SOE Pulls the Plug on Four Games

[Andy Chalk]

SOE Pulls the Plug on Four Games

Sony Online Entertainment has announced the forthcoming closures of EverQuest Online Adventures, Star Chamber: The Harbinger Saga, Infantry and Cosmic Rift.

It's not a great day to be a fan of certain old-school SOE online games. EverQuest Online Adventures, Star Chamber: The Harbinger Saga, Infantry and Cosmic Rift are all coming to an end as of March 29, 2012. "Each of these games shares a special place in both ours and our players' hearts," Sony said in a farewell message [http://everquestonlineadventures.station.sony.com/news_story.vm?id=67961] to EverQuest Online Adventure players. "This is not an easy decision, but there comes a time when it's best for our developers to move on to the next adventure, and that day has come."

Websites and forums related to the games will be shut down as well, and Sony said it will not license or authorize any emulated versions or fan-operated servers. On the upside, EQ Online Adventure players will get three months of gold membership in both EverQuest and EverQuest 2 or, if they're already EverQuest subscribers, a free three-month SOE All Access membership. Sony is also planning to wrap things up with a celebration of the game's "proud history," details of which will be revealed later this month. The downside is that players of the other three games get bupkis.

Full details about the looming closure can be found in FAQs for Infantry [http://forums.station.sony.com/eqoa/posts/list.m?topic_id=115600014244], although aside from mentioning the EQOA extras, they all say exactly the same thing.

via: Develop [http://www.develop-online.net/news/39991/SOE-closes-four-online-games]


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[Meight08]

1st thought: People still play everquest?
2nd thought: Why is it only being shut down now?

 

[Yal]

1st thought: People still play everquest?
2nd thought: Why is it only being shut down now?

Everquest is still going strong, they just released the eighteenth expansion for it.

Everquest Online Adventures is a PS2 MMO almost no one has ever heard of.

 

[Micalas]

Everquest Online Adventures is a PS2 MMO almost no one has ever heard of.

That answers that question. I was wondering what the hell Everquest Online Adventures was. Your answer raises another question though. How the hell has a console MMO, let alone one on the previous console generation survived this long?

 

[WanderingFool]

Dozens of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly placated.

You a... kinda being generious with the numbers there...

 

[viranimus]

Yes, its disappointing for EQOA users, but really a 2003 PS2 title no longer being developer supported is not really all that surprising.

Cosmic rift and the others (which you could throw Tanarus in with it) is not all that surprising. Seriously those games were extremely dated in 1999 when EQ came out. Thing is, most of those games were there for no other reason than to pad the "station" roster. Now that they have several games to work with now, theres really not a lot of logical reason to continue hosting server space for something so few people play.

So really its just SoE trimming the fat. Prolly something they should have done about 5-8 years ago. Again I feel for the EQOA players who have years invested. However at the same time, this is the fate of every single MMO. Eventually it will get to the point where it is no longer viable to cover server costs. It might take 20, 50, 100 years but some day, even WoWs live servers will be shut down too.

Its a sad day indeed to see the pre EQ history die. However if that allows SoE to make a worthy successor to the original Everquest that IS actually a part of the lore, it might be for the best.

 

[Rad Party God]

I already knew that EQOA was coming to it's twilight and it's a real shame, but I didn't even knew any of those games existed.

 

[robert01]

I played EQOA until I was suspended and was never told why. It was a decent game and a great example of how MMOs could work on a console.

 

[Pandabearparade]

I played the game back in 2003. It was completely unimpressive. Surprised it took this long to get the axe.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

How sad. I feel sorry for the collective 7 or 8 people that play these games.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

1st thought: People still play everquest?
2nd thought: Why is it only being shut down now?

1st answer: Still 200,000 - 500,000
2nd answer: It's only EQOA - not EQ or EQ2 - which are still going strong on FTP.

EQ:OA was the rather poor scaled down versionl which I'm surprised lasted that long. (7 years)

EQ has been going steadily for 13 years now...

 

[oppp7]

Which do you choose?

Aw, that sucks. I hope the fans are ok with this.
Well, at least not many people will be severely affected.
Why aren't they allowing emulators?
Never heard of most of these, don't care.

I'll choose... blue.

 

[David Dousharm]

Excuse me, but there was nothing POOR nor SCALED DOWN about EQOA, im sorry you people missed it, and quite frankly it isn't entirely your fault! Sony is NOT known for great advertising! Show a little bit of respect, not just you but everyone here! EQOA did what NO console MMO can do even today! It ran without a HDD yes, that means it ran on a memory card! it was completely massive, and seamless, NO LOADING! NONE! ZERO! Does this sink in? SoE is talking about forge light like it never had seamless gameplay before! This is not new to sony, as far as scaled down goes, the only thing that was scaled down, was no corpse runs, and a focus on faster paced combat with a controller!The community was the best i have ever known, and ive played a lot of mmos people, A LOT! i currently play EQ2 and 1 and to me they don't even come close to EQOA, why? sure they may have more ppl, they may look better, but in EQOA ppl actually group! they dont run through the same instance 1000 times without saying boo to one another and they don't solo or molo, i made long lasting friendships in this game and even met my wife on it in 2003. This game meant a lot to a lot of people! Again, show some respect!

 

[David Dousharm]

9 years actually...

 

[David Dousharm]

I played the game back in 2003. It was completely unimpressive. Surprised it took this long to get the axe.

if you missed frontiers, your opinion is completely wasted! MMO's take time to evolve, im sure you love WoW but there are those of us who enjoy working for our levels! i played several games for a short while, if i went back to them now, im sure they would be vastly improved and until i experience that i keep my trap shut!

 

[Pandabearparade]

im sure you love WoW but there are those of us who enjoy working for our levels!

What, exactly, does the time it take to get a level have to do with -anything-? The original Everquest took a lot longer to get capped than EQOA, that doesn't make it better or worse. Fail argument is fail.

im sure they would be vastly improved and until i experience that i keep my trap shut!

Good for you?

Maybe it became the world's best game the day after I left (though that's doubtful), that doesn't mean it was a good game when I stopped playing. It was a poorly designed game, and it's possible that the expansion changed that.

Though I doubt it.