A 16 Year Journey-What made it great and how to bring it back.

I promise this will get to TLPs to stay on topic eventually.

Its hard not to turn this into a novel because there is more than enough material and memories to produce a few of them, but I will keep it as short and sweet as I can. I have played this game since original beta with breaks lasting no longer than 60 days. I was part of 12 betas over all over all of those expansions that have come out. I helped test raid content, and helped lead raids for more than a decade. This info isnt about bragging rights or legacy but more just to say "hey I have played quite a bit and believe I know enough about eq to have a decent opinion to share." Of course you may choose to feel otherwise but here goes.

What made this game stand out above all others to me and many more is that is was difficult. The game was unforgiving enough that you decision making, choices in game, who you played with etc, all had consequences both good and bad. I remember entire evenings in 1999 were spent trying to round enough people up just to go and get someones corpse out of a dungeon. No exp or loot to be had for an entire night. The game was tough but it left soooo much room to set yourself apart that you and your character and your reputation was as unique as the person behind the computer. Your character may be wearing the exact same ugly armor as every other of that class and race, but YOUR name and how you played was what made you stand out. You might not have been the best player, but you might have showed every night on time and were mr/mrs dependable. Maybe you were the puller who the whole group or raid waited to log on because you were the only way your party were going to get something done. Well as time went on technology and the online gaming player base grew massively and games like world of warcraft came out and offered what I called "cupcake" versions of everquest. I tried wow, it sucked. I mean it was pretty, but you could solo to level 50 in about 5 days and so could anyone who could push attack or cast nuke. Well WoW did something the owners of everquest failed to do. They marketed the hell out of their game on tv. This got them millions of subscriptions and took a large base of everquests players at the same time. Well once SoE bought the game from verant they started making everquest easier like wow believing this would pull players back in. This wasnt the problem though, it was just timing and lack of marketing early on. When EQ came out I had only owned a computer for 2 months and none of my friends or family had one. When WoW came out a couple years later I didnt have a friend or family member who didnt have multiple computers. So again, the number of possible online gamers had grown massively in that short time, and WoW marketed when EQ did not. EQ had its playerbase to work with and magically there has been enough old players like me who refuse to give it up, mixed with new players born into it or trying it and staying to keep it alive. I believe you NEED all of them to stay afloat.

Now to the point. By looking at how many people jumped on the first TLP servers its proof that there is enough of us old players who liked original hard eq.........yes yes I know its not nearly as hard at april 1999. To see what kind of fire caught with Ragefire and Lockjaw was absolutely impressive. There might have been as many players on these 2 servers as all the first servers combined in early everquest. Very impressive stuff. However I see the numbers drop off during play time now nightly leading up to the next expansion. There is constant bickering on the boards about the same old problems that havent been dealt with in a few years. And this is running off or will run off a huge portion of the player base. Including myself. There use to be a set of rules that made playing this game a level playing field. Yes people broke the rules but at times many of them, usually all at once, met dire consequences. It was a very simple line in the Eula. No 3rd party software usage. You see most of us who play this game have 2 arms and 2 hands. My apologies to those who do not or have limited usage. My point is that NONE of us have 3 or more. We are capped at 2. Some can use them better than others and this is natural. Some can use their brain and reflexes more efficiently than others this is also normal and it may set them apart. They may even be able to play multiple characters on multiple machines BUT even the greatest mind/body atheletes who play eq are eventually LIMITED to what they can do with those 2 hands. A credit card and 3rd party software usage completely eliminates any actual gameplay, time play, effort play, competition etc that made YOUR character or playtime unique in the world of everquest. It doesnt matter how well you play, or long, or how dependable you are. The guy playing 24 characters with 4 buttons on one keyboard who is getting all the stuff your character needs in a couple hours that you would have had fun taking months to get, is making the reason to play the game pointless.

So does Dbg need the bot armies for funds? Possibly, I know nothing about their books. I highly suspect though that Krono sales coming rmt armies are boons followed by rapid busts. I would be willing to bet that the money would all equal out if rmt armies didnt exist as players would just play longer to obtain the items naturally and wouldnt resort to buying the crap because its easier, then sitting on their hands waiting for the next expac release. To me this was one of the biggest mistakes SoE made. This was not Dbgs doing. The krono should have never happened. SoE fought for years to never allow RMT into the game. There was no way around it. First ebay, which they forced ebay to not allow virtual transaction. Then some other auction site for games only which did poorly. Then the 3rd party websites would buy platinum and many people would eventually get caught and banned for doing that. Well at some point, SoE threw in the towel and gave in but wanted to keep their pride and came up with the stupid krono. This was 100% for them to get in on the rmt trade when all they had to do from the very beginning was take a percentage of each transaction and just DO THE TRANSACTION THEMSELVES. You dont even need a human on the other end to assist. You have all the in game needs with the parcel system. Just allow DOLLAR transactions minus "whatever" percentage Dbg wants to take for allowing it. Hello, you already have station cash? Why not also allow people to buy or deposit cashcash? I know the bazaar/barter system arent in game for many expansion but neither was the parcel system. Just add a new tab to the parcel system for the time being.

Why am I crazy enough to think this would work? Well it keeps your RMTers happy but LIMITED to what they can do with their own hands. How many can they play with 2 hands and no 3rd party help before its to expensive? Ya cant take out raid targets anymore that is for sure. You still leave room for raiders and real groups of players to use content unlike how it is currently on Rage and Lock. You have an apparatus for those who want to buy their gear still in place. So you RUN NO ONE off. Everyone has the same opportunity to play the way they want to play but with rules in place that allows no one to over run the game content with a credit card and 3rd party software. Heck I believe if you set up the "barter system" with dollars, that this might even create a very long lasting server.

Is it classic? Heck no. But rmt has been around forever and it was against the rules. Rules that were broken since 1999. Now Rmt has been accepted. Though I find the whole Rmt playing disgusting, I think its a great idea to give EVERYONE something without screwing over anyone else. Classic folks like me can play rmt army free and find content where we are likely to run up against other groups as usual, or at worst an rmt 6 boxer who cant take all the content anymore, or at best some folks lfg with lots of mobs up. The guy who wants to play a bit and buy his gear if he can still can. The rmt guy can still tell his mom he has a job from her basement in his underware. And best of all Dbg gets a piece of the action and keeps the game going longer for those of us crazy enough to stay another decade.

NOBODY will ever get everything they wanted. Trust me, I have never gotten my clean server, clean gameplay, except maybe the first 2 months I played. This is over 16 years. It has never happened and it never will. I believe that this scenario gives everyone something, but no one group so much that it messes up their style of gaming entirely. I promise you, I would have to give up my ideology of the first 2 months of everquest for this idea to go off, but even giving that idea up is still a HECK of a lot better than what we have currently.

What say you? Im already buffed for incoming nukes, flames, and melee attacks. Ready for heals if there are any.

*shrug*

I know a lot of people who just wont touch games that are ruled by entitled jerks. I've tried to get old eq friends to play other games like DayZ, but they just wont. They have no reason too.

When EQ first came out it was the information age, and the common sentiments were much different. Right now, the internet culture is in a phase of "IDGAF". As long as that's whats cool right now, old era eq game play is pretty much impossible.

It's already shifting to something else. What's cool today will be lame again in about 3-5 years.

WoW wasn't a thing when SoE bought EQ. Might not have even been what you meant but in the context of that paragraph it seemed that way.

The game can't ever be hard/tedious again because too many of the original players say they won't play it because they have families and jobs and obligations now and too many of the prospect players won't play it because they wouldn't want to play a hard game. They want to experience content instead of the relationships that come from struggling to do basic things. They can get that human connection on Facebook or other places now that we used to get in the game on old-school EQ.
Things like corpse runs and very slow xp just don't appear to appeal to that many people to make a sustainable player base.
I'd love to see a single classic server with some older rulesets, fewer quality of life changes enabled and such but they can't move the entire game that way.[/quote]

[/quote]

I appreciate the response and agree that today is a different time as well. That is why though I have a very specific way I would like to play, am suggesting to try to mold a server that could fit everyone in if folks could agree not to expect everything they want, but can be happy with a good bit of it.

And no my point on the verant to soe to dbg wasnt to prove I remember their ownership timeline. The point was that the owners of Wow not only hit the gaming/technology age at the perfect time but they also marketed it heavily on tv while everquest was ahead of its time by 2+ years as far as the internet age, and they failed to market it on television. I saw a couple adds on tv over the years if I remember correctly. But I have seen Wow on tv for a decade at least weekly. In other words I believe they difference in player base wasnt about the game being easier which is the way EQ went. I think whoever owned it at the time just needed to market it.

Let me make sure I am reading this correctly
TL;DR: You want to add a tab that allows you to convert platinum into RL currency and vice versa?

EQ was great back in 1999 because EQ had no competition back in 1999 ( ultima online... meridian 59... shadowbane? that's about it?).

EQ sense of mystery is never comming back, in any game... not in this age of Internet.

EQ was full of timesink, EQ had interesting ''undocumented features'' in zones like mistmoore, kaesora, unrest or old plane of hate... but EQ wasn't hard. EQ didn't require good reflex and EQ certainly did not have intricate rotation with complex synergy amongst classes...

Lag, timesinks and boredom made EQ challenging back in the day... seriously, 4 hours of CH chain per night, 4 night a week will turn anyone insane...

So, we were really wrong when we thought we were having fun playing Everquest back then? We weren't really enjoying it? Hmmmm...... amazing!

I didn't play classic, I did join Ragefire for awhile. I got a small glimpse at the excitement that must have been classic. I stepped into Commonlands for the first time on day 2 after Rage opened. There were people everywhere, running from wolves and Griffons. At that moment all I could think of is "I have to level so I can help these people". I'm a cleric through and through, it's what I do. The problem is you have 2 types of people, people that want to help and be part of a community, and those that want take advantage of that. I can't even say it's this generation, because some of those takers are 40+. I want no part of TLPs ever again. The crap that went on there was inexcusable, and made worse by the fact that those people are sitting on hundreds of krono. There is no easy solution. You enjoyed it back then because you were young with lots of time, and shrugged off any bullying. We are older now, with kids of our own, and things like bullying don't sit the same anymore.

Just a technical point, Sony or SOE never "bought" Verant or 989 studio's because they owned them all along...

The original name for the studio back in 1995 was Sony Computer Entertainment America, and the head of the division was John Smedley even back then.

The original creators of WOW actually played EQ (one met his wife in game) and when they created WOW they implemented a lot of feedback SOE was not willing to implement in that era. Instanced raids and dungeons, solo-ability of all classes, Timers based on character, Generic drop types (whoever won the loot could turn in the looted token for their class specific gear for that slot), raids for smaller groups, auction house, easy world travel, the list goes on.

I liked EQ because it didn't have these things. It needed to be figured out from scratch. The players had to decide on a server by server basis where the majority of auctioning was going to happen. Most servers used EC tunnel. Some used WFP. Quests weren't clicky based. You actually had to read the text and then ask a question with specific words in it to trigger the next dialogue. Some zones have random wandering higher level mobs you need to watch out for. Nothing like leveling in WC in 1999 killing level 8-10 mobs to be crushed by a level 30 hill giant. Or the infamous "hey lets attack Kizdean Gix, he's a yellow con." /party wipe. The fastest way to advance in XP was grouping in EQ (not true for most modern MMOs). There was "forced cooperation" similar to many tabletop RPGs which was needed to get things done.

Playing EQ for 16 years (with some breaks) and I still haven't done it all. Some MMOs I have played for 2 years and have done everything there is to do.

Yep. Qeynos = Sony eq backwards.

Sony even had a sort of mall/entertainment building built in downtown San Francisco that opened in the very late 90's/early 2000's called the Metreon. It was supposed to be hyper-futuristic, with some innovative arcade games, vr rooms, and robots that talked to people. Sometime after, one of the main walkways was made in to a walk of fame for video games and eq was one of the first to be inducted.






Sony sold it a while back. It is now a Target.

Pikallo wrote "Let me make sure I am reading this correctly
TL;DR: You want to add a tab that allows you to convert platinum into RL currency and vice versa?"

Pikallo---A little more info than just a tab but yes. If we can all agree that RMT isnt going away since we have 16 years of it to prove it even when it was against the rules, and we can agree that DBG is now a part of it with krono sales, then why not just eliminate the obvious and allow the parcel npcs to run a barter window export and import. You got something you want to sell? Have a plat price, krono price, or cash price. Same with import if you want to buy something. You already have a "wallet" that uses station cash that can be purchased with dollars that can then be used to purchase things you can use in the game like xp potions etc. Why not just allow DBG to earn 10 or 20% or whatever to make it easier on everyone instead of the silly krono route. The krono was designed to give the game owner a piece of the RMT action plain and simple. Everyone knows about it now so the cats out of the bag. If dbg is ok with a person paying cash for a krono, then selling or trading krono in game for plat or gear to an Rmt army, then being ok with the RMT army selling the Krono to someone else for real life cash..........then why in the heck not just make it easier on everyone including themselves and get a piece of any action instead of using the krono merry go round? Im in no way suggesting DBG sells plat or items. Im suggesting the make it possible in game for players to, but they get a piece of the action.

Vlorg Wrote --"EQ was great back in 1999 because EQ had no competition back in 1999 ( ultima online... meridian 59... shadowbane? that's about it?).

EQ sense of mystery is never comming back, in any game... not in this age of Internet.

EQ was full of timesink, EQ had interesting ''undocumented features'' in zones like mistmoore, kaesora, unrest or old plane of hate... but EQ wasn't hard. EQ didn't require good reflex and EQ certainly did not have intricate rotation with complex synergy amongst classes... "

Lag, timesinks and boredom made EQ challenging back in the day... seriously, 4 hours of CH chain per night, 4 night a week will turn anyone insane..."

I agree its never coming back all the way its a different time and i stated as such. However if you felt like the time sinks and ch chains that could make or break a raid wasnt excitement then we had VERY different eq experiences. Today a wipe = a 20 minute waste of time with a nice restart right where ya left off. Back in the day a wipe was so bad only those that could take the heat lasted. Great players! Incredible friends few of which I have ever met in person who I am still friends with today and will be until I croak. I havent made a new friend in everquest in years.

Steampunk wrote "So, we were really wrong when we thought we were having fun playing Everquest back then? We weren't really enjoying it? Hmmmm...... amazing!"

Preach on! Ive had a blessed and amazing life outside of eq in 16 years. Fell in love, got married, bought a house, had a kid who im attached to at the hip, just bought a 2nd home on the beach, started and ran my own successful business etc. And everquest has been a part of that life through all of that because of that first year. That struggle that was eq and the reward of conquering things that took time and relationships was very similar to those successes in life. At least the feeling sure seemed similar. Only you could have those feelings several times a week with EQ to keep you busy between those once every 5 year feelings in real life haha.

Roxanna-- I agree

Numiko--Thank you, you are correct. My point was those who were making decisions changed. There was a big change in philosophy and more notably the disappearance of customer service when you started seeing the SoE abbr in front of your face at each sign on. There has been not much change over all with dbg, but they are trying.

Elemenopi-- Ole Dorn in north ro wiping the zone when all ya wanted was a blue orc every 5 minutes lol. Feeling jealous when someone beat you to the orc with a wooden shield worth 2gp.

Always, always, creative people find ways to break / beat the system. It is the nature of the relationship between technological software developers and the users of that software. For every step you take to prevent things, you have people (you should really be paying to be on your development teams) taking more steps to do what you prevented in the first place.

It is human nature to do this. This applies both to RMT and third party software.

The smart play would be to simply design the best software to multibox and sell licenses to use it. Same goes for in-game currency, or whatever else the community demands - similar to your suggestion to simply take a cut. The same argument has been made and is gaining traction for things like legalization of specific plants people like to smoke all across the US. Can't beat them? Costs too much to stop them and enforce things? Might as well take a cut out of the money that is transacted.

There was a time where people were limited in doing these things due to access / exposure to the knowledge, but in a technological boom that Everquest existed in, the old times many people cherish will never return. Ever.

Accept it will never be the same, and enjoy what is out there. It is better that way.

Your solution is spot on. Absolutely briliant and awesome idea. I hope someone will listen

About eq vs wow. My guild were having an awesome time in god. Eq raiding was peaking hardcore after pop+. I assume soe got rubberelbows. Because to counter wow they lauched a gfxical superior eq2 with a completely failed combat engine and horrible itemisation meanwhile in eq1 they released oow, the lvl 70 expansion making pretty much everything before ikkinz trials trivial. So in one blow they went from having an eq1 in momemtum to allmost complete decay. Alot of us went to eq2 wich offered horrible, horrible gameplay, and stuff like passive exp bonus gain, where you get full xp 1 hour per day. Then in desperation we turned to wow with the same experience you describe. Soe did some of the worst own goals meanwhile wow just got bigger and bigger. And honestly the vanilla raids in wow sucked. Was like raiding Mario brothers.

Thanks Tris I appreciate it.

PoP, GoD were my absolute favorite raiding expansions. They were hard plain and simple. The upgrades especially on the weapon end very noticeably improved your player but gear as well. However neither expansion over powered your player and it wasnt copy and paste + 10% like it was for the last 3/4 of eq. I played monk most of my life and pulled for our guild every night. Pop and God was not easy. Those AAs were such a smart idea that allowed you to work on things that made your class and toon better that set you apart. You were an uber monk when resisted spells didnt knock you out of FD 100% like they did before. Then the raids. Awesome. I think it was uqua if I remember right where everyone in the raid had to read yellow text and 1 person click a door at the right time or you all exploded. Talk about making everyone pay attention for the first time. Then it just got better.

Oow was awesome to with the trials both group and raid. Such outstanding game play. The whole raid having to move every 20 seconds or so, or ducking, or not ducking while also fighting mobs. Then the doppleganger trial with so many adds that even I got to tank with my monk. Our job was to get the rogues off our healers. But Oow was the beginning of copy paste gear and mudflation overload.

Of course I still raided through cotf so it didnt scare me away haha.

sigh...

you had fun back in 1999 because it was the only thing on the market. Internet was new, a persistant 3D world was almost unheard of. EQ graphics were great... back in 1999.

I'm sure my grandfather had a ton of fun playing Pong back in the day, but in 2015 this game would be boring after 5 minute.

what worked in 1999 won't necessary work in 2015... Extremly repetive gameplay , long grinds that even korean grinders barely matched, timesink everywhere ( 15 minutes for boats? really?)...

splitting EQ1 money amongst different projects( EQ2, EQoA and now EQnext) is definatly one of SoE worst decision... who know where EQ1 could be if all that income had been reinvested in the original game that put SoE on the map...

Vlorg-- I appreciate your opinion and you and I are just 2 totally different type people is all. I ENJOY the grind. I appreciate the anticipation and lead up to the reward. Lol, I believe a lot of foreplay is absolutely essential to making the reward at the end unforgettable. If you want to log in and have it handed it to you , kinda like how most men prefer the above, then I assure you there are dozens of other games to choose from.

Eq 1 took me 5 months to hit level 50.

Wow took me 4 days to hit level 50.

Which one am I still married to and which one can I still close my eyes and remember the sound of pumas growling at night that kept me from roaming to far from safety? You dont even remember the names of quit it and hit it variety.

If the fundamentals of a game are good, it can be good regardless.
Just because graphics get better and games get more complex doesn't mean an older game gets any worse.

You might be chasing the latest and greatest, but I am not.
EQ graphics are fine, all they do is represent a physical object on your monitor in a way that allows you to interact in a 3 dimensional way. ArcheAge has great eye-candy graphics but it doesn't have the good grind that EQ does, even though I love the farming mechanics. I still did play it for most of a year and did enjoy many parts of it.

Also, one of the defining parts of EQ for me was the time I had to spend "in the grind" with other players. We built relationships together, we won and lost together. EQ was good at putting you in a place where you had lots of time to make friends. I enjoyed that part of the game.

Nothing wrong with Pong either. It is a solid game.

You might want the instant gratification of the transporter, but I might want the immersion of waiting with my group on the dock for a boat. That is why some of us had fun for years while others just moved to faster paced games that didn't require sitting around as much. Nothing wrong with that.

Also, twitch reflexes and complicated raid mechanics don't make a game hard any more than being too grindy does. Hard for you <> Hard for someone else.

Well, thank you for setting me straight on that. I'll have to file it away in my grand conspiracy file, right next to the moon landings.