Pries open one eye and looks about...

[Jorev1]

While I would love to meet the people from Order without having to create a new character I absolutely doubt that something like this should or could be done easily. Not to mention that the only “games” I used to see servers popping up constantly are free web based mmorpgs… like Gladiatus, Ogame or whatever money wasting stuff was also invented. Those games earn money from all the things people buy with their real life money to be just a little better then others. There is no competition here only hey folks and have fun. The only real competition that used to take place was between servers… Namely who could finish a particular world event project first… Other than that do not forget that this game is PvE and not PvP so no need for having the best loot to be just 0,01% stronger then your opponent.

Last thing… It would become a whole lot more difficult for people to actually level considering there are no elder guild members to craft that particular needed piece of armor with those nice techniques that you yourself cannot yet collect.

Think good about what you wish for…

For the first 3-4 years, classic EQ was adding a new server at least once every 6 months and it was so much fun rerolling on a fresh new world, watching and participating in the growth of the social structure and competing on various levels such as seeing who could level faster or become the first master craftsman in a certain trade skill etc. There are many ways and variations of competition which have nothing to do with PvP or loot.

I know exactly what I am asking for with a fresh server. I like the challenge of increased competition for resources and prefer playing in a world where the economy is not flooded with crafted goods from advanced players. Where is the fun in that?
One thing I despise about how some new release MMOGs are marketed is that they will offer a head start to those players who pay more for a collector's edition or pay early for preorders. It's a distasteful form of RMT sponsored by the developers. Players who like that sort of thing will defend it by suggesting what you have, that it's better for retail customers if some players have already advanced a bit in order to alleviate crowding in lower level areas and to be able to offer higher quality crafted goods to lowbies.
That's a horrible notion! Some of my best memories in MMOGs are the crowded lowbie areas at launch, the frenzy and fierce competition for resources, the struggle to advance and improve from scratch, and the fact that everyone starts on equal footing.

The fact remains that even with a completely free to play option, Istaria is not growing it's player base significantly. Granted it would help if Virtrium advertised their free to play option a little. Personally I don't get why someone would play one of those crappy cash shop games vs Istaria, especially since those awful cash shop games are not truly free to play.
Nevertheless, Virtrium needs to try something else, and a fresh server release, with proper advanced advertising, would draw in a lot of new blood.

Believe me, I have been beta testing many newer releases the last several years and they are all WoW clones, and there are a lot of old school players who want nothing to do with those dummied down handholding themepark games but can't find a quality old school challenge MMOG. I think Istaria provides a challenge but many players have no interest in starting on a 7 year old server. If Virtrium offered a fresh server, they would play and pay.

[Vahrokh]

Then there's the cost associated - I've tried a few times to get someone in the know to tell me what it takes to run an Istaria shard hardware-wise just for my own base curiosity, and not met with much success... It's safe to assume though that comparable power these days is considerably cheaper than it was in 2004.

The cost to implement Istaria on a server is minimal compared to the marketing costs of telling people around about it.
Else this third server would start dead.

Also, there are no way enough people will drop their years standing achievements just to reroll on the same game minus the ancient epic events.
It'd need to be a new server with "Istaria 2" or similar. Again, costs to do this dwarf the hardware considerations.

But, spinning up an new server might not even be possible if the game was built around some obsolescent odd-ball thread model on dodo hardware that doesn't exist anymore.

IIRC it's 32 bit Windows servers (a reason why they had to redo the spawning system, the 2GB got exhausted when Istaria got new lands) with a quite obsolescent version of MS SQL server.

Last thing… It would become a whole lot more difficult for people to actually level considering there are no elder guild members to craft that particular needed piece of armor with those nice techniques that you yourself cannot yet collect.

For those of us who were here when the servers were just turned on, the travel has been the best part of the game.
Being level 30 and be one of the high levels, no multiclasser, so much to do, so much to discover, so many epic challenges and events ahead.
Being a crafter and having your stuff actually desired. Venturing to Harro like it is some epic achievement. Kill the first Shadow Dragon. Win against the first Marrow.

You don't know what I'd give to live this experience again (different content though, not just a replay). It's part of the past memories now, past memories that hold some players tied to this game after so long.

A recurring payment game should not live off memories of the past imho.

[Raeshlavik]

The cost to implement Istaria on a server is minimal compared to the marketing costs of telling people around about it.
Else this third server would start dead.

Good point, though word of mouth in the MMO space is in some ways parallel to million dollar media blitzes. I always find it amazing that any time I mention "Istaria" and "Dragon" in the same sentence on a gaming forum ex-players will come out of the woodwork with 'I remember that game, it's still running?' - to which I will answer yes and a little blurb about Virtrium adding content or something and get a chorus of 'I should go check it out'.

When Aywren and I were just chatting up Istaria on mmorpg.com we got an amazing amount of response... If there was an 'Istaria 2', it really wouldn't be hard to get people playing it on the cheap.

Getting players is relatively easy - keeping them is the hard part.

IIRC it's 32 bit Windows servers (a reason why they had to redo the spawning system, the 2GB got exhausted when Istaria got new lands) with a quite obsolescent version of MS SQL server.

If that's the case, I have a half dozen 8-core 16gig Poweredge 1950-III servers running 2008r2 that are collecting dust since I migrated a few services to bigger r710 boxes. Each has about a terabyte of mirrored storage local and can be placed on a 500Mbit link for remote access.

If someone at Virtrium wants to use a few of these for development or something, drop me a PM... I'd be happy to help out.

You don't know what I'd give to live this experience again (different content though, not just a replay). It's part of the past memories now, past memories that hold some players tied to this game after so long.

A recurring payment game should not live off memories of the past imho.

That's what keeps me coming back - while I was only involved on the periphery back when the world was being built and the Satyr being freed, Istaria along with Shadowbane were enough to show me that there's so much more possible in the MMO genera than rinsing and repeating raid bosses.

[AmonGwareth]

Couple things.

CPU speed isn't the limiting factor for the servers. Memory is. More boxes is good, allows for more memory use. However, rack space is not cheap even if you already have the boxes.

The old Satyr, Dryad, etc events cannot come back. I'm sorry, it is actually an impossibility. They are not something that is turned on or off.

[Holth]

What keeps me logging into Istaria every day for over 7 years? Yes, I have logged into Istaria that much. Sometimes I take a few days or even a week off, but I have lived in this world for 7 years. Why?

The world is beautiful. I have not found another world anywhere that has the sheer beauty of Istaria. From the waterfalls to the music, it soothes my soul.

I make a difference. What I build and craft helps and changes the way others on my shard play. There is no other game that allows me to do this.

Yup, I have finished all 19 crafting classes and have built over 30 expert buildings, and have completed 10 adventure classes, have one of the first Ancient dragons and a hatchie that will be 100 before she does RoP. What do I do every day?

I make food and keep the tavern in Defenders Gate stocked for players and my guild. I have a plot dedicated to cooking with about 26 storehouses on it so I spend, literally, days keeping them stocked with resources. I help guild mates build their plots, or I work on my lair (no, it's still not finished). I hunt for trophies to work on my next adventure class. I process tier 6 resources for anyone on the shard that needs them. I help guild mates with quests. I make dye and potions and scrolls and keep them stocked for my guild. I hunt for comps or forms or techs for whoever needs them. I answer questions. I answer questions. I answer questions. And in my spare time (hah) I stand by a waterfall and soak in the beauty, or I go sit in New Tris and listen to the music. I LIVE in Istaria.

So what I do is just everyday stuff. Just like real life. And I stop and smell the roses just like we need to do in real life.

Thaalia of Order

[Raeshlavik]

The world is beautiful. I have not found another world anywhere that has the sheer beauty of Istaria. From the waterfalls to the music, it soothes my soul.

I'm glad you brought that up, because I was looking for an excuse to mention how great the music is in Istaria... The guitar pieces used at the crafting stations are just plain awesome.

Good job Istaria guitar guy!

[LOVWYRM]

As you say it Thaalia- I feel the same. I nearly do the same, especially I sit at my favourite places and simply enjoy Istaria.
I visit my friends on the other shards.
I never have enough time to do the things I would like to do or I should do.
Since nearly 7 years now.
Atm I explore a new Istaria with my hatchie. Exciting!!

[Frith-Rae]

Couple things.

The old Satyr, Dryad, etc events cannot come back. I'm sorry, it is actually an impossibility. They are not something that is turned on or off.

Thanks for the confirmation - I was pretty sure that was the case, but good to know for sure.

[Vahrokh]

Good point, though word of mouth in the MMO space is in some ways parallel to million dollar media blitzes. I always find it amazing that any time I mention "Istaria" and "Dragon" in the same sentence on a gaming forum ex-players will come out of the woodwork with 'I remember that game, it's still running?' - to which I will answer yes and a little blurb about Virtrium adding content or something and get a chorus of 'I should go check it out'.

A problem with word of mouth is that unlike advertisement, word of mouth can go in two ways.

In these years I self advertised Istaria a lot, I even named my characters and facilities / factories / space bases / < place here diverse MMO publicly visible things > after Istaria names and lore.

Result? Lots of people talking about Istaria with me, but they all go like: "yes it could have been a good MMO but it tanked".

MMOs are divided between "good" and "tanked" and once they are classed in the latter category, there's almost nothing you can do to climb out of the hole, expecially by word of mouth.

To revert this public opinion of Istaria, Virtrium would need to do something of huge impact, basically a game with different name, completely new client and so on. Else it's "they are keeping it alive with great efforts, but it's a tanked game".

The world is beautiful. I have not found another world anywhere that has the sheer beauty of Istaria. From the waterfalls to the music, it soothes my soul.

Hell, yeah. Istaria is the ONE MMO whose screenshots I consider "save as Windows desktop background" grade.
These icy places with ice bridges, stalagmythes... can't have too much of them.


I am also totally mesmerized by the Dralk music. The one with those creepy chorus. I could have it run 24/7 and won't get tired of it.

[Jorev1]

Thanks for the developer reply, it's good to know someone reads these threads.
The events were nice, but the least important aspect of what a fresh server start would/could bring.

The two most important aspects of a fresh server start would be that it's a brand new world where everyone starts at level one with no advanced players or crafted items existing, thus the possibilities to achieve something first exist, the economy is healthy for all crafted items, and the goals and rewards to advance on all fronts are enhanced.
These are inherent benefits that will exist simply by offering a fresh server start.

The other aspect would be building/rebuilding the world. I would hope it is possible to reset or manually destroy all the bridges, crafting stations, settlements etc that did not exist or function when Horizons first launched.
Building/rebuilding the world in order to gain geographic access and control to expand, was one of the most fun aspects of Istaria originally. The players who did not experience it really missed out.
The community had to pull together to achieve these world goals, while balancing time spent on personal advancement, since there were no expert tradespeople to easily complete a world project like there are now.

And yes sadly there is a perceived belief that Istaria tanked and is a failed MMOG, mostly communicated by rumour and not by personal experience. There were some rough moments in the history of Horizons though. The free play option is a good way to allow gamers to experience Istaria but it has proven itself not to be enough to draw in significant numbers.

"Virtrium would need to do something of huge impact", and that would only be achieved with a fresh server start and the accompanied advance advertising to make such an event successful.

[Vahrokh]

The free play option is a good way to allow gamers to experience Istaria but it has proven itself not to be enough to draw in significant numbers

It cannot be enough.

Something I learned the hard way is that it's not enough to create something good. It's not enough to create a never-seen-before product.

What's needed is that such idea / product is *seen*, that the big numbers even know it exists.

This is quite harder to achieve than someone could believe. After all, everyone thinks that "just" by inventing something ground breaking and totally new would lead to some success.

It is NOT so, in this era of information bombardment and overload, your unique, new, fantastic product will not attract a single dog unless it has a properly made advertisment campaign, I don't even believe Virtrium have the capital to afford the needed costs for that.

Basically, Istaria got a chance when it started as Horizons back in 2003-ish. Lost it. Will never get up again, as long as something BIG happens and some heavy advertisment is done.

[Lillyjo]

I have no problems in Tazoon anymore, i no longer sink into the ground not for a long time, and many computers later, it never happens and i think it is a beautiful city with much Class and style, too bad its just about empty now except for shops and very few npc.

Lillyjo, Chao's server