As seen on EQ forums:
Hello all!
So we’re
almost into our third month of 2013 already and if you are an EverQuest
player, you know that March always brings something special. Not only
it is my birthday, but more importantly it’s EverQuest’s Birthday! On
March 16th, EverQuest is turning 14 and we have a few cool things to share with you.
At SOE
Live in Las Vegas last October, we had a “Design a Mission” panel where
we divided everyone up in smaller groups to work with a Designer on the
EverQuest team. The goal of that panel was to have everyone participate
in designing a mission that could be experienced by players of varying
levels. We have had this panel in past years and the hope has always
been to put them into game quickly for everyone to play. We’ve succeeded
at times but other times, it takes us a while to fit them into our
schedule. I’m happy to inform you that we will be launching several of
these player-designed missions during our March Game Update to help
celebrate our 14th Anniversary.
A couple
years ago, we had an intern join our team and at one point, we let him
work on some content just to fill out his remaining schedule and to see
what he could do. Well, the content that he created was full of
nostalgic Class-specific connections into the world of EverQuest. Some
time ago, we placed a few of these missions on the test server for
players to run through and they received rave reviews. So without
further delay and after the Anniversary Game Update, anyone that has
finished their Epic quest for 1.0, 1.5 or 2.0, will be able to test
their knowledge and skills by traveling to historic locations in Norrath
to earn an Epic Weapon Ornamentation to use on another weapon. We will
reveal more information soon, but how can you argue against the ability
to Burn Down Freeport and get rewarded for it?! J
Tradeskillers,
you’ll be happy to hear that we will be putting in some new recipes to
create some Hero’s Forge Armor in March. We have several new
animal-themed hats that will immediately take your thoughts to the
famous Barbarian Polar Bear hats in Everfrost. Norrathians can find all
the items for the recipe but they will need help from their fellow
Tradeskillers in order to receive the final product.
We’ll also turn on all past Anniversary events so mark the calendar for cool events to kick-off in two weeks!
Different Subject…
Now, we
know that we have a good Housing and Guild Hall Feature, but we wanted
to see how we could make it great. So, a couple of weeks ago, the
Development team took over a Neighborhood on the Bertox Server and set
up camp. We wanted to spend a couple hours and take a really good
hands-on approach to find ways to better integrate the Housing system
into the game. We are currently compiling our feedback and will be
discussing how we can achieve this. If you want to offer your feedback,
please post your thoughts on this subject as well. Also, if you want to
go take a look at what some of us created, head to the Neighborhood zone
from the Guild Lobby and look up the Priests of Discord Neighborhood.
Feel free to vote your favorite house but remember, almost every house
with substance is going to tell you that it could look better if they
were able to place more items down in their lot or inside their house J
Hero’s Forge Armor
Hero’s
Forge launched last year and we heard your feedback… We are currently
working with some different tech to make Hero’s Forge a tighter fit all
the way around (although, I don’t think I look fat in this armor, I’m
just big-***** J).
Timing for launch of this new armor should be before the summer time.
I’ll be putting up some new screenshots just after the Anniversary to
share our progress.
Shadows of Fear
Last year, we launched the Rain of Fear expansion (EverQuest’s 19th
Expansion) and in April, we will be continuing the Rain of Fear story
with the Shadows of Fear Game Update. Shadows of Fear will be available
to everyone that has purchased the Rain of Fear expansion. It will
include some new zones while introducing some new storylines of godly
proportion and you will have some Spell and AA lines that you haven’t
had before. Stay tuned for a Beta Announcement in March. You were signed
up for Beta for the Rain of Fear, then you will be invited to come back
and we’ll have a small window to invite some of you that missed it last
year.
Saving the best for last!
We have
had a few changes to the EverQuest team lately. I would like to
introduce you to Jonathan Caraker as the New Lead Designer for the
EverQuest Team. Jonathan is no stranger to the EverQuest, as he has been
a designer on the team for many years. Jonathan has been with Sony
Online Entertainment for about 11 years, spending time on multiple games
of which about 7 years was as a designer on EverQuest – most recently
as on the Underfoot expansion. I hope that many of you will remember
Jonathan to give him a warm welcome. We’re really excited about Jonathan
joining the team!
Furthermore,
Akil Hooper is now the Creative Director on EverQuest. Akil, AKA
“Lyndro”, has recently been performing the duties of Lead Designer on
the EverQuest II team and also worked on EverQuest in years past, just
like Jonathan. Julie “Ellyra” Burness and Doug “Elidroth” Cronkhite have
also been promoted to Assistant Lead Designers and will be working
closely with Jonathan and Akil to keep EverQuest headed in the right
direction. They have been working in this capacity for a couple weeks
now and I really like it. J This is a great change for the EverQuest team!
Thank you all for reading & see you in game soon!
Subject: Info on 2nd half of RoF Expansion 
Thu Feb 28, 2013 12:36 am