By: Lord of Dreams

EverQuest: Online Adventures and the new EverQuest PC expansion, Legacy of Ykesha. We got to take an in-depth look at the current state of EverQuest while also getting some sneak previews of what may be able to expect in the future.

I will only talk briefly about EQ:OA in this write-up as I posted a review of the game earlier this week right here. You can find my views on the game and some of the main features that make it differ from the PC version in which know so very well. In general though, we have to find EQ:OA to be fascinating as it’s basically running on a dual 300 mhz machine with a mere 32 megs of ram. Try running EQPC on a machine like that! And not only that, but the system in which it is uses to patch the game is amazing. With just three megabytes on a memory card they are able to patch and change the game, although this excludes art files, almost any way they choose. And fortunately for those of us who have experienced Diablo or Phantasy Star Online and are worried about hackers, all character information is stored server side in the game.

But that’s enough of EQ:OA, you can check out my review of the game for more details. Let’s focus on the Legacy of Ykesha which brings us many new features including:

• 5 new zones
• New playable race: Frogloks
• Looking For Group system
• Cartography system
• NPC Journal System
• Doubled Bank Capacity
• Armor Dying
• Guild Management System
• New Item Slot: Charms

This was obviously a hugely successful expansion, as CNN reported that Sony had sold more than 220,000 copies of it via their pre-order system and that LoY was rising more quickly to the 1:1 account/expansion ratio than any of its predecessors. While we did not get exact numbers on the amount sold as of the time of our visit, we were told that they were certainly higher than the numbers reported by CNN.

The developers call this an extension to the game, rather than a full fledged expansion but with all the new features and content which were added it is close indeed. The main difference however was the fact that this extension was available via download rather than on the store shelves. However, a few copies were available in stores for those who were unable to download such a large set of files.

Will we see more expansions available for download in the future? Maybe, but don’t expect it to be the wave of the future for any new additions to the game. LoY was able to use this digital format due to its size, but according to Rod Humble, the larger expansions will be in boxed format in stores just as we were used to in the past. The sheer size of many of these downloads is what forces this, just imagine the Shadows of Luclin expansion available via download. With its three CD’s, anyone without a very fast T1 or greater line would have to spend hours if not days downloading the files which is obviously not an acceptable solution.

LoY offers a system of features for all players no matter what their current level is. While Planes of Power seemed generally geared towards the level 46+ crowd LoY gives us gameplay features that every level can enjoy. This is hopefully something we can look forward to in the future as well with expansions being more well-balanced to give all players some sort of use out of them.

Something else that would have been hard to miss for any active player would be the invasion of Grobb by the Frogloks. This was a dynamic event using the games new quest system which allowed the script to be activated by a GM, and then left alone until it was finished. The invasion of Grobb was described to us as a drop in the bucket of what this new quest system will allow the team to do in the future, and its success is bound to give them the fortitude to go ahead with more ambitious plans. Another note of import was how the system is truly dynamic, and the fall of Grobb was actually held off on many servers for an extended period of time as the citizens of that server fought bravely against the invading Frogloks. Eventually however, Grobb did fall on all servers. Something else to take notice of is the server stability that we now see compared to in earlier EverQuest times. The Bazaar is proof that a zone can hold 500+ people and remain stable which will allow for larger events which will not crash if hundreds of people eventually show up.

We got a fantastic tour of the new LoY zones with some high level Frogloks on our trip that truly astounded me. The animations and new graphics used were beautiful, and truly made use of the graphics engine introduced with Luclin.

Another big question that many of us had about EverQuest in general was how the current team thought about what impact the next generation of games being released would have on EQ. The team was very enthusiastic about the game future describing to us how whenever another game was released into the market EverQuest would not lose in subscribers, but actually grow as the number of mmorpg players increased. Both games would succeed and the total numbers only grew, they were not divided. The team expects this general attitude to continue as they have big plans for the future of EverQuest and have no intentions of letting the game stagnate.
We were given some inside information on some zones, some of which would be completely new and some of which would be old zones redone. Best of all, these new zone changes and additions will be completely free. Some of these include the Plane of Hate and Veksar. Veksar is the underwater city in the Lake of Ill Omen and will be aimed for Level 50 – 65 players where the Plane of Hate is being redone to allow for smoother pathing and while it maintains its original feel will provide a new spark of life to the hate experience.

We also got to discuss some long-standing issues that players have had with the game like the way archery works and customer service. Archery is an issue that they hope to at least have an answer for by the time the next fan faire rolls around. And in terms of customer service and the problems that lie within it I still find it to be one of the better departments out there among the mmorpg industry. So while it has its problems, the people who work in it are really wonderful people to meet and are continually doing the best they can do to help out those who are having problems with the game. When you see first hand what a lot of the CS team deals with on a regular basis you develop more of an empathy towards them and their work.

It is safe to say that EverQuest is not going anywhere, and that is has a very strong future ahead of it. With new servers opening up across the globe, including China, Korea, Japan, Taiwan, The United Kingdom, France and Germany the market is only increasing for the game in a large way. I will close by giving my thanks to SOE for the great trip. It was fantastic seeing how the game that I enjoy so much is created. It was great to be able to sit down with the developers on a 1 to 1 basis to discuss aspects of the game that you both like, and dislike! (There were plenty of issues that fit into either of those categories) It really brought a spark of brightness in me to see what kind of dedication these people have towards making the game better according to their vision. Most of the team has signed on within the last eighteen months and were once players themselves, so they offer a new vision to the game which may have not been possible just a few years ago. EverQuest has a long bright future ahead of it and we can look forward to many exciting new additions in the months and years to come.