Death of a Game: The EverQuest Franchise

Norrath, how we once knew ye.
Thanks to Joshua Sloan for helping edit the script :)
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#DOAG

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

RIP Brad McQuaid. Without you, none of this would have been possible. Thanks.

[@dankisking]

We had a celebration of life at Mcquaids in Halas on Project 1999

[@Abololo33]

N.S. Geeeey.

[@Novusod]

Brad McQuaid may be gone but his legacy lives on. The Everquest franchise is far from dead. Everquest 2 serves a niche audience. Niche game does not mean bad game. EQ2 is actually the best of what it does which is offer complex world building. WoW is the McDonald's of MMOs. Just because they have sold the "most" hamburgers does mean they sell the best food. Far from it.

[@wedge72]

Hopefully Pantheon Rise of the Fallen is completed and continues on in the vision he has set for it. Brad gave us all many, many hours of enjoyment in the worlds he built for us.

[@eisenhorn5494]

Hail Brad McQuaid!

[@Syntania]

I met my current husband while playing Everquest. His Iksar monk killed my Dark Elf Shadowknight. We've been married for 10 years now.

[@MyNameIsntDamien]

Syntania I met my wife in EQ2. I was an Iksar monk, too. Married 7 years.

[@TheKrisBunch]

Syntania awesome. My wife and I didn’t meet in EQ but we cemented our early relationship via 12 hour marathon sessions.

[@wyrmswyrd]

I hear you Syntania. I witnessed many a case as you describe, and many long term rl friendships grow out of playing together. EQ had a very close knit community since it was necessary to cooperate to achieve almost everything in game. People developed real bonds of friendship due to that, unlike modern day soloable-content MMO's where the toxicity is generally unbearable.

[@elspoko]

I met my wife playing the game. Here we are, 14 years later with four kids and still together.

[@kittykeight24]

My folks aswell. My first MMORPG was EQ

[@MissMarvel_]

I love watching your MMO videos because they all go along the lines of, "Everything was going great, until 2004."

[@bradleyallen6883]

You have awesome taste in channels!

[@yelladude6969]

Spongebob, Simpsons, Everquest. Everything goes bad by 2004.

[@yelladude6969]

@@MissMarvel_ I know. I've been telling everybody that WoW was responsible for the decline of Spongebob..

[@judgeprime3730]

@@bradleyallen6883 simp

[@ethan6322]

WoW was the worst thing to happen to MMOs

[@SyndAg3nT]

While it sounds cliche, EverQuest was my escape from high school life. The internet was still new, and I felt like I was a part of my own little society. I met people who were similar to me, and made friends that lasted for years. While that world now is gone, I still have the memories of spending 4-6 hours in a single group, talking about anything and everything. It's something that no other MMO has been able to provide. Many games now, in the beginning phase, allow the game to be played mostly in a single-player style. In no way am I saying that makes the game "easy-mode", but it just loses the feel of working with other people in a cooperative world. It could just be that I'm 20 years older now - and while I still enjoy gaming very much, there isn't that spark that pulls me in. I had my hopes up for EverQuest Next, and when it was cancelled, I was upset. However, I still knew deep down that I'd be playing a game without all the good friends that I originally met back in the day. I'm not sure where they're at. That youthfulness of staying up to 2AM to complete a raid then going to school is long gone and so are they. Still, I have the memories of a completely different world that put my imagination into overdrive. Here's to the game that gave me so much growing up!

[@Fixwec]

same...so same...

[@chrisjbui]

Check out Pantheon.

[@HighVelocitySteel]

like wise only was in middle school.

[@planescaped]

@Thomas B I got the same experience from Ultima Online and SWG back in the day as well. It's not just that they don't make MMO's like they used to... the MMO audience isn't what it used to be. WoW made them mainstream, and it kind of killed the magic.

[@qik3300]

Yeah what really killed EQ wasn't Wow but EQ2. Many bonds had been formed and guilds were hollowed out as half the active players started turning in stuff and champs to boost their launch in their EQ2 gear and switching. I never switched but lost interest after friends were never online again after that. Many would have happily have played both. I play EQ today Teek quests and new content gave it extended life IMO it's free and a great way to kill an hour.

[@Sonnabend00]

Ah yes, Evercrack, the game that defined game addiction.

[@BloodoperaBlackvomit]

Tetris.

[@deyangrigorov9858]

World of Warcrack

[@peopleddiagram2920]

It certainly makes sense when pyschologists were employed during development.

[@ZenoDLC]

It was based on Multi Undergraduate Destroyer...

[@muess]

@@deyangrigorov9858 Just a child of the one that started it all! Even the name World of Warcrack is a derivative of Evercrack

[@KayossSZ]

Been playing P99 for the last year and a half and when I get a new computer I'm considering trying a live TLP server. For as old as EQ is, and whatever issues it has, at least the staff behind it isn't being investigated for a f'ing sex abuse scandal right now...

[@otakucouture]

Wait what???

[@mage1439]

Is it still viable to start playing on P99?

[@Guirssane]

@@mage1439 sure, on green plenty of ppl to level with even at low level

[@nickeicher9106]

Great video, it broke my heart to watch it. Everquest was the game of my youth, I was obsessed for years. I even played EQ2 for quite awhile. When Next was canceled, a part of me died

[@conorflanagan9000]

I never knew Champions of Norrath was an EverQuest title... Wow... Thanks for giving my childhood some added depth, NerdSlayer!

[@Darkone348]

Champions of Norrath and the sequel are genuinely good games, I wish they were ported to PC.

[@conorflanagan9000]

@@Darkone348 I feel the same way, man. I sank an ungodly amount if my childhood into both of them! If they ever made a new one, I would be all over that!

[@allenharper2928]

T it and it's sequel were a lot like... What was it, Baldur's Gate?

[@elmoisred616]

Norrath is in the title lol

[@aidenpryde8112]

There was also an Everquest rts

[@aphelon6415]

Imagine watching death of a game: World of Warcaft someday

[@vandakaii2893]

As it goes right now Blizzard is def not far off from it at this point..

[@mayhem2648]

@@vandakaii2893 I think its pretty far considering they are releasing old content and its being successful at least until WoTLK

[@PiroKUSS]

That would be historical.

[@vandakaii2893]

@@mayhem2648 I was not going from the numbers that just play WoW I was also going off of their political view and stance in the world and their current marketing issues along with a game that has been on the decline for a while now... You cant expect a game to last much longer when you have ppl within the company telling white ppl.. mainly men their racist etc etc and it float for as long as it has....

[@robertmartin1254]

Can't wait to watch that! Wow suks. Too easy and worst graphics of all the games.

[@ryanhernandez8883]

EverQuest is the only MMO I've ever played that made you feel like you were really living in a dangerous world where you needed to rely on others to get anything done and survive. The death penalties and overall difficulty of the game made it so you really played cautiously, but this also made victories and leveling up feel so rewarding and added to the excitement as well. When you finally got stronger and got better gear and went back to your home town, you really felt like you were a hero returning home from dangerous far off lands with stories to tell and battle scars to show. All the low level newbies would crowd around you to inspect your gear and drool over your cloak of flames you got from a dragon's hoard (knowing full well only a handful of people were lucky enough to posses such a powerful artifact). No other MMO has managed to capture this level of immersion, it just gets lost when trying to appeal to casuals. EQ will always hold a special place in my heart.

[@63Malda]

One of my favorite descriptions of EQ was "it was a world that was trying to kill you". I miss the challenge and the original dungeons were amazing. Tight, narrow corridors, hidden rooms, traps, falling off ledges/bridges, no one make dungeons like that anymore. Plane of Mischief is a unique zone.

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

Thank you for the support as always everyone and I hoped you like my rendition of the story of EverQuest. I realize my pronunciation seems to be triggering some people, and just to be completely transparent I have always had a speech impediment pronouncing R's it's been like that since i started the channel but due to my increased popularity and saying WoW like 100 times this video it was more obvious :D. Also I forgot to mention in terms of games like EverQuest, you guys should check out Project Gorgon. It's very EQ1 esque and it has quite good reviews around it! store.steampowered.com/app/342940/Project_Gorgon/

[@eval_is_evil]

Who the heck would be triggered by pronunciation ? OCD types or very bitter people venting their disappointment of life upon others.

[@308473mb]

Great vid. Never noticed anything of the sorts, perhaps because I was happily enjoying the actual content of the vid.

[@jesserogalski1402]

Hey guy. Was just busting. Wasn't meant to be taken as mean spirited in any way.

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

I guess it's more enjoyable then the actual content for some lol

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

Thank you so much :)

[@michaelb5299]

I'm still friends with my entire guild in EQ from 2000-2003. I never experienced that sense of community again since, and I've played over 20 MMOs.

[@Hijynx87]

Do you boys and girls mmo hop together? I wish I still had communication with my old eq friends, but AIM is gone lol.

[@michaelb5299]

@@Hijynx87 Nah, I played Rift with a few of them for about a year. Now, I just keep in contact with them on social media mostly. I'm actually now playing EQ again, and having a blast.

[@definatelynotalpharius]

You're a fantastic documentary maker. We need more like you. It's just you and noclip doing this sort of thing at the moment. Coming from a massive games company myself it's so heartening to hear history and tales of woe from other developers regarding what could/did/possibly go wrong in deep game development. I'm thrilled you're making these videos and just binging on them at the moment. Don't die. That walk back to your corpse is a doozy.

[@Rmbao]

I played everquest with some kids at my school and we made a leveling friend that worked in the World Trade Center in Manhattan. He never logged back on after 9/11. We have no idea if he didn't make it or just made different life choices after a traumatic experience. He was a High Elf Enchanter.

[@CaptainLekirk]

Thats.... heavy. Eesh.

[@husskiii]

That's sad asf hope he's still alive

[@TeamMBaku88]

Sad story.

[@onigames7309]

Damn.

[@i-never-look-at-replies-lol]

This better be a derivative of some weird copypasta bro. wtf

[@brego129]

Playing EverQuest when it first released and playing many of the big MMOs released since, I can simply say no MMO has ever recaptured the atmosphere, wonder, and feeling of exploration and playing EverQuest. The soul of EverQuest for me really started dying after PoP expansion. The content was fun, sure, but the world also got much smaller with the PoK books.

[@dustinhiggins710]

As a current EQ player to this day, started in 2001, you missed out on 2 of the best expansions imo. House of Thule and Rain of Fear I think were some of the best EQ content ever created.

[@cockiesun]

@@dustinhiggins710 Do you think EQ is still worth picking up for a casual player? Does it still have enough of its original essence?

[@dustinhiggins710]

@@cockiesun Casual? Sure. At max level you can explore all of these game basically. A tank class is the best, SK or Paladin for solo/molo play. If you want original EQ, P99 is there. EQ Live has some of that feel but many QoL changes had made the game easier so new players can catch up.

[@edvinaleksandrov1417]

idk, have you never played WoW

[@brego129]

@@edvinaleksandrov1417 Not when it first came out and overall feeling there was "meh".

[@willieo6027]

It's really a shame. You can say what you want about what features make a good MMO, what mechanics, which one sold the most copies - but as someone who went from playing text based MUDs, to early MMOs, and still plays MMOs to this day I can tell you that nothing has ever rivaled the early days of Everquest. The awe you felt stepping into that world, the danger, seeing that Sand Giant in the Oasis for the first time, nothing has ever rivaled that experience. WoW had much more polish on it and in some ways, was more fun but it never gave that sense of awe and amazement that EQ did. I think EQ was a lightning in a bottle experience that probably can never be recaptured short of an entirely new experience, like a VR MMO.

[@ObscuredByTime]

I was there, Willie. Fuck yes. My wife an I ended up homeless for 3 months because of it, with no regrets. I recognize the real ones, and you're one. We're in a special club, I hope you know that. We were part of history.

[@galadhlinn]

My first online game was the MUD, "The Two Towers, " which last time I checked was still running. I left Two Towers for EverQuest when Kunark was about to be released. EQ is still the game I look back at that scared me like a little kid. Fond memories!

[@jayeisenhardt1337]

Damn Dan! Evercrack! Reminds me of a friend Danlean when I was a noob. The zone outta Rathe Mountains during some even. Turn back yelling at him and I don't think he seen it or knew what was coming. A dragon over the mountains, got away safely but he just lays down to sleep in death. Scary awesome creature as high levels were falling by the dozens while running away just the same. One shot. Just the day before in west Karana that group of friends were talking bout killing me over the 70 plat I got from some other adventurer passing through. I hid it well So even if they tried anything. lol

[@willieo6027]

Is your point supposed to refute something I said? Cuz it doesn't really

[@willieo6027]

You're 0/2 on "comments that make any sense" how about a third try that actually does?

[@mggentry]

I played EQ in my late teens, I'm in my mid 30's, and I STILL have dreams where I'm playing EQ or there's some new expansion I'm playing

[@dookietoon7198]

me too !

[@xanthowl623]

I'm glad I'm not alone. It was a sacred experience.

[@scarlet8078]

I was too young for EQ but I have those dreams about WoW. I was a bit too young for that, too, but I pestered my brother til he taught me how to play & I loved the game so much. It was the prettiest, happiest experience & I met friends that I still have, over a decade later. Ironically it also helped my academics, bc my mom threatened to take away my PC if I didn't get As on my exams lol. I do still have dreams about those early years, playing a bright-eyed night elf running through the original peaceful glades of Teldrassil

[@lairdmichaelscott]

2023 about to start and another great expansion just came out for EQ 1 (still better than 2, despite the graphics). We get one every year and new things are always being added. The game now has thousands of zones. Guild raids are capped at 54 people and there is always a waiting list, and there are many guilds and many servers. I agree the game has not been monetized properly, but the fact it has a strong player base after 24 years is eventually going to cause it to dawn on someone that it should be.

[@Datsugahwallsplitta]

Just hearing the music takes me back and gets me emotional.

[@danlewis2249]

How bout that ‘A Skeleton’ laugh

[@wedge72]

I get goosebumps and a smile every time I hear it.

[@gandolan1473]

@@danlewis2249 i heard that and flipped my shit

[@nastynvte9876]

I was 7 years old when my dad was already raiding as a top level paladin, I remember watching him for hours on end the first year until he finally got me an account and let me play. It was like a whole different world that sucked me in, I was so mesmerized by the game it's indescribable. The music definitely gets me emotional today and probably will always. I still play WoW and miss those certain characteristics of EQ all the time and some of the classes that are not present in WoW.

[@markcarpenter6020]

I still remember the loading screen sayo. Teaching snakes to kick

[@northsouthgaming8001]

Eq will never be dead for me. I still remember my first trek from Qeynos to EC tunnel. Hearing then seeing a hill giant for the first time. About gave me a heart attack! Then hugging the zone wall in kith with all those creepys about! And then the glorious chat spam of EC with the hustle and bustle of a player economy. If i visit a progression server I still get a good feeling if EC is bustling. The WoW exodus really hit our guild hard. Two of my best buds left for WoW. One of which bought me the WoW game and sent it to me in the mail with the cavaet i try it for at least a month. I did and hated it. They werent coming back. Man the early days of EQ will forever be etched in my memories.

[@MsWillowbayOrelse]

I played p99 for this reason. EC still has the seller spam which is wonderful. I remember when Kithicor was a mid level zone and the GM event that made it into the horror zone it is today. It is an amazing game and even as "dead" as it is suppose to be p99 has an average of 1k players during peak usa times.

[@crowsbridge]

heh, I remember a guy made the trip from Q to EC on the Rallos server, only to find out that the trade zone was Greater fay. Though, I suppose he went to freeport to catch the boat, he was still surprised.

[@wildcat31772]

exactly everything you said was basically my experience lol

[@drstevendc]

Same getting to the EC tunnel with out a dam puma killing you, was a thrill

[@3ron]

I can still hear people asking for a SOW at the tunnels.

[@fluffywolfo3663]

"When was the last time you heard of someone beating Everquest?" "When was the last time you heard of someone _playing_ Everquest?" "That's fair." --Sword Art Online Abridged.

[@metagen77]

Why would anyone watch that trash

[@buntado6]

@@metagen77 I eat trashy things sometimes, guilty pleasures, and in the end someone had to watch it before telling everyone that it was trash. And in the end, even bad stuff can inspire good parodies.

[@src175]

@@metagen77 He's referencing the abridged series on KZbin, not the original show. I mean, do you really expect Japanese people to have actually played Everquest? No, they had their own MMOs.

[@calli.catastrophe]

for the record, I still play EQII from time to time..it's my guilty pleasure, and one of my favorite classic games. The max level has been upped due to expansions, and there's currently another expansion on the horizon right now, to compete with WoW's Shadowlands. I will always go back to EQII. 1) It's free to play no matter your level, unlike WoW [unless something changed that I'm unaware of], 2) It has actual guild halls...like PHYSICAL places to meet up with your guild, unlike WoW [unless....see statement above] 3) The amount of creativity one can execute in their own home, or on their own island is something I will come back for time and time again 4) The graphics aren't all bright and pretty like WoW...there are obvious gloomy, disgusting, sometimes terrifying creatures and places in EQII, which if that were even true for WoW, I couldn't take it seriously...just look at the scenery where Blood Elves are from. 5) I can't bring myself to betray EQII for WoW, when WoW has so many inspired-by-everquest creatures in its world. Again, go back to where the Blood Elves are from and kill a tree. Same thing was in everquest. I tried playing WoW, and the entire time, all I could do was see it as some sort of rip-off...call me an elitist, or a die-hard EQ fan...but that's just how I feel. I'm sure I'm not the only one.

[@fluffywolfo3663]

@@src175 I am indeed. Sword Art Online Abridged is HILARIOUS. There's a lot of reasons, but my favorite part is that it takes advantage of the fact that This Is A Videogame. Growing up, reading stuff like dot-hack, manga about MMOs always felt like it was on another planet from me. So it's a breath of fresh air to see SAOA reference stuff like Bethesda, Ubisoft, bad connections (this is LITERALLY the first time I've seen a bad connection referenced in a story like this) NPC behavior, and how imperfect videogames can really be.

[@sasmidraegoon4086]

Was really looking forward to trying EQ Next. Still painful thinking about it's cancellation.

[@lostsanityreturned]

Fuck daybreak, the way they handled both it and landmark is disgusting.

[@jakob244]

As a PlanetSide fan I'm still mad at them for releasing the garbage game that is PlanetSide 2. It's better to have no sequel than to have a really bad sequel.

[@pootlesnoot8278]

Many of the devs were picked up by Intrepid Studios to make Ashes of Creation

[@sasmidraegoon4086]

That's one of the many reason's I'm curious about Ashes now.

[@Shironen2011]

I was a betatester for Landmark, so I feel your pain.

[@mitchellhorton9382]

LMAO that ending makes me think you need to do a video on Star Citizen. 6+ years, 200mil, still don't have core gameplay mechnics established

[@mitchellhorton9382]

But it occupies this weird space between life and death. It's like Schrodinger's Game.

[@lostsanityreturned]

Hmmm? Starcitizen has a lot of gameplay mechanics established, it may be taking forever but anyone who follows it knows that progress is being made steadily. Which is rather impressive given the sort of shit they have claimed will be in the game, I called bullshit on a lot of features thinking it would be cut down... Then they started to implement them. That said I would rather they just get the damn singleplayer game out. Nutso fans and nutso antifans aside I expect the game will come out one day barring some sort of massive legal issues -cough-

[@Relatyvity]

Oh god not again...

[@justinrice5405]

@@lostsanityreturned The anti-fans are just as rabid as the extreme fanboys at this point. Although the skeptics definitely have some merit in their arguments, anyone who follows the game can see that progress has been made. Squadron 42 really needs to be out, though. At the least, a solid single-player will silence a lot of the critics who scream "scam".

[@ragzaugustus]

Don't you poor fool, the cultist will come out of their hellish low-FPS nightmare world and defend the GLORY OF CHRIS ROBERTS! Ignoring the detail that the fucker hasn't made any games since Freelancer and is basically a failed movie producers.

[@GenoBlast1717]

Everquest will never die for me. It has a sort of magic about it that I can't put into words. Everquest is the only game I've ever played where I actually felt like I could escape to another world filled with adventure, excitement, terror, and a great community of other live players.

[@MikeySaysGo]

I recently went back to EQ1 and I am amazed at how many people are still playing.

[@nonnel0355]

1500 pop on p99 most nights

[@LividImp]

If you can get over the wonky UI and dated graphics, the gameplay is still solid. I'd still say stick with Project1999 or an equivalent though.

[@_Chipster]

Or you can just download a new better UI from eqinterface

[@lucasdude]

this is good to know. ive considered coming back to the game so i just might. i loved eq2 as well but i know that ones pretty barren unfortunately. plus the f2p version (at least the last time i played which was 3 yrs ago) is total ass. cant even talk to ppl in the chat to ask to grp up?? like what a load of shit honestly. if u want ppl to get into the game and actually pay monthly why restrict them from socializing in a god damn mmo. made no sense. id never played a f2p version of a game w such an awful "format" before. still pretty livid over it.

[@TheKrisBunch]

MikeySaysGo yup. It isn’t dead

[@richardp2267]

I remember the great times before Eq had an Auction house or bazaar, Where you were selling bags of gear through your inventory in the EC tunnel. Also while selling your skills to help people get their Jboots quest from giants, An orc belt runs. There has never been a game that I played after EQ that held the same depth and challenge.

[@clklipfel]

Pretty much everything Luclin added lowered my interest in EQ and his massive immersion.

[@crowsbridge]

velious was the last expansion I really enjoyed. Luclin wasn't too bad, but PoP made travel too easy and make the world smaller.

[@minerva9843]

@@crowsbridge yeah but the Nexus and having a graveyard was a godsend

[@jayeisenhardt1337]

Still that bazaar and the gambling you could do there /rand The performers, breakdancing dorf poppin and lockin with the old models. Best money I ever spent.

[@kant12]

Classic EQ had very little challenge. The hardest part was finding something to do while you med for 10 minutes.

[@sabrecatsmiladon7380]

EQ is still rolling on with a new Expansion in a few days

[@GeorgeZimmermen]

You gotta be kidding me

[@pandabear1244]

I just picked EQ back up. Absolutely NO other game has come close. I mean...nothing was memorable with WoW, while memories of EQ will live forever. Even after taking about a 10 year break...I have nothing but fond memories of EQ. Long live Verant! SoE can take a back seat. They ruined everything.

[@seancostello26]

@@pandabear1244 wow was a huge pile of shit that took advantage of popularity and a game system that they basically stole from eq and the rest of the genre. Wow was practically the death of the mmorpg as a whole, since nothing good has come out since.

[@markcarpenter6020]

@@seancostello26 wow was a dumbed down version of EQ

[@seancostello26]

@@markcarpenter6020 indeed

[@cadbane7780]

😥 This game changed my world. 1 fact: I actually knew Y2K was fine bc I chatted with my Russian friends before we went out

[@zzygyy]

Ain't that the truth. I was playing Ultima online at the time. A friend sent ICQ message "The world didn't end. Gonna log in and hunt"

[@TheInnerSanctuary]

I completely forgot about EQ: Next. WeCouldHaveHaditAll.jpeg

[@metalsludge8205]

MY EMPIRE OF DIRT

[@bobjeezorham7658]

I'll be entirely honest, the only things I know about EverQuest is from the Champions of Norrath games. I feel I'm gonna learn quite a lot from this video.

[@buddyhartley2829]

Great video. You've really put a lot of great thought into your analysis. With that said, I take a very different view of what happened during the period from the launch of the original EQ, through the following launches of both WoW and EQ2. Simply put, the original EQ was the first huge game offering gamers a chance to play something radically different from anything that they had played before. It was a unique, and ground-breaking experience, and those of us who were there will never forget the feeling of the early days. Nor, I might add, will those days ever be duplicated, no matter how hard we try. Things were just bigger then, and inspired so much more wonder. We were like little kids with our first bicycle, where everything was new and exciting. Once we became teenagers, a new bike under the Christmas tree was never going to be as thrilling, no matter how hard we tried. Moving forward, the battle between Wow and EQ2 was a lopsided contest from the very beginning. Blizzard was launching Wow with a huge, dedicated fan-base already in place. As you mentioned, Blizzard had developed a string of leading-edge, immensely popular mainstream games, and gamers who had never gone near the original Everquest, were waiting in eager anticipation to try the new game that Blizzard was launching, simply because it was a new Blizzard game. In comparing numbers, relatively few people had played Everquest, when compared to the numbers of gamers who had played Blizzard games. So when WoW came on the scene, suddenly hundreds of thousands of people were experiencing their FIRST MMORPG world, and went through those same "first-time" feelings of wonder as those very first EQ pioneers. NOTHING can ever match the first time, and this was the huge hurdle that EQ2 was never able to overcome, and nor could they ever. Why? Because the only people excited about the launch of EQ2, were those who had played the original Everquest, which, when compared to the numbers who had previously played Blizzard games, was very small. EQ2, therefore, had 2 huge strikes against it before it was even out of the gate. One, it wasn't a Blizzard Game, and so would never attract the same number of players as its main competitor, and two, it's main player base would come from those who had begun there MMO experience with the original Everquest, and were looking for a new "crack" that would replicate the wonder and excitement of their early EQ days. EQ2 was never going to match the numbers of Blizzard's World of Warcraft, nor offer the same "virgin" experience as did the original Everquest. In that respect, I believe that the gameplay of EQ2 has been wrongfully blamed for its dismal showing against WoW. There are many who believe that EQ2 had the best gameplay of the three, and as long as you went into the game with maturity, knowing it could never replicate the experience of those first baby steps in the original Everquest, then it was a fine and fulfilling MMORPG.

[@stonedwizard0420]

This comment deserves far more likes.

[@SD-ly1sh]

Everquest raids were a full time job.

[@belle2541]

Actually, they still are.

[@igfmvp]

Listen belle , saying that those things are still true is like saying people still play Monopoly or mousetrap. While it's true in scientific definition it is definitely not true in spirit

[@jayeisenhardt1337]

people still play Monopoly

[@kant12]

Current raids aren't bad. You can finish them all in about 3.5 hours. Most good guild just raid once a week or split it up into twice. The amount of content has gone down over the years but the raids aren't bad. Their are always a few really difficult ones that keep a lot of guilds from progressing until they're tuned down later in the year. So, it's not all easy mode like the video implies. I actually think they've found a good balance recently.

[@odin6667]

Shawn D dam, reading this just brought me back to early highschool when I would go to school with 2 hours of sleep because the raid took 9 hours...

[@pederhalverson2591]

R.I.P Brad, you were an absolute giant to millions of people. You will be missed! 😭🙏🏻

[@Llyander]

This really is a shame. The Everquest 2 "Betrayal" questline where you can switch factions is still one of the most epic gaming experiences I've ever had, and one I still look back on fondly.

[@lucasdude]

god same.. i wish wow would do something like that. it was amazing. and the fact u could stay exiled opening urself up to pvp on both sides on a pvp server?? that was just the best. i was a ratonga troub in exile was even in a guild of a decent roster. probably the best time i had pvp-wise in any mmo ive played. and it was so cool to be able to play any race u wanted in w/e faction u wanted. since eq2s exile system im always disappointed that im so restricted on other mmos just bc i want to play a certain race or class

[@Ashannon888]

I'm honestly surprised WoW hasn't done that yet. I know a lot of folk who'd kill their in game grandmother to swap their Blood Elf to Alliance or their gnome to Horde.

[@sarccacious]

Why would WoW do this? They make a killing charging people for a faction / race / server change. Edit: oh I see, not just a faction change but, take a horde race to alliance and vice versa. Yeah, if they did that it would be cool but, to be honest they would realistically just charge people for it.

[@danskemp4486]

That was truly an awesome quest line. I loved having a Troll Paladin, the double-takes you would get from people running through Qeynos were a lot of fun.

[@jackbeeman9177]

I'm so glad people remember that questline fondly because it also struck me as one of the most unique experiences I ever had in an MMO. I am fairly confident that I was the first dark elf paladin on my server or if people completed before me they immediately quit the character and didn't play. Either way I can't even describe how bad ass it was to be playing on the qeynos side and be the only dark elf in sight. People were constantly oogling me and once they grouped with me and discovered that I also figured out how to tank fairly well, I gained a good amount of trust in the grouping community as kind of a "mascot" or whatever. I never had to wait to get in groups because everyone wanted the weirdo dark elf paladin. I also completed the entire betrayal quest with a random iksar bruiser (was that the dark side name?) that I met up with right as I started the questline. He ended up completing it with me the whole way and became a monk. It was a long time playing before I started to see anyone else who had finished the betrayal besides myself and that monk guy. Either way, I'm not a super elite player by any stretch of the imagination so I've never been able to claim any kind of special credit for doing something super skilled or special in any game. This little tiny piece of infamy really made me feel great and made me love eq2 for what it was at launch despite its flaws.

[@zzygyy]

EverCrack!!!!!

[@Masonicon]

World of Warcraft are Evercrack 2.0

[@michaelstriker8698]

Magic: tG was gamer crack. EQ was gamer heroin.

[@darth_yoda]

Zakaria Shalih WoW don't come close to Evercrack :P

[@jamoecw]

part of the evercrack nickname is the tendency of hardcore players to start using crack in order to progress in the game at higher levels. i personally knew 2 people who ended up getting addicted to crack in order to stay awake long enough to try for their epic quest. the class quests had you kill a certain type of monster, which had a random drop of an item you needed. you would complete the quest by getting enough of this random drop (possible of multiple different types of items as well). monsters spawned within a random area at a random time within certain bounds, higher level monsters tended to have a longer respawn time and wider range of time it could spawn. the items needed for the higher level quests became a rarer drop as well. in addition to all of this drops were not restricted to those that killed it, so anyone could run up and grab all the items from your kill. when all of this is taken together this meant that you had to stay active for the entire time the monster could spawn so that you could get to it first. the big problem is that these monsters were usually unique and spawned randomly within a period of days with a respawn cooldown in timeframe of weeks. with all of this it was entirely possible that someone wanting the high value loot might steal the loot from your kill (or this might be your strategy to get the item) or more likely that what you need won't drop at all, requiring you to get some rest and make another attempt. of course it isn't like you can get by with a previous class quest, because there were 3-5 class quests across 50-70 levels with one of them in the first ten levels. within those first ten levels they had tutorial quests to get you started so that you could progress by those quests alone for the first 10 or so levels. after that point you needed to (for the most part) join a group and take on higher level monsters to grind up to the next class quest. there were a few generic quests sprinkled in between, however for the most part one had to play all classes or talk with friends in order to get the story of what was the lore of the world. this was a game released in the era of baldur's gate, which was such inundated with lore that most people skipped most of it and still was exposed to more than most modern games. as a result if your interest was the lore you pretty much had to be on crack in order to grind enough to get the lore on your own at roughly the same rate as a shut in does news for the real world.

[@Negus222]

NeverRest!

[@jansanxj]

Everquest with my friends back in high school is to this day probably the most transformative gaming experience I have ever had. So amazing when it first came out.

[@fixthesegames6303]

Your intro is dope af

[@LividImp]

I hate all intros...except this one. This is the first intro I think I've ever liked.

[@WondersChannel]

His intro is cannabis? 🤔

[@eval_is_evil]

Agreed

[@eval_is_evil]

@@WondersChannel more like mutated ganja of awesome

[@quixadhal]

Hmmm, I disagree with the comparison between EQ2 and WoW. I played EQ2 from launch to the infamous "Christmas Rollback" incident, at which point all my friends and I jumped ship to WoW. Part of the argument presented here is that EQ2 failed because it was overly simplified, but if you played the game AT LAUNCH, you know it was neither easy nor simple. That happened gradually over the next year, and was likely true from 2006 onwards. At launch, EQ2 was almost entirely "group required" gameplay. Once you stepped out of the tutorial areas, you'd quickly find that the majority of NPC's were linked into "encounter groups", which made it impossible to pull individual mobs, and unless you killed the entire group, you got no rewards at all. The stated goal of this was to prevent kill stealing, but it also effectively prevented solo gameplay unless you were very very careful. Also, in the original game, you started out as an Archetype (fighter, rogue, wizard, cleric), and played through the newbie content until you specialized into a Class, and then if you played up to level 20 you further specialized into the Subclass that appear as the class you can choose today. The archetype system was very fun.. the first time, but also made rolling an alt very tedius, and so was not very popular. The crafting systems of EQ2, at launch, were also incredibly detailed and required player cooperation to make anything but the most trivial of items. Layers upon layers of cross-profession subcombines meant to make a spell scroll (as a sage), you would need to enlist the help of woodworkers, alchemists, and metalworkers to gather all the components you'd need to actually make a spell scroll. Anyone who played the game will also remember the infamy of Death by Forge, since the crafting mini-game did damage to you when you missed a critical failure counter, and you could die trying to complete an item. :) I think the main reason EQ2 failed was the extremely high system requirements, which a friend of mine who used to work at SOE stated was targeted at a single-core 8GHz CPU, which was what they assumed we'd have by 2009. By contrast, WoW would run on just about anything and still look decent. When you couple that with the technical issues of multiple database rollbacks (both over the Thanksgiving holiday and Christmas holidays), it made the game feel very unfriendly for anyone who wasn't part of a raiding guild. If you were part of a raiding guild, the setback of losing your successful dungeon or raid progress was a huge slap in the face. EQ2's response to these failures was to start ripping out the designs that had made their game unique, watering down content in the process, so by 2006 it did indeed feel like an inferior clone of WoW.

[@lucasdude]

thank u for saying this. not sure how many times ive had to defend what eq2 was and why i loved it so much. i played it up until 06 actually and i had also tried wow but much preferred eq2 at the time. it did have its own identity and a lot of the things it did have wow still doesnt compare. i do play wow now - ive been back since cata - and while its made a lot of progress (and im enjoying the shit outta bfa) there are some things its missing that eq2 had and did very well. i loved having to work for my class specialization. i loved the risks u had to take crafting more complex things. and i loved the amount of actual teamwork w other players the game took in all aspects. it was such a good community too (at least on my main server, runnyeye) and players were ready to help anyone out if they could. hell, on my conjuror i had a friend that would mentor me every day until i got to max. like ud be hard-pressed to find a lot of players like that on wow. i hate that the current game is all about "who can get to max level the fastest" and that a majority of players ust leave everyone - even guildies - in the dust. having played eq, eq2, and vanilla wow i just want that actual sense of community back....

[@lmtsuper]

Played since lunch, up until Kunark expansion, I totally agree with you.

[@TenereAMir]

I played at launch until Jan 2005, and yeah...it was a lot tougher than WoW. In fact, when I went to WoW in Jan, I remember thinking: FFS, I can SOLO EVERYTHING (almost). I still hop into EQ2 about once a year for nostalgia (as I did go back and play it in 2006-08 with friends), but it's all but dead now. Cities are ghost towns :( zones are empty...sad.

[@ericp7340]

Ya unfortunately it's clear he never played EQ2, he was very general will the gameplay and mechanics.

[@andreaswolff4627]

Same here Played EQ2 from release for 3-4 years. After wow released I tried it for a weak and classes felt in comparison boring, crafting was not even comparable, story was a lot deeper abd felt more urgent in EQ2 and EQ2 being less difficult is a joke. Dying left a soul shard for 3 days, that reduced all attributes by 10% and so on. Only thing I can agree on with the comparison is that wow fighting felt less clunky. I did not understand at that time why everybody went to azeroth. But after talking to the early adopters, most of them never played an mmo and actually were only looking for an ingame chat room. Which wow was perfect for, as you actually had to be interested in the game in EQ2 to be able to defeat any enemy etc. Reason WoW won was that it was fool proof. Not because EQ2 was too easy. Just the opposite. It was too complex for most people who wanted to relax after worl or school by simply killing stuff and loot and feel good about themselves. And after 14 years all mmos go with this model of making the player feel like he's/she's the top dog by pressing 1 and killing everything.

[@ericiidx]

My nerdy friend in high school told me I should try this game he's playing, EverQuest, where if you die, you have to successfully run back to your corpse, or you lose everything. I gladly picked it up and met a dwarf donned in leather bondage gear. There was also an ogre that sat at the docks of the desert who would help people in the area keep track of the boat, which ran on the (realtime) hour. He'd roleplay as the ogre and yell "BOTE!"

[@Maioly]

Fun fact: Everquest 1 was banned in brazil because a judge somewhere though her son was wasting too much time playing it. Her reaction was not to make him play less, enforce her power as a parent, instead she just worked to get the game banned instead, where it and anything related to it (but not the sequel) still are banned to this day.

[@ag2238]

Maioly Guess in America and uk we gotta protect video games so nothing like that happens here.

[@lucasdude]

"protect videogames"? what does this even mean lol... maybe that judge should have been an actual parent. cant blame a videogame for shit parenting. its a little thing called parental controls or i dunno simply password locking the computer. its really that fuckin simple.

[@ag2238]

You both took my comment out of context completely. It was meant to be a satirical reply. Why even reply at all in the first place?

[@6StimuL84]

Guess what cannot see sarcasm in text...Try adding a /s at the end.....

[@ag2238]

You are right, but in this situation you can easily see the childish wording and reasoning in the statement.

[@rakeesh22]

Everquest, my first MMO love. God the hours I spent getting my corpse back. Good times!

[@fyurileblanc7206]

my nostalgic moments were the hours i spent camping the nameds for my epics. i understand people don't have to camp and spawn anymore- there are npcs that spawn the epic mobs for them.

[@FadRobW]

As someone who still raids end-game content on an EQ1 live server, Bristlebane, great vid! Hopefully Everquest will never die!

[@PsyloOfficial]

I do also.. RoV 4 LIFE!!

[@seanmartin2382]

My toons are on BB as well...havent played in a while...got back on to complete all the 1.0s I was still missing from back in the day

[@2roly2]

wish they had the Merc NPC's back when I played in 1999 . Took way too long to get groups with my Wizard I only got in groups when I hit 50 cause of the dmg

[@vorpalchicken3140]

Excellent video and tbh hit's most of the truth behind EQ, I'm a 19 year vet of EQ, played Beta as well, SoE and now Daybreak really dropped the ball with the EverQuest franchise, our last hopes now for capturing what was once the best gameplay lies with Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen. No other online MMO I've ever played (and I have tried alot) have ever come close to the sense of satisfaction I gained from playing EQ, I honestly can't even articulate what it is about EQ, but it just has something that no other MMO has ever been able to replicate (Asherons Call came close, RIP AC) I remember reading an article with an EQ2 dev (can't find it, but I know I read it lol) where he stated one of the biggest mistakes they made with EQ2 was basing it on EverQuest and that they should have created a new IP. Everquest is kinda forgotten now, it's sad that such a good game for it's time, should be treated in the way it has been by SoE/Daybreak. I'll probably be saying my final farewells to EQ when Pantheon is released, it will be a sad time and I can genuinely say that there will be tears, this from a 43 year old, EQ has been apart of my life (and family life as my wife also plays EQ along with me) and I will continue to remember the good times in EQ for the rest of my life. GNOMES RULE!

[@MichaelRCarlson]

Agreed. Nothing since has captured that sense of adventure, and sense of anticipation, that EQ had.

[@Tetsu9701]

I played EQOA & FFXI, which was an Japanese skinned EQ. I loved FFXI & Pantheon is the closest thing that I'm gonna get to it. Hope to see you in Terminus!

[@belle2541]

I'm a long-time EQ I player too, I've refused to give up my EQ Cleric to even try to play another game. but I'm looking forward to trying Pantheon--if it ever launches... Still, I'll play EQ I until they take it down.

[@TheBigBadWolf85]

I kinda feel like. It was a Tolken Novel that only a fee of us got to actually live. Because that what it was like. Forget the graphics (albeit that was the only good upgrades and I think it would still be around if not for ever expansion after PoK..)... moving on.. for us few who were so blessed and cursed by this.. experience (it was so much more then a game.) It was a world of it's own. The places.. uhhh... I need to just stop here.. I know you get it.

[@TheBigBadWolf85]

Oh also it's now free to play on steam! Not the same world... sadly.. but you can revisit most places and at least.. to a small degree.. relive a memory.. it's a little hollow these days. .. like going back to the high school you grew up in or the grade school.. when all the kids have gone home and everything is empty.. and you just sit on the swings and remember.... wow. Ok I kinda just bumbed myself out... sorry yall. Chaos Dragons! Best guild ever! Srill Silverpine, Tudden, Kiknrun. Vex server.

[@TheZackofSpades]

Oh heck yeah. Orientation tomorrow and I’m nervous as hell, a nice half hour Nerdslayer special is exactly what I need to calm down enough to sleep.

[@CaptainLekirk]

Let me know how it goes, fam. Sure you'll do great.

[@husskiii]

Just started college I'm not prepared for adulthood bruh lmao

[@skudlugs]

Everquest was a world , a brutal world. We lost xp, we lost levels, we even lost all our gear ! The struggle was real yet we loved it ! You earned stuff, modern mmorpgs are a sham. I was lucky to have been there.

[@leonseuropeanislandadventu7398]

You act like being punished makes it a good game.

[@skudlugs]

@@leonseuropeanislandadventu7398 makes players get good, teamwork too

[@Ted_Bell]

Having nothing to lose makes a meh game.

[@skudlugs]

@@Ted_Bell yes, only ever feared death in EQ1, as it was at start, nowadays its nerfed to

[@lesagemariah]

Omg... Hearing this music... He also wrote the music for Homm. The og game is such a legend.

[@DamonBlackpool]

Older MMOs can have absolutely wonderful Roleplaying Communities on them. Heck, I recently upgraded to a subscription on Ultima Online instead of the Free to Play account due to how much fun I was having roleplaying with Roleplay guilds on one of their servers.

[@guyverjedi]

Everquest brilliant game. Back when games were hard, and progression was tough. Skill in players showed, the quality of gear owned by a player was respected as it was a huge task to acquire. The opposite of WoW in everyway.

[@LuvLexyU]

Idk why but this has made me sob and cry from nostalgia. Thank you.

[@zomgl2pnoobffs]

These worlds are real places to us players. I feel the same revisiting vanilla WoW every once in a while. A view will catch me, the music kicks in, and suddenly the monitor goes all blurry.

[@Voo504Doo]

:( I know..was such beautiful and much more simpler times.. all games were better back than now its all a cash grab

[@bigchez123456789]

I still play EQ today. It still my favorite MMORPG and they just release their 25th expansion. The game still has a devoted player base, so I would say it is far from dead.

[@Ellzwerfmusic]

Daybreak just built a design team dedicated to furthering eq so yes we will return and I can't wait!

[@aaronsmith-qb8im]

@@Ellzwerfmusic dont hold your breath i wouldnt trust daybreak to mow my lawn let alone develop a mmorpg, eq is doomed to cut and paste spells and nothing really new in a expansion eq is like a caterpillar thats been parisitized by a wasp still alive and moveing but a zombie of its former self

[@Ellzwerfmusic]

@@aaronsmith-qb8im the hype is still there though

[@robertwhichello5254]

The "WoWification" was something that was inflicted upon EQ2 over the course of time, not at launch. They removed shards because it was too hard. They removed crafting class interdependency, minimized crafting damage, and sub-pristine crafting results, because it was too hard. Eliminated the sub-class system, group mobs in overland zones, access quests, and more because it was too hard...

[@markcarpenter6020]

Well the subclass thing was a pain cause you never knew of you would actually like what you picked till you got to level 20 +. Though my complaint was there was too little difference between sub classes. Summoner and Necro played almost identical there wasn't enough individuality

[@havan56]

LOVE the EQ1 scenes! - I was one of the early Everquest addicts. I had actually played meridian 59 and fell in love with the whole MUD concept even playing a few DOKUmuds etc before hearing about Everquest. I was a halfling druid on the Bertox server and I wanted a user name of Vanyel. Failing that I tried Stavan eventually Havan adopting the IronOak last name upon reaching level 20. - I actually was forced to quit cold-turkey on 9/11/2001 when the towers fell and my apartment in Battery Park City was declared part of the "disaster area" Didn't get back to my apartment on a regular basis until just before Christmas and by then the world just felt different. Still a big fan of D&D inspired games though these days it's Oblivion.

[@JamesNoms]

Meridian 59, my man - Server 105 ftw!

[@SexyDragoness]

Everquest was and will forever be my favorite all time game. The experiences I had, the lessons learned and the friendships made transcend anything else. WoW was a great game but a shallow experience and remains so to this day. After years and years I had a literal year of playtime on one character alone. It's as much part of the history of my life as anything and I'd never trade that for anything. Sadly EQ is a mere shell of what it was. Dumbing it down detracted from its identity. As its sequel and everything else since, trying to be like something else meant it was nothing of it's own. Truly makes me sad to know it won't really ever have a future.

[@EBEDieandRetry]

It was so good to be part of the 8bit era, the golden age 16 bit era, the PlayStation era, the voodoo FX era, the Quakeworld era, the Mario 64 era, the Evercrack era..

[@aaront.akabiggs631]

So good!!

[@JMayer-rg5nu]

VooDoo FX was my first 3D capable GPU

[@TiMSKiii]

I've always wanted to play EQ 1 but never got around to it..

[@Darcnova1]

It's still somewhat active if you wanna try it out, heck progression servers definitely are

[@khaunleper]

you still can, you can play with SOE, with various types of servers. If you want the experience that many of us talk about (before they eased up on some of the challenges), check out project 1999. Back then, it didnt seem that hardcore, Going back its still a lot of fun, but it does take a bit to get used to the different style.

[@shoutingstone]

I was there at the start. Played EQ1 & 2 for years before switching to WoW. Tried to go back a few years ago (my old characters were even still there after 15+ years!) But even with nostalgia goggles firmly on it's just unplayable dated and clunky now. Lot of fond memories though

[@nomeanlol]

It's one of those things that I'm really glad I got to experience back when it was new but holy mother of butts I can't even imagine playing it today.

[@DangermuffinVideos]

I've been playing the Coirnav Timelocked Progression server for the past 2-3 months, has been a real fun experience! (Never played EQ before, tried p1999 before the tlp server but I found it too hard)

[@savedbygrace2397]

They ripped everyone off when they cancelled Landmark. I would never play another game owned by Theybreakgames.

[@OdaSwifteye]

I'm so glad I didn't invest in that game. I was hoping it was going to be a success but when they veered away from focusing on Minecraft stuff to make it PVP I knew the game was screwed. It's hard enough to make a good minecraft clone.

[@jakobfel2]

Agreed. I don't buy the bullcrap excuse they gave us about EQN: "We played it and it wasn't fun". Yeah right. More like it was going to take more time than they were willing to spend. I'm grateful I didn't spend more than the $20 for the base founder's pack because I was strongly considering getting the highest tier founder's pack.

[@AnonEyeMouse]

I got the £100 founder's pack. I was drunk. I was still ripped off.

[@erojzmmo2661]

I bought 3 founder game keys for me and my sons, I'm still pissed they cancelled it.

[@wedge72]

@@erojzmmo2661 My wife and I both got the $100 level. We also both had active plus accounts with SOE, mainly for planetside and occasional jaunts back to norrath. Shortly after Daybreak killed EQN we called to cancel our SOE plus memberships (we had just missed the annual billing cycle though) we asked if they would refund the remaining 11 months and were told as a 1 time favor for our accounts they could do that. That really hit me the wrong way and I told the poor woman that they already had their one time favor from us, and with this second strike we were done and never coming back to a Daybreak game, and hung up. The charge back on the card did appear a few days later, for the full amount. I still havent forgiven them though lol

[@deadtreebark]

I played everquest 2, I fell in love with champions of norrath and return to arms on ps2, I hope one day they will remake champions of norrath

[@drelt]

I don't agree with the reasons you stated for EQ2's failure. They really didn't try to copy WoW until post-release. The game was difficult and obtuse from the start. It was like EQ1, except with the lore removed, any feeling of past class identity, any connection to past places or characters, they removed the gods....All this stuff was removed and replaced with absolutely nothing interesting. There were a few zones and dungeons that were actually great, but their focus on not carrying over EQ1 IP so they could instead replace it with nothing was baffling. Eventually they tried to re-add nostalgic items and location, but I felt EQ2 at launch was missing all the secret sauce that was used in EQ1.

[@user_mac0153]

The EQ2 combat system sucked, the locked encounter system sucked. But the EQ2 world was fantastic.

[@lmtsuper]

They actually overhauled the combat in desert of flames expansion to make the combat feel much batter, and I pretty sure they remove the locked encounter at the same time.

[@fyurileblanc7206]

you are right. in some ways, they threw the baby out with the bath water.

[@jprec5174]

What? All of the Vanilla eq2public dungeons were full of loregasm. Black Burrow, Stormhold, Wailing Caves, Ruins of Varsoon. Fallen Gate was literally the collapsed ruin of the Neriak foreign quarter from eq1 in which you find out the queen did so during the cataclysm because shes a bitch. The lore was there but it was insanely difficult to get it or out of the way. It wasn't simply fed to you through quests npcs but often random books and clickable objects that were easily missed.

[@SharpTony]

It's time for Death of a Game: Anarchy Online!

[@SilverFoxGaming]

SharpTony yes!!

[@Razzorn34]

Oh man... That's easy. All you have to do is look at who was behind it. Nothing says unfinished like a Funcom MMO.

[@SharpTony]

Funcom is pure garbage these days. AO was amazing until Craig "Means" Morrison left, then the game turned to shit.

[@leavy]

I always look back fondly at AO, it managed to pioneer things like cutting downtime via items (food/drink in WoW and EQ2) and a liberal use of instancing, to name a few

[@jacobyrassilon]

I loved AO! Martial Artist ftw! I still have nightmares about that damned virulent bull!

[@Unchainedfury]

You've a well researched presentation here and I appreciate you taking the time to make it. Pull up a chart of "EQ Exansions Timeline" and notice the correlating decline in EQ1 population with the expansions released. They have two common denominators: Instancing and expansions released sooner and sooner with little to no real content. These two points were the death nails in the coffin for EQ1 and I remember it vividly. Sometimes, it's vital that any successful entity pause and take stock of what made them get to that point, reflect upon it, and go back to that well. LDoN was the first expansion to introduce instancing in Sept. '03. Outside of the augments, it was a bad expansion where people didn't need to talk to one another or otherwise interact as had previously been done since launch in '99. Legacy of Ykesha also introduced the LFG tool, another bane of a true MMO, and was quite possibly the worst EQ expansion ever. One is supposed to go out into the world and meet new people and form friendships and bonds, possibly enemies too, not pull up a tool that erases that magic of exploration and interaction. Gates of Discord was released way too soon and was so buggy, not to mention extremely difficult, that players could not experience the content until Omens of War came out. OoW expanded upon the instancing content for end game raiding, thus lessening interactions between raiding guilds, yet it tried to bring back some of the original EQ magic as best it could with groups in the Walls of Slaughter etc. By this point, it was too late, the next 3 expansions were a sinking ship and everyone playing at the time knew it. What we can conclude from the EQ history is quite clear: Anything that lessens interaction within an MMO is a terrible idea and effectively kills the "magic" that a true MMO brings. Atari went the way of quantity of quality, EQ1 did the same thing, EQ2 tried to emulate WoW only further pissing off their fan base, followed by SWG, SWTOR, etc...the list goes on and on. At some point we should rename and define what constitutes an actual MMORPG. Another category should be conceived and labeled to these so called MMORPG's that aren't. Perhaps "Sub MMORPG" and any game claiming to be a true MMORPG which limits interactions between the player base should be placed in this category.

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

I just go with what the eastern market calls them without much fuss, MORPGs

[@Elizabeth-rp8kz]

I was so pissed when landmark got shut down without giving us the ability to even play a game we paid for anymore.

[@karrane879]

Me too Elizabeth.. I loved Landmark. I didn't play it to kill things.. I played it to BUILD!!! It was an amazing place to see, knowing that every building was player built.

[@joescofield1086]

Eq emulator

[@Elizabeth-rp8kz]

@@joescofield1086 Landmark was much more like Minecraft than it was the original Everquest or EQII

[@selenadansfield1305]

@@karrane879 Agreed. I loved building things, I would lose hours of time having fun building.

[@selenadansfield1305]

@@joescofield1086 Are you aware of any Landmark Emulator?

[@ExecutionDbl9]

Years later since this video released - I can certainly agree with the premise regarding the overall franchise - there's not much of an EverQuest franchise. But EQ1 itself certainly isn't dead. It's not among the most active of MMO's, but it does have enough of a base left that it is still bringing in significant profits, releasing expansions, and opening up progression servers. So I definitely don't see EverQuest dying off anytime soon. I do miss the OG-EQ days tho, and even on the progression servers or P99 you're not going to get the same experience as when EQ was new and lively. EQ will always remain among my top all time favorite games.

[@Srdjana-]

It is dead...dead as a doornail. Edit: the only people who have not moved on from Everquest are people who are stuck in Sunk Cost Fallacy mentality. Not to mention in EQ they may be part of a raiding guild and think they are "someone " and if they go to a new game, they are nobody and blend into the masses. Not to mention alot of the EQ playerbase left ( the few hundred or so ) are playing on such outdated computers, they just can't afford to move onto something new. Most of the playerbase left in EQ uses MQ2 since it has been ignored by Daybreak and the game is flooded with bot armies. EQ is most certainly dead.

[@dcrose001]

Aww triggered like a typical failure. Latest expansion just dropped. You are wrong again beta boy.

[@seeksmorelight928]

God this brings back so much nostalgia. Makes me happy but also makes me sad. Everquest was such an experience and im grateful i was able to he apart of it in its best years. 2000-2008. Bristlebane server . The game that really started it all and did it right.

[@wedge72]

Tribunal was home for me. No game since has captured the wonder, teamwork and exploration that EQ did. I still remember my first day getting lost on my wood elf ranger and wandering into the darkness of greater faydark. I ended up dying in crushbone and a very nice druid had to explain /consent to me to get my corpse back. She then gave me a full set of armor and bags she made. it was a great community.

[@maul281]

everquest is NOT dead, Everquest is LIFE!

[@thesilence6543]

still enough dedicated and if they did a project 1999 but with all expansions to right now and the main died it would still go on

[@MrTiton536]

EQOAnostalgia largely unknown by who ? The gaming community it’s huge. If your talking about console gamers they don’t know about any pc games that are not console also

[@jesse8600]

Yeah eq is still a solid game. Try coming back after not playing. And level 80-81. Hard as hell.

[@DenverDonate]

Another DayBreakGames employee with the same upvotes as the others that said the exact same thing you did. Give it up, nobody is falling for your fake posts and all of you with the same 50 upvotes. "Come back EQ is Alive" what a joke of a company that mismanaged one of the greatest games of all time into the dirt. You should be shamed for eternity.

[@safespacebear]

WoW destroyed my guild(s) after it went live. It was so hard to replace some of the great people that jumped ship. I was so impossible back then that anyone on my friends list I learned dabbled in WoW would be deleted immediately. It was obvious the threat and the talent leak a lot of guilds were going to suffer. After some server merges a population stabilized a bit and raiding was almost back to normal. I bounced between EQ1 and EQ2 for years but Daybreak Games era it got too much for me especially the more recent EQ2 expansions being cash grabs and not much more. Started cheating on Norrath and encountered the proper optimization of graphics in GW2 and had trouble putting up with Everquest clunky mechanics. But nothing will ever replace the first few years of EQ1. Happiest online time of my life

[@kenbuechler6681]

Three years later and people, including me, still playing Everquest one. Not the numbers it used to be, but still see others all the time.

[@ashwinnmyburgh9364]

I still play Everquest, still a great game, a game which has a special place for me.

[@Tinfoiledhat]

I started playing EQ when I was just 10 years old in early 2000 lol. I remember my friends dad was a server admin and was telling us to try out this new game. We had dial up at the time and I would literally come home everyday and load the next cd for installation. We literally would sneak online before school every morning and play. What a great game.

[@neiloch]

I was there the day they were taking down the SOE sign, getting ready to replace it with a Daybreak one. Most of the employees were informed of the change of ownership that same day.

[@Rheinguard]

Dude Champions of Norrath was the shit!

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

Another time another video :)

[@Rheinguard]

@@nerdSlayerstudioss Oh heck yeah!

[@TheTankbus]

'Was'? It IS the shit.

[@xorith]

I still have my EverQuest Online Adventures PS1 game disk somewhere. SOE actually broke my account and never fixed it. They comp'd my account to the Frontiers expansion, but never sent me the new disk. So I would randomly find myself in broken situations and the game eventually became quite unplayable.

[@Tremulantone]

Daybreak ruined something special. I had high hopes for EQ Next. The nostalgia associated with EQ 1 is something I think about a LOT as an adult. Hopeful that Pantheon can deliver and is successful but I don't know if I'll have the time I once did to live inside an MMO.

[@husskiii]

Its good tbh tho playing too much isn't healthy imo I look back at my time playing games 24/7 as a mistake to not repeat I missed out on a lot of my school years

[@leavy]

Bryan Ganz here’s hoping, as long as you’re not drowning too deep in nostalgia most of us should remember the marketing blowhard that Brad McQuaid has always been

[@eddabjornsdottir7962]

The same people that worked for SoE also worked at Daybreak, so it's a little disingenuous to say Daybreak killed EQN. I would understand if you said Columbus Nova killed EQN, because not even a month after they bought SoE and the company was forced to rebrand, 40% of the staff was laid off. But make no mistake, they were the same people pre and post buy out.

[@Tremulantone]

@@eddabjornsdottir7962 I only said Daybreak because it was under them that the game died. Daybreak was by and large SOE so it's semantics in arguing which did it. SOE started killing EQ way back in the day around Velious in my opinion. That's around when I left and didn't go back. To be honest it'd be a lot more apt to argue capitalism killed EQ with the way the games industry and MMORPGs specifically raced to find more ways to milk more money from their paying customers. Columbus Nova's acquisition is case in point. Cash shops are now standard and include ways to level faster etc. That's a rabbit hole that'd be worth it's own video series though so I'll stop there.

[@eddabjornsdottir7962]

+Tremulantone You're right. It is semantics, but you wouldn't believe how many people are ignorant to the fact that the same people who were present during the buy out are the same people that have been at the company for years and already ruining the games.

[@BLUEPELICAN234]

I’m brand new to EverQuest and I’m playing on the very recently launched TEEK server and it’s AMAZING you truly feel like you’re living in a new world. Nothing feels wasted. It feels like a real world. So many MMOs have everything in the background. EverQuest feels like you’ve just been transported. Tons of people playing too. Get on it! Has a subscription tho

[@jcbynum007]

Be honest here, online data collection services compare activity for every online game in the world. If you mean "tons of people" as a literal comparison to a ton being 2000 pounds, then I guess you are right. On it's BEST day, EQ has around 1000 to 2000 players online. That's not alot, friend.

[@gmoney546]

@@jcbynum007 That is 100% false. The Teek server, alone, had up to 7000 concurrent players on that server upon release. There are thousands, tens of thousands, of people who continue to play EQ and EQ2. The EQ emulator servers (that are free) have 5000+ (5712) players on right at this moment.

[@brettvv7475]

I remember helping a friend move into his new place... which consisted of setting up his PC and internet to play EverCrack, and nothing else. No food. No furniture. No dishes. Not even a desk and chair for the PC.

[@nathanfree4654]

I met more people in one week in everquest than all the years I have played wow. This will always be the greatest mmo ever created.

[@RRGreiner]

Landmark was amazing in concept.... but it fizzled.

[@nastynvte9876]

Those damn fizzles man.... hahaha

[@WraithTDK]

"Before Azeroth?" Bro. Azeroth debuted in *Warcraft: Orcs and Humans* in 1994, and re-appeared in *Warcraft II: The Tides of Darkness* in 1995; long before Everquest. As to how the community reacted to it? I'm pushing 40, and I remember it clearly. We called it "Ever Crack" for a reason.

[@Dgafsranger]

I believe they were talking about the expansion not the above view versions of the game that weren't mmorpg

[@WraithTDK]

@@Dgafsranger I know they were. That's the problem. Saying that it came "before Azeroth" implies that Azeroth debuted in the mmo.

[@Fuzzy_Barbarian]

Your pronunciation of World of Warcraft amuses me way more than it should. There's an 'L', man! I don't think there's a Ward of Warcraft.

[@Erekai]

I wondered what Wurduv Warcraft was.

[@fenrirswolh3]

Sure there is. The Ward of Warcraft is Nomi. Because his fire burns all.

[@AngersFiction]

I also enjoy "everquestiz"

[@ericg7183]

So glad I am not the only one that noticed that.

[@TheFizzster]

Came here to say “Ward of Warcraft”

[@Aace00]

The downtime was why I loved FFXI so much. The game required a lot of downtime between fights since mages need to recover mp. As such, it gave people a chance to chat and hang out. Modern mmos barely have downtime, and a dungeon is just action all the way through.

[@Herbal916]

High hopes for PantheonMMO

[@RAimotion]

hell yes. All other mmorpgs looks boring in comparison. KID games.. *puke*

[@christianaho1058]

Heres hoping pantheon is the true next gen mmo

[@storm7586]

Me too

[@Teheskimo]

I had hope, but the more I think about it the more I really believe no game will ever re-capture the glory of the old 90's/very early 00's MMOs. Not that I think the game will be bad, it looks great! It's more that the numbers of people like us have been dwindling over the years. Pantheon will not be successful because it won't make enough money and will die off in just a couple years, of that I'm almost certain. Which is a shame. An amazing game with only a couple hundred people playing isn't worth it to me, it needs a rich population and community of thousands like how it used to be.

[@randomguy4781]

if it ever comes out

[@Jboychoy]

Oooooo baby! nerdslayer time

[@jonilarsen-haikarainen8733]

Winter is coming, now we're all looking to Pantheon to slay the Night King.

[@kaibaCorpHQ]

You know, I'll take it as a blessing from a player perspective that EQ2 turned out to be more of a niche game compared to WOW. When I first played EQ2 it had the most amazingly nice player base I've ever played with, people who loved the game and it was more tightnite. During my heydays playing that game (from rise of kunark to chains of eternity) I had a really good time with the people I played with. I was pretty depressed to hear that EQ Next was cancelled though, I didn't care about landmark and was so hyped for the actual game so I waited, and waited, and waited, then years later I read it was cancelled and SOE sold off the studio and that really sucked.

[@cobaltblues2121]

That skeletons laugh. oh my the memories

[@TheLordUrban]

I was horrified by EQ when I finally tried it back in the late 90s. It was everything my beloved Ultima wasn’t. Rather than trying to be a player driven virtual society it was a formulaic level grind driven by external and mostly irrelevant NPC quests. I know many people have fond memories of the game, but I feel it forever stunted the potential of what an MMORPG could and should be.

[@Alexander-ix2jp]

Ah yes, seeing as how this channel put its "death of a game" stamp on the EQ franchise, which is still alive and kicking, even mentioning its potential sunset or end, I look forward to the "Death of a Game: World of Warcraft" edition. Let's see you do that one now that it has taken an arrow to the knee and now that it is a mere shadow of its former self.

[@REDACT3D]

wow the skeleton sound brings me back lol 4:00 TRAIN Don't die on the boat!

[@lovecheese45]

Attack the boat! lol

[@Hyberlol]

It was the focus on raiding and departure from small 6 person adventurous and highly social groups that facilitated the beginning of the end for EQ. Raid livers can never seem to accept this basic fact while single group lovers slowly just faded into oblivion.

[@Bathezid]

Oh the memories. Verant era EQ was the best MMO experience ever.

[@solhsa]

From evercrack to neverquest.

[@LividImp]

So close, but you missed the bullseye. Try: From Neverrest to Neverquest

[@shoutingstone]

@@LividImp phonetically that's better sure, except it was widely refered to as Evercrack back in the day. So Evercrack > Neverquest makes more logical sense

[@LividImp]

+ShoutingStone I was there in '99 and it was referred to as Evercrack and Neverrest in the day, though over time Evercrack seems to have become more popular (I always preferred it). But yea, I was going for the flow and phonetics in this case.

[@shoutingstone]

Fair enough. I never heard it called Neverrest back then but my memory isnt what it used to be :)

[@daltonv5206]

Good ol Evercrack

[@johnnybensonitis7853]

A good friend of mine has been playing Everquest II for over 10 years. That game might not have a huge player base but apparently those who do play are in love with it.

[@DenverDonate]

It was Evercrack and I really thought it would have lasted forever, and not just because of the name, but because it was addictive and people loved it. I will never understand why they removed the crack from it. 20 years later, we would still be playing it. Plenty of things last 20+ years. People still go bowling, and the game of bowling is the exact same as it was 20 years ago. People go fishing and fishing is pretty much the same as it always has been. We had this game and the great wisdom of those pulling the strings killed it. World of Warcraft was never even close to addictive as EQ was. People wrapped their lives around this phenomenon. I think history will write it as the biggest failure because of how it was managed into obscurity. It's a really sad tale of neglect and 20 years later nothing has recaptured it. A damn shame.

[@Dadaph]

Feel some heavy nostalgia from watching this. I picked up EverQuest summer 2000, shortly after the release of Kunark, and I played the thing night and day for three years, not even getting to lvl 60. It was brutal, but fun. Remember my guild, a casual family guild, quite fondly. Never played EQ2 more than up to lvl 20, it just didn't grab me. Was really interested in EQ Next, and sad when that project closed down. Was really weird to go back to EQ through Project1999. The game hasn't aged well, but at the same time, I felt a lot more involved in the world than I do in modern MMOs. The lack of in-game maps and quest menus, really forces the player to keep their own notes. I still have my old notebooks from 2000, pages upon pages tracking my failed attempts of getting the Paladin Epic weapon. It's not really a fun game to play today, but a nostalgic one. I wish for an MMO that manages to capture the same level of involvement, without handholding.

[@daegon1985]

I ended up selling my account for $200 on ebay, and my main of several years wasn't even 50

[@Dadaph]

I grew sick of it during Luclin/Planes of Power. Had reached 56 by that point (spent a year at 52 attempting to grind some drops from Naggy/Wox, a rather difficult task as I was not in a raiding guild). I just laid awake one night, thinking it was no point to keep playing the game as I never had any fun anymore. So first thing the next day, I gave away my stuff to guildies, then just charged into the Militia HQ in Freeport and got murdered by Sir Lucan D'lere. I wanted my character to go out with a bang, and I kinda had a vendetta with the corrupt Freeport Militia, so it was fitting. Then I deleted my character without even attempting a corpse run. And that was it for me, didn't have heart to sell my account, even though that would have been the smart thing to do. Kinda regretted ruining my character like that, but the game I liked turned into a different beast at the end. I don't have much nostalgia for anything that came after Velious. Which made p1999 such a fun thing to try out as it was one last experience with a game that defined three years of my life. Heard Lucan became a major villain character in EQ2, so that was kinda fun to learn.

[@kant12]

@@Dadaph EQ2 was just bad but EQ1 has had its ups and downs. Some expansions are super EZ mode and some are really difficult. Although, sometimes that's just because of bugs and them not completing things. They did two Kunark themed expansions recently though and they were both pretty good. I've been playing off and on since the beginning and they're actually in a decent place right now imo.

[@KruegerV]

This is my favorite review... I keep coming back to it every few months. Thank you for doing your research!

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

My pleasure!

[@benjaminedenfield3368]

I hadn't thought about Allakazam in years. My friends and I started playing EQ and did so for many years. I go back in from time to time and look around and remember all the good times.

[@Eroen515]

Will you ever make a video about Oldschool Runescape? It has been seeing a great growth in players ever since its very disappointing launch in 2013. Would this be a good topic for a life of a game video?

[@Drprophetius]

This!! Jagex is the worlds most interesting developers ever because no company in the world has ever fucked up so many things over decades. And still it's alive, even if not in the form Jagex would like to (RS3 or is it 4 now?).

[@Jake-rw7jm]

Rs both old school and rs 3 are actually doing quite well especially when considering their age. The games have mannaged to exicute well on what the other lacks making for a play your way experience. And with the bond system they have u can pay in game currency to pay for membership. Once you get good u can get a months membership in about 2 hours of gameplay.

[@Drprophetius]

I thought old school was doing well and 3 was pretty dead? But yeah it's true, but the reason for is it's fanatical playerbase, Jagexes own vision for the game always fails.

[@Eroen515]

The problem with RS3 is that Jagex is running it into the ground with content updates geared towards high leveled players which only appeal to people who have already been playing the game for many years, as well as a focus on microtransactions which cause whales to be RS3’s main source of income. Meanwhile OSRS has had about twice the amount of players at any given time compared to RS3 for the past couple years, and OSRS recently hit its highest amount of players online.

[@Darkone348]

Last I heard RS3 was dead? OSRS is doing really well though.

[@MarvelousAdmirer445]

"Honestly when was the last time you heard of someone beating EverQuest?" "When was the last time you heard of someone PLAYING EverQuest?" "....That's fair."

[@Nathouuuutheone]

My mom played EQ1 for the longest time. She was a top player of the world. But at some point she got tired. She now plays Entropia Universe.

[@kylebrown4978]

Is she world class in her new game?

[@thephuntastics2920]

oh she is into gambling and casino games :D ... i played it tooo ... hit a 15k$ tower survey once .... was happy to be rich for a day or two.

[@fk3239]

Holy shit Entropia Universe is still around?! I remember farming sweat as a broke-ass kid desperately trying to make money in lieu of an allowance I never got. Didn't make a dime.

[@chrisplissken4626]

nostalgia ...about 4 months ago I started playing EQ classic again lol and I still play it today

[@usererrer7493]

I remember being enraged, I mean ENRAGED, when I found out that they were releasing EQ2 as a non-compatible sequel to EQ1 and that characters wouldn't be transferable. All that time spent leveling up toons only to have *&^^%^ing Sony make them all instantly obsolete. The EQ1 servers were virtually depopulated as half the player base vanished, and you could be online for hours without being able to get a group. I soon rage-quit, and swore a binding oath that I would never in my life spend a penny on ANY Sony product, or anything EQ-related. I wouldn't have cared if EQ2 was the most sublime experience life had to offer, I wouldn't have spent a penny on it. May the corporate suits who pulled that crap all rot.

[@epicfail5473]

They should really make a Champions of Norrath 3. I love/d the first two. As far as PS2 games go they still look great and play well.

[@Venislovas]

And remake/remaster first two.