I looked at my Blaugust stats yesterday for the past few years, and was a little disappointed by what I found…
My first Blaugust was August of 2020, right in the middle of the pandemic; I managed 38 posts. There were 32 posts in Blaugust 2021, 45 in Blaugust 2022, 31 in 2023, 30 in 2024 and 18 this year.
Most of the month was spent playing Dune: Awakening, and most of what I was doing wasn’t anything special, really. I couldn’t think of new things to say about Dune every day. We ran some labs, we did some ships, we harvested spice… As in any MMO, the actual things you are doing run secondary to the people with whom you’re doing them. If friends weren’t playing Dune, I doubt I’d have stuck around much longer than it took to finish the main story.
I did make an effort to do some non-Dune activities, not always so that I could just write about them 🙂
The categories for this month’s posts track my interests. Five posts about Dune: Awakening (there could have been many more). Three each for Malifaux and Frosthaven; none for HeroQuest because, apparently, we didn’t play HeroQuest this month. We played Terraforming Mars in the most recent game night. Two posts about the Vectrex! And I’m glad for those; Blaugust gave me a reason to get the Vectrex out and play some of the games I’ve been collecting. While writing the most recent post, I found that the Vectrex is getting the “mini” treatment! So there was even news I might have missed were I not writing a post.
Since I went to the trouble of writing a Python program to decode my blog backup, let’s look at the other years. Here’s the tags and categories that were used at least ten times in the months of August since I started the blog, omitting ones like “Blaugust”:
Foundry
First post: Neverwinter: Another Foundry Night (August 13, 2014)
Last post: Blaugust #7: Be The Best that Ever Was (August 13, 2020)
The Neverwinter MMO and its sister MMO, Star Trek Online, both shipped with an amazing feature called “The Foundry”. The Foundry allowed players to use a subset of the MMO’s level design tools to create their own adventures with unique characters, scripting, environments — everything you would need to make your own game within a game. The Foundry fostered a tight but inclusive group of level designers of which I was proud to be a member. Kasul and I started reviewing the creations and it was the most fun we had in that game.
From what I understand, the Foundry lost the developer who knew how it worked, and there was a huge rise of garbage adventures that people would speed run for the achievements. Once Cryptic lost interest, its days were numbered.
Neverwinter
First post: OMG! It’s Neverwinter! (August 25, 2010)
Last post: The final days of Blaugust (August 31, 2023)
After having played the Neverwinter Nights games alone and with friends, I was so pumped to revisit the fabled city in MMO form. Cryptic oddly said it would not be an MMO, but rather an “Online Multiplayer Game”. Players would be able to interact in the city itself, but then they would depart on instanced adventures. The final MMO would eventually have a much larger overworld and would actually ‘fess up to being an MMO by the time it launched.
It was a fun game; I found a great guild (through Google+, remember that experiment?) and, as mentioned, loved the Foundry. Once the Foundry closed, I lost interest, and the whole loot box thing soured me both on Neverwinter and Star Trek Online.
Eve Online
First post: Daily Blogroll 8/4 — Lifetime edition (August 4, 2009)
Last post: Daily Blogroll 8/21 – Gloomshine Edition (August 21, 2009)
I loved doing those Daily Blogrolls; reading everyone else’s blogs and linking to the ones I really enjoyed. EVE Online was pretty big, but the biggest news in 2009 was over Dust 514, the FPS side-story where EVE Online players would have ground-bound Marines fight for their amusement. It didn’t do well.
3D Printing
First post: Sleeving Jaws of the Lion (August 10, 2020)
Last post: Painting the White Dragon (August 14, 2024)
I bought my first 3D printer, the Creality Ender 3 Pro, during the pandemic. That disaster was the source of so much creativity, world wide. I immediately started printing bits and bobs for Gloomhaven and similar games. Since then, I’ve gone through the Prusa and AnkerMake printers before coming to the Bambu P1S, which actually works, keeps working, and is easy to repair, and can print in many colors.
Final Fantasy XIV
First post: Leviathan! (August 23, 2015)
Last post: From Hydaelyn to Veeshan: A Tribute to Creators (August 16, 2023)
Coming out of FFXI, I was excited to play the New! Improved! Final Fantasy MMO! When FFXIV finally released, I couldn’t have been more disappointed. Kasul and I eventually dived into it once it had been rewritten and had a great time playing for a few years.
Star Trek Online
First post: STO: To go boldy… (August 11, 2008)
Last post: MMOs on the Bubble (August 7, 2021)
First post was me trying to figure out what Star Trek Online would be like to play, based solely off its trailer. A bunch of us bloggers had done a lot of theory-crafting around what would make the perfect Star Trek MMO. The final MMO was a mix of bog-standard “away missions” (usually based around killing anything that moved) and space missions (the fun part). I kid; some of the mission arcs included truly cool ground missions, while the space missions could become too cluttered with dozens of player ships that nonetheless took on standard MMO roles (DPS, tanking, healing…).
DC Universe Online
First post: DCUO: The Fortress of Solitude! (August 19, 2013)
Last post: The final days of Blaugust (August 31, 2023)
I’m not sure how Team Spode decided upon playing DC Universe Online in 2013. I think we’d just come off of Dungeons and Dragons Online? Unsure. And yet we found ourselves playing and stayed playing for several years — Lord Spode is still playing every day.
Craiyon & Dall-E 2
First post: One: The Game – A Superheroic Multiplayer Experience (August 1, 2022)
Last post: Blaugust theme week: Lessons learned (August 31, 2022)
I had this amazing idea to use the very first versions of Open AI’s pre-ChatGPT program and its second image generator, Dall-E 2, to write 31 videogame ideas based off the numbers 1-31. The results were a mixed bag, but I had fun with it and showcased where the AI industry would be just three years later. Craiyon was, at the time, a free alternative to the paid Dall-E 2. It didn’t do too badly for being free.
I had ChatGPT re-render the banner image from Day 1. It’s gotten a little bit better.
Champions Online
First post: Daily Blogroll 8/4 — Lifetime edition (August 4, 2009)
Last post: Ship of Heroes: Superheroes IN SPAAAAAACE! (August 22, 2021)
The news back in 2009 was that Cryptic was offering a lifetime subscription to Champions Online for just $200, but, but, you also got some Star Trek Online goodies as well. I wanted to like the game but it never really clicked with me.
World of Warcraft
First post: WoW and EQ2: Newbie Quests (August 14, 2006)
Last post: From Hydaelyn to Veeshan: A Tribute to Creators (August 16, 2023)
I was invited into the World of Warcraft Friends and Family beta, along with everyone who showed any sort of interest. I was a little salty over not being invited into the EverQuest 2 beta even though I, like, spent all my free time in the game, was a guide, raided etc. Turns out you had to basically be in a uberguild to get in on any EverQuest betas.
I loved the game, and it was clear it was going to devastate EverQuest when it came out. But my loyalty to EQ was strong, and when both WoW and EQ2 launched, EQ2 was my choice and I didn’t return to WoW for a few months, where I dived back in playing a troll priest on the Kirin Tor (RP) server. Back then, (RP) meant something, and everyone tried very hard to stay in character. It was a fun time, but guild drama ruined the guild, RP disappeared, and I returned to the EverQuests just before the first expansion, Burning Crusade, launched.
Final Fantasy
First post: Blaugust #18: The Island of Unfinished Games (August 18, 2020)
Last post: PS2 RPGs: Quick Reviews (August 22, 2024)
My history with the Final Fantasy series stretches back to… Final Fantasy III (US; VI in Japan). I didn’t have a NES, and so I’d missed the first game as well as the other related games, like the Dragon Quest games. I wasn’t in Final Fantasy from the beginning, but I caught up.
I still have those Perler things on my fridge… but the two Chrono Trigger ones had a detour to my boyfriend’s fridge when he was living in Ohio, but they came back when he moved in.
Wizard 101
First post: Wizard 101 update (August 22, 2008)
Last post: Wizard101: Ravenwood vs Hogwarts (August 25, 2011)
I loved Wizard 101 soooo much that the developers, KingsIsle, reached out to ask if I would like to be one of the blogs listed on their website, and participate in their contests? Heck, yeah! First (and only) time a dev has reached out like that.
Team Spode’s Stingite, AKA The Friendly Necromancer, was as in love with the game as I was, and eventually managed to get an actual job with KI, first as a community manager but soon as a writer and designer.
I really loved the game, but I did eventually go back to more standard MMOs.
Skipping some of the AI stuff…
EverQuest
First post: Anguish Farming (August 7, 2005)
Last post: Erenshor — EverQuest for soloers (August 28, 2024)
Wow. EverQuest. I was a little surprised that the original flavor EverQuest had fewer posts (in Augusts) than its new extra crispy EverQuest II incarnation. But here we are.
This blog was started as an EverQuest blog. I was raiding with Crimson Eternity at the time on the Erollisi Marr server, and EQ was pretty much everything I wanted this sort of game to be. Small server populations meant it was easy to get to know people; people would know your guild if they didn’t know you. Everything felt so important. Nowadays, MMOs have little room for individuality or community and it’s a loss.
EverQuest 2
First post: The End in Sight (August 1, 2006)
Last post: The final days of Blaugust (August 31, 2023)
I wasn’t one of the ones who was weirdly angry about the role > class > subclass leveling of the original EQ2, or the muddy graphics on anything but the highest end computers, or about the weird character graphics. I was, by the time EQ2 launched in 2004, a veteran of many MMOs with wildly varying graphics and gameplay. I was happy that SOE was trying to push the limits of graphical technology in the same way they did with the original EverQuest, the first MMO to require a 3D graphics card.
There was a lot to like about the early EQ2. You could start raiding almost immediately, at level 15, and SOE would keep releveling the early raids to keep pace with the leveling playerbase. There were open world bosses, re-imagined mobs and zones from the original game plus new ones only previously hinted about; it was solo-able to an extent so that there was stuff you could do even if you weren’t interested in a group (or unable to find one), quests were actual quests that needed no weird alchemy to find or finish, every race had their own starter zone… I really liked this game and spent years in it.
I’d go back right now if I had a group of friends interested in playing — no hesitation. But that’s true of any MMO. You could get me to play Old School Runescape if you’d come with me and commit to playing for at least a few months. Nothing sadder than realizing your friends have all dropped a game you really had fun playing. Which was what eventually happened in EQ2.
There it is. August as seen through my blog, through the years from 2005 to twenty frickin’ years in the future. Wild. Who knew I’d still be playing these games?
Well, there’s enough in there for a dozen comments but I’ll just stick to the thing that really jumped out at me, namely that you didn’t manage to get into the EQ2 beta. I can’t speak tothe earlier stages but by about exactly this time in 2004, namely the turn of the month from August to September, so with about two months to go before launch, I got in and so did everyone else I knew who wanted to, which at the time was about half a dozen of us I think, all from the same EQ guild, which was about as far as it’s possible to be from an uberguild. Most of the guild never even got to max level!
I played non-stop for the whole of the beta for as long as it lasted, as if it was already live, and in the eight or nine weeks I had I just about managed to get to Level 20 so I could pick my final class which, god save me, was Templar. The lag for almost the whole two months was verging on unplayable and it got worse towards the end, when it was often actually unplayable. XP was attritionally slow and although there were all those quests I seem to remember we still spent most of our time grinding mobs because that’s the only way you could get Adept spell books. The class quest at Level 20 was impossibly difficult too, or the templar one was. And of course a ton of stuff was still either not in the game or not working properly.
I remember they addded the Griffin towers right at the end, just before launch and that was amazing, although the lag meant it was almost impossible to get on one. They promised a “miracle patch” when the game went live would remove the lag and no-one believed them. And then the game launched and the lag was gone. I’ve been in several betas where the devs claimed a “miracle patch” would fix all the problems come launch but this is the one and only time it actually happened.
In a way I think you may have been fortunate to miss al of that because by the time the game went live it was a big anti-climax in many ways. We had some fun for a while but the systems, particularly the interdenominational crafting and all those curbs and restrictions to maintain the Good/Evil factions (All of which got dumped relatively quickly but nowhere near quickly enough) led to everyone Mrs Bhagpuss and knew leaving by Easter 2005. Our whole guild imploded when the guild leader snapped on a Sunday afternoon, loged out and was never seen again. Everyone else had either already left or went in a week after that. We hung on into about June, I think, then finally we went back to EQ as well. By the time Scott Hartsman turned up to save the game, EQII must have been a ghost-town.
I’m still playing it now though. Every day, albeit not for long sessions. It’s the eternal game.
I envy you for getting into the EQ2 beta, though probably, from what you say, it was good that I didn’t. I did play day 1, and my son played with me for awhile. Most of my EQ guild went to WoW; a few went to EQ2, but they didn’t play long.
Many times when I think about a particularly memorable zone or encounter, it’s from EverQuest 2. Every so often I load it up and say hello to my characters or start a new one, but eventually I remember what a grind it is to play solo and log off once more.