Next year marks the 10th anniversary of EverQuest, and while Sony is promising big surprises to commemorate the occasion, dedicated fans will get rewarded early with two new expansions over the next two months: EverQuest: Seeds of Destruction and EverQuest II: The Shadow Odyssey.
In Seeds of Destruction, players travel to a new hub world that, in the beginning, is an empty, shattered void. Something terrible has occurred in the space-time continuum, and it's up to players to figure out what. Adventurers get to experience the lore of EQ firsthand as their journey takes them through historically significant realms and battles of the EQ universe. The graphics won't blow you away, but if you're still playing EQ, graphics are probably not your primary gaming concern.
In celebration of EverQuest's 11th anniversary, Steam is offering a deal that includes the game and its 15 expansions along with the exclusive Shroud of Steam in-game item; a $20 value all for $2.50.
Given the age of EverQuest, why are we expected to pay the $15 monthly premium that modern MMO's require?
15 extensions...waw :D
a friend of mine played soooooo much of that game, saying me how hardcore and passionating it was.
He had something like 340 days of /played ... -_-
Jeff Hollis is back with another opinion piece looking at failed launches of MMOs. We've asked him to go into marketing, but he's not interested. This is a taster of his popular weekly feature:
"It's not like players aren't looking for something new. If anything, the initial launch figures of several games indicate that players are, in fact, sniffing around for a new MMO. For example, both Conan and Warhammer sold over a million copies of their game early on, only to have their subscription numbers dwindle later. It's rather widely believed that LOTRO, Warhammer, and EVE all boast similar subscription figures, at around 300,000. Of course, hard information on all this is very challenging to come by."
Hehe, there that international group that does sales figures should do subscription figures :)
WoW is an aberration, and analysing why it's done quite as well as it has, I think, comes down to the fact that it was a polished game that hit at just the right time and has kept pushing and pushing.
Very good point in the mid-game content, though. Online, there's a lot of people vocal about the endgame, but that tends to be the hardcore minority. The beginning content is obviously important as it's what pulls players in and keeps them there, but yes, the mid-game is hugely important. Weird how I can still think of areas in WoW that I hated so much I've never, ever done again, but that there were always others for me to do. I'd not really thought of the mid-game as being that important before.
Jeff Hollis is back, and this time he's looking at the reasons Sci-Fi MMOs fail.
"Hello there, my fellow avatar jockeys, and welcome to this week's futuristic edition of MMO Weekly. In this week's epic installment, we'll take a hard look at some of the more intriguing sci-fi MMOs of the past few years. We'll also examine why they failed, and why sci-fi MMOs generally fare quite poorly.
"Fare quite poorly" doesn't accurately describe the state of things though, does it? Perhaps a bit more accurate would be the phrase "die a horrid death." If you're a lover of sci-fi, and you find yourself endlessly hoping for a juicy sci-fi MMO to sink your teeth into, you know exactly what I mean. Sci-fi MMOs just don't do very well - and usually go under- especially compared to traditional fantasy MMOs."
Hellgate is one of my favourite games, really..
Well, it WOULD have been, if it had WORKED and not FLOPPED :(
Edit: Also, she is hot, and yes, that is an official pic.
She really is quite hot. I couldn't not slap her on, she can be slapped on anything as far as I'm concerned