ProSiebenSat.1 is the Exclusive Partner of Sony Online Entertainment in Europe

Hello all,

You may have read the recent announcement that SOE is expanding our partnership with ProSiebenSat.1 to include EverQuest, Vanguard, Bullet Run, and Wizardry Online. We are very excited about this publishing partnership and look forward to sharing more with you in the near future. In the meantime, please take a few moments to read the press release below.

Munich, Germany, August 15, 2012.

ProSiebenSat.1 Games and Sony Online Entertainment, LLC (SOE) are expanding their exclusive partnership with four online games for the European market. Following the successful launch of DC Universe™ Online on the servers of ProSiebenSat.1 Games, the games publisher from Unterföhring has secured four more exclusive licenses from SOE: Vanguard Saga of Heroes®, EverQuest®, Wizardry® Online, and Bullet Run™. This extends the portfolio of ProSiebenSat.1 Games to cover a total of 12 online games from the U.S.-based developer studio.

Arnd Benninghoff, Chief Digital Officer of ProSiebenSat.1 Media AG, states, "SOE is the ideal partner at our side, expanding our portfolio with fantastic blockbuster games. As one of Europe's leading TV companies, the players expect us to provide premium TV content, premium online offers, and premium gaming entertainment. We are very happy that we are able to expand this cooperation just months after its inception.“

"ProSiebenSat.1 is the ideal partner for us to reach an even broader audience in Europe,” says John Smedley, President, Sony Online Entertainment. "We are confident that the combination of the media power provided by ProSiebenSat.1 and our expertise in developing high-quality online games will appeal to players in a new and captivating way, creating the perfect prerequisite for achieving great success with our games in Europe.”

About Vanguard: Saga of Heroes
Vanguard Saga of Heroes is a fantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) set in the vast world of Telon, an ancient world of magic, intrigue and adventure. Facing the challenges of a war-torn world, the diverse people here struggle to rebuild their once great civilizations. A fragile alliance has been struck and with the lands set upon by invading forces, the races must band together to survive. In the north, the sprawling green hills of Thestra are plagued by an unstoppable undead menace. To the south, the deserts of Qalia have been besieged by an elemental threat spawned from the depths of the earth; and to the east, inhabitants of the tumultuous jungles of Kojan fiercely battle encroaching otherworldly fiends. Telon is in desperate need of heroes. Your journey begins now.

About EverQuest
For the past 13 years, the first game in the epic EverQuest® franchise has captivated its players with exciting fantasy MMO adventures. With 18 game expansions, 16 unique races, 16 distinct classes, thousands of alternate abilities and items, the game offers countless possibilities for character development over 95 levels. Legendary battles, exciting events, and heroic adventures await.

About Wizardry Online
Wizardry Online is a Free-to-Play, hardcore fantasy MMORPG developed by Japan’s Gamepot Inc. From insane difficulty to complex mazes, unrelenting Mobs and traps around every turn, even the best RPG players will find this to be the ultimate challenge. With the risk of permadeath always looming, players group with trusted allies to survive. Using skill based combat, and a little bit of luck, players battle to defeat amazing anime creatures, cheat death, and live to tell the world!

About Bullet Run
Bullet Run is a Free-to-Play, team-based multiplayer game that puts players in the ultimate reality TV game show, where contestants showcase their deadly talents in the name of fame. Bullet Run was already praised for its tight controls, quick respawns and massive amount of options. Fit for gamers with any level of FPS knowledge and dubbed “absurd fun”, Bullet Run is sure one of the most entertaining titles in the FPS genre.

About ProSiebenSat.1 Games GmbH
The games publisher ProSiebenSat.1 Games is a subsidiary of the ProSiebenSat.1 Group and focuses on the Europe-wide licensing and marketing of online games as well as games partner acquisition. The portfolio includes, among other things, S4 League, Maestia and Florensia. Since early 2012, ProSiebenSat.1 Games has held the Europe-wide licenses to several games from Sony Online Entertainment, including the blockbuster games DC Universe™ Online, EverQuest® II, Star Wars®: Clone Wars Adventures™, Free Realms®, Magic: The Gathering – Tactics®, Pox Nora®, the upcoming PlanetSide® 2, and the next installment of the EverQuest® franchise.

About SOE
Sony Online Entertainment LLC (SOE) is a recognized worldwide leader in massively multiplayer online games. Best known for its blockbuster hits and franchises, including EverQuest®, EverQuest® II, Champions of Norrath®, PlanetSide®,Free Realms®, Star Wars®: Clone Wars Adventures™ and DC Universe™ Online, SOE creates, develops and provides compelling online entertainment for a variety of platforms. SOE is building on its proven legacy and pioneering the future of online worlds through creative development and inspired gameplay design for audiences of all ages. To learn more, visit www.soe.com.

SOE, the SOE logo, EverQuest, Champions of Norrath, Free Realms and PlanetSide are registered trademarks of Sony Online Entertainment LLC. All other trademarks are properties of their respective owners.

The original thread can still be found in the archived forums here: http://forums.station.sony.com/eqold/posts/list.m?topic_id=188272

This thread is to give you an opportunity to continue the conversation.

Thanks,
Dexella

Can we get the FAQ's now ?

I keep checking these threads, in hope of the day they'll announce the cancellation of the deal, so I'll be able to put both accounts back to Gold again.

same as me, i don't care what their FAQ's will look like, the only way i will stay and a lot of others is if we ware still SOE-customers

Might take a while.
Currently Pro7 is busy promoting Lord of the Rings Online - they don't have to invest time into SWToR because they obviously didn't get that one (although trying)

From my postings on the old forums sorry about the differnt font sizes cannot figure out the family font size etc. I have taken them from various posts which is why they seem random

Some questions that will hopefully be answered on here

If I buy expansions in the future will I recieve the same pre order benefits (if any) as USA subscriptions

You say post on PSB7 forums with our concerns, could you please post a direct link to the correct forum? I googled and got a Ghost hunters site

It has been stated that there will be a PSB7 panel at SOE live, for us Europeans that cannot make it there will there
A) be some where where we can post questions for that panel and for us to recieve replies from those PSB7 reps ?
B) A broadcast/posting/transcript some form of what was said at that panel on the forums?

Regarding any In game promotions, at the moment SOE is running Big bags on Marketplace will Europeans be entitled to any in game deals SOE do in the future?

If not from SOE what will SOE do to ensure that PSB7 run similar promotions. I ask this because if I am in *europe* and am excluded, or none are even run, from these sort of deals it could breed resentment.The same applies to Station Cash.

Talking of Station Cash any, If have left over from SOE will that be carried over to PSB7? and at what conversion rate?
Seven cash which is PSB take on SOE system however the post showed some conversion Euro to Sterling rates which are hard to understand how they got to them, who sets those rates ?
IF its PSB7 will SOE hold them to the same rate as Station Cash to sterling?

Will my Station cash be transferred to Seven cash if i carry on playing and if so at what rate ?
or will i lose all of it ?
Will items on SOE marketplace be on PSB7 marketplace AT the same price ?


If my freinds from USA visit and decide to play EQ will they see the same Marketplace items as I will and at similar cost?

Also will the see the same game as I do?

I read there may be a price increase in my subscription due to this takeover, how much of an increase will SOE allow to happen, I read it could be as much as £2:00 that is nearly a 25 % increase for us UK peeeps. Currency flucutations cannot be said to be a cause as my bank converts to US dollars and does not charge me much for that.

Are there checks to ensure that PSB7 will give the same customer service as SOE ? EG SOE takes 2 hours to respond to an in game petiton PSB7 takes 2 days to respond If these checks are constantly breached what will happen?

Who do we then turn to if these delays constantly happen?

What will happen if accounts and account detials get fraudently used, will SOE police this as they have in the past?

If accounts get lost in transition and time paid for is lost how wiill people be compensated and who will do it ?

Is there an update to Players Studio for europeans, would europeans get the same 40 % deal as the USA are currently getting ?

And the major one is security of my detials will they be safe?
All my detials including Credit cards debit cards etc will they be safe?
do PSB7 in fact comply with UK law?
What happens if they dont comply to UK law?
What happens if my bank refuses to pay PSB7 any money ?
Would I lose my account ? Would I on this period lose any loyalty points or veteran rewards?
Who would I speak to about losing my account or the fact that my bank will not pay PSB7 ?
Who do i speak to if my account goes wrong, it should not be some volunteer working for nothing, as it appears to be on another post, but a trained member of staff who is working for the company, that can then be held responsible for the actions of their staff.
IF it goes ahead can I pay by some other means EG paypal ?
I thought the one account per email was to be looked at but now appears that you cannot do this ? What changed and when was it announced ?

The Subscription rate appears to be going up because of conversation rates from Euro to Sterling ? Never had to pay extra with US dollar to Sterling

Who do I pay for expansions ?

Player Studio is only for US at the moment when will it come to the rest of the world ?

People are to be paid by cheque how will this work in Europe?

Thanks

"Following the successful launch of DC Universe™ Online on the servers of ProSiebenSat.1 Games, the games publisher from Unterföhring has secured four more exclusive licenses fr"
as you can see from soes announcment it seems that these games all end up on ps7s own servers which means eq for europeans will not be on us servers but on european servers.....we just lost our buddies i think.

I hope with PSS1 it would be better, so many Annoucements from Soe excluded already europe ppl...

They need to get themselves sorted quickly one way or the other. We need game cards from one of them back in the shops.

Could we get some infos on the subcontracting from PSS1 to MyTF1 in France? It seems it will be MyTF1 'not even a gaming company) that will publish the SoE games in France.

Smedley tweeted this today about Prosieben:

Sounds like it basically means if you have a SOE account now you can stay with SOE unless you want to swap it over, but any accounts past whenever it moves over are ProSieben instead of SOE.

So, if you want more accounts down the line make them now

Hey Folks,

As many of you may have seen this morning on John Smedley's Twitter, we have been working together with ProSiebenSat.1 Games to come up with solutions to some issues that have been brought up by our customers since the announcement of our publishing agreement with ProSiebenSat.1 Games in the EU Region. Together we have worked out a deal where existing customers will be able to choose whether they remain with Sony Online Entertainment or transfer to ProSiebenSat.1 Games.

Here are the tweets from Smed:

"I wanted to thank our players for continuing feedback. We've been listening along with our European partners at Prosieben. We've found a way to let existing players of our current games that are migrating over to Prosieben (EQ, EQ II, Planetside 2) keep their SOE accounts and stay with SOE. Down the road we may offer an option to move over to Prosieben. Just to be clear after these games launch on Prosieben's service new accounts will be created on their sites. However all US and EU players can still play together no matter which service they are on.

I want to be clear that Prosieben will have better European CS and payment options IMO. That's why we went with them in the first place. Also Prosieben has done a great job of listening and is working on changing some of their CS policies. More to come on that soon. Just going back and forth with our partners at Prosieben. I can confirm that we WILL offer the ability to migrate to Prosieben. No word on timeframe just yet, but shouldn't take too long."

Both SOE and ProSiebenSat.1 Games remain comitted to making this transition as easy and beneficial as possible for players; more news will come in coming weeks, especially after we return from SOE Live.

Thank you for your patience,

As far as I am concerned this is good news indeed, and it goes to show that they have been listening to the feedback from the current euro community, with many (me included) wishing to stay with SOE. This seems to be a decent compromise to me.

I am pretty sure the European player base will be most happy to hear this news!

Excellent news - looks like it's time to reactivate the accounts again

Thank you very very much! That is so good news )

Reading this properly, and not blinding myself to hatred over it, I wish to know, should I chose to move to Pro sieben, and later decide that it isn't beneficial, would I be able to transfer my account back to SoE ?

I'm raising a glass to common sense tonight.

This makes me extremely happy.

Party time!
Missed giving you a poke in the lobby when I run through....we were just talking about you last night.