The house that Sony built just keeps on trucking. With little fanfare and quiet competence, the thirteenth expansion to the original EverQuest went online today. Buried Sea adds pirate ships, underwater zones, and something that sounds a lot like technology from the Transformers.

The Buried Sea introduces players to a new type of inventory slot called a Power Source which is used for new equipment available in the expansion, known as an Energeian Power Source. Energeian Power Sources are similar to a magical battery and come in a variety of types such as: fire, cold and light.

More than meets the eye, indeed. While the new content added at the high end will no doubt be welcomed by players, in my opinion the best stuff added by the expansion is the Fellowship and guild support. Guild banners: awesome. Fellowships: even more awesomer.

Fellowships are basically mini-guilds, a formal recognition of a regular group. As someone who is still having a lot of fun playing in one of those, I’d like to request that this be added to EQ2 asap!

On a semi-related note, EQOA is celebrating four years of existence. Keen … but um, realistically how many people are still playing?

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Via Brenlo’s World, a short Gamespot blurb that indicates an EverQuest movie is in the works.

[Yair] Landau also hinted the Metal Gear Solid movie may just be the beginning. “There are other games we are looking to develop,” the executive said. “We’re working with one of my favorite producers right now on an idea for an EverQuest movie.” The producer was apparently of such stature that Landau declined to name him. “I’ll let him disclose that,” he said cryptically.

Erm. Okay. Nicely … nicely … how do I say this nicely ….

While I understand and respect the idea of growing the EverQuest brand via movies and other media, it is my considered opinion that ‘EverQuest: the Movie’ is a bad move from a customer loyalty perspective. There’s little possibility such a thing would live up to expectations of players and fans of the game, and the derision you would recieve from a hokey fantasy movie with the EQ name attached is not worth contemplating.

…

Or: Bwahahahahahahahaha. An EQ movie would really really suck.

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I’d like to offer a huge congratulations to PC Gamer for taking a stand and refusing advertising from IGE and other auction sites. In my opinion this was the right thing to do and it took a lot of guts. It’s saying ‘not all money is the same,’ which I strongly agree with. I think we’re beginning to see the impact that this kind of unsanctioned activity is having on in-game activities in MMO’s. – SOE’s John Smedley, in his first blog entry.

I just had a quick chat with a couple of old guildies from the SWG days. One of them was poking around on the main Sony Station site, looking for one of their other games (yes, they do make non-MMOGs). He got to the bottom of the page and saw something that, as he put it “Made me wonder what fucking alternate reality I was living in.” This is what he saw:

Right. So here you’ve got your standard Google ads. All well and good. Except, no one has made sure the ads aren’t for SELLING THE COMPANY’S PROPERTY through third party vendors. I know the SOE folks are are all hot for their ’solution’ to the fact that they’ve put a treadmill into the game. I know that not all RMT is bad, no matter what the academic folks say. Heck, as long as I’m casting stones, I’ll be up front about it: I’ve purchased in-game currency. I’m no angel. But there is a world of difference between some random guy buying some gil (oops), and a major force in Massive games hosting ads on their front page for third party RMTers. And crappy RMTers at that … jeez, guys, where’s IGE?

Obviously, this is a mistake. No one would have ok’d this at the SOE manse if they’d taken the time to think this through. No one has a problem with Google ads on your frontpage … it’s yours to do with as you please, right? But c’mon, guys! Wake up! What does it say to all the nice little Wizards and Necros that don’t buy gold when you’ve got ads for their sale right there front and center? The negative reaction to the Station Exchange will be nothing compared to what will happen if every EQ player comes to understand that you are advertising for ‘Chinese Farmers’ (to use the pejorative).

Indeed, this is bigger than just bad publicity – Remember that thing about the Korean stance on RMT? I imagine that’s a country SOE wants to continue doing business in … but I could be mistaken.

Seriously: Smed, whoever in marketing cooked this up, fix this. Like, yesterday. You need to keep on top of these things, guys. Cuz somebody’s always watching … and not all of them are as nice as I am.

I’ll leave you with some words from a more articulate man than I, Mr. Scott Jennings:

While Station Exchange’s introduction rubbed me in several wrong ways (since as an MMO player RMT trading makes me ill and as a developer I see people trying to buy their way past a game as the ultimate symptom that the game has issues), at the end of the day it’s SOE’s game to run … With outside arbitrage dealers such as IGE, none of the above applies. And interestingly, despite IGE’s initial ‘Gosh, Station Exchange is great, it legimitizes our business model, happy happy!’ press releases’ oddly enough, IGE still sells things on non-Station Exchange EQ2 servers. Funny how that works. I guess the people who specifically chose to remain on non-RMT enabled servers for that game? Yeah, they shouldn’t get to make that choice. It should be made for them. Yeah.

Update: Smed wrote to say: “We added google ads and are filtering out RMT sites or at least we are supposed to be. We absolutely will not take ads from those sites. They will be taken down immediately.” So good deal. Looks like it was just a mistake after all. Thanks guys.

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Didn’t Serpent Spine (you know, the EverQuest expansion I really liked) just come out? It’s time for another one already?

Clint Worley, Producer, Sony Online Entertainment:

As the thirteenth expansion for EverQuest, The Buried Sea will continue to challenge players with two new worlds to explore, ship-to-ship combat on the open seas against swash-buckling pirates, and a variety of new missions created especially for this expansion.

I know nothing’s nothing until you’ve played it, but the features they describe in the press release are so far removed from the core EQ gameplay … it makes me worry.

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If you’re like me, you enjoy screenshots from Massive games. The static experience we have in single-player games make screenshots purely a marketing tool. In MMOGs, the unique experience every user can have results in unrepeatable, unique experiences – great fodder for photography. If you’ve got screenshot troves sitting around somewhere online, feel free to link to them in the comments.

My Stuff-

• Chocobo Express – A buddy’s adventures in Vana D’iel
• Star Wars Tragedies – My time in SWG.
• A Tale of Rotting Flax – ATITD
• World of Warcraft Beta Screens – See! Dwarven Mages, Night Elves on Raptors, Old Ironforge, and More!

Everquest 2 -

• just_gwendolyn’s flickr set – Some great scenery shots of Norrath.
  
• An EQ2 raid – A night in the life of a raider.
  
• mercera’s flickr set – Some great FanFest shots, as well as in-game moments.
  

World of Warcraft -

• AFK Gamer’s flickr account – That one guy. He’s a great in-world photog, actually. Take more shots, Foton!
• Joi Ito’s ‘weknow’ shots - In and out of game shots from the leader of the somewhat famous ‘We Know’ guild. Nice BC shots too.
• Downbeatjunkies’ BC set – Lots of scenery from the new newbie areas.
• PVP IronForge Raid – Caps from a Hordie raid on the center of the Alliance’s world.
  
• Mederi’s flick set – Nice raid-level scenery; Onyxia, MC, etc.
  

Others -

• Thanopstru’s FFXI flickr set – Follow him via RSS, always beautiful Vana’diel shots.
• haysophie’s Everquest flickr set – Raids from ye olden days of MMOGdom.
  
• Wizzel’s Vanguard Beta flickr set – See the shiny before it breaks.
  
• Pentadact’s CoH/CoV flickr set – Great moments from a game I often miss.
  

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Brent, buddy, you know I love what you do. But jeezus … your top ten list suuucked.
The Virgin Worlds podcast is a happy part of my week, every week, and at first I was enthused when a ‘Top 10 MMOGs’ list began back on the 12th. Instead of listening to the first back at the start of the month, I waited until the second half was released to start listening.

My biggest beef was the assertion that the higher numbered MMOGs were somehow ‘better’ than the lower numbered ones. I realize it’s less interesing when a top ten list doesn’t imply ranking, but in this case I think that’s the way I would have gone. Otherwise, it seems somewhat offset to compare almost decade-old work to brand new stuff. Likewise, games built on a shoestring compared to juggernauts like WoW? Blah.

I don’t care that WoW was #7. It’s iteratively better, not evolutionarily. Totally agree. You guys are obviously approaching the games from the POV of MMOG snobs, and I respect that at least. No problem.

But Jeezus. The fucking Warden? You’re complaining about the Warden? You’re complaining about their bad Customer Service? “Hi, this is 2003, I want my complaints back.” You then go on to discuss how Asherons Call is better than WoW, because some of its shitty content was hidden from most of the players. That is the most ass backwards thing I’ve ever heard. It’s a game, guys, not a scavenger hunt or geocaching. The point is to have fun, not spend time searching for content. (Subtle glares at Star Wars Galaxies and Everquest.)

On top of that, you then ranked Everquest 2 above WoW on your list. The hell? I’d love to know what alternate reality you folks are living in where EQ2 is a ‘better’ game than World of Warcraft. EQ2 is just like the majority of SOE’s games: lots of promise, plenty of potential, flawed execution. The traditional SOE recipe for failure has kept the greatness of EverQuest 2 from dominating the MMOG conciousness, and positioning it higher than WoW on the list is not going to change that.

Other crankiness elicited by your list:

• Guild Wars is Multiplayer, and it’s Online, but it ain’t Massive by most definitions.
• You should be ashamed of yourselves, making us Westerners remember that Lineage II exists. You gave children nightmares and made our crops blight!
• Ryzom’s big ticket to fame is it Frenchness. Okay, the Ring is really good. I’d like it more if the game the Ring was built on wasn’t so damn boring.

Since it’s my blog and I’ll second guess if I want to, my list would have looked more like this:

1. Everquest – teh Winner!
2. World of Warcraft – your new lord and master
3. FFXI – the much overlooked asskicker
4. City of Heroes/Villains – tights make everyone happy
5. Dark Age of Camelot – PvP’s home turf
6. Everquest 2 – so much potential
7. Ultima Online – Grandpa
8. Eve Online – funnest screensaver ever
9. Puzzle Pirates – puzzles are the future
10. Star Wars Galaxies – what not to do

All whining aside, I liked the obvious effort you put into the feature. Nice work, gents. Just, less ganja next time you working on the Science.

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Not too long ago, my feelings about Sony Online’s Everquest (EQ) were mostly frustration and disappointment. Despite its position as a genre-defining title, the release of EverQuest 2 signaled to me that Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) was no longer going to be focusing on the game … I can now say categorically that I was wrong.

I recently had the opportunity to take a tour of the upcoming expansion, Serpent’s Spire, with EQ Lead Designer Travis McGeathy. I’ve seen the light. Today I’m going to look at EverQuest’s past, the reason for my reversal of opinion, and where the game is going. Finally, I’ll talk about why I think the direction Everquest is headed (and the revamp of Ultima Online) signals nothing but good things for the future of Massive gaming.

GameSetWatch – COLUMN: MMOG Nation – ‘Resurrecting EverQuest’

Every time I think I can sit on my throne built out of righteous Sony Online annoyance …

I find it utterly flabbergasting that the same company that has so royally screwed up the Star Wars license can craft such a customer-focused and cogent expansion. Obviously, very different teams and pressures is the explanation, but it’s still a little brain-bending.

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