EQ's producer discusses new Legends of Norrath-gated instance after player concerns

Although the Legends of Norrath digital trading card game can be played completely separately from EverQuest, the two games have a lot of ties to each other beyond just lore. The former can be launched from within the latter game. There are also "loot cards" which not only function in LoN but can be redeemed in EverQuest for certain bonus items. Some people that play EQ but not LoN may have been upset in the past at missing out on a few of these loot card items, but it's doubtful that anything has caused as much of an outcry as is currently occurring over an upcoming loot card. The card in question is the Dragon Brood Crypt Key Card, and the resulting EQ reward will be the only way to access a brand new dungeon instance.
The players must have been fairly vocal with their concerns, as both Craig "Grimwell" Dalrymple and EverQuest's producer Thom Terrazas have discussed the issue in the last few days. They were able to provide some more information about the card: it seems that one person with the item can bring five other players with them to the instance, and once it is completed, they are locked out (unless they get another card to receive the quest again). If the final stages of the instance are not completed, the instance can be "farmed"; however, we are told that the only notable rewards come from the completion of the quest. Terrazas also said that the LoN devs are separate from the EQ devs, and that making this instance did not detract from work on the Underfoot expansion.

To get a taste of the overwhelmingly negative player reaction to this situation, continue reading the thread from Grimwell regarding the card. The backlash can be attributed to a few key facts:

Not all EverQuest players want to play Legends of Norrath
Legends of Norrath packs cost real money, like most TCGs, so it's not as simple as just playing to get the card
Also like other TCGs, buying a pack does not guarantee that you'll get the card you're looking for

Regardless of what rewards are to be had inside the instance (reportedly on par with Korafax group encounters) we don't doubt that a lot of players will remain unhappy about this situation if nothing changes.

Reader Comments (15)

This is a case of tricking your players to buy expensive and worthless digital cards.

How disrespectful to expect players to have to take a gamble their own money on getting this random 'virtual' card, the same players loyal to this game for 10 years.

I don't care if the team was 'specifically tasked' with this project, independent of the expansion. Who in their right mind decided they need, "screw our players over task force" anyway? Building content around this is an inexcusable waste of resources.

Fact of the matter, SOE can't make good games any longer, and so have to trick players into spending more cash to keep these games running.

I just don't get why SOE just don't want to make fun games any longer, they just want to continue to work against the community to screw out every last penny.

Anyone here remember when Everquest was just fun, teamwork, frustration, exploration, achievement, bewildering, different and finally a virtual world that people could escape to and fully immerse themselves in?

What happened SOE, what happened...?

It's called GREED. One of the world's biggest issues when it comes to "art" or "fun". Look at all the junk games, movies, and books that could be better if they weren't just trying to make a buck. But the overwhelming number of bad titles in all these mediums shows that MONEY is the driving force behind most decisions and only every now and then do you get a true gem that goes beyond the money aspect.

Anyway, about this issue with LoN and SOE. I personally hate the card game. It's confusing, annoying, and giving extra benefits like this are completely unfair to the paying playerbase. If the game was FTP with microtransactions, I could see this MAYBE being ok, but it's not and it isn't OK.

I agree with you Mr. Angry.

Unfortunately more and more companies look at what SOE is doing and copy them as fast as they can. Its no longer about making fun games that keep people subscribed, and its no longer about being happy with just raking in millions on subscriptions. Now it is all about nickle and diming the hell out of your customers and squeezing all the money out of them that is possible.

Build a solid game.

Include large amounts of fun and varied things to do.

People will subscribe.

Include updates of REAL content(not rebalancing) a couple of times a year, and people will stay subscribed.

Profit.

Bottom line. This is a business. Along with a business comes cost and profit. If you don't like the product, don't buy it. Of course money is the driving force behind their decisions. This isn't a non profit. I can never understand how people lose sight of that fact. Sometimes an idea fails, sometimes its a success, but a good business model should always be trying new strategies to see what works and doesn't work. The hard part for game developers is that they want their fans to see it as "art" and something the player is contributing to, but they need their investors, managers, and share holders to see a turn in profit.

We play a game.

steven.fuller,

When anything is driven by profits above all else the consumers are the ones who are short changed.

Steven, when does playing a game as a leisure activity, mean you have to worry about how people do business? It's not a charity, and you know why, because people already pay a monthly fee to play the game, did you overlook this part? People are already paying a monthly subscription, which was laid out when the game was released. If you don't like this, don't play, yup that's fair. If you don't like additional charges, hidden content, development resource used for a gambling game, then how do you feedback?

Do you just shut up and figure that's the way people do business
...or do you complain?

Fact of the matter is they got the business end of this entirely wrong, and now it's effecting people's enjoyment of the game.

Don't like it, don't buy it, yeah nice try, but prior to a couple of years ago people had invested upwards of 8 years, then they changed the game to incorporate faux mini transactions in game.

They can try new business ideas on new games, no problem with that, don't force it down the necks of established customers who have already bought into the game, that smacks of greed, not innovation, there has only been one loser with this whole pitiful charade, that' the faithful customers.

Secret is, make a good game, innovate, impress, develop and communicate, not nickle and dime players whenever you get the chance. SOE have had such a bad track record with their clumsy attempts to wring every last penny out of their IP's it's pathetic.

I'm really uncertain why they thought this was a good business model. Yes, it forces purchases. That will generate money. However...goodwill is far more valuable than tricks. How many people, looking at this, think "well, that means I won't buy an SOE product," compared to the number that suck it up and spend extra money? How many people will flat-out quit?

I purchase LoN cards pretty regularly. However, I do not play LoN. I purchase the cards so that I can trade for the loot cards that I want. This requires purchasing approximately $100 in LoN cards monthly.

So, I'm likely to wind up with a few of these "Instance" loot cards. But, since none of my EQ2 characters are level 80 they'll be of little use to me. So, if they're tradeable, I'll wind up trading them. And, I suspect that I'll be able to get just about any loot card I want for them as a result.

So, I personally have no problem with this development. However, I am completely sympathetic to those who are upset by it.

I think folks that are already paying a premium price for a very old game should have access to ALL the content. If I was still playing EQ, this would certainly end it for me. I guess SOE figures they have the old-guard well and truly hooked, and that SOE can do whatever they want to squeeze them dry.

Man, all you EQ players really need to join us in Vanguard.

Eh they might as well just slap a cash shop on the game from the sounds of how its going.......

I understand the sentiments but at the end of the day the only way SOE will get a clue that this wont work in EQ is if people simply refuse to partake in it.

I understand how some feel about gated content but EQ has a whole ton of gated content, whether it be by one means or another, this is just another mechanic to gate content with.

Instead of seeing this as some awful "scheme" it should be viewed as "bonus content" provided SOE doesn't put items in this content that are not as well provided for in other areas of the game and it simply serves as a extra bit of variety in scenery then it's really not a big deal, if there are highly unique items hidden away in it for which equivalents cannot be found elsewhere then it's pretty heinous and cynical.

So it really depends on exactly how the rewards from this new area are done as to whether this is plain money grubbing, or just providing a way for LoN players (and their non-LoN playing friends) to get a neat bonus in EQ.

Remember when EQ was fun? What happened?

Oh yeah, everything after Velious.

Of course, Spyderbite, you work for ZAM and are in SoE's pocket, as clearly evidenced by your posts on EQ2Flames and the official SoE boards, so of course you have no problem with this, since part of your income relies on SoE.

I'll be interested to see if Brenlo makes a more thorough statement on the matching card for EQ2; Brenlo insists that it was the real EQ2 team, not the LON team, that made the exclusive dungeon for EQ2. Either he didn't get the memo that he wasn't supposed to admit that, or for some reason EQ1 dungeons are easier to farm out to the LON team than EQ2 dungeons.

EQ's producer discusses new Legends of Norrath-gated instance after player concerns

Reader Comments (15)

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 11:14AM Mr Angry said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 11:33AM elocke said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 11:48AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 11:59AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 12:21PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 12:27PM Mr Angry said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 12:47PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 11:40AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 11:58AM Innocentte said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 1:34PM postpwn said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 12:26PM Scuffles said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 12:40PM SkuzBukit said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 1:19PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 3:41PM Celicynd said

Posted: Oct 6th 2009 4:42PM GreenArmadillo said

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