EverQuest Message Board

Having been in operation for 15 years now, Sony Online Enetertainment's MMORPG EverQuest has built a rich and detailed history for players to ignore while they scrabble for loot. Read more...

On March 16, 1999, Sony invited players to venture into the world of Norrath for the first time. EverQuest has been changing lives ever since, including mine. Read more...

The next generation of EverQuest inches closer with the official launch of the EverQuest Next Landmark alpha test. Invitations to test the building portion of Sony Online Entertainment's two-pronged MMO revamp will be going out later today. Keep a keen eye on your inbox. Read more...

Have you been looking for an MMO to round out the less massive, woefully lonely aspects of your life? And not just any MMO, but The MMO, one that can be summed up using a checklist of vague yet overwhelmingly familiar elements? Well then, have I got a game for you (to Kickstart, naturally). Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen has the pedigree of EverQuest and Vanguard developer Brad McQuaid behind it, but so far it doesn’t seem to have many other aces up its long, wizardly sleeves. Fast-ish-paced combat, teamwork, and old-school difficulty seem to be the big selling points. So it’s a fantasy MMO with some slight tweaks to a withered and ancient formula. All well and good, but worth $800,000? Hmmmm.

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When you build something in the open-world sandbox game Minecraft, you can share it with your friends. You can invite people to hang out in your little world of blocks and pigs, or can put your creation on YouTube, to be admired and posted on Kotaku for the world to see.Read more...

With two of Sony Online Entertainment's massively multiplayer online games already PlayStation 4 bound, it makes sense that the company's ambitious EverQuest reboot would get similar treatment. Speaking with GamerHubTV, SOE president John Smedley says he can't wait to see it happen. Read more...

That the developers can hop into EverQuest Next and transform a barren landscapes into complicated structures in real-time is almost as cool as knowing players will be able to do it too, once EverQuest Next Landmark launches later this year. Read more...

Our friends at Massively launched a stream of updates this week on all things EverQuest from Sony Online Entertainment's SOE Live 2013 event in Las Vegas. We're breaking down the news from the week to get you caught up on all that's in store for the popular MMORPG series.

The next game in the series, EverQuest Next, features destructible environments built with voxels. The world isn't entirely a sandbox-like playground, though, as SOE will enforce some restrictions on what can and cannot be destroyed in the game, and the crumbling world will respawn after some time. The game's AI will include "likes and dislikes," and NPCs will remember player choices made during quests, such as instances where players side with either humans or orcs. Public quests known as "Rallying Calls" will also unfold over the course of multiple months and see permanent effects in the game's world, Norrath. Player locomotion will expand in EverQuest Next as well, as players can move along terrain in more ways than the typical run, walk and jump animations offer. Registration for the game's beta program is available now.

SOE also unveiled another game at the event, EverQuest Next Landmark. Landmark offers players tools to construct any (appropriate) structure on a plot of land they claim in the world, then sell in the Player Studio's marketplace, possibly for use in EverQuest Next. The toolset offered to players in Landmark is the same that developers use for EverQuest Next, so the build-and-explore facets of the game should feel genuine.

Lastly, for on-the-go players that need their questin' fix, SOE is offering an iOS and Android app called EverQuest Worlds. Worlds delivers quests and mini-games "that reveal lore, content, and rewards from the EverQuest franchise." The app is free and available now on the App Store and Google Play store.

I've played every major massively multiplayer role-playing game released since 1998, yet it feels like I've spent the past 15 years playing the same game over and over again. That's a problem. EverQuest Next is the solution. Read more...

Just when it seemed that the future of MMOs might be a bit boring, the people behind EverQuest have decided to massively shake things up.Read more...

I remember when I first played Everquest. I was younger then - naive, optimistic, and completely unable to grasp the concept that a PVP server meant idly tapping the attack button around other people could cause an international incident. Still though, it was my first MMO, and what a magical experience it was. I’ll never forget my first death by Sand Giant or related, nearly naked corpse run through Terror Country. I tried it out again recently, though, and it’s, uh, really different. But I suppose that makes sense, seeing as there have been 18 expansion sets. And now it’s about to get even more different with a 19th. Also, EverQuest II’s hitting number nine, because… jeez, really? Nine? Where did the time go, everyone? What were we doing?

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MMOs are pretty much about two things: breaking and taking. Kill ten things, take six things, etc, etc, etc. Monsters, boar gizzards, fish, barrels – nothing is safe. But all that destruction can get a bit exhausting at times. I mean, who hasn’t met an Orc, ogre, or space marine who just wanted to paint? So now SOE’s letting players balance out their wanton destruction with a little creation. Player Studio, as the new system’s known, will allow players to submit custom items to the likes of EverQuest, EverQuest II, Vanguard, and (eventually) PlanetSide 2 for potential use by everyone in each respective game. It does, however, seem a bit less community driven than, say, Steam Workshop.

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#everquest Earlier this week Sony Online Entertainment revealed its new SOEmote technology, which enables EverQuest 2 players to map their facial expressions and mouth movements to their in-game character. This creeped many people the *crag* out. I just had to try it. More »

#sony Sony has applied for a strange little patent that streamlines the process via which online friends in an MMO can meet up in the real world and become real friends. More »

#everquest One of the longest-running subscription-based massively multiplayer online role-playing games has finally succumbed to the sweet, sweet lure of the microtranscation-based business model, as EverQuest celebrates its 13th anniversary by going free-to-play. More »

#retrohumor These days you can tell you play too much of Sony Online Entertainment's massively multiplayer online role-playing game EverQuest by the simple fact that you play it at all. Ten years ago, when hundreds of thousands of people played the game on a regular basis, there were different standards of measurement. More »

I can’t help but wonder how many of today’s crop of MMOs will manage to last 13 years. Running expenses are surely so much higher than they were in dear old EverQuest’s day. The major precursor to the dark age of grinding and number keys that we know so well has indeed managed a baker’s dozen-sized lifespan, and while its days as a subscription game are not yet numbered, it now also wears a free to play coat on its aged frame.(more…)

#everquest After more than a decade of dedicated fans paying a monthly fee to adventure in the lands of Norrath, the massively multiplayer online role-playing game that got the MMORPG ball rolling back in 1999 is going free-to-play come March. More »

#everquest In video game years, Everquest II's like the great grandpa to newer MMOs like The Old Republic or Rift. Launched in 2004, it's got a faithful community that's still questing around on its servers but the game's days of accruing new players month after month seems to have ended a while back. More »

#everquest MMORPG EverQuest, which launched in 1999, is plagued with cheaters. Sony Online Entertainment is fed up. So you better watch out, cheaters! More »

No, you and you internet browser haven't slipped backwards through time -- though EverQuest 2 already went free-to-play last year (with the somewhat confusing, browser-based EverQuest 2: Extended), the game is going really free-to-play starting December 6. A post on the game's official site clears things up: The offerings of Extended will be folded into the rest of the title, and membership will be broken down into three tiers: Free, Silver and Gold.

Free members get a handful of races, classes, character slots and other utilities, while Silver members ($5.00 or 500 Station Points per month) get ... well, a handful more. These two tiers also have the option to purchase some items (like races and classes) piecemeal. Gold members ($14.99/mo.) get unrestricted access to everything. Check out this handy rubric if you're still confused by all these precious, precious metals.

Right then, what’s left? Everquest 1, Ultima Online, World of Warcraft, Warhammer Online, Lineage… What else yet stands firm against the free to play tide? The latest to switch is SOE’s 2004-launched Everquest II, which will offer itself to the microtransaction gods next month.

It’s dabbled before with a F2P parallel client, with but as of the Age of Discovery expansion free-to-play will be active on every one of its servers. It’ll retain subscriptions and expansion packs for those who want to stick to the old ways, however. Full details on exactly how it all works are in this Massively post; apologies for not summarising here, but I’m still a zombie after power-playing Skyrim. Also, I want to go and play some more Skyrim.

This week in our series of highly personal retrospectives on landmark computer games, videogames PhD researcher and independent games developer Mitu Khandaker looks back to the wonder, exploration and lofty world-building of what might well be the most defining entry in the history of MMOs: EverQuest.

Everquest was like magic.

I feel like I’m cheating a bit writing this; after all, this isn’t about one of the games that I played when I was the tiniest, my perception of the world at its most plastic. The games I played then – illicitly, on a Commodore 64 that wasn’t mine; and later, on a series of hand-me-down consoles – certainly defined a lot about the person I would become. However, not all of our most formative experiences happen when we are tiny, young, and impressionable. Instead, many happen when we’re at our most vulnerable, our most confused, our most lost: during our mid-teen years. When I was 16 years old, EverQuest made me.LOADING, PLEASE WAIT…

UPDATE: Sony just sent out a press release explaining the reason for the SOE outage, confirming that user information was stolen from the SOE servers in two separate incidents on April 16th and April 17th, 2011. Apparently, most of it was from an outdated database that mostly held expired credit card info. So says the release in greater detail:

This information, which was discovered by engineers and security consultants reviewing SOE systems, showed that personal information from approximately 24.6 million SOE accounts may have been stolen, as well as certain information from an outdated database from 2007.  The information from the outdated database that may have been stolen includes approximately 12,700 non-U.S. credit or debit card numbers and expiration dates (but not credit card security codes), and about 10,700 direct debit records of certain customers in Austria, Germany, Netherlands and Spain.

So, if you live in America, good news everyone! Your SOE customer info is probably safe. As for the rest of the world? Bad news, everyone! Your (hopefully) old credit card/debit card info may have been compromised. There is additional info on the situation over at SOE's website, including steps to take if your information was, in fact, compromised.

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They say "when it rains, it pours." For Sony, these past couple of weeks have been less a pour and more of an end-of- Deep Impact brand of killer tidal wave. With the PlayStation Network still down and Sony still working on repairing the service's infrastructure in the wake of the intrusion by hackers that maybe-involved-your-identity-getting-stolen-but-possibly-it-didn't-but-more-likely-it-did, now yet another bit of bad news has befallen the beleaguered publisher.

Sony Online Entertainment, the MMO arm of Sony's games division, put up notice today that it had taken down all of its online servers due to the "external intrusion" that Sony Computer Entertainment has been investigating relating to PSN. Though SOE's PC operations had thus far remained largely unaffected, intermittent website issues had been reported and acknowledged as early as April 21st, around the same time Sony opted to take the PlayStation Network down.

So reads the statement on Station.com:

"We have had to take the SOE service down temporarily. In the course of our investigation into the intrusion into our systems we have discovered an issue that warrants enough concern for us to take the service down effective immediately. We will provide an update later today (Monday)."

SOE would not elaborate on that statement when we asked.

SOE maintains a number of MMO franchises, including EverQuest, PlanetSide and DC Universe Online. While we don't know if the Monday timeframe is definite or just some kind of "high level ballpark estimate," we'll keep an eye on Station.com and update this story with new information that becomes available.

They say "when it rains, it pours." For Sony, this past couple of weeks has been less a pour and more of an end-of-Deep Impact brand of killer tidal wave. With the PlayStation Network still down and Sony still working on repairing the service's infrastructure in the wake of the intrusion by hackers that maybe-involved-your-identity-getting-stolen-but-possibly-it-didn't-but-more-likely-it-did, now yet another bit of bad news has befallen the beleaguered publisher.

Sony Online Entertainment, the MMO arm of Sony's games division, put up notice today that it had taken down all of its online servers due to the "external intrusion" that Sony Computer Entertainment has been investigating relating to PSN. Though SOE's PC operations had thus far remained largely unaffected, intermittent website issues had been reported and acknowledged as early as April 21st, around the same time Sony opted to take the PlayStation Network down.

So reads the statement on Station.com:

"We have had to take the SOE service down temporarily. In the course of our investigation into the intrusion into our systems we have discovered an issue that warrants enough concern for us to take the service down effective immediately. We will provide an update later today (Monday)."

SOE would not elaborate on that statement when we asked.

SOE maintains a number of MMO franchises, including EverQuest, PlanetSide and DC Online Universe. While we don't know if the Monday timeframe is definite or just some kind of "high level ballpark estimate," we'll keep an eye on Station.com and update this story with new information that becomes available.

#anniversary Today marks the twelfth anniversary of the original EverQuest. What keeps one of the original big massively-multiplayer fantasy games going after all these years? More »

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