Earth & Beyond shutting down

I know I've run into a lot of people in SL who played E&B, so I thought I'd post this.

http://www.ebportal.com/news/928

This was my first MMORPG. Even though I haven't played it actively in a long time, I still check in occasionally to see how it's progressing. I'm very sad to see it go, as I think it had one of the most interesting and creative background stories of any MMORPG. It's a shame EA bought out Westwood, neglected to market or invest in E&B and then buried it.

I've decided from this point forward, I will actively avoid any software created or published by Electronic Arts, and encourage others to do so to the best of my ability.

Go Kex Go!

But ya I bought it too, played 1 month and stopped... it was just to much, wash,rinse,repeat for me! But ya I did enjoy my time in E&B!

Well if they're buying up software companies (Westwood seems pretty big to me) you might not have much of a choice soon. lol...

There's always Sierra and the bloated clone crap they like to publish. 1-2 gigabyte install for a crappy game you're bored with in a week, anyone? And there's Microsoft of course.

This may seem cruel (well, I suppose it is) but I'm glad it's gone. The more small MMOGs that fail, the more people there are available for the ones that remain to keep the good ones running. Of course, that's the selfish POV.

(And who am I to talk, playing WWIIOL. hehe)

For those of you that are heartbroken, there are a couple of games similar to E&B.

Jumpgate and at least one other that I forget the name of.


If you like MMORPGs a good news site is:

http://www.mmorpgdot.com/index.php

(I just mention it becasue I love the site for MOG news)

There is also a games database there that lists most of the games out there or in development (even the really low budget ones).

Shame... I played E&B for a while, it was a fine game.

Unfortunately EA are well-known for this - if something doesn't look like it'll be the kind of multi-billion-revenue-making machine like Tiger Woods or The Sims, you can kiss goodbye once these guys get their hands on it.

I remember them ruining and then axing Air Warrior when they bought Gamestorm, also cancelling the new Ultima Online shortly later to name a couple of other examples...

I fondly remember a couple of months spent playing E&B. The views were nice, the player models well done and decently customizeable. Unfortunately, both trading and combat got very, very tedious, and the quests were ... eh. Travel times actually made me set up a television next to my computer so I could watch fu flicks instead of falling asleep. But oh my, those Prasad and Fenris runs were profitable.

Terran Trader Tarrant of the TTV Fate Amenable To Change, signing off.

They cancelled one of the most interesting gaming concepts ever, Motor City Online, in order to "focus more on upcoming products". Which, coincidentally, was E&B.

When I heard E&B didn't have PvP, I knew it was destined to fail.

If there's no competition between players other than "my x is bigger than your x" without being able to settle it in some sort of pissing contest, the game will fail.

MCO failed liek that too, because usually *everybody* "won" during a race (everyone got money).

Don't boycott all EA products... most things from Maxis are awesome (Simcity 4 is one of the best games EVER), as long as they're not forced to create something trite and "marketable" (TSO would have been cool if EA didn't meddle with it)

Avoid any MMORPG game published by Electronic Arts. It won't be around for more than a year or two before being shut down. They like to play it safe way too much.

LF

I still miss MCO. An original idea that EA did not support. I'm surprised that E&B lasted as long as it did.

Check out Eve Online, it look phatty.

I'm sorry to see it go as well, it really had some character. Can't say I'm not part of the reason though; I had an account for a few months then cancelled it. After the initial OMG look at my custom ship and wow these space panoramas are amazing, I got sick of mining asteroids. I always did enjoy playing galactic tour guide though, but even that lost the flavor when the level grinders showed up.

I'm actually surprised more mmorgs haven't shut down (i.e. Shadowbane, and soon Horizons), as a lot of the technology is getting old and people are getting sick of the cookie cutter. I can tolerate EQ in small doses now, like a couple of hours, nothing more, and I used to be MAD hardcore. My toon is powerful even by today's standards, but I just don't see anything new in it, and that includes GoD. I may not even buy Norrath's End when it releases this year...woohoo more levels, more reason to stand in the plane of fire and solo for eight hours a day!

The other day I was in the vid store picking up unreal 2k4 (the new editor is supah) and stopped in front of Final Fantasy XI. The packaging is nice, the rumors good, I picked up the box, read the back...and saw my self installing it, having fun for a month or so, finding the patterns to level and acquire wealth/power/prestige, and falling right back into the pattern. I put the box down, paid for Unreal, went home and started building a mod.

Anarchy Online is probably overall the most interesting mmorg left, with DAoC a somewhat distant second (as initial leveling is SO tedious). If only AO wasn't so buggy when it came out.

BTW Tron 2.0 is has level editing as well.

Don't forget about a Tale in the Desert...

http://www.atitd.net/

If SL ever goes under, I'm going back there.

LF

I played this before SL. It's...okay... got bored after a while though. Sold my account for $150 or something. The nice thing about it is that you can "train" all the time (even when logged off) so I was able to get a half valuable character to sell without wasting too much RL time.

But SL pwns it in all ways (if you consider SL a game).