The Tattered Notebook What I Want To See In EverQuest Subsequent

I was going to update you effective folk on my adventures in rolling my 17,000th EverQuest II alt for this week's Tattered Notebook, however SOE decided to drop a Fan Faire Live date on us, which sort of mucked up my nefarious plans.

Why will we care about SOE Stay? Effectively, there are a number of reasons, but the most important one is that as a substitute of getting to attend till October, we now get to see (and touch!) EverQuest Next in early August!

This information threw me for a little bit of a loop, I don't thoughts telling you. I imply, I knew that SOE's John Smedley flat-out guaranteed a playable EQNext demo at SOE Live 2013. And i knew that it is in reality 2013 already, so arms-on time with what is likely to be the next nice sandbox will occur inside of a calendar 12 months. It still seemed really far off for some cause, although, I guess because it was just three months ago that we had been ending up SOE Stay 2012. August 1st is going to be here before we realize it, so it's excessive time we begin prognosticating about EQNext, wouldn't you agree?

Hopefully it goes without saying that I'd like to see these things in addition to the standard excessive-quality PvE questing, dungeon, raid, and progression content material.

Heritage quests

Despite the fact that I played the original EverQuest for only about a month, I really like love love EverQuest II's heritage strains. In a franchise that already units the standard for MMO lore, it was a genius concept to tie the two games collectively and throw EQ vets a nostalgia-drenched bone by offering up extended epic quests with EQ-centric item rewards.

Extra like that in EQNext, please.

Housing

You recognize SOE goes to place housing in EQNext, as the company does the function better than any other MMO developer (sorry Trion -- great effort, though). The query is how can it ever be as good as EQII's implementation. Realistically I do not assume it could actually, at the very least not at release. It is literally a sport-within-the-recreation that has more in frequent with Minecraft than typical MMO afterthought design, so if it takes SOE a while to suit it into EQNext's framework, I'm Ok with that. Whereas we're dreaming, I'd also be more than Ok with SOE discovering a way to do EQII's housing in an open-world atmosphere.

And sure, I know, Mr. Hardcore Gamer, housing and non-combat choices are for Barbie lovers and casuals and no one uses them. Except for the tens of hundreds of thousands of players who have made the Sims franchise the most popular within the historical past of the private computer.

A crafter-pushed economy

This goes to be troublesome for SOE to pull off, notably given the loot-drop legacy of themeparks like EQ and EQII. My definition of sandbox is built on an precise player financial system, though, and one in all my frustrations with EQII is the huge, intricate, and fun crafting system that is sort of completely wasted on a sport the place most of the gear is mob-dropped and bind-on-equip.

I do not envy the designers here as a result of along with the balancing challenges inherent in making and maintaining a sandbox economic system, they've also obtained to deal with the psyche of the new-school MMO participant who doesn't want to be bothered with crafters and who needs to distant public sale his gear with a minimal of effort and participant interaction. At the identical time, the agency has minced no words about the truth that EQNext is a participant-pushed sandbox, so the way it navigates this potential minefield will be fascinating to watch.

Good guild instruments

Copy EQII's guild tools. Anything less makes Jef cry. The tip.

Issues I don't wish to see

Before I knock off for the day, let me spend a couple of paragraphs on issues I don't need to see. Firstly, in-sport VOIP. Look, I realize it makes for an excellent again-of-the-box (do we still have recreation boxes?) bullet point, however the truth is that it is a waste of growth assets even if it is shoe-horned in there by a 3rd celebration.

I imply, really, what guild with a clue would not use Ventrilo, TeamSpeak, or Mumble lately? These are all free apps -- except you're the guild leader paying for the server, and even then it's normally a lot cheaper than a standard MMO sub -- and they dwarf the performance present in current in-game solutions. In-recreation VOIP goes to be laggy, it'll sound like crap, and the only individuals who may use it for greater than 5 minutes are the poor saps in pickup dungeon teams.

Secondly, let's not have any of that dev-generated private story foolishness or the related voice-appearing. This is a massively multiplayer sandbox, after all, and that i can think of at the least two current AAA titles that have carried out more than enough to justify tossing these ideas onto the proverbial pile of MMO fail. I'm probably preaching to the choir right here, as Smedley has given multiple interviews over the previous few months that illustrate the corporate's "the gamers are the content material" motto. However, nonetheless. MMORPG. Sandbox. Please don't with the single-player savior-of-the-cosmos nonsense. Thank you.

What's in a reputation?

Whew. This isn't an exhaustive list of course, and I am fairly curious to see what a few of you want to see in EQNext. Relaxation assured that we'll be revisiting this topic typically as SOE ramps as much as its August reveal and beyond.

And with that, let's bring this week's challenge of The Tattered Notebook to a detailed. MINECRAFT KITPVP SERVERS Oh, that reminds me! With EQNext in our near future, MJ and that i are seemingly going to rename the column at some point, each as a strategy to freshen issues up and to higher seize the spirit of the franchise going forward. And we would love your assist! Feel free to publish your recommendations in the comments or contact us immediately by way of [email protected] or [email protected].

EverQuest II is so big that it takes two authors to make sense of it all! Be part of Jef Reahard and MJ Guthrie as they discover Norrathian nooks and crannies from the Overrealm to Timorous Deep. Running every Saturday, The Tattered Notebook is your useful resource for all issues EQII and EQNext -- and catch MJ each 'EverQuest Two-sday' on Massively Tv!