EverQuest

Boss Fight Books #34

by Matthew S. Smith

“You’re in our world now.” This bold tagline led Sony’s 1999 ad blitz for EverQuest, the year’s most anticipated massively multiplayer game. Though just five words long, it challenged players to live in a virtual world beyond anything they’d experienced before—and delivered. The game that proved the MMORPG’s potential, EverQuest outsold all prior entries in the genre and was the most popular subscription game in North America for five years until Blizzard’s World of Warcraft overthrew it. Yet EverQuest lives on, with tens of thousands of players logging in every day.

Based on new interviews with EverQuest developers and veteran MMORPG developers, journalist Matthew S. Smith explores EverQuest's unlikely creation at a studio built to develop sports games, a rocky release which overwhelmed the game’s ill-prepared datacenter, the enticing game loops that placed EverQuest in a media firestorm around gaming addiction, and the real-money black market for EverQuest items that foretold the future of digital goods.

Genres: Video Games, Nonfiction

224 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2024

Reviews

[Kryptomite · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars*

I never played EverQuest, but was excited to learn more about it. And I certainly did. I will say, however, that this book features more of a broad coverage of MMO's and how they originally began, back with MUDs, with EverQuest essentially being the grandpappy of 3d MMO's. This book also discussed world of Warcraft, star wars galaxies, ultima online, and others, along with topics on real world economics, lawsuits, emulators, and other details. This book did not delive into the lore of EverQuest, or anything like that; it focused on creation and direction. I would say, if you really like MMO's, and have not played EverQuest, don't let that dissuade you: this book covers a lot of ground that has personally effected you. If you are interested in EverQuest lore or stories from players who played EverQuest, I'd pass. As a person who played galaxies, wow, and gw2, I thought this book was quite informative in regard to where my own history originated.

[Joseph · Rating 3 out of 5]

I never played EverQuest, but as someone who has played MMORPGs seeing the heritage of MMOs from MUDs, and all the precedents EverQuest set for everything that would follow was interesting. Multiple times throughout this book I thought "Oh, that explains why World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy work the way they do." While EverQuest can't claim to be the first, it clearly a landmark in this genre, and this book provides context as to why.

There were parts of the book that dragged. The Economy chapter struggled to keep my attention. There's a lot of context for what different MMOs were doing at the time with the real life sale of digital goods. I think this is an interesting and noteworthy subject when discussing MMOs. Maybe it was because I knew the end result, but that particular section felt dry.

If you play MMOs and want a crash course on one of the most important games in that genre, and how it came to be, critical precedents set, and how it continues to survive 25 years after launching this is a great book to check out.

[D]

An entire chapter dedicated to ADDICTION but not one mention of "batphoning", "poopsocks", ten hour raids; or Brad McQuaid being a pill-popper.

[Mason · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great look at the spark that really started the wildfire that are MMOs.