EQ2 – Page 5 – A Pixel Nomad

End of Holidays and Back to Gaming! #WurmOnline #EQ2 #3DS

I hope everyone has had a very Merry Christmas and Happy Holiday this year. As you can tell by the lack of posts I fully enjoyed my Christmas break, and I’m gearing up for new years (with a lot of baking involved).

In Wurm Online I’ve acquired yet another deed, this time on Independence. That brings my total up to three, one on Deliverance (lets call this home base), another on Pristine (separated from the rest of Freedom, what I consider my future vacation home) and my newest deed I’m currently setting up to be a refuge for my priests, to work their skills and hang out at.

Speaking of my priests, they’re coming along well. The Fo is not a priest yet but still only a follower, but my Vynora priest and Magnaron are both doing well. Faith gains have slowed down on both but the Magnaron is inching towards 70 faith which allows me to strongwall mines. The main reason I want this particular priest to begin with.

I’ve also been playing a little EQ2, I started up a necromancer and started leveling her through some older content. Thanks to triple station cash and a few Christmas presents I’ve got a nice stash of station cash and while there hasn’t really been anything lately that has caught my attention, I’m sure it won’t be long. Perhaps a new house or some furniture, or a mount. I’ve always loved the choices in EQ2’s station store.

I also got two new 3DS games for Christmas (and an amazing laptop that I’m completely in love with) one of the games was Epic Mickey (loads of fun, think Mario but with Disney characters), and the other is from the Professor Layton puzzle series of games. This one is my favorite so far, you listen and follow along with a mystery story while solving puzzles of various degrees. Plus I’ve just acquired a bunny that I’m training to perform, I think if the game was only that I’d still like it just as much.

So, what geek goodness have my readers gotten this holiday? Please share in comments below!

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself

A Little WurmOnline, NaNoWriMo, Sims 3, EQ2, and WoW

I made my 50,000 words for this months NaNoWriMo, but it was a very difficult run. I would start a story, get interested with it, get bored of it, and then write a new story. I even gave up for a week or two. After some consideration I decided there was no reason for me to give up and so I started again. I’m very glad that I did. I’m not really sure why this year was so difficult compared to others, it was my 5th year attempting it so there really no surprises, but it seemed like everything hit this month, and I really felt it so maybe that’s why.

Of course in between writing I still played games. Wurm Online being my main choice these days as far as MMOs go – but I’ve also decided to pop back into WoW now that 5.1 has come out. I’ve been playing a little EQ2 (have you seen the incredible new house they added that’s a ship? Much love) and I’ve been playing some single player games like Sims 3. During the black Friday sale EA had some fantastic deals on their Sims franchise, so I picked up the last expansion I was missing, and now all I’m missing are three “stuff” packages that I don’t exactly care about getting. The base game was going for as low as $9 which was really great to see.

TODAY is the last day to register for the 2012 Gamers Secret Santa. I’ve gotten over 150 replies so far from interested parties, and I’m really happy that people are still interested in this. I’m also doing a card exchange this year, so if you’re interested in exchanging your address for that, please email me!

What has everyone else been up to this month? It feels like it went by so quickly! Before we know it, Christmas will be here!

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

The Month of Gaming Stuff #EQ2 #EQ #VGD #TS3 #Riftgame

Not only is NaNoWriMo going on this month (which I have been failing at, horribly), I’ve opened registration for this years Gamers Secret Santa, Rift released Storm Legion, Sims 3 released Seasons, EQ2 released Chains of Eternity, EQ1 is releasing Rain of Fear, Vanguard is releasing City of Brass, Planetside 2 is releasing, and that doesn’t even begin to touch on the other console games that came out this month like Halo 4.

What a month to be a gamer, hmm?

Important News re: ProSiebenSat.1 #EQ2 #EverQuest2

Taken from the official EQ2 forums

As many of you may have seen this morning on John Smedley’s Twitter, we have been working together with ProSiebenSat.1 Games to come up with solutions to some issues that have been brought up by our customers since the announcement of our publishing agreement with ProSiebenSat.1 Games in the EU Region. Together we have worked out a deal where existing customers will be able to choose whether they remain with Sony Online Entertainment or transfer to ProSiebenSat.1 Games.

Here are the tweets from Smed:

“I wanted to thank our players for continuing feedback. We’ve been listening along with our European partners at Prosieben. We’ve found a way to let existing players of our current games that are migrating over to Prosieben (EQ, EQ II, Planetside 2) keep their SOE accounts and stay with SOE. Down the road we may offer an option to move over to Prosieben. Just to be clear after these games launch on Prosieben’s service new accounts will be created on their sites. However all US and EU players can still play together no matter which service they are on.

I want to be clear that Prosieben will have better European CS and payment options IMO. That’s why we went with them in the first place. Also Prosieben has done a great job of listening and is working on changing some of their CS policies. More to come on that soon. Just going back and forth with our partners at Prosieben. I can confirm that we WILL offer the ability to migrate to Prosieben. No word on timeframe just yet, but shouldn’t take too long.”

Both SOE and ProSiebenSat.1 Games remain committed to making this transition as easy and beneficial as possible for players; more news will come in coming weeks, especially after we return from SOE Live.

Thank you for your patience.

Lets Talk ProSiebenSat.1 #EQ2 #SOE

(Comic is curtsy of @CheesePirate, and was censored from the EQ2 forums) I was really hoping I wouldn’t have to speak up on my blog about this situation, because I dislike posting negativity, and it’s rare that I do. However. I’m also not one to just sit down and let things pass by when I feel that there is something that can be done. For those who are unaware, here is the situation:

– SOE announced a deal with a company called ProSiebenSat.1 that would affect eight Europe-based SOE games. With this deal comes region locking. US players will no longer be able to access EU servers and those EU players who currently have US characters will be grandfathered in, but not future EU players. This deal carries over into future SOE titles, like EQNext, and PlanetSide 2 (for me personally, it means I can no longer access my Splitpaw characters. There’s a huge list of other consequences here).

– ProSiebenSat.1 are known for their shoddy customer service, and they’re also known for publishing the personal details of customers which is in violation of EU and German privacy laws.

– MANY people spoke up on the forums about this situation, and were banned for “excessive negativity”.

– Feedback was requested, but the deal has already gone through (6 weeks ago).

– A player even called ProSiebenSat.1 to try to get some answers since SOE has been very reluctant to say anything on the matter. They (ProSiebenSat.1) said “EU Customers will regret being considered US customers” because of all the events and marketplace items they have planned for the EU servers. In fact, it looks like the EU servers will have absolutely nothing in common with the US servers once this deal is implemented in full.

Perhaps things are not all doom and gloom, and this deal really is a GOOD thing. I fail to see it, personally. Region locks are NEVER a good thing, especially from my perspective where I play EU hours and live in Canada. In a day where games like Rift are trying so hard to allow players to stay together (free weekly server transfers, no region locking) it seems outrageous. It’s especially bad for games that have already been established. Put yourself in the position of the US military personnel who has been gaming on a EU server and now that they’re finally home, are unable to play with their friends because they must move to a US server, no longer having access. One of the major reasons any of us play these games are to be able to play with our friends, no matter where they’re from. To be able to meet people from all over the world, form bonds and learn from one another. Restrictions such as these do nothing but separate players, and having (what sounds like) completely different rule sets on US/EU servers makes me wonder for the future of our EU friends.

It has been said time and time again – companies listen to nothing but MONEY. If you disagree with this and the future of SOE games, PLEASE consider cancelling your accounts. SPEAK with your wallets. That is the ONE sure way to get your opinion across in a way that will make the higher ups listen.

(As a side note, I hold no blame to the community team of SOE nor the developers, I know this decision was not something that they personally made, but came from higher ups).