Prepping for a raid in Everquest on June 21st, 2002.

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.

Bash da Bashers!
(Click for larger version)

A wedding at the Spires in North Karana.

Good ol’ Kedge Keep.

I spent some time in Everquest recently with some old gaming friends. We didn’t have much time available, so we decided to head out to the Loping Plains and get some grinding experience in. Our Wizard was bound at the spot where we usually set up camp, so we all met up in the Plane of Knowledge and then ported out to the Plains.

This is a very safe camping spot, so not much excitement happened. Our group consisted of level 80 gnome warrior, 76 wizard, 80 mage, 80 cleric, and me with a wimpy 68 ranger. We used the pulling technique we have used for years. The warrior would pull, and if he got multiples, the mage would cast Call of the Hero and pull him back to camp aggro free. This helps split the camp and we get easy solo pulls. We popped Lesson of the Devoted, which gives us 30 minutes of double experience, and got to work.

A common critter we encounter is the blue orc, which comes in several different types. There is the standard warrior orc to start with, and then there’s the rogue, shaman, and necromancer orc. The neat thing about these orcs is that they can change form mid-way through a fight. They start out as one type of orc model and then transform into something different in a flash. Here is an example:

So we took out plenty of the orcs along with black horses with flaming hooves called Nightmares. Experience was good, even for the level 80’s in the group. Loot drops are nothing special, but they do sell to vendors for a decent amount. It wasn’t a flashy, brag about it night, but we all made advancements and had a good time making fun of one another. A nice diversion from Vanguard every now and then.

Every now and then I will post some old screen shot of when Everquest was young. This picture is of my old grouping buddies as we explore the Rathe Mountains for the very first time. This was back in 1999.  I felt so uber in the Banded armor. We had a ton of fun that night.

I was reading an article over on MMOCrunch entitled Phantasy Star Goes Offline In Japan when one sentence caught my eye. The author asks the following question: “If the (MMO) world was to end tomorrow, what would you do?” I found that to be a very interesting topic. How would you react if the MMO that you love, that you have played for years, suddenly announced that it was closing up shop in the near future?

I think that for a great many people, their reaction would be summed up in two words: Complete Panic. If this were to happen to a large and very popular MMO, you can bet that the online forums and blogs would explode with a wide range of diatribe. Depending on the person, emotions would surely range from outrage, disbelief, sadness, and depression. In a way, a lifestyle would be coming to an end. What would you do to replace it?

I don’t have much of a frame of reference for such a happening. I have played many MMO’s, but none of them has gone offline for good. Several games have gone down the tubes, but I suppose my judgement in what games to play is better than I thought. Asheron’s Call is probably the biggest game that I know of that went under. Motor City Online would be another. I didn’t play either of those.

The only experience I can relate it with would be the end of a beta test. I have had some incredibly good times at the end of a couple of beta’s I was involved with. The end of the Everquest beta was one of the best gaming experiences of my life. It turned out to be very special. Multiple gods attacked all over the Everquest world and most people were too low a level to defeat them. Giant skeletons appeared in my home zone of Qeynos Hills and wreaked havoc. A large army of orcs attacked players at the Crushbone zone. Rumors ran wild with tales of amazing things happening in one zone and then another. Traveling wasn’t very fast back then, so it took some effort to try and see as much of the events as we could. It was an incredible experience.

What made the end of EQ beta so special was what my friends and I did at the very end. Several of us met up at the Freeport docks just before the servers went down. These are friends that I met playing the beta and I still play with or keep in touch with to this day. When the server shutdown timer started to count down, we decided to swim out to sea. We kept ourselves underwater and swam out as far as we could. As the last shutdown timer was announced, we all turned our characters and looked at one another. A couple seconds later the screen went black with a You Have Been Disconnected From The Server message. It was such a surreal moment. Little did I know that EQ would hold me for more than five years.

So what would I do if Sony announced that they would be shutting down Everquest? First, it would make me sad that such a wonderful game that brought me into the MMO world would be going away. I would travel all over the game world, taking screenshots of everything I could, so that I would have a record of my favorite places in the game.

In the end, I would find myself smiling as I recalled all the fun times I had playing the game with great friends. On the last day, when the last seconds are counting down, you can be sure to find me at the Freeport docks. I will jump into the water and swim. I will swim as far as I can. Until the screen fades to black.

–Wolfen

Hello and Merry Christmas to all!

I suppose it’s a strange day to start a blog, but it is as good a day as any for me. As a bit of introduction, my online gaming name is Wolfen. I am a 38 year-old casual gamer who likes to play MMO’s. This blog will chronicle the playing of certain MMO’s from a casual playing point of view.

For a bit of my history, I started playing online games with Everquest. I played it starting with beta and continued to play it for more than five years. After that, I quit the game, returning rarely to play from time to time. I am currently playing it now. I have played many more online games as well. Those include Dark Age of Camelot, Everquest 2, World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, Vanguard, Planetside, and others.

Two games that I will be picking up again will be Everquest 2 and Vanguard. My plan is to report the current-day newbie experience in both games and see what has changed since these games first launched. This may not sound all that exciting to you, but I’m curious to find out how casual friendly these games can be. We all know that World of Warcraft is the god of casual games, but I want to see how these games compare. Should someone even consider starting up with one of these two games? We will see.

I was fartin’ around in Everquest last night and ran across some Frostfell NPC’s in Qeynos. Who knew that Santa was an ogre?

Ol’ Santug gives out a couple of quests. One of them sends you off to kill invisible grimps that drop pieces of his Naughty and Nice list that he lost. The reward given is a single use breastplate that turns your character into an ogre. Seeing my ranger as an ogre was a neat novelty, but having only a single use was disappointing.

So, my first post is done. I will be starting up EQ2 and Vanguard very shortly after the first of the year. I have a new computer on the way that will allow me to run them better than my current machine. This will be especially true for Vanguard, which is high on graphics and low on optimization.

–Wolfen