Global Chat: Money prison

What kind of prison charges you money to stay there? An MMO prison, obviously!

The Ancient Gaming Noob has a few insightful words to say about EverQuest II’s Drunder server and how it’s being used to house the game’s malcontents and rulebreakers while charging them a subscription fee.

“In the end though, I don’t know how this will play out,” he muses. “What sort of relationship does this lead to. Is it going to be some sort of Escape from New York dystopia, players raging against other players, griefing and annoying all who come within range? Will the players unite and defy the company and form their own community? Will Drunder even be noticeably different from the current servers? Will people just quit?”

That’s only scratching the surface of oddity in today’s roundup of MMO bloggers. We’ve even got an EverQuest hat trick today with posts on all three games, including the one you just read!

The Friendly Necromancer: My top memorable locations in EverQuest

Speaking of the good ol’ days of EQ, Stingite takes us on a photo essay of some of his favorite spots in Norrath and various memories associated with them.

“[Here is the] Plane of Disease bone wall and the entrance to the land of creepy giant hair follicles is done by jumping into a sewer pipe… ALRIGHT! This used to be the spot where groups would sit and soak in the glorious experience all night long. Pulls were easy, experience was decent, and the scenery was GORGEOUS.”

Occasional Hero: Three features every MMO should have: WildStar

ChaosConstant has words of praise for WildStar — three words, in fact. As part of a new series, he identifies a few features that he particularly enjoys from this sci-fi MMO. One of them? The excellent player housing.

“Given that this is a game that tried really hard to bill itself as the savior of hardcore raiding crowd, it’s a little odd to find that their housing system is perhaps the best casual, out-of-combat feature of any game on the market. There are other games that have housing, but I know of no other game that combines so much creative freedom with the wide variety of whimsical housing objects that WildStar has.”

Clean Casuals: O Guild Wars 2, where art thou?

Aywren is dismayed with the direction that Guild Wars 2 has taken, and after hearing more details about the new Heart of Thorns expansion, she says she’s all but given up hope of playing again.

“I used to say that you should give an MMO about two years to really mature into the kind of game it would become. I still think that’s true, and GW2 is no exception. It just seems like GW2 tried and tried to experiment with format and development and it, quite frankly, failed in these experiments. It feels like so many things GW2 started out championing, they’ve gone back on.”

Lair of the Wolf Dragon: My thoughts on the Trove classes

Ever wonder what all of the Trove classes are like to play yet you don’t want to spend money on them to find out? I’d recommend that you read this breezy post of testimonials about many of the professions.

So what is her favorite class? That’s easy: the Candy Barbarian. “The biggest heal also heals any nearby players, increases everyone’s attack speed briefly, deals a good amount of damage, and comes in the form of a giant ice cream cone plummeting from the heavens. What’s not to like?”

Gaming Conversations: Is hype dead?

Braxwolf says that he’s been observing a decline of hype — and excitement — regarding MMO news and announcements, especially at major events, and he speculates about a couple of reasons why this may be.

“I do wonder if there’s a better way to balance the knowns and the unknowns,” he writes. “Something between the fire-hydrant burst and the constant garden hose stream of information that players have now come to expect. Something that would make these industry events a little more exciting and worthwhile.”