I never played Planetside, but I did try out the Battle-Royale they put out in 2019 when it was in early release. If that's the same engine then it would be a good place to work from.
Sad to see how many people aren't into fixing all the things wrong with the game vs. 1 year without an expansion, but I suppose if EQ were the only game I played or I finished new expansions the week they were launched I might feel the same way. It's also odd considering how many people complain about how bad new expansions are anyway. And threatening to quit the game for a year is probably a good thing, it's good to take breaks and do other things for a while. It's important to keep your regulars happy, but it's also important to increase new/returning player retention. This game's Live community has changed a lot and become very anti-social. I see new/returning players asking for help all the time with no response, everyone is just running around by themselves with their merc or boxes, and purchasing/selling loot rights. That's why I mainly play TLP instead of Live, because TLP at least actually represents the type of game I want to play, a cooperative and social MMO where we have to rely on one another to accomplish goals. Frankly Live should just merge all servers into one (aside from FV/PVP of course) and only have Pickzones. Though with the playstyle of today's MMOer, who knows if that will even help. Regardless, I think leveling is one of the things that needs to be worked on. There is a reason that MMOs introduce things like level squishes or change up leveling to be quicker after some time. Reducing the amount of EXP required to level or getting rid of the merc rank quests are simple things that don't really require much work. Maybe even just getting rid of the splitting of EXP while grouping and making it so grouping literally just gives you more EXP. One of the reasons that I get bored of modern MMOs so quickly is because the leveling is a solo-to-max-level quest grind. I love party grind MMOs. I love meeting random people and making friends. But that doesn't happen anymore while leveling in EQ Live. I see plenty of people leveling in the 10s and 20s, but it seems like once they get to the 40s they all just disappear. I don't necessarily mind having to solo to get to a relevant expansion where playing with other players might happen again, but getting to that point needs to be a lot faster. Also people really need to stop suggesting new players do Hero's Journey, it is an enormous waste of time and a lot of it cannot be completed solo unless you greatly out-level the content. It's nice to have objectives instead of just grinding mobs sometimes, but grinding a hot zone is just so much faster than bothering with all the running around and camping rare creatures that Hero's Journey requires. Aside from leveling adjustments I am hoping that the 64 bit client becomes a reality.
I am all for this. As horrible as grinding Velious would be for another year, this has needed to happen for a long time now. 64 bit client alone will solve a ton of issues, More buff slots (or at least more Clickie buffs tuned into AA's), more consolidation (less key bloat), Less LAG, some actual new class defining abilities / spells, and much more. I can think of tons ways to make the game better, I'd even pay for it! Call it "Fix the damn game" expansion.
Of all the many, many things I do, playing EQ is one of the things I spend the least amount of time on, and I still complete everything except collections and a few hunter kills each cycle. The game will stagnate if it is left for 2 years without an expansion.
Shouldn't our subscription fees just pay for devs who maintain the game and resolve bugs? The and expansion fees cover the cost of developing the expansion? The game used to have more content in half the time. The bugs and lag are not an issue of time management. They are an issue of neglect.
For this to happen the money people spend on expansions would have to come from somewhere else. I'm struggling to think where that would be.
As a software engineer who has worked on my own projects and projects created by others... over 20+ years of code being written by tons of different people there is no way your code is ever going to be bug free. Think back to what the original ui did before kunark came out and think about what the game does now. It is crazy to think about all the changes that have happened over the years.
I think some of us, and I include myself, have played EQ long enough to know we enjoy suffering. So, if DBG wanted to postpone an expansion, there is enough of us who would keep playing to maintain the game. If DBG wants to pick up their pace in expac releases, a good number of us would play on. Face it. If anyone is still playing EQ after all these years, we are pretty hard-core fans. I know I am.
No it wouldn't. Change the target in VS, compile, work out any specific issues. Sure, it'll take a lot of hours but nothing like a rewrite.
Instead of 1 year with no expansions, how about 2 years with small expansion, and a technical overhaul? I admit Im tired of velious, and would like to explore somewhere else, but Im open for compromises.
