EQ2

Destiny of Velious Postponed & Pre-Orders Announced #EQ2

stargrace January 14, 2011 7 Comments

Players will be able to pre-order the next EQ2 expansion starting on January 18th according to the EQ2players web site. On that same note, if you were looking forward to diving into the expansion at the previous release date of February 8th, you’ll have a little bit more of a wait. It’s been said that the expansion will now be releasing the 22nd of February.

As you know, we’ve been working hard on the “Destiny of Velious” expansion pack. It was originally scheduled for release on Feb 8th, but after getting feedback from players, spending time playing the game internally, and discussing ways to make things better, we’ve decided to move the release date back to Feb 22nd instead.

Feb 22nd gives us another couple of weeks for polish, tuning, and a honing of the fun factor for the expansion. We think the wait will be well worthwhile.

Check EverQuest2.com for the announcement on pre-order dates! And also stay tuned for an announcement about a raft of cool events coming out in the week after DoV becomes available!

On a side note, we’ll be adding another batch of players into the Closed Beta on Jan 24th, so if you put in an application and haven’t been accepted yet, don’t give up yet. Your time may be coming! – SmokeJumper announced on the EQ2 forums.

Fine tuning is always a good thing and I have no doubt that the developers and community involved are all working incredibly hard to get this expansion out the door. Thoughts? Please feel free to post them in comments below!

Things Sony Could have done Different #EQ2

stargrace January 9, 2011 6 Comments

I know, by now you’re thinking to yourselves “Stargrace! Stop beating a dead horse!” but it’s not so easy to simply stop writing about something I’m incredibly passionate about. Plus a lot of my friends are still playing the game, so I hear about this subject all of the time. I wanted to name a few things that Sony could have done different to avoid the feedback from the public that they are now receiving.

In regards to the TrueFreeblood race: In order to avoid a huge amount of screaming from the public (but note, this would not eliminate all screaming; because then we wouldn’t be human) all Sony had to do was offer the race for free to everyone without conditions. Release it as a Velious race or a perk before Velious if you want (so the company at least sells a few extra boxes) but allow every player to create one without cost. Now, add all of your vampire goodies to the station market. Sure you won’t make as much money as offering the entire race for $20 early to the masses, but you’ll save yourself a lot of fallout. After all, one of the finer things that must be done is finding a balance between making money and selling things on the marketplace, and keeping players (old and new) happy. As my previous arguments pointed out I do not mind the market, but I feel that a RACE is supposed to come with the very basic $14.99/m that I pay (or an expansion). Froglok. Sarnak. Arasai. Fae. Make us pay for every little cultural extra (animations, appearance weapons, homes, mounts special to the race) but the basics should be included.

In regards to the Lucan D’Lere merger. I thought of, and discussed with Arkenor, a few possibilities for this and none of them will make sony any money which is probably the problem. Lets assume that people from LDL are upset with the news of their merger, because I know at least a few are (Arkenor, Ysharros, G33kg0dd3ss I’m looking at you three in specific). I know a good number are happy to be moving to a higher population server but I’m going to play the side of the role player in this scenario. Number one, Sony said that they could not move LDL players to AB because the population on AB is already far too high. Why not allow those who want to leave AB do so, for free. Lots of people pick a server based on its population. Due to the recent merges, I’d expect those populations to be much higher now then they were before. I also imagine there are a lot of non role play players who would not mind moving to another server. On that same note, why not allow those role players of AB who are tired of the crowds, to move to LDL for free. AND why not open up moving to LDL in general for free. The part that irks me is that although Sony has stated AB is overflowing with players – you can still pay $25 and move there. If the folks from LDL merging are adamant about staying on an RP server (and lets assume that a handful will be) they will be more than happy to pay $25 to move to another RP server instead of losing their ‘culture’ (for lack of a better term). Win-win for Sony.

In regards to the Velious Beta forums fiasco. For those who were unaware, the Velious beta forums were moved from the EQ2players web site, to the EQ2X players web site. Why? Because EQ2X players are unable to view the EQ2 forums without a regular EQ2 subscription. Now this entire time we’ve been hearing that “EQ2X will be completely separate, you won’t even know it’s there!” – except for those people in the Velious beta, because you’ll have to log into your beta forums from the EQ2X forums. Also when you actually play the Velious beta (note – I am NOT in the beta, this is through observation of others playing) it announces on Raptr that you’re playing – you guessed it – EQ2X. I realize this is because it’s using the same servers and what not, but still. For the life of me I can not figure out why EQ2X players need an entire forum to themselves. Why don’t they just have a sub topic in the EQ2 forums like the Bazaar and Vox servers do. Aside from stuff being on sale is there that much different in the basic game play? The mechanics (as far as I’m aware) all work the same for both games except one is Pay to Play and one runs on a subscription. I think Sony created extra work for themselves in fabricating these entirely new forums, and it should not have been done in the first place.

I realize it’s easy for me to say all of this stuff since I am a 3rd party, removed from any of the actual facts and decision making. I know the people at Sony work really hard and I have nothing but admiration for the Developers and the folks in Community Management because I know that a lot of these choices are out of their hands – but – someone really needs to wake up. Time and time again these past few weeks I have seen veteran players state that they no longer know the games they once loved. That things have changed, the company has changed. New direction is good; but not at the cost of your loyal veteran players.

Guest Post and Musings #EQ2 #MMORPG

stargrace January 8, 2011 5 Comments

I was asked if I was interested in doing a guest post over at mmorpg-info.org regarding my decision to leave EQ2. It’s  not often I get asked to do these and I was flattered (plus I’ve been a long fan of the site) so of course I said yes. You can find the article over here: Guest Post. Hopefully with that this unpleasantness of giving up a game is behind me and I will move on to writing about other adventures.

A few notes. Since I’ve posted my goodbye things have changed even more. There is the server merge between Lucan D’Lere and Crushbone, which for those who do not know is the merge of an RP server into a non-RP server. We already saw this when Vanguard merged, and while it doesn’t affect me I do know how disheartening it is for those role players out there. I also think that this choice is better than no choice, or the choice of letting a server completely die.

Then there was the fact that all of the Velious beta forums were moved to the EQ2X forums which means those people who wanted to completely ignore EQ2X would also have to ignore those beta forums and never log in. With this move came a leak of everything that was on those forums, as they were set to public. Not only that but the old forums which resided on the EQ2 (regular) section were actually completely deleted, not transferred over. Players were requested to start their beta posts from scratch, no archives.

My question to that would be – why are there completely separate forums. EQ2X members are not allowed to view the ‘regular’ forums at all. They don’t have access. Players with a paid EQ2 subscription have access to both. This entire us verses them that I feel goes on between EQ2 and EQ2X (enforced by Sony, not the players) is just odd.

In any case, there you have it. Now, lets get back to playing games!

Safe travels.

What Would It Take #EQ2

stargrace December 29, 2010 18 Comments

A good question was asked to me yesterday in the comments of my ‘Goodbye EQ2’ post.

“Could you try to find it in your heart to figure out what it would require to get you BACK into EQ2? The reason for me asking is that I got that question from my wife, who still plays. I quit… months ago.”

What would it take for me to start playing again? Well. Some definite changes would have to take place. I’m not saying that all of these would have to happen, but enough so that my opinion of the game and those making the decisions changed.

1. Large and In Charge – I want to know beyond a doubt that the people working on the game and making the decisions actually care about whether or not the game is going to succeed or fail. That they are openly communicating with their player base, and taking players consideration into account. I want to know exactly how they are getting the idea that “most of” the player base wants or does not want a particular thing. I want to see constant progress and a real attempt at improvements. If those creating the game don’t care about it on a very personal level, why would anyone else.

2. Pricing – I don’t mind that EQ2 has a market but I’m not going to blow $25 on any one thing when I already pay a monthly fee and expansion fees. Entice players to spend more by offering lower prices. $55 to rename a guild? $65 for a Vampire Package? I understand that games may not be making what they should be profit wise, but high prices alienate your loyal consumers. If everything in the store was 1/3rd of the price it normally is on top of my subscription fee, I would be much happier.

3. Us vs. Them – The separation of the EQ2X servers and EQ2 servers has to go.

4. Not everything has to be a marketplace item – Almost every single announcement of anything going on in the last few months has revolved around the marketplace. The neatest looking gear, the coolest house items, they are all marketplace items. This point actually goes along with my first point. It doesn’t feel like anyone cares about the game any more they only care about creating things for the marketplace.

5. Learning from their mistakes – I want to see proof that when something goes wrong, or doesn’t work out the company LEARNS from this and improves upon it and makes it better. This one is a little harder to prove, I know. Lets take expansions for example. Lets look at world of warcraft (I know, bad example but it’s what I have to work with here). Personally I felt BC was a poor expansion. I didn’t enjoy the quests or the dungeons. Then came Wrath, which I loved even though there were things that could be improved upon. Then came Cataclysm which I loved even more. With each expansion I felt that Blizzard was actually learning from their mistakes of the previous expansion. I could see a clear line of “oh, this didn’t really work out too well, lets make it better”. I want that very badly for EQ2.

Those are my major issues. I don’t see any of them changing any time soon but I would LOVE to see it happen. I don’t hate EQ2. I don’t hate Sony. I feel sad and upset over where the game has gone direction wise but I don’t think that it’s anything more than the game just not being “for me” any more. I played it for 6 years and enjoyed it for countless hours. I have over 1,150 blog posts alone dedicated towards the game. I understand that times change, that games change, but there has got to be a balance of bringing in new money and players vs. losing all of your old ones. Veteran players are not supposed to be sacrificed for new changes.

Saying My Goodbyes to EQ2 #EQ2

stargrace December 22, 2010 42 Comments

I’ve played EverQuest II since release. I never intended on making the switch from EQ1 but after picking up the game on a whim I basically never looked back. I have been a strong supporter of the game, even when others shunned it’s numerous flaws. I stood by it when the station marketplace came out, despite the fact that the majority of my friends are against RMT. I made excuses for things like shoddy graphics that should play far better on great machines, lackluster expansions, and changes that no veteran player was a fan of.

Yesterday the game crossed that ‘imaginary line’ that we all have where we say to ourselves “Ok, enough is enough.”

Don’t get me wrong. I adore the people from the community that I’ve met over the years, but the changes that have taken place in the last year made the decision for me. I won’t be coming back. As a long time veteran player of the game I am absolutely disgusted by the changes that have taken place, and it is very obvious that the game is no longer for me. I’m sure all of the new people that are supposed to be enticed by this new market place will be thrilled, and more power to them. It’s simply not for me. What was it that pushed me over this virtual edge?

Today a vampire race goes live on the station marketplace. It’s $20 for the race for your account – or you have a chance to get ONE Freeblood character in February. Without all the fancy do-dads. Anyhow. It’s $20 for the race. It’s $5 for some animations. It’s $25 for a race-specific mount. It’s $15 for a vampire house. That’s right, for the entire “Vampire Package” it will cost you a whopping $65. This is on TOP of the 15/m you pay for a subscription and whatever extra yearly costs you have for things like character transfers, station cash items, and lets not forget the yearly $40 expansion. How many of us even have a free character slot to try out this new race. You can’t even preview the character design in the character selection screen before purchasing it to decide if this race is something you really want to put down more money for.

There are so many other games out there that do their market place the RIGHT way. When I subscribe to LotRO VIP ($15/m) I have no race or class restrictions. I can quest freely, and lets be honest here the majority of the awesome looking appearance gear is also available IN GAME in case I don’t feel like forking over extra cash. PLUS VIP earn 500 turbine points a month, and you can earn turbine points in game.

Wizard101 also has a market place. They have a subscription. I’m not restricted by wizard type or zone when I am paying a subscription. World of Warcraft – for all of the hating that people seem to do on the game is still one of the only games I know of that supports itself by a monthly subscription and DOES NOT have an item shop per say. Sure, they have a very small handful of companion pets that they sell, but nothing more than that. EVE Online may sell PLEX and they also have RMT but I can fly any ship that I want and again I’m not restricted when I’m subscribed to the actual game.

In case you haven’t been able to tell by now I am INCREDIBLY upset over the path that EQ2 has taken. I feel betrayed as a veteran player. Perhaps it’s silly, but again I’ve played this game for 6 years, and supported it and defended it time and time again. I have spent over $5,000 for two accounts over 6 years including character transfers, expansions, Legends of Norrath, and other items,

I just can’t do it any more.

So. Goodbye, EQ2. I really hope EQ1 and Vanguard do NOT go the same rout. I will play either of those games before I even consider returning to EQ2. Sorry for those dedicated readers who enjoyed my EQ2 posts – I’ll be writing about whatever games I happen to find myself in but they won’t be EQ2 related any more. I suppose it won’t be that hard for me as I really haven’t played EQ2 since before Sentinel’s Fate came out. I just wanted a little finality to it.