A great article was published on the EQ prequel, Everquest Online Adventures over on Game Daily's website. I'd summarize it... but its too good to shorten it :)

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EverQuest Online Adventures Sony Online Entertainment Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) is taking a giant leap forward today; introducing PlayStation 2 owners to the world of massively multiplayer online role-playing (MMORPG) games with the release of EverQuest Online Adventures. The title is set in the Age of Adventure, or about five centuries before the storyline of EverQuest for the PC. As the game is only playable online, consumers will need a PlayStation 2 Network Adapter to take part in the persistent world. GameDaily had the recent opportunity to find out more about Everquest Online Adventures with Sony Online Entertainment's Ben Bell, a producer on the title, and Scott McDaniel, SOE's vice president of marketing. "This is definitely the new frontier so to speak, " said McDaniel, understandably pumped up about bringing a MMORPG to the PlayStation 2. "Online gaming is really the next evolution, the next stage in where entertainment is going to go. What massively multiplayer gaming does, is it provides something that stand-alone games have never been able to, a social and community element. It's really important that these people have a sense and a feeling of being part of a larger group. That's been one of the key successful drivers for the growth of EverQuest on the PC." He then reeled off some impressive numbers for the PC version of EverQuest—430,000 active subscribers and a recent record of 113,000 simultaneous users McDaniel reeled off what SOE feels are the four main gameplay elements to EverQuest: exploration, social/community, fantasy fulfillment and item acquisition. "In our real lives item acquisition is a big driver, people want a new car, a big TV etc… It all can kind of relate and transcend into the gaming environment." Bell informed us that EverQuest Online Adventures has been in development for about two and a half years. "For about the first year of development SOE had around 15 people working on the title, then the head count was bumped up to about 30-40 people (depending on what state the production was in). All told, when figuring in people working on the game's infrastructure, there was about 42- 43 people who participated in the entire production of the game." McDaniel offered a good analogy on developing for the PC versus the PlayStation 2, calling the PC a "lean forward device," in that users are interacting in a very "dedicated and directed" way. He views the PlayStation 2 as a "lean back" device, or a more relaxed, couch-oriented gaming session. Game design for EverQuest Online Adventures was addressed with this in mind, making it easy to join a game, offering quick rewards and a general "no experience needed" game plan. The only thing needed is a PS2 Network Adapter—and while a USB keyboard can be used for chatting, no mouse can be used with the game, another nod toward keeping the game as simple to use as possible. GameDaily wondered if the developers where able to use any pieces from the PC version of EverQuest to aid in making the game. Bell answered, "The entire game was developed from the ground up. Because EOA has a seamless world, we have a very different way of doing our low level network operations than the original EQ PC game or any of our other online titles. So, we wrote everything form the ground up." Bell added that starting from scratch on the PS2 product still resulted in a quicker development time when compared to the company's PC products, "One of the great things working on the PlayStation 2 is that you only have to worry about one configuration and one set of hardware. The development cycle for this game was pretty short for the type of game that it is. A lot of that had to do with the fact that we didn't have to deal with six types of video cards or a weird brand of RAM from Hong Kong." SOE put EOA threw its paces during three rounds of beta testing, slowly letting in more players over time to get in some load testing and game balancing, as well as squashing exploits and bugs. For beta three SOE sent out about 30,000 discs. "Our servers can hold comfortably somewhere around 2000-3000 players in the game world, that's about where we maxed out on any one world during the beta," said Bell. EOA is designed to support dial-up users as well as broadband (just like the EQ PC products). While broadband users may gain some enhanced stability issues, Bell indicated that would not result in any competitive advantages, "The way the quest system works, all the events are very discreet and all transactions take place instantly. As a player if you are disconnected, you might think you've lost progress, but when you come back in you are going to see that you got the item from the quest or whatever it is you were doing. Disconnection will not ruin your game, all saving happens on the server side." The initial launch of EOA is for North America only. "We are still negotiating our Asian and European launch," said McDaniel, adding, "Early last year we were attempting to get live real-time translation services for our EQ PC title. It's still a long-term goal but for now it is just that, a long-term goal. It's very new technology and one of the hardest parts we found is that it takes a combination of both machine and human translation capabilities because EQ contains a lot of fantasy and game-specific terminology." McDaniel talked a bit about expected demand for the title, "Our initial forecast is within 30 days we expect 50,000 people to be online and playing. Within 45 days we expect that number to double. As it goes from there we have the hardware, and again, are ready to kind of flip on the light switches as needed." Like most MMORPG games, EOA is backed by scaleable servers. "Our infrastructure is situated such that, based on our backend development and technology, we can scale servers and arguably flip switches to bring them online as needed. With our PC title, we started out with 13 servers and now we are up to 47. We've been able to scale over the years without really any hiccups, " said McDaniel. SOE isn't expecting much crossover from fans of the PC version of EverQuest according to McDaniel. "What we've found from the beta is that a miniscule percentage had prior experience on the PC (with EverQuest). We think that the most important thing for this upcoming year is to grow the user base and not to cannibalize it. To that degree, that's why we are addressing new platforms (PlayStation 2) and genres (expanding into online shooters with PlanetSide). Sure, there's going to be some sharing, but it's going to be very small, they all bring in their unique audiences." So, is there any chance of EverQuest ever branching out to other platforms other than the PC and PlayStation 2? Probably not according to McDaniel who said, " If you take a look at the name of our company (Sony Online Entertainment), I think that the answer is self evident. I'm not one to say never, but in the short term we have no specific plans in that regard." SOE is backing the game with a "standard marketing program" that is now beginning to ramp up. The campaign includes ads in all the top gaming pubs as well as online gaming sites. One advertising element that differs from most of SOE's previous PC releases is that EOA has a multimillion-dollar TV campaign supporting it. The series of TV ads started this past weekend and will appear for approximately five weeks at a cost of around $3 million. SOE is also working with Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) inform owners of the Network Adapter about the launch if EverQuest Adventures Online. SOE is also in discussions with SCEA to get a playable demo, or free trial of their EQ title, bundled in with the Network Adapter. McDaniel views the high demand for the PlayStation 2's Network Adapter and its scarcity at retail as a good sign for EOA, "That just goes to show the demand for people wanting to get online. As soon as they hit the stores, they are off into people's hands and we love that." Thirty days of free online play are included with the retail version of the game. After the grace period, a monthly fee of $9.99 will be required to play. Pre-paid game cards will also be available at retail, helping users unable—or unwilling—to use a credit card to pay the subscription fee. EOA will have buddy lists, to help friends easily find each other online. The PS2 game will also have an in-game mail system (a feature even its PC counterpart does not have), allowing players to shoot messages to each other within the game. When players log into the game, messages will pop right up in the screen. While EverQuest Online Adventures did receive a "T" (Teen) rating, McDaniel stated that swear and language filters are in place in the game. "We also stayed away from dismemberment and blood or anything that would really take it over the top." Yes it's hard to imagine, but EOA will be virtually devoid of load times in-game. Expalined Bell, "If you are navigating the world normally, just walking or running around, there are no load times. The only time you have to wait for a load is if you teleport somewhere far away, because you teleport out of the bounds of the streaming technology, resulting in a brief 15-20 second load time." The EOA world itself is massive, consisting of about 350 -360 square miles, or around 500 - 550 square kilometers. "It's hard to count the underground space, there are a few really huge dungeons in the game. During the beta testing (several months) players discovered about one-third of all of the land. It will be a couple of months after release before people have seen everything there is to see, " added Bell. All in all there's about about 500 hours of gameplay per character said Bell, noting that experiences for each character in the game are "wildly different" EOA's content is totally dynamic. Bell said, "We already have events planned out for six months." Bell and his co-workers can adjust content depending on how players react to certain things. He gave the example of a rarely visited dungeon in the beta test. He and his team were easily able to stir up interest in the dungeon by adding additional items and monsters to it.

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Check out the article HERE, as there are some really nice Screen shots too. -Kenti