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EQII dev discusses the art of plugging a memory leak
No one enjoys a memory leak in their favorite game. Perhaps you've reported one in the past, in the hopes of a speedy fix. EverQuest II's technical director Joshua Kriegshauser recently noticed quite a few reports coming in about a possible leak in the zone Veeshan's Peak, and has done a write-up of what it takes to repair these crippling and annoying problems.Having read through the article, we won't pretend that we understood everything that Kriegshauser has written, but we get the point -- fixing memory leaks is no stroll in the park. For those of you that can keep up with what he is saying, kudos to you. For the rest of us, it opens our eyes to what really goes on behind the little hotfixes we zoom past in the latest patch notes of any given game. In case you don't make it to the end of the article, we'll let you know that he did manage to fix the leak -- we're going to go now and sleep off the headache we got from reading that far.
First LoN promo weekend of Spring kicks off today
The next Legends of Norrath Promo Weekend is imminent, beginning at 2:PM PDT today, and will run until at 10:00 AM PDT on Monday, April 7th. The usual deal of increased card drop-rates in EverQuest and EverQuest II applies, as well as the introduction of two new cards. Players will be able to snag the Icewell Commander card (seen at EQ2Players), as well as the handsome dog pictured here, the Blackburrow Troublemaker. Look at his sweet face -- how can you not want to take this adorable Gnoll home?
Raiding LU 44 Preview: Do You Feel the Hate?
Coming this Tuesday, April 8th, along with the rest of EQ2's Live Update 44 is the Shard of Hate. It follows last year's Shard of Fear and Estate of Unrest free, nostalgia-drenched content updates. Unlike those other two, though, the Shard of Hate is a raid zone. EQ2 lead designer Akil "Lyndro" Hooper was kind enough to take some time out of his day to show us around the spite-filled roads and alleys of this small, deadly fragment of Innoruuk's demesne. You'll find the portal to the Shard of Hate in the dark elf section of Nektulos Forest -- go all the way east, then head north. You may see the Avatar of Hate lurking nearby, but he'll let you in. It's safe to zone in, but don't move around much; patrols come close to the zone in. Who rules the Shard of Hate? --->>>> %Gallery-19782%
A late April Fools' entry: EQII's Weighted Companion Chest
We nearly missed this one, but thankfully one of our readers didn't, and sent us this screenshot of a chest in EverQuest II. Looks just a little bit different doesn't it? Another nod to the gaming world's beloved Portal, it seems that players were treated to Weighted Companion Chests in EQII for April Fools' Day. Hopefully you looted that quest starter before tossing the chest in the Emergency Intelligence Incinerator, Rollins![Thanks, Rollins]
SOE exhibits 20 new pics of EQ2's Game Update 44
The official EverQuest II community site has been updated with 20 screenshots of the forthcoming Game Update 44. The screenshots illustrate the new features that were announced a week ago. There are quite a few shots of the new Shard of Hate instance and its related events, as well as the updated trade skill facilities in Freeport. You can also see the two new warg mounts and an oh-so-titillating shot of the new "Show Ranged Weapon" option for Rangers who'd rather show off their epic bows than their melee weapons.Once you're done looking over those, you can go read some snarky, sarcastic remarks about all the new Game Update 44 content in a pretty amusing commentary titled "Island of the Patch People," provided by EQ2 players RazorX and Coyote over at Ten Ton Hammer. All patches can be nitpicked at least a little, even the awesome ones!%Gallery-19417%
Bristlebane's Day told in pictures
It's Bristlebane's Day in Everquest II until April 2!The god of tricks and pranks has a special job for someone (maybe you!). Look for Blat Berisen outside the gates of your home city... The gods are sending evil thoughts into his brain, and only you can retrieve the tinfoil cap he needs to block them out. Will you accept the challenge? Check out our exclusive gallery for hints to help the quest along -- including amazing shots of the tin cap itself!%Gallery-19394%
Interview with Thomas Sincich, EQ2 character artist
SOE recently posted a new video developer chat. In this month's edition, Midori "Momochi" McDaniel chats with EverQuest 2 character artist Thomas Sincich, about his work on EQ2's fifth expansion and Legends of Norrath, his character work on the Arasai and Sarnak races, and his designs for epic armor and the Soulfire weapons. You can download the entire DevDiary chat and see some of Thomas' absolutely stunning artwork, but it's a bit large, so we've transcribed it here for your enjoyment. Click through the break to read the whole thing, and check out some of our previous EverQuest 2 developer interviews.
Shard of Hate sneak preview
Pinski over at EQ2Flames brings us some news about EverQuest 2's new zone, the Shard of Hate, due to arrive in Live Update 44. The Shard of Hate follows last year's re-opening of the Shard of Fear. That zone brought single groups through one of EverQuest's most memorable raid zones. The Shard of Hate introduces the same sort of nostalgic goodness in juicy raid form -- though without the four hour corpse runs, we hope.Pinski reports at least six named encounters, one of which is a group of five named sisters. He also notes that the citizens of the Shard of Hate have some rather interesting damage shields. Read more of his perilous trip through Innoruuk's home in this first look at what is sure to be a fun time for EverQuest 2's raider community.
Fights to break out for EQII's Game Update 44
EQ2Players is featuring a brief glimpse of EverQuest II's next major content patch, Game Update 44. Apparently, GU44 will bring The Shard of Hate to Norrath, causing fighting to erupt in the cities. Whether this is something to be stopped or promoted is up to you, as you can assist either side of the battle by speaking with the "Priests of Love" or "The Dead". There's no word on the possible repercussions of deepening or cleansing the Hate, but it sounds like the foundation for an interesting world event.Along with the Shard of Hate, GU44 will feature a renovation to the Coalition of Tradesfolke in Freeport, similar to what was seen at the Ironforge Exchange in GU43. An option will be added for ranged weapons to be displayed instead of ranged weapons, and there will be changes to the level requirements on ranged ammunition. Lastly, a pair of new Kunarkian armored Wargs will be available, one meant for battle and the other for spell-casting. We're promised that the next update will include some pictures, so stay tuned for those.
EQII lore: Escape from Guk part 3
The final chapter of the EverQuest II lore piece Escape from Guk is now available, and we're able to follow Nurgg and Kaltuk on the last leg of their escape. After Kaltuk successfully out-drank the Trolls and ended up passing out, Nurgg threw him over his shoulder and set about getting past the rest of the guards.What he found was that every other Troll on the way out of Guk had already been killed, leaving piles of bodies with odd bloated wounds. Nurgg made it out of Guk with no resistance, and started to trudge through the swamp. However, with the strange scene in Guk still in mind, he suddenly realized that it was a little too quiet outside ...
Massively toasts Brell with the EQII Brew Day quest guide
The Brew Day holiday is nearing it's end in EverQuest II, and if you haven't completed the holiday quests yet, you soon won't be able to! Thankfully, we've created a guide for you to use for your Brew Day adventures that covers the three available quests and will get you your rewards in no time. One of the new rewards for this year's holiday is the Brew Day Cloak, pictured in the screenshot above. There's also a whole new quest line that wasn't around last year, obtained from the Avatar of Below. Click on the above picture or the gallery below to check out the guide, or to just flip through the purdy pictures, and raise your stein to Brell! %Gallery-18890%
King Tormax commands you to enter this weekend's LoN tournament
Another "Double Threat" Loot Tournament is scheduled for Legends of Norrath players this weekend, offering the chance at fame, glory, and some shiny new cards. Your 10 Event Pass entry fee will guarantee that you receive a minimum of three Inquisitor booster packs, as well as one of two loot cards and a special promotional card. The promotional card is none other than King Tormax, Lord of the Storm Giants. Once a formidable raid target in Kael Drakkal, he's now a bit of a pushover with new levels and gear, but plenty of people would surely like to pick up this card to remember him at his best.The two loot cards on offer at the tournament are the Familiar of Phara Dar for EverQuest and Fury of Di'Zok for EverQuest II. The event will kick off at 7AM PST on Saturday the 22nd of March, and go until 9PM PST the next day -- and yes, this is one of the tournaments that only U.S. residents can enter. Check after the break for full tournament and prize details.
The Daily Grind: Concentration buffs
Over at Kill Ten Rats, Zubon brought up the topic of concentration buffs. For those that don't know, a concentration buff is one that only needs to be cast once and will remain until canceled, and takes up a certain portion of the caster's "concentration" (as a way of limiting the number of perma-buffs that are enabled). Both Dark Age of Camelot and EverQuest II use this system, and there are certain Lord of the Rings Online buffs that only need to be used once -- but why aren't more MMOs making use of this?Not every buff should use the concentration system (especially some of the more powerful ones), but there are some with a longer duration that may as well just be permanent while grouped. It doesn't add to the fun, or take any skill, to recast a buff every 30 minutes or so. It's also easy enough to keep it under control, through having to be close enough to the caster to receive the buff, and needing to remain in the party.So are there any good reasons that this shouldn't be a more common feature in MMOs? Is it something that you'd like to see more of in upcoming games? Tell us what you think.
EQII designer Kyle Valle interviewed
Over at EQ2Vault, one of EverQuest II's designers Kyle Vallée answered a couple of questions about his work on the game, and Rise of Kunark in particular. Vallée was the designer for three of the epic quests (Shadowknight, Brigand and Ranger) that were introduced in Game Update 42, and also for the Jarsath Wastes area in RoK. These are just some of his larger projects, and he talks about a few of the other things he has done in the interview too.Aside from his designing, he loves to play the game as well, and his level 80 Brigand, 75 Bruiser and 70 Warden are testament to that fact. When asked if he could tell us anything about the next EQII expansion, we expectedly get nothing -- but we're assured that it will be good! View the whole interview at EQ2Vault.
EQII fan video parodies "The Internet is for Porn"
Brell's Magic Keg is for Ale! The EverQuest II fan video above comes from Mysterious Ranger Productions, and is a parody of the wildly popular song "The Internet is for Porn", from broadway musical Avenue Q. It comes at an appropriate time, with the Brew Festival underway, and certainly gets you in the mood for an EQII pub crawl. If you've never heard the original before, you'll find it after the break, but keep in mind that it's just the slightest bit NSFW.
Part two of EQII lore feature Escape from Guk available
The next installment of Escape from Guk, an EverQuest II lore piece, has been made available at EQ2Players. Part one began with us joining an Ogre by the name of Nurgg Rockfist, trapped in a Guk prison, as he was introduced to his new cellmate, ale-loving Dwarf Kaltuk Ironstein. Whilst Nurgg had been imprisoned for many years, Kaltuk had already managed to think of an escape plan in a matter of days. In this chapter we get to see how he uses his fondness for drinking to try and get them out of their cell. A challenge is proposed to the Troll captors, and a good old fashioned drink-off ensues. But does Kaltuk have the constitution to come out on top when he is matching their drinks two for one?
One Shots: Traveling in style
How we long for the days of the future when we'll be teleported where we want to go. Sure, ours will likely involve far less magic and be much more in keeping with Star Trek, but it's still a nice dream. (And just think of all the awesome news coverage we could give if we could just teleport around!) Today's One Shots brings us a screen of one of the places we can at least enjoy fast transportation today! This comes to us from Firelore, Level 50 Warden in EverQuest II, who appears to be hanging out on a flying carpet inside of a spire. (Did we mention that we want flying carpets too?)Do you have a cool screenshot of how you get around in your world? Or maybe something interesting you've seen while flying or riding around? Whatever it may be, grab those screenshots and send us a bunch at oneshots@massively.com! Let us know your character name, server, level, or whatever you'd like to tell us about you and tell us a bit about what's in the picture/what game it came from. It takes only a few minutes, and it's a lot of fun to see your adventures shared with everyone.%Gallery-9798%
EQII Lore: Escape from Guk, part 1
On a recent trip to Trakanon, some parchments were discovered that contain the story of an Ogre, Nurgg Rockfist, and a Dwarf, Kaltuk Ironstein, and their escape from their Troll captors in Guk. The parchments are thought to be from the Lost Age, and were penned by a previously unheard of bard named Eylee Zephyrswell, a friend of the two escapees. Thus we have some new lore for EverQuest II fans to enjoy!EQ2Players has obtained a transcript of the parchments, and has featured part 1 of the tale for all to see. It opens with Nurgg, having already been imprisoned for around 10 years, being introduced to his new cellmate Kaltuk. After barely being there for five days, Kaltuk thinks of a plan to bust the two of them out, and being a good Dwarf, it of course centers around drinking ...
One Shots: A Sarnak cowboy sunset
Okay, we know EverQuest II isn't a western cowboy-type MMO, but this particular screenshot put us in mind of old-school cowboy TV shows from the 50's. It was sent in to us by Firelore, who plays a L42 Warden. It features the swirling winds and blazing sun of the Sinking Sands zone. We keep expecting to see tumbleweeds blowing by every time we look at it. If you've got an interesting image of your journeys, (with or without cowboy-themed vibe) what are you waiting for? Join the fun and send them to us at oneshots@massively.com! Add in a blurb about what you were doing/why it's so cool so the rest of us can share in your adventure, and voila. Yours could be the next up on One Shots!%Gallery-9798%
EQII Game Update 43 preview shows new features and lots of pics
EQ2Players has put up another preview for EverQuest II's Game Update 43, and not only does this one have a large amount of pretty pictures, it also details some new features that we didn't see in the last preview. As well as the group looting and shiny harvesting changes, major cities will be revamped with some new travel bells and extra banking/broker/mender NPCs, and significant renovations will be made to the Ironforge Exchange in Qeynos.For the tradeskillers, new Froglok mannequins will be available to craft, and there will also be some faction items for those those with good Riliss, Bathezid and Danak factions. An example of one of these items is shown above -- the Crafted Vault Expander -- and it makes you wonder what other kind of handy crafted goods might be coming. Check out the gallery we've compiled of all the pictures featured in the GU43 preview.%Gallery-17446%
