When was your first experience with Everquest?

[LetTheWookieWin]

I bought the game at future shop in september of 1999, rolled a dwarf cleric and went nuts on Prexus. My friend had suggested the game after finding out I had played meridian 59. I was also a big fan of MUDs and we had both played those.

Eventually ended up in a guild called Unity, but had many friends in Keepers of the Faith as well. Best early memories:

a full suit of banded armor at level 9, looting dawnfire after kunark came out, and hitting 51 with 2 different characters when kunark was released nearly instantly.


Also I remember how satisfying it was to destroy the planes after we suffered so hard raiding them with the level 50 cap. Good times

[Lindsay Carouselle]

I remember being at Electronics Boutique learning about this new online gaming thing and the guy working there had said the Ultima Online box I was holding would do fine, though he suggested I try this game called "EverQuest" because it was growing in popularity and I might like it.

Despite my dial-up connection and garbage computer, I was able to play.

First death: falling in the water outside the casters' area in South Qeynos and drowning because I couldn't figure out how to swim.

[Toehammer]

I remember it was in 1998, and I read a sort of sneak peak in PC Gamer of Everquest. It mentioned that it was basically D&D minus the stupid dice (awesome!) and a totally open world. But the line that really got me was that in the world, they said that "each raindrop exists" and is rendered individually and that if someone shot a fireball across a harbor, you would see the same trajectory but from your vantage point. For some reason those two things got me really intrigued... maybe the level of detail or something.

At the end of the article there was something about a "Beta Test" and I had no idea wtf that meant, but I sent in a letter, and several weeks/months (cannot remember) later my dad said, "something arrived for you in the mail today" and I had no idea what it could be, but opened it and saw a plastic sleeve with an EQ beta CD inside. I was like OMFG, installed it, but the beta wasn't starting for a couple days, so I played the tutorial with Soandso probably 10 times.

When the beta server launched, I made a barbarian warrior named Korlaorf and unintentionally discovered the polar bear skin armor. We all had theories about how killing the polar bears with clubs gave you undamaged skins, so tons of barbarians were wielding clubs haha. Nobody really understood the power of grouping and downtime, so most people just rolled solo. I was about level 10 and thought I was totally badass because I got a sharpening stone from somebody coming from the the Qeynos area and made a TARNISHED two handed sword. Full tattered/rawhide armor too!

Then this level 30 something ranger zones into Blackburrow one day dual-wielding minotaur battle axes and wearing ring mail, and we all thought he must be a god. He started handing out minotaur battle axes and we were so sad that it was the last day of beta.

He told me about "Ice Giants" way past the frozen river in Everfrost and I got a SoW and invis from a shaman to go check it out. Well, I wondered how tough they were so I shot an arrow at them, and a couple came after me. I sprinted all the way back to Halas, but people were trying to engage the IGs en route. I stopped and saw a bunch of people getting mauled by the ice giants, and a couple people tried to focus on one... but there is not much level 10-20s can do to an IG.

I think a couple hours before the beta ended I sold all my gear and bought booze in Halas to get my alcohol tolerance up, since characters weren't being transferred to live. I also believe I put all my starting points into stamina, thinking that it would raise my resistance to the elements or something haha.

When live hit, I made a Dwarf Warrior named Toehammer. Butcherblock and Everfrost are still my two favorite newbie zones.

The most fun I ever had in EQ is playing a dwarf paladin in Unrest and accidentally finding the bookcase to go down into the basement and getting blasted by a festering hag. A week later we made it to the ghost... got me a sweet set of boots. However, opening weekend on Red 99 was a close close second in terms of pure fun to the exploration of Unrest prekunark.

That first time playing though, stepping on that ferry in halas and seeing the huge size of Everfrost Peaks was magical. The sound effects with the snow crunching while running was just too much immersion... I looked up and saw that indeed every snowflake fell with its own trajectory... HOOKED!

[Starrla]

Started in 2000 and the biggest break I took was when I went on vacation. Made all the newb mistakes like running into the DE in commonlands and being flattened before I even knew what hit me. Also delt with all the bugs, IE, getting picked up from the F.V. dock and slammed on the front of the boat as it left Firona Vie only to jump into the water and gate back to the dock (*whew* glad I had just bound to the dock). The crazy Plane of Fear break ins, the PoP rathe council of a full raid of 72 ALL mains. The good memories I have only vets can appreciate I believe. Not many folks these days would put up with all the inconviences and qwarks we delt with in the game back then but man they were FUN times! [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[chatgirl]

I remember the first time I played. My dad had an account since release I started playing on it maybe a couple months later I was like 7 or 8 I think. My brother was playing on it aswell. But the first thing I remember doing was running around freeport on my brothers character tossing all his items on the ground lol. Around 3 months later my dad got me my own account where I started a necro on Xegony and transfered with my family from Xegony to Seventh Hammer when they opened it. By the time I was 13 I was playing just about all day lol I was home schooled so I had alot of extra time.

I remember my first trip from freeport to butcherblock to where I got murdered on the sister isle and lost my corpse in the water when your corpse would fall off when it zoned lol.

Such fun times

[galvaunis]

got it on my 11th birthday a few days before luclin dropped, and cried because I could only play at my moms house, first couple years i made a new character everytime i was at my moms house and slowly learned the ropes

[LuckyLuciano]

I remember the glory days, when whipper snapper rogues weren't all running around with Ragebringers and the community was bubbling with young future gamers like myself running around with their rusty halberds and tattered armor.... Ahh.

I joined right after Kunark was released, my cousin and I first rolled 2 dwarf warriors (what a combo). I remember his brother had played it, and we shrieked at the fact that one must pay 10$ a month to play this. Had never heard of such nonsense at the time, and the only real games I came from was text based rpgs & Simtower (haha).

Alas, our two dwarves rolled (literally) out of Kaladim and started hacking away at goblins and skeles. I remember a dark elf group coming into Kaladim shortly after, and proceeded to raid the hidden castle in Kaladim killing Npcs (this was before the Guildmasters were uber nerfed rediculously). I remember following the high lvls around, picking up the bronze weapons and such of my fallen comrades.

With a bronze halberd and some shitty overpriced ringmail pieces I bought from the merchant at the forge, my cousin and I took the boat from the BB docks to freeport. I remember seeing the Freeport docks and getting so excited I jumped off the boat, only to be face to face with a big ass shark by the docks and a dark elf beside it.

Before I knew it I was fighting the shark, and the dark elf pounded me like newfish in prison. My cousin tried to avenge me and died a pitiful, though glorious death.

When I look back on these days I remember the excitement, the wonders of exploring a new world and just the sense of fear I had running from giants and spectres. My cousin was banned shortly after for training Hill Giants to the Oasis docks, and after he left I ended up leaving soon after, only to come back a few months down the road and re roll.

This process happend repeatedly from the ages 13-18.

Glad to be back in Norrath... the real experiences will stay with the Xev server [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Ocura]

About a month before the relase of Kunark. I recall vivadly my guildies alt group busting a gut when I ran like hell from the lizard that popped up in Crushbones castle. I had no clue about kunark coming out lol!

[Pend]

EQ ended up in the local newspaper because its launch congested the major internet backbones going into San Diego and caused a short outage for almost the entire city, if I remember correctly. I picked it up just as Velious was released because my brother had gotten into it and I was looking for a new RPG. To be honest, the thing that originally turned me off on buying it until then was the name--it sounded so corny and childish that I didn't consider it a "serious" RPG until I started playing it. Then I was instantly hooked. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Luclin so completely jumped the shark that it really kinda ruined the experience for me. I stayed on until the expansion after it, though, almost entirely because I got a partial CH healing spell on my druid with Luclin (seriously).

[Luthandrias]

Started back in June of 1999. Me and 5 other of my friends would pile into a small room with a slow computer (333mhz processor) and waste time hailing everything and talking to NPC's thinking they were real people. The horizon never seemed to end and the adventurous spirit of the game was amazingly magical. No maps, slow boats and long hold-overs made it so real. The game was so raw it felt authentic, the risks were so great that it really did feel like you were your character as you explored dangerous territory with your heart beating in your chest. Long live EQ.