Return to Norrath Day 1

March 10th, 2009.  Day 1.

Years ago, before World of Warcraft, before Star Wars Galaxies, and a little at the same time of Ultima Online and Kingdom of Drakkar, I played a game that many used to call EverCrack.  Yes, I speak of EverQuest.  I think I started to play it in 1999, shortly after it first came out.  I played it up until about the end of 2002.  I don’t think my character ever got huge, I think it made it to level 35.

Back in late 2004 I started to play World of Warcraft.  I found it super easy to play, not too much of a challenge, but after about 4 years I grew very bored with it.  I think around August of 2008 I stopped playing all together.  I was level 70, and did not have the time it required to hunt for epics or join lame-ass raids where you had a 1 in 40 chance in winning a roll (and even then the item you rarely needed).  Seriously, I had done everything I wanted to do in the game.  My skills were maxed, my level was maxed, and I was bored.  Yes, I knew that Wrath of the Lich King was due out in November, but I was PAINFULLY bored.  So I stopped playing.  I think my account still has about 50,000 gold, so if I ever do decide to go back it won’t be too bad to kickstart again.

Okay, so that leads me to now.  For the past 7 months I’ve been bored out of my skull where it comes to playing games goes.  I got a Wii, immediatly got Legend of Zelda from the virtual console thingy, played it and beat it within two weeks (classic game tho), got Left 4 Dead (still play the hell out of that but it does nothing to quell my thirst for an RPG), play Mobsters on MySpace (Overdrive too), but still something is missing.

I got an email a couple of days ago from Sony inviting me to Return to Norrath, that my characters were still there.  Hmm.  I vividly recall exactly why I stopped playing it, I died and could not get back to my corpse in time, lost everything.  Got super pissed off.  Deleted the game, cancelled my account.

But..

It’s been 7 years since I’ve been there.  I broke out my Ruins of Kunark strategy guide, and forgot a bit about why I was so pissed off.  I was a different gamer back then, perhaps I’ve changed.  Perhaps my view on events will inspire instead of condem.  What the hell?  I’ll try it out.

EverQuest.  Does anyone still play it?  Is it a dead game?  They came out with an “expansion” of sorts back in October of 2008, it contained all the previously released expansions.  I’m downloading everything now as I type this.  More than likely I’ll head off to bed and wake up to find it’s still downloading.  14 expansions in all, plug the game itself.  DSL connection, so it’s a fast download, it’s just really freaking huge!  I wonder how long it will take to update everything once it’s installed…

Until then, get ready for an adventure!