Exciting week!

It's been an exciting week around here!

Not only is the Destiny of Velious beta getting underway for EverQuest II, but there's lots of other things happening too.  Last week saw the soft beta launch of "Dungeon Overlord", a facebook game that I've been playtesting in alpha for quite some time.  It's reminiscent of the old DungeonKeeper games (which I loved), in that you can build your underground dungeon lair, designate rooms, and attract creatures.  This is a social game, however, and besides attacking innocent NPC villages in the world above, you can also launch attacks on your fellow players, raid their dungeons, even destroy and steal things.  I've been enjoying the building aspect very much, but am not yet sure how much I will participate in the PvP side which I'm guessing may become quite competitive as the world fills up.  I'm looking forward to seeing how it develops, and in the mean time building up my hordes of evil minions ...  Check out the official page, watch the trailer, and give it a try on Facebook!

Edit to add an update: check out the great review from Curse.com!  And tune into the Jethal Silverwing show on Online Gaming Radio Tuesday night to hear Jethal and SOE's own Linda "Brasse" Carlson talk more about Dungeon Overlord.

Also just launched is EverQuest II's Fortune League, a Facebook-based fantasy-football type of tournament where you join a league, assemble a group of 6 hardy adventurers, and try to complete a weekly quests.  Participants can earn rewards for their characters within EverQuest II, as well as fame and glory within their league, of course!  The interesting thing about this game is that you assemble your group from all the race/class combinations available within EverQuest II, and their performance during the quest is actually based on real data pulled from the EverQuest II game data. So as I understand it, if barbarian wizards have a particularly bad week within EverQuest II, it will affect the performance of your barbarian wizard in Fortune League.... and the reverse is also true. I have never in my life played a fantasy football game so I had to have a good read of the instructions and FAQ and no doubt there's still much to learn, but it looks potentially a lot of fun, particularly for folks who really do enjoy fantasy football type games.  This week's quest is called Siege at Kaladim: "Isolated and penned into the city you tried to liberate, you and your team defend ancient Kaladim against the hordes of screaming mad bugbears and goblins trying to rout you out. If you can endure and survive long enough, your hope is that help may arrive in time to push your foes back again."  My brave group of mostly short races is eagerly waiting to fight back the bugbears!

And of course, last but surely not least, January 11th will see the launch of SOE's latest MMO, DC Universe Online.  This is launching for both PC and Playstation, I believe the first MMO to ever do this, and I'm sure the team in Austin has been heroically overcoming unexpected technical challenges in the process make lesser beings tremble.  I took part in the early beta testing on PC, but haven't had a chance to check it out more recently since I've been so busy with EQII's own upcoming launch.  It was lots of fun when I did play it though, and from what I've heard it's improved by leaps and bounds.  Besides being a fun comic book themed game where you can actually play with various big-name superheroes you know and love, it's also so pretty!  I confess I found myself flying around taking huge numbers of screenshots, and some of the quest areas inside buildings made me sigh and wish we had that furniture for player housing in EQII. 

 

Of course we are all hoping it does brilliantly, and are on the edges of our seats waiting till the launch.  Follow the link above for more information!  And if you didn't already see the fantastic "who do you trust" trailer released last year, here is is again:

Which ones will you be playing - or will it be all of them?  =)

It's beta time again, beta time again...

January, and it's that time of year again ... beta time for the upcoming EQII expansion, due to release in February!  This year's expansion is called Destiny of Velious.  If you haven't seen the teaser trailer we showed at Fan Faire yet, here it is.  I love the music, which sounds both epic and somehow nostalgic, and the video itself gives you a little teaser of what some of the zones will look like.  Can you guess which bits of the video are inside Thurgadin?  Did you spot the Tower of Frozen Shadow?  If you remember Velious fondly from EQ1, then you're probably looking forward to this expansion very much, as I am.

While many players are rushing to sign up for beta (secure link here) and impatiently saying they can't wait till it launches, the dev team of course are running around madly trying to make sure everything is as good as it can possibly be, and unable to believe how fast time is flying past.  As always, we tried to get everything done and ready before beta starts, but there are always a few things that don't get done quite on time, and other issues that may not become obvious until large numbers of people are running through the content.  So now is a time of much bug fixing and polish: polish being a catch-all term that means anything from "making it look prettier" to "explaining it better" to "improving the fun of it" and more.

Normally we all receive copies of nightly compilation reports from players on all our live servers who have used the in game /bug or /feedback commands to submit their comments.  If you've skimmed this blog in the past you may have seen some excerpts of the feedback reports that have caught my eye for one reason or another.  We also get regular reports from the customer service team highlighting problems they've come across through the live petition interactions, and of course there is always plenty of feedback posted on the official forums too.  All this is could be enough to keep a person busy all day just reading it; but during beta we add yet more reports on top of this.

During beta we compile and report the beta /feedback and /bug reports separately, so that they can be tracked separately, and these reports get the top priority for our attention.  We also have separate beta forums where people can leave feedback, and where we developers can post answers and information, or ask for specific feedback on areas we may want to get more information on.  Many of us log into the beta server itself as time permits, and either talk to people there, or perhaps just listen to the talk in the chat channels to see what people are talking about and whether there are any common themes.  We also get an additional report that we don't normally receive, which reports quests not completed.  This is a list of all quests that have been accepted by at least one player on the beta server but which have never been completed by anybody.  It's a good way of quickly highlighting a quest that might be broken: if 300 people accepted a quest but not a single person has managed to complete it, then chances are there's an issue that needs to be looked at.  Sometimes it's an easy reason - for example, maybe the quest requires entering a zone that isn't available yet on the beta server, or which is too hard thus far for anybody to have completed, or maybe there's a timing element that means you can't actually finish it for a couple of days.  But other times it may be that an NPC isn't spawning properly, or there's a bug in the quest causing it to actually not update, or similar.  We turned on these new reports about a week ago and they'll run till beta ends and the expansion launches, by which time of course we hope they will be completely empty.  So far no quests of mine are in the list, which makes me happy - but there are still several weeks of beta to go, and at least one rather important quest of mine that hasn't been tested yet, so neither I nor anyone else will truly relax until the last bug is closed and the launch date arrives.

More Mighty Muggs!

Regular readers of this blog (yes, all 3 of you) might remember that I and other SOE staff decorated some little figurines called Muggs to auction off at this year's Fan Faire.  (My blog about the one I made can be found here.)

The SOE Muggs, awaiting auction:

Well!  Little did we suspect it, but we apparently inspired Dellmon and Aliscious, the co-hosts of the EQ2Talk podcast, to make their own Muggs of each others' characters.  Which fabulous works of art they are now auctioning off, with the proceeds to go to the Child's Play charity.

 

So, if you want to see more details of their Muggs, make a bid to support a good charity, or just obtain a model of Dellmon to burn in effigy, check out their page with the details.  You have till December 31st to bid, so (as Dellmon would say), bid early and bid often!

As for my Mugg, he was purchased by EQ2Traders, who last I heard were taking suggestions on a wide variety of nasty things to do to him.  Poor Qho!

Edit:  an update to note that Dellmon also commissioned a professional artist to create an Ali Mugg for her Christmas present.  Here's the result, which is pretty impressive!

What Do Players Want?

Apologies for the blog silence - between moving house and work getting busy as we approach the holidays and upcoming expansion beta, I haven't had a lot of spare time!  But here for your interest now are some interesting/amusing/just plain odd selections of player feedback submitted over the past week.  (It should be noted I have already implemented at least one of these since seeing it ...)   =)

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Text: I think there should be a zone where it is pitch black and you need infravision to get through along with your personal torch, i think that'd be a fun zone to play in.

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Text: Void Wood. I raid occasionaly on my Ranger and rarely see enough wood dropped when I do. cost of Void wood on Broker 50plat+. Please add this to T9 wood nodes. its rediculous that you cant use good arrows unless you A) Raid and are lucky B) Raid and are luckyor C) Raid and are lucky. ORRRR add like 5 void woods to each and every raid mob in the game, thx. VOIDWOODVOIDWOODVOIDWOOD OMG HELP <<<<((DOMINO))>>>>

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Text: if you do Firiona'vie's outfit ill buy it make it so people can buy it ty.

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Text: Thank you for all of the new(er) quests in Kingdom of Sky. They really help fill out the area and AA needed for this lvl.


See? Positive feedback exists. :)

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Text: Large New Halas housing:

Would it be much trouble to move the spawn point for entering player characters to appear back by the front door, up the on raised step, instead of down on the main floor, away from the front door as they do now?

Many decorators want to put something there over that floor, such as a "Rose Mystique Rug" for example, which is very large and thick. Because the player character spawns down on the main floor instead of by the door, however, he or she arrives buried up to their ankles/knees/waist (depending on race) in carpet, which looks very odd.

Thanks for reading!

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Text: Wouldnt it be more realistic to sit on a flying carpet and not stand? My wizard would love to use the fiery carpet from Lavastorm but wont because of the horrid looking crouch on them. Please oh please make it so we can sit on a flying carpet like it is meant to be!

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Text: Hiya guys um i would like to know when frostfell is coming i love it plzzzzz relpy if u can thanks and is it in qenoys harbour caouse i normally camp here so yeah thx bye =) =)

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Text: fix or repace paladn heals with something useful

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Text: You guys need to add a rare spawn mob in Shard of Love......Cupid or something!

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Text: Here's an idea for a new tinkered recipe for fun and maybe Roleplay. Secret Agent Spy scrolls! Would work like a player writeable book, but can be sealed by the author. Once sealed, it can be unsealed once, which consumes the item, and lets the user who unsealed it to read the contents, but it also includes a "this message will self destruct in 20s seconds" part at the bottom, and after 20s it causes the reader to get knocked down as if from a small explosion.

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Text: This whole damn game is jimmy rigged ... what a joke...

[note: this was sent from within a guildhall, so I have not the foggiest idea what it was referring to]

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Text: find out who the plat scammers are working for. and then send the info to the Better Business Bureau. let them take care of the scammers

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Text: WHAT????????????????????? Totem of Escape changed from a reeediculous 30 mins to 1 Hour????????????????????????????? who made that decision????????


I will call and write to Japan and go to the top!!! Guaranteed

and Scathe that person ... tell me who did it ????????

I'll petition usless CA for the name GUaranteed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sick of this Garbage.. you already STOLE our money with S of Fates for your own uses and royally Gyped casual players I have ther Facts!! come meet them !!!

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Text: It would be fun to have a house pet that is a giant (like a fire giant, or one of the regular giants from the Steppes). I'm thinking for the guild halls, having a giant stomping around would be a cool change. :) Just an idea.

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Text: Heya :)

Would be fun if in new xpack some of the raid bosses would drop must have house items :)

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Text: We need to inundate the market with rares in order to bring the prices down some. Prices are getting ridiculous on this server, for rares and the items made with them. Help!!

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Text: I've about fucking had it with you and having to explain how to balance your crappy Joke of PvP in this game. Get your shit togeather already.

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Text: The Day/Night Time of the game., I really do not like the night time! It gets so dark I can hardly see., is there a command to do away with the Night Time? Thanks for listening...

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Text: the guild hall flooring makes me sick.....the flooring that we as players are allowed to place should be one piece....the floor blinks rapidly causing great stress upon me

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Text: When are weapon appearence items going to be in the marketplace? Want some!

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Text: You guys could take Stonebrunt, Sinking Sands, Tenebrous Tangle, Pillars of Flame, and a couple of the void instances and make one helluva golf course. Just saying.

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Text: You should put some chain-looking options for cloth wearers in the appearance section. Specifically pants.

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Text: Can you port /gems from EQ1 into EQ2?

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Text: Re: Things running slowly

In Greater Faydark, strolling, me
A prowler, running, I did see
His limbs full stretch, as if to reach
Some far-off distant strond, or beach
And yet though round and round he went
His labours clearly were mis-spent
For though he seemed to want to run
His dreams were dashed, by someone
A higher being than this poor dog
Had deemed that he should ever slog
And, while seeming to be going fast
He's doomed to prowl slow till the last.

:(

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Text: Void warped wood drops need to be higher, I believe.

Also, can we have armadillo pets.... kthxbye. :)

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Text: There should be giraffe and zebras mounts from the Commonlands.

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Text: Hello,

Do you think players would like some quests in which you get some attackers or unexpected visitors when you are in your own home and maybe in your own guild? Thanks and regards

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Text: This game needs fingerless gloves. In some way, shape, or form. Even if it's Station Marketplace bought. It'd be awesome to have some.

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Gamer Entitlement Going Too Far

Anyone who works in or even near the game industry is probably familiar with the phenomenon of entitlement - how people who play games feel they are entitled to rather a lot more things from a game than the game's developers, or legal terms of use, might actually reasonably expect.

This happens in other areas of life too of course, but for some reason computer game players seem to get particularly passionately attached to their games of choice, and can sometimes react unexpectedly strongly to the most minor things.  I've read feedback reports from my own game where people have said they're quitting the game over ridiculously tiny things - to give one example, because we changed the little picture that appeared on the coins in our game (graphics only even visible a tiny portion of the time).  I've read submitted feedback that compared the developers on my game to pedophiles, Saddam Hussein-followers, and much worse language too.  A week often doesn't go by without seeing someone in the feedback saying that at least some of us should be fired, are incompetent, could be replaced by a 3 year old, or clearly have no brains/sense/right to life.  And you need only stop by the discussion forums of pretty much any MMO to see similar passion is alive and well in discussions of most games.

I don't agree this is right, and although I understand how someone who loves a game can be so passionate about it, I think it's a misguided sense of entitlement that leads people to cross the line between politely stating an opinion or objection, and personal insults or even threats.  Happily, the majority of people who play the game I work on are generally polite and sane, despite a few apparent exceptions.  However, I read an article on Kotaku today that made me really fume about the misplaced sense of entitlement that some groups of gamers can develop, and somehow manage to justify:

Minecraft Apparently Under Siege

The gist of the article is that a group of players are disappointed at how slowly developer Notch is putting out updates to the small independent game Minecraft, and have decided to try to "force" him to work faster by launching a DDOS attack on the Minecraft servers.  Their thinking, apparently, is that if they prevent ANYBODY from playing Minecraft then Notch will lose money and have to do what they want.

From the article above, a post purportedly from the people responsible for the attack:

"It's purpose is to send Notch a clear message of how the future of minecraft will turn out unless he gets to work, namely by influencing the amount of sales taking place, due to the attacks.
Start providing your customers with the updates that you promise them.
We have roughly 83,000 bots available, and preserved for this seizure, we could if we wanted to keep this going for weeks, however we have decided to give it a week, and see whether or not your attitude, and commitment will change, we believe it will when money stops rolling in for the time being..."

I just haven't got the words for my disgust at this behaviour.  As a human being and democratic citizen, I resent some other group of people impinging upon my freedom of choice by deciding for me what I can and can't play and what I do and do not want. As a gamer who happens to be enjoying Minecraft, I am perfectly happy with the level of updates in Minecraft and I don't appreciate someone else telling me I should not be, let alone attempting to prevent my playing it.  And as a game developer, I am disgusted by the damage that this group is trying to do to a small, dedicated independent developer.  From what I've read, Notch is a very smart and talented programmer who has managed to create a really captivating game pretty much all on his own, and is trying to continue its development independently.  This is an accomplishment that many game designers can only dream of: the freedom to work for yourself, and do exactly what you want to create what you believe is the best game you can, without having to operate within the confines of a big corporate structure or team.  Notch has that dream within reach, he may become that one in a million game designer who is really able to be independent -- and a small, selfish group of individuals are trying to bring him down, just because as an independent developer he's not able to work as fast as they want him to?  Sickening.

The guys who are launching this attack have spent as much as anyone on Minecraft:  10 Euros (about US$13).  That's the cost of going to see a movie in the theatre ... less than you'd pay for a nice meal at a restaurant.  If they are that passionate about the game, then they've clearly already played it for many, many hours longer than a movie or a nice meal would have lasted.  There is no possible way they can justify their feeling of "entitlement" to more than they've already had.  They paid a very tiny price for days of enjoyment of an excellent game that they are well aware is still in alpha stage -- not even in beta.  This isn't the way to express their disappointment that updates aren't forthcoming as fast as they would want.  This is outright bullying, and it's inexcusable.  It's also illegal, and I hope they get their pathetic selves thrown in jail for it.

Acts like these make me lose faith in computer gamers.  :(



Edit to add: another great post on the topic, from @LivingWorlds.  In which he uses rather stronger language and discussion than I was comfortable using, but quite agree with.

Yay, Arixystix!

A co-worker of mine from SOE has just become a former co-worker, abandoning us to work full time at her real-life crafting.  She's an artist and has worked on a number of SOE's games over the years, most recently FreeRealms and Clone Wars, but she's been doing more and more "real life" crafting over the past couple of years and finally decided to try and make a full time business of it.  It's a big step, particularly in this economy, but she's already had some great publicity in the gaming press for her plushies based on the Plants vs. Zombies game, as well as other custom commission work including a Pocket God display for Comic-Con 2010.

Check out her blog here, her Etsy store here, and follow her on twitter @arixystix!  Best of luck Alix - though with all those adorable plushies, I'm sure luck won't even be needed.

Butter Tarts Recipe

Butter tarts are apparently a Canadian classic (though I had no idea till I left Canada and nobody had heard of them). They're delicious and easy to make, and I still have some former co-workers who drool at the memory and demand I make them when they visit.

So here's the recipe, in two parts (pastry, and filling).  Pastry can obviously be used for any kind of tart instead, also!



Short Pastry

This is an unsweetened shortbread-like pastry. You might be able to find pre-made short pastry in a supermarket; if so, you can be lazy, and skip straight to the filling section. It probably won't taste as good though, and this isn't hard to make, so here's how.

4 oz butter (softened, though not totally melted - leave it out of the fridge for a few hours, or microwave VERY briefly, maybe 5-10 seconds.)
8 oz plain flour
1/2 tsp salt

Put these into a bowl, use a knife to chop the butter up into small blocks about the size of a pea, then use your finger tips to mix the butter in completely.  The mixutre will look a bit like fine breadcrumbs at this point, depending a bit on how hot it is where you are. If it's a very hot day you may find the mixture is soft enough to stick together, in which case you can stop here.  Probably however it'll still be loose crumbs, so in this case add no more than 2 tablespoons of cold water and mix in, using the knife, adding only the minimum amount of water required to get it to stick together. (Note: flour + water = paste.  This is not tasty.  Flour + butter = shortbread.  This is yummy.  Therefore, the less water you add, the more tender and tasty your pastry will be.)

The pastry will still look fairly crumbly but can be carefully rolled out into a sheet, or just shaped by hand. For tarts I don't usually bother rolling out the pastry but just shape it to the baking dish - I used fancy little tart dishes here because these are for a dinner party, but you can use almost anything - muffin/cupcake tins work well for example.  Use your fingers to push the pastry smoothly into the dishes/muffin tin, and stick it in the fridge to wait while you make the filling.

Clockwise from top right:  pastry ready to be pressed into the dish; pastry ready for filling; pastry with walnuts; filled tart ready to bake.

There is no need to grease or spray the dishes before putting the pastry in, since it contains so much butter it should be easy to remove as long as the sugary insides didn't overflow and turn to sugar cement; and if that happens all the greasing in the world won't prevent them from welding themselves to the dish. If you have a little sugar overflow and are using something smooth edged like a muffin tin, try using a sharp knife to gently slide down the sides and ensure the tarts can spin slightly in place while they are still hot, which will make them much easier to remove when cool.

Butter Tart Filling

4 oz butter (softened, as above)
8 oz light brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp lemon juice
1 egg

chopped walnuts (optional)

Mix together in a bowl (don't need a mixer, just a spoon). Put into the pastry shells, fill them only about 2/3 full as the filling will expand a bit and bubble while cooking. Add some chopped walnuts into each tart if you like, this is optional.

Bake for about 15-20 minutes at 400 F. When the pastry is just starting to turn colour but not too brown, and the filling should have significantly darkened, they are good to go. (They can be taken out earlier, but this will leave a liquid filling in the center which is still tasty but more dangerous to eat!)  Let them cool to room temperature, or refrigerate them for about an hour, before eating them.

This recipe made exactly enough for 6 tarts this size.  It will make 8-10 using standard muffin tins, or even more using mini muffin tins (and these are very rich, so smaller may be better).
This is what they looked like directly after removing from the oven:

And this is what they look like when cool.

Depending on the size of the dishes or muffin pans you use, you may end up with either extra filling or extra pastry.  Both can be separately frozen in air tight containers and thawed to cook later.