Developers talk to Magelo about VoA, Customer Service and more

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General Game Questions

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Thom: Typically, when we unlock, we unlock from a few expansions ago. We would consider unlocking some. I believe Underfoot would be due. We don't have a timeline, but it is something we would consider doing.

Adam: Not at this time. It's a larger project than it sounds, because it's based on our whole pathing system (which has some problems).

Thom: Part of the vast, extensive nature of EverQuest content. Just in terms of static zones- well over 500- but if we add in instance zones, we're talking thousands. That sort of content doesn't exist anywhere else that I am aware of. So if we were to look into pathing, that would be something really, really big.

Adam: We very specifically don't want to release that at this time., because we'll tell people how to have an easier time getting around it.

Thom: Pretty much anyone cheating.

Adam, Thom: Yup

Adam: About eight weeks.

Thom: We began implementing this right after the Veil of Alaris launch.

Adam: Yeah, we took a lot of time to watch the data, and figure out where we might be getting some false positives.We tried to clear out as much of that as is possible before doing anything. So we just watched it for a little bit, and watched the cheaters a little bit. And then we said, "Okay, we're confident enough. Now we're going to start getting people for it."

We're confident we're no longer getting false positives.

Adam: No. The existing spell is too powerful, so no. So we do not plan to add it now. We do not plan to add it later. We do not want to make an overpowered ability an AOE overpowered ability. The answer is a very strong “NO.”

Veil of Alaris

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Adam: It is great. We put much work to it and it is gratifying to send it off into the world.

Adam: We have a very strong storyline, and feel that we gave players many opportunities to experience that story.

Adam: We do continue to look and see if we can fix various issues.

Adam: I would need information on how it creates an imbalance to answer this.

Customer Service

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Eric: You have many situations that lead to petitions. For example, someone may accidentally click on 5 of something where they only wanted one. And so the GM staff goes in and tries to help the player. So on that, they're really really good.

But of course, around the holiday time, people take time off. The queue grew to a size that was a little bit larger than usual. And when support time began to be impacted, we had to make a decision. We had to say, "For cases of player error, we might have to turn some of these down."

Now for anything where it was the game still bugging, we still did that. We were focusing more on the immediate and pressing issues than, say, "Oh, I forgot to click this."

It's something every business has to go through. You try to help everyone. But sometimes, you have to focus on the more important things.

This is completely addressed now. Our petition times are back down to where they are normally at and we've started completely helping people once again.

Eric: Yes.

EverQuest's 13th Birthday

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Adam: We hope to give a batch of extra content for everybody. Everybody who's a member will get it. March 14th is when we'll have our patch for that stuff, and we're hoping it's fun. Just keep thinking about "thirteen".

Thom: Yeah, we have a nice theme of "Thirteen" that we're delivering with the content.

Developers discuss their beginning with the gaming industry, EverQuest

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Thom Terazzas, Producer

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I started out on consoles back when I was a little runt. The Atari 2600 was my first game system.

As I graduated to be an adult, I played various MMO's – many games which were similar to EverQuest. I do like to play sports games as well. I loved playing FIFA, Black Ops, first-person shooters. Planetside was a game that just kept on building on the FPS mode and taking it a different direction that no game I have ever seen will ever be able to match. It's exciting to see Planetside 2 come out in the near future.

I completely fell in backwards. Much like the San Diego Chargers, how they enter the playoffs. And that is talking from a San Diego homer of course. I'm not bashing them, but telling how hard it must've been.

So if I can equate that to the hardship of falling in backwards, I was working in the horticultural field for about twelve years. And construction, development went kinda south. I was doing odd jobs for a few days. And one of my buddies went to work for Sony in the Customer Service Department and Testing Department. He was the brother of our past CEO Kelly Flock over at 989 Studios. And he said “Well, if you're tired of odd jobs and want something more steady, the pay isn't great but it's a great opportunity to put your foot in the door.” And it sure was.

That was back in 1998, I came to work for one of Sony's companies. 989 Sports, Verant Interactive and then SoE testing games. I then went into the Customer Service Department. I ran the Customer Service Department in end-game, and also on the Technical Support and Billing side. I did that for about 5 or 6 years and moved into Project Management on the development side.

I eventually made my way to Planetside. I've touched a lot of games. We were just talking about that – about how many games I've touched here on the development side. Vanguard, Planetside – just games we still see running around. But EverQuest was that game I played ever since it launched. Got myself into trouble with my spouse and family members, just like a lot of other people for playing it too much. And now its kinda cool to be on the game and actually leading the charge.

Adam Bell, Lead Designer

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I also started out on the Atari 2600. But then my father brought a terminal computer home from work. I played a little Space War on that, and it sorta got me hooked on computers.

We got a TRS-80 Model 1, way back in the age of computers. Tape drive to load everything, the sound was a crystal radio stuck on top of the computer. And I've had a computer ever since then.

Most of my play has been computer games. I've gotten a few consoles, but they never really stuck with me. I don't play them very much. I've played some Final Fantasy on console.

I typically play MMO's. I played EverQuest for a long time. I played EQ2, Star Wars Galaxies. I dabbled in WoW, but it just didn't interest me. I've dabbled with a few other people's games, but I find myself coming back to EverQuest.

As a designer, my biggest achievement that I liked was my first creation raid. I did the Underfoot final raid. I really liked it, despite players somewhat disliking it (because of how hard it was).

Eric Cleaver, Community Manager

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Well, just to be different than everyone else, I started with the ColecoVision. That is my console of choice. Which is far superior to the Atari 2600.

I am a longtime gamer. I got my start in the industry by being a community representative of NCSoft on the City of Heroes title, and I am now a Senior Community Manager over at SoE for EverQuest and Legends of Norrath.

A friend of mine was working in the industry, and they said, “Hey! We want you to start working with us, but in order to get you working we gotta start you in Community” So I said, “What's 'Community'?” But it turned out to be the job I always wanted.

I was a day one EverQuest Player. So I always had a huge love of the game. And I always wanted to be that guy who was out there talking to the players, finding out what they wanted and communicating what the company wanted to tell the players.

And so, for me, it is the most interesting place in the MMO industry. These games are all about our players. So this was exactly the spot I wanted to be. And after several years, I found an opening I wanted to be in for EverQuest (it's always been my first love). It is my all-time favorite game, so I had to go for it.

In Community, it's hard to point out one achievement. But the thing I am happiest with right now would be successfully communicating the free-to-play release. That's definitely a big, exciting moment for us here. And to be involved in such a huge moment in EverQuest history is quite an honor.

Developers discuss F2P decision in part one of three in our exclusive interview

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Thom: For us, it's a no-brainer. It makes sense for us to go free to play like all our other games, and to give the same type of offering our other games have. We're designing a nice, flexible system for anybody to play the way they want to play. So many people have played our game that we see this as a great opportunity for our past players to come back and play, and to give new players an incentive to play.

Adam: Yes, there will be a maximum amount of currency. Currency locks are in place for our free and Silver users.

Thom: The free-to-play system is something we have been working on for a long time – since long before the Veil of Alaris launch.

Thom: We were talking about it then. Unfortunately, we couldn't do it at the same time. Veil of Alaris was consuming most of our time. It was something we wanted to take the extra time to do well, and to put a nice polish on it. Especially the tutorials.

Adam: No, it shouldn't have a significant impact. There was that one minor bump as we were developing the tutorials. We spent some time working on that where we weren't making new content. Going forward after launch, it shouldn't affect us at all.

Adam: Yes, full customer service is only available to those with a Gold Membership. Billing will continue to provide full service.

Thom: Yes. There will be warrior, cleric, wizard and rogue. (To be clear, those are the ones that are UNLOCKED and available for free. The rest will need to be unlocked, unless of course you are gold)

Adam: We have no specific checks. Those things tend to balance themselves out, though. Plus, the mercenary mode would allow 100 warriors to play.

Adam: No. This is not due to any consolidation needs. EQ and EQ2 are completely different games.

Thom: Even though we've kinda toyed and talked about, “Wow! It would be cool to do this or that,” between the two games. It's definitely not a possibility.

Adam: The technology is too different.

Thom: Pretty much everything about it is too difficult for anything like a merge.

Adam: It is still a little too much in development at this point for us to go into it.

Thom: Recruit-a-friend has already been removed from our website. You cannot invite new recruits at this time. The recruit-a-friend program will then be unsupported at the time we go free-to-play. We are already in discussion about a new Recruit-a-friend program.