Developers on vacation? Optimism please.

[Eveningsong]

Closed beta invites go out tomorrow, the expansion is due out next month, they're currently in internal alpha/friends & family testing... I suspect they are just darned busy right now.

Marketing releases about specific details usually go out closer to release, as there are often changes in the beta phase.  It would be nice to get some info about pre-orders though...

[Golbezz]

thesiren wrote:

I have definitely wondered about that myself, especially considering that the 24-page, multiple-week-long thread about converting live to Extended was heavily moderated and yet not one red name came in to soothe those against it, or say it wouldn't be happening.

Well, I hope they freaking advertise it if that's the case.   A real ad campaign is long overdue.

Considering the number of players still playing on live servers vs EQ2x it is at least short term a pretty safe guess that live servers will remain in their current form. Far too many live players would simply quit if their servers change to "pay to win". I would be gone to another game with my guildmates if the live servers changed to either EQ2x or exchange rule sets and I know many of the long time hardcore players feel the same way.

What I do expect long term if there is any chance of this happening:

1) New EQ2x servers being started with FREE transfers to them.2) Server merges of live servers to maintain that rule set.3) The eventual merging of exchange servers into EQ2x when contracts with LG end.

[The_Cheeseman]

Neskonlith wrote:

Greenmist@Permafrost wrote:

Let me answer your question with a question: How much history and lore is broken or bugged?

Luclin, Tower of Tesseracts and the Drednever are broken, and you should note that ravasect history is awfully buggy.

Well played, sir. Bravo!

[Gaealiege]

I don't understand the response of "DPS is just fine" so that negates what I posted as having been broken for years.  It's mechanics that exist in this game and have been ignored for a long time.  That's absolutely pathetic.  It's not simply whisked away by a "DPS is just fine" rebuttal.

[Lempo]

Gaealiege@Butcherblock wrote:

I don't understand the response of "DPS is just fine" so that negates what I posted as having been broken for years.  It's mechanics that exist in this game and have been ignored for a long time.  That's absolutely pathetic.  It's not simply whisked away by a "DPS is just fine" rebuttal.

As a warlock with an ENDLINE spell that is a dumbfire pet and uselss for everything except pulling scattered non agro mobs I agree the dumbfire pets need to be fixed. The DPS is fine remark was not understandable because it was just mindless drivel, it has nothing to do with DPS it is a mechanic that affect most every class and the mechanic is broken and has been broken for ages.

[Cratoh]

Eveningsong wrote:

Closed beta invites go out tomorrow, the expansion is due out next month, they're currently in internal alpha/friends & family testing... I suspect they are just darned busy right now.

Marketing releases about specific details usually go out closer to release, as there are often changes in the beta phase.  It would be nice to get some info about pre-orders though...

Poor excuse to say they are too busy to have someone give a bi weekly direction thread given the state of things in game and on forums, people are leaving at a busy rate.

[agnott]

Golbezz wrote:

agnott wrote:

Mark my words.

SOE is getting out of the "traditional" MMO business. They will be shutting down eq1 and eq2 within the next 18 months.

They will instead focus on social & console gaming. All the signs are there.

$OE will keep EQ and EQ2 alive as long as they generate positive cash flow. When EQnext releases I suspect both EQ and EQ2 will go far more casual as those of us with the more hardcore playstyle tend to move on to the new game when it's released.

Long term what could be expected are more server merges as EQ/EQ2 age and more $C offerings to make up for the declining populations of the aging games.

I'm pretty sure sony already has a console division to handle developing console games and I suspect the per user profits are too high to ignore in the PC market. Lets be honest here, with the management pushing the devs on this project to release things the way they do, would you trust any of this software ending up in such a buggy state on a console?

I think there is no chance EQ3 will not be designed for console or social gaming or both. You will be able to play it on a PC but It will be a very very simplified version of an mmo.

I know SOE. They are not just going to ignore the millions of players in theses markets. Not to mention thier image is not the best in the world. To launch a major new mmo for PC only?   ....I don't think they could pull in the numbers to justify it.

[Raknid]

DCUO was their most recent foray into "MMO" territory. I don't think the feedback from PC players about the controls has been very good. Will SOE develop the next EQ for console? Probably so. Will they have learned from their "mistakes" in DCUO? Up in the air...

[thesiren]

Raknid wrote:

DCUO was their most recent foray into "MMO" territory. I don't think the feedback from PC players about the controls has been very good. Will SOE develop the next EQ for console? Probably so. Will they have learned from their "mistakes" in DCUO? Up in the air...

They will have no choice but to implement a simplified, console-type interface and a greatly inferior chat system.  Consoles don't have widespread keyboards in use, nor do their setups and locations really allow for those.

[agnott]

They could succeed with a new pc only mmo but it would have to be nothing short of revolutionary.

If they launch an mmo that goes completely in another direction with leveling and graphics etc  .... they could knock it out the park with a game like that.

[Lempo]

My PS3 takes any USB keyboard I've thrown at it, pretty sure the XBox and Wii both take keyboards as well, but do not know 100% on those.

[cawalton]

agnott wrote:

Golbezz wrote:

agnott wrote:

Mark my words.

SOE is getting out of the "traditional" MMO business. They will be shutting down eq1 and eq2 within the next 18 months.

They will instead focus on social & console gaming. All the signs are there.

$OE will keep EQ and EQ2 alive as long as they generate positive cash flow. When EQnext releases I suspect both EQ and EQ2 will go far more casual as those of us with the more hardcore playstyle tend to move on to the new game when it's released.

Long term what could be expected are more server merges as EQ/EQ2 age and more $C offerings to make up for the declining populations of the aging games.

I'm pretty sure sony already has a console division to handle developing console games and I suspect the per user profits are too high to ignore in the PC market. Lets be honest here, with the management pushing the devs on this project to release things the way they do, would you trust any of this software ending up in such a buggy state on a console?

I think there is no chance EQ3 will not be designed for console or social gaming or both. You will be able to play it on a PC but It will be a very very simplified version of an mmo.

I know SOE. They are not just going to ignore the millions of players in theses markets. Not to mention thier image is not the best in the world. To launch a major new mmo for PC only?   ....I don't think they could pull in the numbers to justify it.

John Carmack Says iD Will Take A Console-First Approach To Games

"We do not see the PC as the leading platform for games," Carmack said, although he admitted that top-of-the-line PCs can deliver a much better experience than the less-powerful consoles – but it simply doesn’t make financial sense for iD to toss its resources at PC-centric titles . "That statement will enrage some people, but it is hard to characterize it otherwise; both console versions will have larger audiences than the PC version.”

He said this early this month, so the writing really is on the wall for those of us that prefer the PC for gaming

[Raknid]

cawalton wrote:

John Carmack Says iD Will Take A Console-First Approach To Games

"We do not see the PC as the leading platform for games," Carmack said, although he admitted that top-of-the-line PCs can deliver a much better experience than the less-powerful consoles – but it simply doesn’t make financial sense for iD to toss its resources at PC-centric titles . "That statement will enrage some people, but it is hard to characterize it otherwise; both console versions will have larger audiences than the PC version.”

He said this early this month, so the writing really is on the wall for those of us that prefer the PC for gaming

There will always be a market for computer games because there will always be players who prefer it. Who fills that niche is another thing.

[Yimway]

Banditman wrote:

I actually just commented on this in the Community forums, where it was announced that the Devs would be doing a Webcast regarding the "Nights of the Dead" event.  Somehow, the best thing our Executive Producer has to talk about is an annual holiday fluff event, with barely a month remaining before the release of the next expansion.

"Something is rotten in the state of Denmark"

I'm not so sure our producer is still our producer...

[ObsidianNightmare]

Atan@Unrest wrote:

Banditman wrote:

I actually just commented on this in the Community forums, where it was announced that the Devs would be doing a Webcast regarding the "Nights of the Dead" event.  Somehow, the best thing our Executive Producer has to talk about is an annual holiday fluff event, with barely a month remaining before the release of the next expansion.

"Something is rotten in the state of Denmark"

I'm not so sure our producer is still our producer...

There's a post in community news that will show you the truth in that.

[SisterTheresa]

Lempo@Everfrost wrote:

My PS3 takes any USB keyboard I've thrown at it, pretty sure the XBox and Wii both take keyboards as well, but do not know 100% on those.

Normally when I throw a keyboard at my PS3, it breaks ...

[Golbezz]

agnott wrote:

I think there is no chance EQ3 will not be designed for console or social gaming or both. You will be able to play it on a PC but It will be a very very simplified version of an mmo.

I know SOE. They are not just going to ignore the millions of players in theses markets. Not to mention thier image is not the best in the world. To launch a major new mmo for PC only?   ....I don't think they could pull in the numbers to justify it.

So you think thier image would be any better to console players? I doubt it really, the real loyal EQ series followers are pretty hardcore PC gamers and if the game was not released optimized for PC those customers would probably be lost.

I doubt the majority of console players would be interested in the EQ style gaming. I also don't think SOE could pull off the quality needed to really make EQnext work on a console.

[Felshades]

Nefain wrote:

Brigh wrote:

Nefain wrote:

I still see an antiquated UI...  You are always free to use a custom UI. I've been adventuring in on the most populated server (AB?) and I tried butcherblock.. .

I do use a custom UI. However, the functions you can implement in a custom UI are lacking.

WTB WoW's UI.

[Ilovecows]

It seems you are experiencing a some what watered down version of what happens to pvpers 99.9% of the time.  No dev posts or updates for months.  after a few months a gm comes and asks for ideas and after recieving feedback says they will try to get to doing the stuff they promised us to arrive months and months ago at some point.  Believe it or not, they rarely do.

[Cyliena]

Ridolain@Antonia Bayle wrote:

Lempo@Everfrost wrote:

My PS3 takes any USB keyboard I've thrown at it, pretty sure the XBox and Wii both take keyboards as well, but do not know 100% on those.

Normally when I throw a keyboard at my PS3, it breaks ...

Thanks for my evening laugh.

[Kalunord]

Cratoh wrote:

There hasn;t really been many positive dev posts for a while, and there seems to be a lot of people chattin on the forums and in game about quitting (hysterically) right now over:

Game oversimplification

AoD (what is it? How much is it? What do they get?)

Other game being released

Class imbalance

New people getting funnelled onto EQ2X servers

Rash of Statino Marketplace items being released

$OE in general

Moneygrabbing

Releasing of broken content and subsequent hotfixes to fix, re-fix and re-fix again.

I personally, if this was my business model, would be setting a spin doctor to work if there actually wasn't any positive feedback to be released, and at least be having someone post on these foums o na regular basis as anyone that is thinking of subbing at the moment, and who indeed has a little dip onto a server are getting hit with a despondant and down trodden responce when asking in general about the game and it's current state.

Come on, spin time - make people feel happy they are playing EQ2.

Obiviously I didn't get funneled into the EQX servers and I'm new just trying out all the other SOE games since my MMO (Star Wars Galaxies) is shutting down and I have 75 days across all games to try em out at full subscriber status , cause I def need a new MMO to play after Dec 15. and so far SWTOR isn't cutting it (Beta Tester)

[Alpharaz]

Cratoh wrote:

There hasn;t really been many positive dev posts for a while, and there seems to be a lot of people chattin on the forums and in game about quitting (hysterically) right now over:

Game oversimplification

AoD (what is it? How much is it? What do they get?)

Other game being released

Class imbalance

New people getting funnelled onto EQ2X servers

Rash of Statino Marketplace items being released

$OE in general

Moneygrabbing

Releasing of broken content and subsequent hotfixes to fix, re-fix and re-fix again.

I personally, if this was my business model, would be setting a spin doctor to work if there actually wasn't any positive feedback to be released, and at least be having someone post on these foums o na regular basis as anyone that is thinking of subbing at the moment, and who indeed has a little dip onto a server are getting hit with a despondant and down trodden responce when asking in general about the game and it's current state.

Come on, spin time - make people feel happy they are playing EQ2.

just replying to OP I know of 2 main reasons why a lot of players have quit since DoV or talking about quiting in near future...

1. Itemization (very poorly thought out) beginning of DoV merging the main green stats to 2 for each class was silly... it made certain buffs less useful as well as deity pets. and progression was ridiculous. Simple quest gear and PQ gear basically rendered SF gear useless  and forced the casual player into CM, and CM was in all gear and the need for CM was high. throughout the year they have tried to fix some of these issues one by one (take out the need for CM in most all DoV heroic content and overland zones, some class adjustments, diety pets give all stats now, etc) which was basically fixing their own mess-ups. There is honestly so many reasons why the itemization this year is soooo wrong in many many levels,  which is the main cause of class imbalances . I think frankly people either deal with it and quit whining cuz they still have faith in this game or they are long gone by now playing another game.. yeah it"s*u*x oh well i guess i will continue paying my subscription for now anyways..... It's not too late to fix some of this stuff tho

But as of recently a 2nd reason has emerged with the talk about AoD ...if this is what i understand it to be I'm not paying money for it .. why not make it a SC adventure pack for $20 USD. Only thing that will force players to buy it is the need for BL in future groups/raids, increased aa limit, and possibly reforging if this feature ends up being halfway decent. gonna test it out in beta before i decide so hopefully im proved wrong and my faith will be restored.

to a new player the above statements would not matter all that much the game will still be fun and enjoyable

I edited what i post to try and add optimism

[Alpharaz]

^^fixed my optimism issue^^

[feldon30]

Amitee wrote:

On the OP's topic, one thing that I've always found disturbing about SoE is they are very poor on communication to the playerbase.  

I know they're busy, talented people. I respect that. But to also allow player unrest to build and fester on the forums with no feedback or replies from a dev or a community leader source is poor business and further damaging to them IMO.  SoE has good products, talented devs, but their rep for no communication until "after the fact" and upsetting their playerbases is pretty infamous across the MMO spectrum.

It's the new reality of SOE at least as far as EverQuest II. Everything is reactive instead of proactive. There always seems to be a sense of surprise when players draw their own conclusions in an information vacuum.

[feldon30]

cawalton wrote:

John Carmack Says iD Will Take A Console-First Approach To Games

"We do not see the PC as the leading platform for games," Carmack said

That's ok. I don't see iD as a leading developer of games. RAGE took 6 years and it flopped.

[dawy]

feldon30 wrote:

Amitee wrote:

On the OP's topic, one thing that I've always found disturbing about SoE is they are very poor on communication to the playerbase.  

I know they're busy, talented people. I respect that. But to also allow player unrest to build and fester on the forums with no feedback or replies from a dev or a community leader source is poor business and further damaging to them IMO.  SoE has good products, talented devs, but their rep for no communication until "after the fact" and upsetting their playerbases is pretty infamous across the MMO spectrum.

It's the new reality of SOE at least as far as EverQuest II. Everything is reactive instead of proactive. There always seems to be a sense of surprise when players draw their own conclusions in an information vacuum.

Spot on assesment Feldon sadly

[kaedianeq2]

Nadirah@Crushbone wrote:

Nefain wrote:

Brigh wrote:

Nefain wrote:

I still see an antiquated UI...  You are always free to use a custom UI. I've been adventuring in on the most populated server (AB?) and I tried butcherblock.. .

I do use a custom UI. However, the functions you can implement in a custom UI are lacking.

WTB WoW's UI.

Play WoW.

[Nrgy]

kaedianeq2 wrote:

Nadirah@Crushbone wrote:

Nefain wrote:

Brigh wrote:

Nefain wrote:

I still see an antiquated UI...  You are always free to use a custom UI. I've been adventuring in on the most populated server (AB?) and I tried butcherblock.. .

I do use a custom UI. However, the functions you can implement in a custom UI are lacking.

WTB WoW's UI.

Play WoW.

WOW UI's use open sourced XML for third party customization and most people don't use the Default UI.... ever!

[thesiren]

feldon30 wrote:

cawalton wrote:

John Carmack Says iD Will Take A Console-First Approach To Games

"We do not see the PC as the leading platform for games," Carmack said

That's ok. I don't see iD as a leading developer of games. RAGE took 6 years and it flopped.

Haha, yeah!