Darkpaw Games is Hiring!

https://www.everquest.com/news/darkpaw-games-is-hiring

EverQuest

• Associate Artist, Environment
• Associate Artist, Environment
• Associate Artist, Environment
  • Yes, we really do need three.
• Associate Software Engineer
• Associate Technical Writer (Temp)

EverQuest II

• Associate Artist, Environment
• VFX Artist

Darkpaw Games

• Community Manager

Those leaving, sorry to see you go. Thank you very much for your work!

Looks like next expansion will have lots of new zones.

But they aren't hiring GMs. They need more GMs. And the last two years have proven working from home is viable and in many cases even more productive. Surely a work from home solution can be found.

Not the 2022 one, the zones are probably mostly done already, after training and it takes the artist something like 9 months avg time to build a zone probably wont see the benefits until one of the 2 PoP expansions (2023 / 2024)

I really hope they are more imaginative than just repeating all the old expansions one more time.

I want to see new places...We still haven't seen Drinal...and I bet there are entire continents that are just waiting to be discovered somewhere on Norrath...

I didn't see any "designers wanted" in that post. EverQuest has thousands of unfixed bugs, thousands of unread suggestions all due to a lack of manpower.

Daybreak already outsources most of their art offshore. I'm not sure why they need more artists but sure, it's welcome.

What are your data points?

Source?

If you look at the credits at the server select menu, you will see that some of the artists are from https://lakshyadigital.com/

I don't know who makes what, or how much that is outsourced, but some of the artwork is.
Maybe they want to change that, by hiring more inhouse artists?

That said, I get the impression that the zones themselves are made by inhouse devs, by those "get to know the dev" -interviews.
Im guessing "Associate artist, environment", is about making zones.

Thanks for the information! I count 8 artists in ToL credits. Lakshya Digital has offices in Seattle.

This is not a political forum (issues of free markets, globalization, and populism/nationalism) but I think most customers/players see the wisdom in the efficiencies gained by contracting artwork to a point. One can even argue that contracting helps to alleviate the workload for in-house artists (as opposed to overworking employees and trampling on labor rights).

Edit: My last statement is not directed at you but as a general observation.

I feel ya man, GM's are like a "golden age of gaming" thing.

Sadly games are now run so much like businesses that a return to having 2-3GM per server is like drifting off into a wistful daydream only for it to be shattered by the sound of a CEO banging his desk & yelling "MONETISE THOSE PLAYERS HARDER AND CUT COSTS TO THE BONE, WE MUST DRIVE UP BASELINE PROFITABILITY TO INCREASE OUR SHARE VALUE".

Sadly GM are seen as an entirely unnecessarry expense when in truth they were a huge part of the early success of this game, and even when EQ had 2-3GM per server they never really got used to their full potential.

GM's were a great asset. But, TBH, is anyone surprised that owners of businesses try to increase profits? Inflation is high in the U.S. (gas especially for me), and I don't see that changing very soon. We should expect more monetization strategies inn more businesses and we will likely have to deal with it as best we can. It sucks, but life is what it is.

It reminds me of the real estate market.

For landlords or homeowners, charging "market" rents is morally acceptable.

For renters, charging "high" rents is morally objectionable.

Both sides see themselves in the right. In the free market system, you simply walk away and vote with your money. A renter with a low budget should not rent in New York City, San Francisco, Seattle, or Honolulu thereby lowering demand in those areas. If you disagree with the management of a game, simply don't support/play it.

Removing GM's was a tectonic shift on the business approach, essentially they gutted almost all of the great (& possibly best-in-industry) Customer Service that they once had in exchange for a bare minimum amount.
It was also done at a time when the pressures on the business were actually a huge degree smaller than today.
Even if they only started off with 1 dedicated "Event GM" who ran 5 events per week & rotated across all the servers it would be a choice they could make but likely won't because they don't have to and it wont make them more money.

I don't think any game on the market has dedicated server GMs. (I'm sure some will pretend to have dedicated GMs that are really separate accounts run by one or two individuals).

This is like expecting American Airlines to provide 1970s/1980s-level concierge service when every other airline (United, Delta, Southwest, JetBlue) runs on a minimum industry standard.

Honestly I feel lucky to have been an EQ player when GM's on the servers interacting with players & running GM events was an actual thing.
It's why I called that the "golden age of gaming" and it was largely a holdover from the MUD roots of the game & the fact most of the big movers & shakers in early EQ were fairly hardcore RPG (and D&D) gamers themselves & wanted EQ to do the things they had always wanted games to do - at least until the bean-counters became the shot-callers.

For better or worse, these are the values and morals of 21st century capitalism. Everyone is trying to get rich quick - let's not pretend that we ourselves are pure altruists. The problem described is not confined to EverQuest or the gaming industry. I would even make the argument that this concern is more trivial in the larger context of societel woes (inequality, homelessness, poverty, crime).

I'm not expecting anything, maybe you got the wrong end of the stick.

Removing assigned server GMs was one of the most misguided and stupid decisions ever made. The CS Manager at the time convinced the one of the SOE VPs to do this. Both of them were best buddies. Many Senior Guides like myself have long memories of how the GMs and the Guide program was completely gutted.

Spot on!

I believe I questioned them about an open GM position 2 years ago and it wasn't something they wanted to offer remotely (living entirely across the US it's hard to come into the office).