EverQuest Next: Cancelled..
stargrace 
The announcement didn’t come as a surprise, but that didn’t mean we weren’t still sad to hear it. Daybreak finally told us what we all had in the back of our minds, that EverQuest Next was not going to be a thing:
To Our Daybreak Community,
I’m writing today to let you know that, after much review and consideration, Daybreak is discontinuing development of EverQuest Next.
For the past 20 years EverQuest has been a labor of love. What started as a deep passion of ours, as game creators, grew into a much larger passion shared by you, millions of players and Daybreakers alike. Watching EverQuest’s ability to entertain and bring people together has inspired and humbled us. It’s shaped our culture and has emboldened us to take aggressive risks with our game ideas and products. When we decided to create the next chapter in the EverQuest journey, we didn’t aim low. We set out to make something revolutionary.
For those familiar with the internals of game development, you know that cancellations are a reality we must face from time to time. Inherent to the creative process are dreaming big, pushing hard and being brutally honest with where you land. In the case of EverQuest Next, we accomplished incredible feats that astonished industry insiders. Unfortunately, as we put together the pieces, we found that it wasn’t fun. We know you have high standards when it comes to Norrath and we do too. In final review, we had to face the fact that EverQuest Nextwould not meet the expectations we – and all of you – have for the worlds of Norrath.
The future of the EverQuest franchise as a whole is important to us here at Daybreak.EverQuest in all its forms is near and dear to our hearts. EverQuest and EverQuest II are going strong. Rest assured that our passion to grow the world of EverQuest remains undiminished.
Yours truly,
Russell Shanks
President, Daybreak Games
I’ve been a huge fan of the EverQuest franchise for years now. EQ1 was my first MMO. EQ2 quickly followed, and I ‘met’ some folks who would become my absolute best friends. I played steadily for many years before finally throwing in the towel, but that didn’t come easily for me. There are still days when I find myself missing both EQ and EQ2 and so I wander around remembering “the way things were”. Of course everyone is quick to remind us that you can never go back, and that times have changed and games have changed with those times (as have we, the gamers), but I still wander the old dungeons, reminiscing.
What comes next? Well, Landmark is apparently launching this spring, though what the final version will look like I have no idea. It feels like the end of an era but lets be honest here that era faded long before this announcement came out.
Over all I’m just saddened by the announcement. What more can we do except play the games we love, for as long as we are able to love them, and take our precious memories with us when we leave.
