ffxi gil

THE LOST SHEEP RETURNS

The Lost Sheep Returns

by Nanyea

The “Vision” is one of those phrases that have become a mantra of MMO
gamers everywhere. It all began with 989 studios

and a book full of sketches and notes from an eclectic team of would
be designers and industry veterans in a single office.

The “Vision” spawned Everquest ™, the largest persistent game world
ever and many of those same visionaries left that

dream in the hands of Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) to move forward
and begin again, to try again for that masterpiece,

that Zen enlightenment that would be the perfect world. SOE went on to
make Everquest and its franchise (Everquest 2,

Everquest Online Adventures, Champions of Norrath and more[1])
partners, wildly successful that would be the blood that

fueled so many new projects expanding gaming in every direction
imaginable.

Now we come back to our wayward sheep. Not too long ago Microsoft (MS)
the publisher for Vanguard decided that the

direction of Sigil and Vanguard: Saga of Heroes (VG) was not where
they wanted to go. MS has been getting it rough in

gaming, online gaming in particular and they were hemorrhaging money
on investments that had little to no return. “We want

another World of Warcraft[2],” they said, millions of subscribers.
Brad[3] stuck to his guns and wanted to keep creative

control of his baby and struck a deal, he went back to SOE and
negotiated an end run with MS that allowed them to cut their

losses and let SOE pick up potentially one of the best games out
there.

Now we come to the recent past and where we went wrong… Brad’s vision
was the most challenging and realistic environment

ever to be digitized, its been quoted many times in some areas such as
smithing that you could and would learn how to craft

a suit of armor in approximately the same amount of time as you would
at a real life forge. It was that realistic, and in

the same tokens that “Hard Core.” Sadly, Brad’s sticking point and his
target audience was this type of gamer willing to

invest 40 hours or more per week into his beautiful creation and to
take every challenge head on with a stiff upper lip.

There’s something admirable about that to stand up against the entire
gaming industry and make your dream, what you

believe in. Brad did that, although recently more and more compromises
have slipped in. People at Sigil are were scared if

they would have a job the next week, the next month and it was
starting to slip out to the general public just how

terrified they were.

And now finally we come to the present day: Brad has some good news
for us, the players; SOE has generously agreed to

aquire Vanguard and bring them back into the flock. Like the ill fated
MxO (The Matrix Online) and its flagging 13,000

subscribers which misses the mark for a successful (for our terms a
MMO that can keep its head above water and continue to

produce content) by a good bit, so too has VG missed that mark and
while initial sales were promising subscription numbers

are dangerously low. This move by SOE will ensure that Sigil and VG
continue to update and produce new content and give it

the boost it needs to continue building a subscriber base.

Looking to the future, there were a few things that went wrong with
VG, but now some things will change. Everquest 2

initially for me as a Hard Core raider was a letdown, but now a few
years later it in my opinion is one of the best MMOs

available period. VG now has the opportunity to develop content,
adjust to its player base, and continue to attract new

players. It’s not often that John Smedley, President of Sony Online
Entertainment gets praise, let alone from a media

site, but in this case I really hope he is what he is being made out
to be and will move forward and make Vanguard: Saga of

Heroes into the success that it can be
http://www.rs2-gold.com
http://www.buy-rs-gold.com
http://www.ro-ragnarok-online.com
http://www.worldofwarcraft2.co.uk
http://www.buy-kamas.com
http://www.ragnarokonline.com
http://www.buy-gil.com