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Player Disquiet Leads To EverQuest Expansion Delay
EvilBastard writes "Sony Online Entertainment have announced that, due to an almost universal player backlash against the next expansion pack that is seen more as a $30.00 patch for missing content, they are delaying the new EverQuest expansion by 6 weeks, and will 'spend time fixing the problems you have brought to our attention'. Also announced is a plan to fly some of the more vocal website people to SOE headquarters, to try to restart enthusiasm for what may be the last EverQuest expansion ever. With the cancellation of Everquest for Mac, some high-profile guilds quitting, 6 months of allegedly declining numbers, big - budget competition and now a widespread call to boycott future games, is the much-predicted end of EverQuest almost here?"
I for one dumped EQ over this exact problem. Why charge your loyal customers another $30 for something that should have been in the last bloody expansion!
There are lies, damned lies, and statistics.
Can someone tell the rest of us what the content referred to here is:
due to an almost universal player backlash against the next expansion pack that is seen more as a $30.00 patch for missing content
I thought one of the things with these MMORPGs is that first and foremost they're 'massive'. Did they break some content and are charging to put it back in? Are the people complaining about it just after something for free? Or are Sony just milking it for all it's worth?
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Some day, when MMORPGs have matured a little more, I might get back into them. So far, I have seen very few that aren't essentially EverQuest clones. Ultima Online used to be good...
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The bizarre thing is that the mechanics of just about every MMORPG are identical to the mechanics of MUDs, only the interface is significantly altered.
Now, with most MUDs, especially free muds, the client is free but you can use a commercial one (telnet, tf, zmud). With MMORPGs, you have to pay for the client, and it's the same price as most modern PC retail box games.
MUD: $0
PC Game: ~$50US
MMORPG: ~$50US
With most MUDs, and most modern PC games, online multiplayer is free. You need to pay a monthly fee for MMORPGs. Valve also wants you to pay a monthly fee to play CounterStrike (they call it Steam, but if it looks like a porkbarrel and it quacks like a porkbarrel...)
MUD: $0
PC Game: ~$50
MMORPG: ~$50 + ~$10/month
Now we come to expansions, which is what this is all really about. Expansions for MUDs just happen overnight, and they're more or less free. PC Game expansions are rarely free but usually inexpensive. MMORPGs use the same price structure. There will probably be more than one expansion on a successful game.
MUD: $0
PC Game: $50 + $30 + $30 = $110
MMORPG: $50 + $30 + $30 + $10/month = $110 + $10/month
Okay so basically MMORPG's cost a lot of money. Do they provide a better interface than a standard PC game? Debatable but lets' say it's about the same. So we can more or less suggest that in terms of measurable quality metrics (graphics, sound, polygons, etc) a MMORPG is identical to a PC game.
In terms of gameplay, you essentially need to be a mudder to appreciate a MMORPG (bear with me) because the nature of MMORPG gameplay is identical to that of a MUD. You farm items, you kill rats and level up and gain XP and gain gold and gain items. The gameplay is identical. MMORPG's are more successful than MUDs have been because the interface has broader appeal. This is nothing new! Gaming in general is in a golden age because the level of quality in the graphical interfaces has progressed to the point where games appeal to a vast and wide audience, previously locked into TV only.
So in essence, a MMORPG is a graphical interface on a MUD, and it's an interface that people are willing to pay more than the cost of a similarly interfaced PC game for the privelege of play. Combining in essence MUD and PC game.
Will EverQuest die?
MUDs have been known to live for over a decade. Theoretically then, EverQuest has the potential to live for over a decade. However, the eyecandy factor that attracts more players to EverQuest than muds have attracted also works against EverQuest. More and more MMORPGs are entering the market. They have nicer, cleaner graphics, because like a PC game, a new MMORPG will have better graphics than an older MMORPG. Let's assume that all MMORPG's cost around the same - so there is no price factor in demand. Let's assume that there is a fixed number of people playing MMORPG's, this figure will not grow dramatically over the coming years any more than the overall gaming market will. The determination then is whether the value of the time invested in EverQuest outweighs the personal pleasure obtained in playing a newer, better interfaced MMORPG.
I am government man, come from the government. The government has sent me. -- G.I.R.
After creating a worthless design in star wars galaxies, he got promoted to overall creative designer to EQ,SWG,EQ2 and others. Look what we get from him.
If you think this expansion pack is good wait until we get EQ2.
In comparison, modern MMORPGs have succeeded in one thing if nothing else. Making it possible for the casual gamer to jump into a game with a set standard of rules that they can learn on the fly. Wanna go drown yourself? Theres water over there, oh wait for some reason you can't enter it. I guess you can't do that. Wanna go blow up that town with your fireball spell? Its not targetable, so I guess you can't do that. Wanna go try and kill that dragon that owned a group of 20 people 50 levels higher than you? Sure, but you just got your ass smeared across the ground. I guess you're not experienced enough.
Guess which of the two types of games will appeal to the casual gamer first? Yes MUDs are free, expansions are free, and support is unbeatable (I've seenen MUDs where the programmer is the GM, hard to top that). But the casual gamer (who has money) would rather spend a few dollars on a game he doesn't have to read a 20 page manual just to get started and then spend weeks learning the tricks of trade in the game.
Everquest is finishing? Man, i have a friend who's gonna be bummed.
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The customer is always right. And right now they are tired of mmorpg's in general.
:).
I personally loved everquest, however I logged out for the last time a year and a half ago, played daoc for a year intermittently, and now don't play any mmorpg's.
I honestly think everyone in EQ is going through the same boredom/withdrawal that I did. MMORPG's as they stand are dying. It won't be until we have a paradigm shift in their design that they are reborn. This may take an even greater technological leap though.
Star wars galaxies had the best chance to implement a new paradigm, but instead chose to create a similar game, with less content. (randomly generated fields of monsters doesn't count). Nobody wants to be a slimeworm killing grunt in the star wars universe. For me SWG was great for about 10 minutes of looking around and going wow, I'm in the star wars universe, and I'm a slug.
Perhaps world of warcraft or guildwars can reinvigorate burned out mmorpg'ers, but lets face it, mmorpg's had a good run, comparable to the run of RTS games, and it's time for something new.
Personally, I've taken up golf again.. no not virtual golf, real golf. The sun is a lot warmer than I remember, and I'm a lot weaker and fatter after a few years glued to mmorpg's. I highly recommend getting up and doing something fun outside again
By that logic, an MMORPG is glorified IRC with graphics?
That's a serious question.
That would be too unreal to believe if I hadn't just seen it with my own eyes.
Thanks for sharing. Sheesh, and I thought the Hampster Dance was weird.
It has been around for a few years, although IIRC earlier versions simply assigned an avatar with each IRC user, so there was no real comic as seen in the current screenshot, but simply comic characters talking to each other.
;)
Needless to say the client flooded the channels with heaps of protocol text, which was useless for a "normal" irc client. Comic users weren't very welcome in most channels
I can't say I've seen any users using comic-chat lately, MS probably pulled the client back for further development. Still, the idea by itself is intriguing, I have to admit *g*
My cats ate my karma. They also wrote this comment.
I know many people here are not into everquest, and this article doesn't touch on it, but exactly what is this "$30.00 patch for missing content" providing? Most of us are not everquest players, so it would really help if someone here who is, would mind explaining this, it would be very helpful.
It was only a matter of time before Phantasy Star Online put them out of business :)
is the much-predicted end of EverQuest almost here?
god i hope so
I have never played an MMORPG, but here is an outsider's view of what seems to be happening. When Everquest came out, it was really the only DOMINANT MMORPG. Yes there were a few others, but Everquest was really the only one that people played. There was a long time that things remained status quo with only one real option if you wanted this type of gaming experience, even if there were certain parts of the game that you really didn't like. It was almost a monopoly on the MMORPG scene.
Now, the market seems to be flooded with high profile MMORPGS like Matrix Online, World of Warcraft and Star Wars:Galaxies (yes, I know I probably missed a few, but you get the point). Of course the number of Everquest subscribers is going to drop; people now how a legitimate choice. Will it die? I don't think so. There are far too many people who have made it their lives. It's user base will probably migrate to Everquest2 and it will most likely maintain a strong userbase among the other options.
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Look at UO. It crashed and burned as well with expansions. They all hit a spot where the mistakes are going to outweigh the desire to stay and then you're going to shed the less dedicated players. There will always be tens of thousands of players, probably a couple hundred thousand players, that will cling to Everquest until the day they close the doors out of sheer stupidity. Stupidity on the part of Sony because they can charge these people for ever and ever because they have established relationships in the game that they'd rather not risk messing up for the sake of some other MMORPG that just has the same shit.
There are MMORPGs like UO and older that still have hundreds of thousands of players and don't look to be faltering any time soon. That's just how it is. Call them names, do what you want, but THEY aren't going anywhere.
Take a step back now and look at yourselves. Everquest is dead. Everquest is dying. Isn't that an old enough cliche that even the most cynical retards would know better than to repeat?
Everquest is going to be around forever.
Literally.
the much-predicted end of EverQuest
This means that the guys next to my cubicle is starting to do actual work now???
I don't think the pricing scheme for MMORPGs is that out of line. $10-$15 a month isn't bad, since they're maintaining the servers to make sure the game runs all the time. Also, a good MMORPG will release free content for download, like EQ used to do (Paineel, the Warrens, etc). $30 for an expansion isn't bad either, assuming the expansion is worth it. The Kunark expansion had an entirely new continant, with a new playable race, new items and weapons, and zones and content for every level. $50 for a game that you have to pay monthly for is a little mean, but for a game that you could spend years on, it's not too bad. With other video games, you're lucky if you're still playing them at the end of the month, and they cost the same.
The real problem is that the expansions aren't doing enough to satify the players. I'm sure people who still play can explain better than me why the new ones suck, but it seems that the new ones are small, buggy, and only for high level players. They also seem to be released every six months, which seems a little extreme to me, and adds to the impression that SOE only cares about money, and not the game.
I really wish the makers of EQ cared as much as the players do. I used to love it. But it stopped being fun, and from what I can tell, it's gotten even worse since I left.
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I've played quite a few MMOG's over the years. Beta tested for a few. Ran an emulator for awhile. I don't think this is the death knell of EverQuest. Look at UO, which is even more dated then EQ, which is still running along its merry way. What we are going to see is a trend towards second generation MMOG's become more popular. This is really a natural progression. The fundamental question of what happens to old MMOG's that have run a long time and no longer become viable hasn't really been answered yet. It will be interesting to see how it is. In the meantime, I think we will see consolidation of servers across various MMOG's as the user base becomes smaller. Though I think this will only apply to the MMOG's that have a long and successful history. Slowly, by the time 3rd or 4th generation MMOG's come around, I think those too will fade quietly or maybe with a loud bang as the creators let the world go out in a huge fight. I don't know that we can really count SWG as a true second generation MMOG. I played it, it was like EQ in the future with Jedi. You waste huge amounts of time performing tedious tasks. FFXI I never played. I can't speak on it. City of Heroes - I have played it, its very good and you don't waste huge amounts of time doing tedious tasks. It appeals to casual gamers with the sidekicking option. This one has potential to last awhile. WoW will prove to be huge for too many reasons to list. We're at the transitional stage right now, between the passing of the old and the coming of the new. Which really makes it a great time to invest in some of your non-graming related hobbies while you watch to see what tumbles where :)
The evidence includes having the second-highest subscribership in the aforelinked subscriber study, where the highest subscribership is padded by Japanese subscribers who were never marketed to buy EQ in the first place.
Yes, a lot of people were disappointed with the Gates of Discord expansion, and were infuriated at being asked to pay another $30 this summer to continue the grind. But considering how many MMOGs are out there, EQ is staying surprisingly resilient. The true test will of course be when genre-competitive next-generation MMOGs such as WoW and EQ2 come out, but for the moment, SOE doesn't have anything to worry about with EQ.
I have played a few of the more prominent MMORPG including Ultima Online, Everquest, SWG and Dark Age of Camelot(DAOC). I have always gone back to DAOC. The problem I had with say SWG is that it was not fun for me. I enjoy the interactions with people and the RvR the most. SWG just did not give me that. I felt like I was just soloing all the time. Mythic(creator of DAOC) constantly gives free updates that are like mini expansions. They put in housing as a free expansion, they put in new areas as a free expansion and currently they are redoing all the RvR(PvP) areas and making boats to fight on and new keeps and weapons. They also put out normal expansions that one has to pay for. The point is the combination of both keeps giving players new things to work on and do. It also makes the players feel like their $12 a month is well spent since they get the changes and additions they want. I know my roommates are in the same boat as me. DAOC gives RvR which is why we love it and keep coming back to it. If you have not tried out DAOC it is worth the shot. Many people enojy it more then the other MMORPGS including FF. thats my 2 cents.
Hmm, completely off topic, but it's funny how 3/4 of the time when I run into pages on mud stuff, KaVir shows up somewhere in it. I just find that mildly amusing... too bad I bore of muds too quickly to make anything like Godwars. :P
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Play 24 hours of Wold of Warcraft and it will be easy to quit 6 years of everquest. The game is so great with so many quest. supervillain level 39 warrior
Ineffective. The people that run websites are are typically high-end raiding players. The majority of the game and gamers will be represented accidentally at best by that crowd.
--- Mercutio was right.
I have been on an EQ hiatus for some time now. Every time I come back to play, it's lasts for a day or two and I'm back to my hiatus. I was shocked when I patched and logged in last week only to find another new expansion on the way.
My thoughts were that overall SOE was on the right track up until the PoP expansion. Shadows of Luclin offered new some new updated graphics (enough to hold over until the launch of EQ2) and new content for all levels, albeit primarily for higher levels. Since then, new expansions are beginning to rival the dreaded patches that were always full of new crap but always caused more problems than they fixed. The SOE focus has become "Let's see how big we can make the EQ world" instead of "Let's see how we can improve the current gaming experience and keep our customers". Remember bigger isn't always better. Instead of expanding the current world, why not try and do some upgrades to the existing content? Oh wait, wasn't that promised once before? I think they called it Lost Dungeons of Norrath. I half anticipated seeing some upgrades done to places like Crushbone and Befallen. When was the last time SOE actually looked at zone utilization? I can pretty much guarantee if you wanted to take you level sixty whatever to West Karana you'll find a whole heck of a lotta crap that isn't worth a toss. Boring? You bet!!
I have never been one to jump on the leveling band wagon. For me, I have always enjoyed the ability to solo and do my own questing. You know it's pretty bad when I had to start a 2nd account to follow around and do nothing but heal myself. Where is the fun in that? I definitely don't call that soloing.
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You put it there; now leave it the hell alone!! You know I rather enjoyed using the Delightful Orb of Forgotten Magic until it was turned into a glowing piece of crap. It wasn't an uber weapon it but as far as I am concerned it was an excellent choice for lower level non melee types. It actually gave my cleric a sense of satisfaction when it proc'd during a fight. Hell and wizzie can nuke for thousands, let me have my measly weapon proc. Now, it has no value to anyone. I can see if it was a bug or a design flaw, but if it was originally intended to be that way, LEAVE IT ALONE!!
Being a former volunteer for the EQ Guide program (twice), I have had the opportunity to participate in a different aspect of the game. I can tell you the first time was an enjoyable experience, but this last time really drove me to the breaking point. Why would anyone in their right mind volunteer 6-10 hours a week to play messenger for SOE? The majority of the time is spent responding to "I know you can't do anything but can you ask the GM..." not to mention the constant ridicule of "Oh your just a Guide, you don't know anything". HAH! Free play! Trust me, it's not worth it. Sony get your head out and hire a real helpdesk.
I know my 2 cents will probably get buried somewhere in a forum but I hope enough of us are under the same opinion Sony will have to take notice and actually take measures to correct the problems of what was once commonly referred to as EverCrack but in my mind is steadily becoming EverCrap. Hail and Farewell!