stopped altogether.  GM run events are so rare these days that I wonder if they happen at all.  It is a shame because they added flavor to the game and a neat change to the standard day to day MMO grind.

Giving the players some variety gets them enthused about the game.  GM and player-run events create the sense of a living game world where neat things can happen at any moment.  If Joe MaxLevel is running through the newbie yard on auto-run while watching television, and he suddenly gets attacked by a 100 foot tall rooster who shoots laser beams out its eyes, you can be damn sure that word will spread quickly and draw many players into the fun.  It will create buzz that will keep people talking about the event and they will look forward to the next one.  If the developers follow through with a series of them, ane the players keep talking about it, then you have created something special.