I just woke up after the 36 hours of sleeplessness that was our adventure to SOE. I have a few things to say about our experience but I will try to be brief. Community day was simply amazing. 3 members of The Black Watch were able to make it. We left home about midnight prior and arrived in the early morning. Once employees started showing up, it immediately became apparent how cool these guys truly are. Everyone was sincerely and genuinely happy to see us and cared about what we had to say. We have attended community events for other game developers before and never have we encountered such nice folks.
One of the first people we met was John Smedly who thanked us for being there and grabbed some shirts for us (NC FTW). Soon after, we got to meet Tony 'RadarX' Jones who I would like to personally thank for being extremely accommodating and went out of his way to make sure we got everything we asked for (thanks brother, you are THE MAN). Later I got a chance to talk with a dapperly dressed Matt Higby who was super generous for answering all of my questions (stay tuned for more on that
). I could go all day listing everyone from the art team to QA but everyone was just so cool to talk to. After Josh Hackney gave us a very informative tour, I now know how Charlie felt walking through the chocolate factory.
Without saying too much, the game is coming along VERY nicely. The action was fast paced. The animations, environments, and level design was all top notch. The scale of the game is huge and feels larger than anything I have ever played, and this is coming from an EvE veteran. All I have to say in summery is this: BF and COD will soon have some real competition. I even think that the boys over at CCP should be wetting themselves as I see PS2 being the premier sci-fi/military action based game which blurs the line between genres. Free to play? Are you kidding me? This game could easily net a box price and sub fee, and I only got about an hour in total to try it out. If they ever implement a crafting and economy system, other MMOs would lose a lot of subs.
Overall, SOE threw one hell of a successful event. The game is going to be amazing for vets and bring a lot of fresh blood in. I hope that they continue to host these kinds of events in the future.
-Tech
The Black Watch
Tbwgaming.com