Where do we go from here? Advice from long time franchise player.

fistorm

The big question is where do we go from here?   I know just where, because I have played eq1, eq2, eqoa, landmark.  So here's whats been neglected and feel the company should go from here.   First step has already been done, the people who were sinking the EQ name brand have been let go and wont get into that subject, as there is already enough threads on that.  So the next step and the future to fix the name brand name of Everquest and which lead to EQ next's success and a healthy future for the EQ brand:

Next step,  Recognize that name Everquest is the name brand that is the lead flag ship in all development of the ex-soe brand, now daybreak brand.  From here on I'll refer to the EQ brand as now Daybreak brand.   Own it, and never put it second to other games you now own or make.

You have to seperate both genres of the new Daybreak,  Shooters, and RPG's.  Here I will only cover RPG's, as shooters are a whole differant genre of the brand that was spawned.

First step would be now to recognize that you have a huge problem with insecurity in the EQ brand name, not because of new ownership of the EQ brand name, but because one of the games in the EQ brand name series was wiped out of existance along with many other games that SOE had made.   That game would be EQOA.  When EQ Next was Unveild at SOE live, EQOA was wiped completly from its existance in the EQ timeline.   If one of the EQ titles no matter how big or small can be wiped away with such ease, its going to hurt the brand name of EQ1, EQ2, and EQ Next.   I would have you look at Turbine Inc. for how to fix this problem, and that would be to bring back EQOA on another platform, and start to develop it very quickly to modern games.  Turbine brought back Ashreons Call, not because its a money maker, but because its part of its brand name, and realizes brand name is more important to the health of a company then playing an 80s buisnessman who shuts down games on gamers because it was no longer a moneymaker,  as long as the brand name exists, its vital to keep its entire name in tack, meaning keeping open games you might not want to, or developing a newer version of it on another platform.

 

Having lost the EQ brand name on Consoles, and killing many game wearing an SOE or EQ title was one of the biggest mistakes of SOE past and will continue to hurt the future of EQ because of the insecurity of anyone wanting to invest time into a game they know can be shut down and erased at any point of its ups and downs.   EQ1 fears when EQ Next comes out that they might be shut down next.   Shutting down games with no where for the players of that title or a future title of that series of game, is a huge image problem. 

 

With that out of the way.  The next major fix to the EQ brand would be to make EQ Next look more like Skyrim, as the voxel industry has already passed up EQ Next and soon it wont be anywhere close to the voxel games we are already seeing coming to STEAM gaming.   Take EQ Next and create a EQOA 2 or updated EQ1 version,  which can be a massive world, without zones, on a gaming Console and Computer.  Make it realistic looking and as voiced over and interactive as Skyrim was.  If there was anything to learn from Skyrim Record breaking sales, it was that RPG players pay more then people who say graphics dont matter.  Skyrim showed what RPG games should be like and the costumers agreed.  Even ESO got this one wrong by putting Skyrim interactive style RPG second to PVP battlefields in that game.   For a guide on what to do, and I'm sure Holly can help you on this one, is to take EQOA devs and make them create something as great as EQOA was at first launch and make it Skyrim for EQ Next on consoles and computers, as Elderscrolls Online has already blew its chance to do so.   If that doesnt sit well with you, then go foward with two EQ Next (one for console, one for computer).

 Moving onto EQII,  reopen up all city suburbs in EQII, shutting down those districts in the game of EQ2 was one of the biggest failures to people who actually play that game on a daily basis.   To give them the same city with less access was one of the biggest marketing gimick failures, and all the players knew it, as they are getting older and smarter now.  Theres other things but this was one of the main mistakes, if anything you should be adding more and more districts to the city, build new huge cities like Qeynos and Freeport in the game.

 

EQ1.   Make a Database that all players can go to in order to understand the game.  All across google it takes over 10 mins to find out what one single Quest item drop is for and what quest and how to do it.  With as many quest item drops in the game, this is again one of the biggest failures of EQ1.   Make EQ1 live again by having a massive database outlining what items are and what NPC is used for them with the name of quests, rewards, ect.   No online website is good at doing this anymore and now it is up to the company to do this for this game.  To expect any new players coming to the game to do this kind of time investment is going to send them straight onward to more modern games without ever making it past the first zone of EQ1.

 

Next work on restoring the trust of people from galaxies and vangaurd.  This hurts the image of the company the second most in all of this mess we have here.

 

Is it too late to do all of this?   Of course not.  Was it too late to ever make a Skyrim?  Of course not.   Is it too late to repair all this damage to the company?  Of course not.  Now stear the ship in the right direction and make this happen for EQ Next.   Make games for Adults in the EQ series, lord knows most of the starting players already are.  To dummy down EQ Next so some ceo can please his daughter for shutting down Free Realms is like George Lucas putting jar jar into Star Wars I,  we all know how well that played out.  

 

Please save the EQ name brand and remember the lessons of history and how name brand does matter.  shutting down any EQ title, bad!  keeping the brand name alive, good!

 

tawess

Sorry all i can see is the closing act of the "once more with feeling" episode of Buffy...

 

"we" go nowhere... Where Napolion Dynamites unknown cousin goes with the Everquest franchise... Most likley no place that old time fans will appreciate. But that should in reality be no change from what SONY did with it.

 

My prediction is that development on Landmark and EQ:N will slow down for a while as CN make their plans known to the studio and the new work flow is drawn up. This i would guess includes a few quick projects to recoup some of the costs and more focus being out in to the engine development to prime it as "tech for rent". EQ:N and Landmark are important parts of marketing said tech... So i have a hard time seeing them shut down. But we might be looking at as much as a year extra added to development. Or CN could do a UbiSoft and just release Landmark asap and then dump EQ:N on the market as soon as it reaches M.V.P.

 

Where do i go from here... To the kitchen... It is lunchtime here.

Gestankfaust

Yeah...that's a whole lot of writing for not having a clue what's to come....

 

Why is MMORPG the training ground for bloggers these days?

Rydeson

We have entered the Twilight Zone.. 

EQ franchise is unclear from my nose bleed seats..  We have not heard from CN / Daybreak what their vision is for the future or the company, other then some canned PR rhetoric.. Will CN continue full support and growth in the PC gaming market, or will they water down games to be a multi-platform company..

My gut tells me they are going to focus on multi-platform games, and PC gaming will be an afterthought bi product..

azarhal

Originally posted by tawess

My prediction is that development on Landmark and EQ:N will slow down for a while as CN make their plans known to the studio and the new work flow is drawn up. This i would guess includes a few quick projects to recoup some of the costs and more focus being out in to the engine development to prime it as "tech for rent". EQ:N and Landmark are important parts of marketing said tech... So i have a hard time seeing them shut down. But we might be looking at as much as a year extra added to development. Or CN could do a UbiSoft and just release Landmark asap and then dump EQ:N on the market as soon as it reaches M.V.P.

Where do i go from here... To the kitchen... It is lunchtime here.

CN have been looking at things since last November, if not before that. November is just went the some leads at the studio got to meet their potential new owners and that they learned SOE (and not CN) was planning layoffs (that's why Omeed left, he knew he was going to lose his job anyway). Sony put up SOE on sales, there was multiple potential buyers that showed up and SOE/Sony executives got to select who was going to buy the company.

CN was selected not because they offered the most money for the company, but because they agreed to honor the severance packages SOE wanted to give out, something they didn't have to do. If they had any plan to cancel or close games, we would know already, their entire team would have been layoff. Right now, all the teams are still there, they lost a few elements* which was probably more clean up than anything else.

*Some of these people might have been public faces and real awesome with the community, but from experience company do not layoff their key people when it is about returning to profitability, they layoff the ones they can do without, aren't cost/effective or are causing issues. The DCUO team was barely scratched and it's the only game at SOE/Daybreak that seems to know where it is going. This is not a coincidence.

fistorm

Heres something I think Holly could enjoy from EQOA days. and what I thought a EQ Next should be like, its not too late to start to do it....  tell me that what I describe with EQ Next on PS3 is a copy past of EQOA + Skyrim!

http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/297636

Titled: What I would love to see in a EQOA for the PS3, mistakes of eqoa and visions of a future eqoa title. 

Note:  Its not too late to make this the next console game for EQ brand name.

 

http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/280590

Titled: Things i would like to see added to future mmorpg's

Note:  Its not too late to add this to the future EQ brand name as well.

 

 

If you look at the above you'll see, that Skyrim could have been the next EQ, it could have had record sales, it could have been geared towards mature EQ RPG players,  if only SOE had listened to me on these two posts, we would have moved the EQ brand name foreward a decade ago.   It's not too late Holly, not too late!    sooner or later, it will have to be done in order to survive....