Was he actually from Everquest??? This is true??!
Yeah here’s an excerpt from his blog:
In 2002, I was invited to a community summit on site in San Diego. Seeing the offices where the game was made, being able to talk to the team and get a peek at upcoming content… it was magical. I was told that the guy who ran the studio, Rod Humble, wanted to chat with me. You could have knocked me over with a feather. Rod was super chill and polite, telling me how he appreciated Mobhunter. He asked if I’d checked out the newly launched EverQuest Online Adventures on the PlayStation 2. I said no, because I didn’t have the console. He turned to a PR guy in the room and told him to send me one, along with an online adapter and a copy of EQOA. It felt like Zeus had blessed me with a magic sword. I couldn’t believe that companies actually did stuff like this. Rod had something else he wanted to talk to me about. We all knew by this point that EverQuest II was in development. He said the game would be needing a community manager. Was that something I’d consider?
Was it something I’d… something I’d consider??? Yes, Rod. Yes, I would.
A few months later, they brought me back for an interview. I met the new team, got to see the new game. Two days after arriving back home, they called me with a job offer. And my life changed forever.
That was 2003. The development of EQ2 could be its own series of articles, and the founding and downfall of 38 Studios could be a novel. In my return to SOE, I worked on Vanguard, Landmark, and the ill-fated EQ Next. Now I’m at Blizzard, working on the MMO that grew to be many times more successful than the game that inspired it. But none of these things, including the job I have today, would have been possible without EverQuest.
Here’s the full thing if you feel so inclined:
http://www.moorgard.com/2019/03/16/twenty-years-of-eq/
I love how he has to throw in the shade of EQ inspiring WoW first.
5 Likes
Ah the game whose factions were
- Good Race
- Evil Race
- Neutral Race
That explains so much.
9 Likes
Much like Metzen was often (and sometimes correctly) criticized for just cycling through the fantasy of the brutal, tribal, Horde vs the western, noble, Alliance in WoW repeatedly, sounds like Danuser is obsessed with like 3 characters. A good one. A bad one. A neutral one. Fighting over and over and over.
For the second time now it sounds like it’s a 40 year old man obsessed with just repeating the stuff they liked when they were a teenager and pretending doing that same idea repeatedly will…like recapture what they loved from youth or some crap.
Meanwhile it’s just ruining the game. I’m still kind of shocked that he flatout admitted the unreliable narrator thing without understanding how it would make fans of the story think about their investment of time into the franchise. I was somehow giving Steve Danuser too much credit. I didn’t think that was possible.
Well hey maybe if Danuser and his cronies ruin the game and burn it to the ground, perhaps we can finally end WoW and get like Warcraft 4 or some other RPG in the franchise where they can actually tell a story coherently.
4 Likes
Warcraft as a lore universum needs a new start, an entire new start. to settle things right by a talented and nuanced and passionate writerstaff.
i mean, the potential to a really really good universe is still existing…thats the sad thing, warcraft have a good fundament to build something great on it.
Danusers also told in that interview that we will see Nathanos, and will know about his destiny in one of those new scenes, that were datamined.
Yep, just like Garrosh never told anything bad about Sylvanas, in Cata quests.
3 Likes
The stuff is about the out of game contexts mostly, as in the stuff in books, It isnt about the ingame stuff.
1 Like
The lore isnt what is ruining the game it is the decisions by the top people in the systems stuff.
In traditional media, unreliable narrators are used to plant surprises in the plot, explore characterization, and provoke questions in the reader.
In WoW, unreliable narrators exist as a fig leaf for marketing the latest lore installment as a MUST READ NEW PERSPECTIVE ON THE LORE without really having any concern for consistency or long-term worldbuilding.
So yes, you’re right in purely abstract terms, but people aren’t angry about the abstract ideas, they’re angry about what Bliz is actually concretely doing.
19 Likes
I feel like a lot of the problems with the story might be beyond a few writers. It feels like you would need to rip out the philosophy of the writer’s room.
14 Likes
Why go through this torment when you can unsubscribe or live in the classic era
3 Likes
I was a big fan of WC 3, and I have been playing WoW since Vanilla. I have come to enjoy alot of the Gameplay, as well as amass a considerable amount of pets, mounts, titles, and other nifty things.
I may be alone in this, but if 9.1 was delayed 2 more months, I would have been fine. I like raiding Castle Nathria over and over again. Yesterday, my Rogue got a BoE 213 ring with a socket from trash - that might still sell for a pretty penny. I’m not sick of the current Raid, and I have like 3 or 4 level 60 Characters that cleared it multiple times.
As opposed to the Nyalotha raid. That was tedious. Maybe it was the drab grey/purple color scheme? Or the Characters involved? I really enjoy hanging with Draven and the Accuser.
Anyway, I am having fun playing. Even if the story is going off the rails.
The thing is, in different hands I could find this a very interesting idea. In histography when you’re reading say a historic quote you’ve to try to discern the whole context. Who is the speaker, who are they speaking to, do they’ve an objective, what if any events happened around the statement and so on.
And conceptually having to engage with a fantasy’s history while wearing a detective hat sounds really cool.
If it were say Tolkien’s work. Or something else with a very clearly thought out and well defined world. And WoW’s in the ‘making ish up as we go along’ camp. Which is fine, good even, that’s where other fun stuff like Star Wars wandered out of.
But it makes me think this is more a tacit admission they can’t be bothered to keep up with this nonsense either, and if there’s a glaring contradiction it’s not a continuity error it’s because of an unreliable narrator.
19 Likes
Even then i think the ship has sailed on that, sadly.
I’m pretty sure Chronicle stated that Derek Proudmoore was burnt to ashes when the Dragons attacked his ship. Yet somehow 20+ yrs later ingame during BFA the Horde finds his body. Not only is he in perfect enough condition to be raised after being on the ocean floor for 20+ years but he also has absolutely no indication of being burned.
16 Likes
See, you have to understand, that’s a perspective thing. Burnt to ashes… others would have seen it as magically preserved so that decay was prevented and crabs deterred, leaving him almost perfectly recognizable by his sister 20 years later.
26 Likes
I want to point out that what we see ingame isn’t immune to this nonsense. This happened multiple times in BFA. There’s the situation with what Genn said to Rastakhan, and there’s the Furbolgs in Darkshore during the prepatch that had differences depending on what faction you played. I still don’t think we know what’s definitely canon for that Furbolg situation. The Gorillas in Zuldazar have a similar situation with them.
2 Likes
God that was so insane.
It wasn’t even different in an interesting way where Alliance hears the violently colonial racist language but Horde hears the chill not that had language
It was just crap
22 Likes
Considering his Tweets on Nathanos show how Nathanos is stung by Sylvanas’s comments:
What are the chances that they will kill off Banshee Queen Sylvanas while preserving previously extracted Good Half and have Nathanos work with the Jailer in hopes of reuniting with a version of her only to get a stinging rebuke from that version of her?
Absolutely genius. Brilliant.
I cannot believe I never considered how Sylvanas’ inner monologue in the War of Thorns short stories about not wanting to be warchief and having Vol’jin thrust it on her might have been unreliable narration.
After all, why would Sylvanas know what Sylvanas’ plan was all along? This would explain so much.
I am floored, brilliant writing.
29 Likes
Actually that monologue was the from Before the Storm novel which was written by Christie Golden after The Three Sisters comic(which was partially written by Christie Golden) was written mentioning that Sylvanas serves the True Enemy…
The Three Sisters Comic reveals that Sylvanas is serving the True Enemy while the later written Before the Storm reveals she has no idea how she got shoved into the Warchief Role despite that and assumes the Loa to be responsible.
Of course it turns out to be Bwomsamdi’s Boss Mueh’zala who is later revealed to be the one who gave the Jailer his Eye and struck the alliance with Helya(who serves only herself it seems according to her own mouth).
Danuser and Golden are practically making the narrative that the Bad Guys are not a cohesive organization but are so chaotic and unpredictable that looking at each member’s point of view won’t give you the answers you seek to their goals!