Classic GOTW: Everquest
Oh, Everquest, though we have long since separated and your looks have not exactly improved with age, I still think about you when you were young and beautiful, and the long nights we spent together. They say you never really get over your first, and I suppose that's probably why it took so long to finally say goodbye for what now truly seems to have been the last time. How many times did we break up? Six? Seven? I'd always come back to you and time, too much time, would evaporate into lost nights. Eventually I'd grow bored and interested in someone younger, and then you'd go and have some work done, come back with promises of experimentation and I'd fall for you all over again.
I still long for you occasionally, though I know it can never be like it was. You're a hard addiction, strident in your rules and unforgiving in a way that some of the younger ones will never know. Maybe that's part of the appeal, the way you would dominate me again and again, despite my frustration. I wanted to tame you, but you were untamable by all but age. Even your replacement, its plastic facade only a hint at your youthful beauty, can never really match what we had together. Sure, I've found someone stable, reliable, forgiving, caring and less ruthless in World of WarCraft, and she and I are happy together now, but there's always a place in my heart for you Everquest. I'll never kill a rat without thinking of you.
There aren't many games that I remember with such clarity as Everquest. I remember the first rat I killed just outside of Qeynos, and the first time I adventured into Blackburrow, certainly to be killed in the next instant by a train Gnoll Guards. I remember the cackle of the skeletons, the sound of my wizard casting, the glow of the Will O' Wisps, and the feeling of constant peril the first time I traveled across the continent. I remember grouping with friends in the Field of Bone and feeling invincible when a high-level would buff us lowbies before they changed the rules. It was a harder world, but at times a much more rewarding one, and I look back on EQ with almost inexplicable fondness.
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There's a subtext in those first two paragraphs but I can't exactly place my penis, I mean finger, on it.
JUST PUZZLED YOUR ASS UP, SON! -Mr Crinkle
Steam Community: McChuck XBL: GWJ McChuck
I didn't play this game for very long. Perhaps 3 weeks. Like most MMORPGS, I would buy them, not find the time to get above the grind or be able to play late into the night like some of my friends and then just cancel it because I couldn't justify paying monthly for something I played casually. Thankfully I only played the open beta of WOW for I fear if I ever did buy it that it would be the one to consume me.
I did however witness an EQ wedding in mid 2001, which was beyond hilarious. It was for a friend of a friend who had a sort of internet relationship that came about as they bonded in the EQ world. I think a buddy of mine still has screenshots of the groom emoting poetically as the GM appeared and gave them the same last name.
Xbox Live | Steam | Xfire | Last.fm
Ah yes. EverQuest. The game that started my feelings of "I don't understand the addiction to this genre."
I played it once after a friend let me borrow his huge Everquest collection. It had something ridiculous like nine expansions on the CD, and no documentation in the box about how to even begin. When I was killed by a rat on my second fight I gave up.
Dark Age of Camelot, though? Man, sign me up if anyone still plays that.
"I recommend against throwing your kids when you're high, regardless of how high you are. You should, however, be very drunk." ~ The Fly
Xbox Live: Vrikk GWJ
Ah, Everquest. You stinking, shallow, irresistible whore. How I loved you once - but time has not been kind.
Your silence will not save you.
-Audre Lorde
AHHHHH! The time I spent in front of that screen. It was such a wonderful experience though, that first time my poor little dwarf warrior attempted to get across the Western Commonlands.
Xbox Live: Irongut | Playstation ID: Irongut_GWJ
Great article!
Gamer Tag: Rantyr
ppfffffff
he'll go back to her again... I just know....
'Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.'
Benjamin Franklin
Wow, at this point, with so many expansions, is there anything left to develop that you can't do in EQ? Can you level up a god yet? I know they implemented monster play a few years ago. So does that make the playable classes and races like 40 each?
D'you think an 8800gt can run the Luclin expansion yet?
Being fangoriously devoured by a gelatinous monster.
I think there really was something about the harshness of the game world in EQ that really adds something to the memories. To me it's all about Kelethin and Crushbone. I'll never forget realizing I was severely outnumbered by Orcs and running blindly through the forest finally evading the pursuing orcs only then to realize i'd run right smack dab into the gaping entrance of Crushbone. Then there was always the stealthy naked corpse run back into enemy territory. While I would never wish these mechanics to be forced on anyone in any game ever again it is amazing how much tension and emotion they added to the experience.
PSN ID: Stric9
Another EQ moment came to mind that I experienced during the first evening of play.
I believe I was a dwarven barbarian (or warrior, whatever I can't remember) and I had wandered way too deep into the woods near my starting zone and was running out of food and near death. I had NO idea where I was and finally in the middle of the forest I came upon a dwarven camp. "Brothers!" I thought, as I approached the camp ready to spent my newly earned gold.
Turned out they were enemies.. and I then had to learn how to do a corpse run.
Xbox Live | Steam | Xfire | Last.fm
I remember the loss of my corpse at level 1, with all the jumblie bits of rat junk I had because I got lost in the gnome home zone and it starts you *outside* rather than inside where your character starts. I remember noone wanting to party with my enchantress unless there was no other class available. I remember staring at my f*cking spellbook for 10 minutes because bards didn't get an evocation spell for 10 levels after having to start to memorize spells. It is times like these that I wonder why I loved the game so much, then I remember the times that our tank ran away from a train and I had to work a crowd control miracle while brow beating him to get back to the group to help us. I remember running into a random group while travelling across Karana, joining up with them and having fun. They were added to my friends and eventually we formed a guild. I remember all the good times I had in Blood Tide, slaughtering undead frogloks, slaughtering beholders and minotaurs in the gorge, invading gnolls lairs, decimating the undead scourge that suddenly appeared in Kithikor woods on All Hallows eve....
"Also, I have four legs and am covered in wool. Baa!" *Legion* reveals his inner furry.
Can I get a SoW?
Letters to the Internet
I miss the days when Everquest was a new experience to me and I was in awe of a "living, breathing" virtual world. It was a tectonic plate shift in gaming for me, incredibly advanced over the MUD's I enjoyed.
By far most of my fondest MMO memories come from EQ. I remember so vividly finally getting the "Cast Monster" on my mage and running through Oasis with a big sand giant following me /yelling "Cazel by the docks!!!".
Oh the memories haha
PAR
For all who live in such times, it is not for them to decide. All we get to decide is what to do with the time given us.
XBox Live: par02
Damn you Ely!
I just fired up the 14 day trial. Oh they have made such strides only to have a few crippling faults. The UI has come a long way but the fundamental way you interact with everything is so dated. Looting, combat targeting, interacting with quest givers and merchants, managing your inventory, are downright awkward.
I gave you an hour. That is more than enough.
Being fangoriously devoured by a gelatinous monster.
I feel much the same way about Ultima Online.................
Man, I loved EQ...making the Qeynos to Freeport run as a level 3 character was an incredibly tense experience, but the sense of achievement I felt in doing it was enormous. I can still picture the zone just outside Qeynos, where all the lowbies leveled up....the first time I saw a zombie pop out in the field, and the first time that bastard Fippy killed me. In the end, my erratic play schedule kept me from joining any guild, and the game became absolutely punishing to solo. As a cleric I could get in pickup groups any time, but I mostly soloed, running around doing quests & giving out free rezzes until level 32 or so...a pretty damn good feat, given that I couldn't solo a fricken baby.
"Come, amigo, throw away your mind." --Malcolm Lowry, Under the Volcano
This article hits HOME. I don't understand the mystique and it's haunted me ever since I played so long ago. Even in real world locations I'll be walking through a forest and effing get that nostalgia. Kelethin! My GOD Kelethin! Words can't describe...
Very interesting to learn that I'm not alone. Someone needs to psychoanalyze this.
Edit:
How'd you know my last name
I remember getting asked to be a guide in Beta, and how rewarding it felt to be able to help out players who got stuck under the world, or fell off the boat due to lag, or lost their equipment due to an inventory bug... feeling like I was an integral part of the game I loved to play, feeling like I was helping to make it the best it could be.
Then it went retail and everything went to sh*t.
Your silence will not save you.
-Audre Lorde
Ah, the days of creating artificial monopolies in the now-laughably antiquated Bazaar.
Turning the graphics down to the point where fog eclipsed anything beyond a few feet in order to buy and sell more efficiently. Waking up every two hours to see if anyone had put anything interesting up and, if so, if I could steal it from them for a song in order to put it up for 4x what I bought it for. Staying up until dawn once when adventurers returned from a new dungeon, elite items in hand and visions of gold in their eyes, so that I could turn around and sell it to envious up-and-comers. Having more lucre than entire guilds, but never managing to build a character that got more than a mediocre level.
There'll never be another one like it again. Thank god.
One of my favorite games of all time. Nothing will ever bring back that thrill/fear/wonder of the first few weeks/months of EQ1. What an awesome game now superceded by a jaded attitude and grinding-as-art-form in WoW and LOTRO et. al. Cheers to you EQ1. Nice nostalgic post.
XBL Gamertag: Bear Patrol
I know it's irrational, but in it's prime EQ was the most fun I've ever had gaming.
If it wasn't such a colossal hassle, I'd still like to pick up my Shammy and wander around for a bit.
Oh well, now its all 1080p and 5.1 suround sound, but how I did love that crappy PITA game.
Sigh.
XBL: LarssonGWJ (aka the Victim)
Never played it, but this thread reads like an abused wife support group forum.
The man wears a bucket of KFC on his head. I wouldn't expect anything less. - Pred
Ah, she calls to me, as well.
I was at the local CompUSA yesterday (on what I assume is its last day before closing forever), and I grabbed a copy of the Platinum edition for $4. I have no time to play EQ (or any game, really - which is why I lurk at GWJ, to game vicariously), but bringing that box home gave me a warm feeling. Memories of playing online with friends around the country, using Battlelink (I think that was the name) for voice chat over the Internet - very cool for 1999/2000. Thanks for giving voice to my thoughts, Elysium!
www.enworld.org
This brings back sooo many memories, mostly good ones.
I played a Wizard on Povar.
I agree with those that remember EQ as one of the most fun gaming experiences of their lives. I was completely addicted to this game back in my younger days, playing easily on average 4-5 hours a night on weeknights. Bought the expansions and played until...hmm...I think the last expansion I played was Planes of Power. I have fond memories of some great exp groups and some pretty intense raids. Plane of Fear and Plane of Hate both scared the crap outta me, mostly because breaking into either could be an extremely harrowing experience, and corpse runs to either were something to be avoided. It was so damned easy to screw up in the entrance to Hate. One wrong move by any of 30+ raiders after the 'port in and everyone is toast. Aggro through walls sucks, don't it?
I think (looking back) that it was the penalty for dying that made EQ so intense and gripping at times.
You really did not want to die in this game, because the consequences ranged from quite annoying (long corpse run) to potentially dire (corpse run to an out-of-the-way/dangerous place like Hate or Fear, big xp loss + possible loss of corpse and all your equipment).
Man, I could sit here and go on and on and on.
Definitely touched a nerve with this one Ely!
"I have not supped of Buffy, nor have I supped in any wise during the absence of Firefly. When Firefly returns again in glory, then shall I sup at the table of Whedon." - Fedaykin98
LOL QFT. I played a mage on Fennin Ro and was in one of the top two uberguilds that moved to Druzzil Ro when EQ had its first ever server split. It was crowded as hell and I remember making 40-50 mostly by grinding Freeport guards. I think part of the reason it was so strong for us was because EQ literally made you spend so much time in the same places so they became "real" to us. Add to that the go anywhere, get killed type of exploration, no guide rails etc and if you survived that and the long travel times, the sense of immersion really go to you, because you literally had to run EVERYWHERE and actually had to be there when the boat came etc, it felt like you were in the world. You couldn't just hop on a gryphon and then go get coffee. I was also one of the guys that spearheaded the EQ stratics thread for the idea of the "mage summon" which eventually became the Call of the Hero spell. However by the time it was put into the game I was no longer playing
Yup, as much as we dismiss the "plastic" themepark-ness of WoW, I bet those guys are going through the same thing. I still think EQ has the most lore and fleshed out world of any MMO, just because they were well in over their heads and trying to do so much. The cities had way more detail, NPCs etc, there was more race diversity and there were also plenty of places that were off the beaten path and were also unique. i.e. the temple in permafrost or finding Splitpaw in a PuG and being diverted for an entire evening thinking we were like the first people EVAR. I also remember exploring and visiting every nook and cranny of Highhold Pass and thinking there is so much detail here but there's nothing to do here, no quests, its not a starting city etc, this is such a waste. Another classic example of that kind of mad genius that comes about when no one knows what they're doing
In the years that followed every year or two I would listen to the music and be instantly transported back to that world as if I was still playing. There was always the feeling of, if I were to log in again, everyone and everything would still be playing locked into a time capsule and old friends would still be waiting for me. However as the years passed, i did this ritual again last year and finally the music had become just another game memory of something I had beaten. That's when you know you are finally over your ex.
Oh I have to give credit to EQ for giving me two things though. 1) My social skills lol, EQ really got me out of my shell and helped me to be able to relate to a wide variety of people, even if most of them were American. 2) My love of travel, I never really cared to travel before EQ and didn't know that it would be a cure for a lot of jadedness back then, post EQ I moved to the US on my lonesome with no one to greet me at the other end except for some online friends a month or two into the itenary and I didn't think twice about it because in my mind I had already done all my big bad travelling and exploration in EQ and I was eager to now conquer the world in a similar fashion irl. Plane ride? pft its just like the boat ride from East Freeport to Butcherblock Mtns, what could go wrong? it certainly can't be as bad as the Erudite newbie zone can it?
I never got into Everquest. UO was my addiction for 4+ years. The first year of it was the wildwest of online persistent worlds. Stealing houses (HOUSES!) from people, what a rush.
Do you ever walk alone like a drifter in the dark?
I also played Ultima Online. What a great game. A few weeks ago I was asked by a friend to play again. He wanted to assemble some friends to restart our Ultima Online addiction. I wonder what happened to this idea.
I still remember putting on a bright yellow jester cap that I cursed myself so that it wouldn't come off and getting asked every 10 minutes why I was wearing such a stupid hat. *sigh* I had lots of fun.
"I'd take the awe of understanding over the awe of ignorance any day." ~ Douglas Adams
You should check out Shards of Dalaya. It's a public server that runs a version of Everquest that has been modified. Most of the zones are there but all of the mobs and lore have been changed. They average about 400 ppl on peak nights which seems pretty good while playing.
Steam ID: DistantSound
A pox on EQ!!!!. A pox I say!!! Although EQ was the original reason I upgraded to broadband, ("Gee honey its only $25 more a month and we can drop the 2nd phone line") it quickly became a source of major gaming agita and a blackhole that sucked my space time continuum bone dry. I am primarily a single player PC gamer. Although I loved the complexity of the world and the ability to help noobs, the minute you went outside a safe zone (to get XP) you were toast.
I finally gave up in frustration after the fifth time I tried to recover my highest level character's body in King Xorbb's Maze. Arggggghhhh I'm paying $15 bucks a month to be this aggravated!!??!! After I canceled my account, removed the game, wiped the directory, microwaved the CD and shredded the Mastercard I used to fund my insanity, I was ready to join the living again.
EQ taught me one thing though. Don't pay the money if you aren't having fun. A lesson I applied to Eve online (gankers) and WOW (griefers). With LOTRO I joined a Kinship right at the beginning which made for a more enjoyable experience.
Thanks for letting me vent.
"Do. Or do not. There is no try." - Yoda