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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?"
People are basically angry that SOE has promised them the world, but delivering a not-so-polished turd. They have released a neutered character class, tons of high-end content that casual players will never have a chance to see, and a new game engine that has severely broken collision in the game. The gameplay has become even more of a grind and massive time sink over the years and EverQuest is basically no longer that game that had such amazing appeal.
EQ2 aims to fix a lot of the design issues they had with EQ. The graphics engine in EQ2 is fucking incredible, and if the gameplay has quality half as good, it will be an awesome game.
By that logic, an MMORPG is glorified IRC with graphics?
;)
No no, that would be MS Comic-Chat!
My cats ate my karma. They also wrote this comment.
Medievia does have an interactive combat system, some nice er "text" graphics, and is more entertaining than any of the 6 MMORPG's I've played (City of Hero's, DAoC, EQ, Anarchy Online, SWG, WoW Beta). After Maxing out 2 accounts in DAoC, I still go back and play Medievia.
How to Speak Leet
Basically whatt the "$30.00 patch for missing content" means , is that they release a new expansion on a fairly regular basis (~6 months?) and charge $29.99 US for it.
Typically what you end up with, is an expansion full of bugs, both major and minor, and unfinished content at the high end.
The more "hardcore" players rush into the new content, and often find themselves struggling against bugs instead of content. Mobs disappearing, keys not working, etc...
Then there's the more general bugs... text wrong, quests not working, horribly unbalanced (or useless) abilities that get changed after release... they are often accused of baiting players with "Oooh... with this expansion Mages can do this!! Wow!" and then a couple weeks in there's a patch, and that ability is "fixed". (Note: I'm all for fixing unbalanced things, it just happens so often, that it proves to me that SoE doesn't really test it).
But, not to let you think that Sony only charges for this stuff, there was a "free" upgrade to the DirectX 9 engine... and that brought weeks and weeks of bugs, falling through floors, mobs going through walls, players getting stuck on tiny pebbles on the ground, display glitches, performance glitches, crashes, etc... and only now is it starting to get more stable... and it's still not as good as it was pre-dx9 with respect to collision detection.
Things that led to this:
Interestingly enough, during this time they've reduced prices on expansions and have several bargains on year long subscriptions. My theory is SOE is painfully aware of the MMORPG competition and is using a shotgun approach to hang onto the market. That would explain bringing the game up to speed to today's graphics and releasing expansions rapid fire, while at the same time dropping prices.
Hecubas
The high level game could be quite fun and you could be reasonably casual to play it, but it's more like a sporting event and less like a video game. You gather a bunch of people up in the same place at the same time, get all your gear, then go play for about 4-6 hours. Sorta like a giant golf outing: you all bring exotic equipment and wear funny clothes and swing at a lot of shit.
The high level game consists mostly of "raids" involving 18-72 (or more in some cases) people destroying a dungeon (at a high rate of speed) and tackling a "boss" mob who is typically horribly overpowered, unfair and drops very nice stuff should you kill it.
It actually can be fun, if you can put together 72 of your closest friends. With 72 strangers, I'd rather have my teeth removed through my anus with hot tweezers.
But, you, the consumer doesn't care about all that, and there's no reason you should. I'm just explaining how it got that way. If you really are interested in MMORPGs that have no upfront cost, but does have a monthly fee, there should be plenty of those out there. Once the initial costs get paid off, this is a strategy that the games can take. I know that Shadowbane (the only one I actually play) does that now--you can download the game and get a 15 day trial for free.
He decided to just watch the government, and kind of scale it down to size, and run his life that way. --Laurie Anderson