Everquest Next - Preview @ Penny Arcade

Penny Arcade has posted a preview of Everquest Next about how the developers want to bring online gamers back by changing the rules.

“Way back in Ultima Online the very first thing that happened to me in that game was the thing that hooked me onto MMOs forever,” said Georgeson. “I was walking down a road and there was this stick laying in the road and it started talking to me. It said, 'Hi, I'm a magical stick, I fell out of a tree and I need to get back to the forest. Can you help me?'”

Georgeson's voice jumps up a few octaves when he's taking on the persona of the talking stick, as though mimicking a forest pixie. You can tell he enjoys telling this tale, and has told it more than a few times before.

“So I picked up the little log and carried it to the forest, and then a thief, who was hidden with a stealth skill, de-cloaked and went laughing his ass off into the trees,” said Georgeson. “He was standing cloaked right next to the log so it'd look like the log was talking to me. And that's when I realized that user-generated content is way better than anything a designer could ever come up with.”

It's a fun anecdote, but user-generated content doesn't just hinge on players screwing with one another.

Georgeson said that when SOE set about redesigning EverQuest Next they went back to the core of the role-playing experience: Dungeons & Dragons. What is it that's so great about the Dungeons & Dragons experience that has kept it alive and thriving for thirty long years?