Happy Birthday Everquest
Everquest wird heute 7 Jahre alt, wer hier regelmäßig liest, weiß wie viele Stunden ich in Norrath verbracht habe, drum musste ich dem Ganzen einen Eintrag widmen. Einer der damaligen Gründungsväter, Bewahrer und Halter der “Da’ Grind” Flagge, Brad McQuaid schreibt dazu:
Ah man, how time flies! It seems like ages ago in one sense, but then like yesterday too -- hard to explain as I am filled with almost surreal emotions?
So Happy 7th Birthday EQ! And congrats to all of those who have contributed to keeping the game going for all of this time, from the original members, to the live teams, to each expansion team, to the CS teams, operations, sales ? amazing work, commitment and tenacity all!
Man, if someone had come to me early on in EQ and said the game would be around 7 years after launch, as love with the game as I was (and as proud of it as I remain to this day), I think I still would have laughed in disbelief. Certainly Steve & I never planned or designed for mechanics that would keep the game going for nearly that long (so again, big kudos to those people post our time there who have kept the flame burning and alive).
Another b-day just passed recently as well. On March 4th, 1996 Steve Clover and I started work at then SISA to begin development on EverQuest. It was just the two of us, tasked to design the game and begin coding it. So 7 years since EQ’s launch, but 10 years now -- a decade -- since work began on that project! I remember those days well ? the day perhaps a month after we began when Steve came into work with the name EverQuest is memory I will always treasure. Drawing up Norrath on our white board too, and coming up with the names of the continents and starting cities? Building the team? getting to know Keith Parkinson and working with him on the EQ covers? I could go on and on?
A huge thank you to John Smedley who hired us March 4th, put his trust in us, took a chance on us, etc. And also big thanks to Milo Cooper (who had worked with Steve & me before on our first little shareware game, WarWizard). He was already working at SISA on the playstation Gameday franchise and I know Smedley asked him what kind of people we were and whether he should take a chance on us -- thanks Milo, for putting in a good word for us, for moving later to EQ (Milo left a very profitable franchise at the time to join the EQ team -- a huge risk for him at the time), and another thank you to both Milo and Steve who are now at Sigil cranking on Vanguard -- you have my eternal gratitude for your continued faith and perseverance.
There are also many other people for whom sincere thanks is warranted (Bill Trost and Kevin Burns who did the art on the WarWizard 2 demo that caught Smed’s attention and then later joined the EQ team, Jeff Butler for taking over as EQ’s 2nd producer after I was promoted to VP at Verant and then CCO at SOE and simply didn’t have the time to focus completely on EQ, and so many more ? simply too many to mention). But let me specifically also mention Kevin McPherson. He was hired at SISA shortly before Steve and me and was working at that time on Rally Cross. When I was promoted from programmer to producer on EQ, Kevin left Rally Cross to join the EQ team to replace the programming slot that I left open. Now Kevin is also at Sigil, doing an amazing job in the programming department.
Lastly, a big thank you to Sojourn/TorilMUD from which Steve and I learned so much ? how and why MUDs were so compelling and what made them tick. May we all do an ever better job with Vanguard in capturing that magic but then also translating it into a 3d world?
What an amazing 10 years… and while I can imagine the next 10 years to some extent and certainly dream and plan big, I’m sure the MMOG space will continue to exceed my wildest dreams and surprise me quite pleasantly over the next decade. So while remembering and celebrating the past is very cool, here’s also a toast to the future, the next 10 years, and what it will bring!!!!!
Ein paar Gedanken noch zusätzlich. Ich denke EQ ist immer noch eine sehr gesunde Community und ein hervoragendes Projekt. Immer noch setzt es neue Grenzen, was dieses Genre betrifft, mal gute und mal weniger gelungene.
Ich hoffe Sony besinnt sich drauf, und bietet bestimmte EQ Inhalte für jeden kostenlos an. Was gäbe ich nicht alles für einen kostenlosen Velious Server. Happy Birthday Everquest.
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Auch von mir einen Herzlichen Glückwunsch! =D