The Tattered Notebook What I Wish To See In EverQuest Subsequent

I used to be going to replace you fantastic 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 do we care about SOE Reside? Effectively, there are multiple causes, but a very powerful one is that as a substitute of getting to attend until October, we now get to see (and touch!) EverQuest Next in early August!

This news threw me for a little bit of a loop, I do not mind telling you. I imply, I knew that SOE's John Smedley flat-out guaranteed a playable EQNext demo at SOE Reside 2013. And i knew that it's in actual fact 2013 already, so palms-on time with what is perhaps the subsequent nice sandbox will happen inside of a calendar year. It nonetheless seemed actually far off for some reason, although, I assume because it was just three months ago that we have been ending up SOE Reside 2012. August 1st goes to be here earlier than we understand it, so it's high time we begin prognosticating about EQNext, would not you agree?

Hopefully it goes with out saying that I'd wish to see this stuff in addition to the usual high-high quality PvE questing, dungeon, raid, and development content material.

Heritage quests

Although I played the original EverQuest for under a few month, I love love love EverQuest II's heritage lines. In a franchise that already sets the usual for MMO lore, it was a genius idea to tie the 2 video games collectively and throw EQ vets a nostalgia-drenched bone by providing up prolonged epic quests with EQ-centric merchandise rewards.

More like that in EQNext, please.

Housing

You understand SOE goes to put housing in EQNext, as the corporate does the function better than any other MMO developer (sorry Trion -- great effort, although). The question is how can it ever be nearly as good as EQII's implementation. Realistically I don't assume it might probably, at the very least not at release. It is literally a recreation-inside-the-game that has more in frequent with Minecraft than typical MMO afterthought design, so if it takes SOE some time to fit it into EQNext's framework, I'm Ok with that. Whereas we're dreaming, I'd even be greater than Okay 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 options are for Barbie lovers and casuals and no one uses them. Apart from the tens of thousands and thousands of gamers who've made the Sims franchise the preferred in the history of the non-public pc.

A crafter-driven financial system

This is going to be tough for SOE to drag off, notably given the loot-drop legacy of themeparks like EQ and EQII. My definition of sandbox is constructed on an actual player economy, 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 game the place most of the gear is mob-dropped and bind-on-equip.

I do not envy the designers right here as a result of in addition to the balancing challenges inherent in making and sustaining a sandbox economy, they've also got to deal with the psyche of the new-college MMO player who does not want to be bothered with crafters and who needs to remote public sale his gear with a minimum of effort and participant interplay. At the identical time, the firm has minced no words about the truth that EQNext is a player-driven sandbox, so the way it navigates this potential minefield will be interesting to observe.

Good guild instruments

Copy EQII's guild tools. Something much less makes Jef cry. The end.

Things I don't want to see

Before I knock off for the day, let me spend a few paragraphs on issues I don't need to see. Firstly, in-recreation VOIP. Fake It Till You Make It Look, I realize it makes for a very good again-of-the-field (do we still have game bins?) bullet level, but the fact is that it's a waste of growth sources even if it is shoe-horned in there by a third occasion.

I mean, actually, what guild with a clue doesn't use Ventrilo, TeamSpeak, or Mumble as of late? These are all free apps -- unless you're the guild chief paying for the server, and even then it is normally much cheaper than a traditional MMO sub -- and so they dwarf the performance found in current in-sport options. In-recreation VOIP is going to be laggy, it'll sound like crap, and the one individuals who might use it for more than five minutes are the poor saps in pickup dungeon teams.

Secondly, let's not have any of that dev-generated private story foolishness or the associated voice-acting. This is a massively multiplayer sandbox, in spite of everything, and i can think of not less than two current AAA titles which have executed more than sufficient to justify tossing these concepts onto the proverbial pile of MMO fail. I'm probably preaching to the choir here, as Smedley has given a number of interviews over the previous few months that illustrate the corporate's "the gamers are the content" motto. However, nonetheless. MMORPG. Sandbox. Please do not with the only-player savior-of-the-cosmos nonsense. Thank you.

What's in a reputation?

Whew. This is not an exhaustive list after all, and I am fairly curious to see what some of you would like to see in EQNext. Relaxation assured that we'll be revisiting this topic usually as SOE ramps as much as its August reveal and past.

And with that, let's deliver this week's challenge of The Tattered Notebook to an in depth. Oh, that jogs my memory! With EQNext in our near future, MJ and that i are doubtless going to rename the column sooner or later, each as a way to freshen issues up and to better seize the spirit of the franchise going ahead. And we would love your help! Be at liberty to post your solutions in the comments or contact us directly by way of [email protected] or [email protected].

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