Friends Who Game Together, Stay Together
In 2014 I got a text from one of my childhood buddies, “I’m playing Classic EverQuest again, get it and log on.” Clearly confused, I shot back “how is that even possible!?” By that point, EverQuest had gone through countless expansions and was a very different game compared to the one we had played ten years before. “Its on an emulator server called Project 1999. It’s just like the good ole days.” Some fans had decided to host an unofficial version of the game. Many people may not understand why this was so exciting to me, but those texts started a flood of memories. It brought back the grind, the raids, and the insane amount of a time I spent in the fictional world of Norrath (almost 100 days logged). It also reminded me of the friendships that grew during that time and why EverQuest remains one of the best gaming experiences in my life.
I grew up during the beginning of online gaming in the late 90’s. I’d rush home from school, fire up our family’s AOL account using the cutting edge 56k modem, and get sucked into a Counter-Strike Beta Match until my mom would barge in and tell me to start my homework. Once I upgraded to cable internet, the world changed. Being able to play with and against people from all around the world absolutely blew my young mind. However, the main draw for me was playing with my real life friends and then talking about it the next day at school. Although most of us played high school sports, the six of us would spend hours discussing strategies, plans and the glorious adventures of the previous night. It quickly became apparent that unless you were playing with us, it was hard to stay an active part of our nerdy adolescent clique.
The first major online game I played was Diablo II with my friend Corey. Corey had played Diablo I and recommended that we play the sequel together. Turns out, it was a gateway drug for online gaming due to its relatively simple dungeon crawler gameplay. When I’d go over and watch Corey play, his stepbrother Brennan (who was also my friend), would sneak upstairs from his bedroom to stand at Corey’s doorway and watch us play and talk about it. Their parents had just gotten married, and the brothers were a tad apprehensive of each other, as any teenagers would be of step-siblings that were identical in age. However, with me as a mutual friend and Diablo II as a game we’d all play together, they really cemented their friendship and became true brothers. Later, their parents would even credit me for helping make the beginning of the marriage run smoothly. It didn’t hurt that they were both just big game geeks at heart and bonded in that way.
EverQuest was a completely different beast. We had never seen something like it before, and the sheer size and scope of this massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) captivated our larger group of friends. In fact, it dominated the lives of some of our friends. I played a lot, but I was one of the more casual players of the group. One of my friends Greg, who had joined Township Rebellion, one of the premiere EQ raiding guilds, would stay up all night with them, drink a few red bulls, then go to class in the morning. He did this somewhat regularly, and I still can’t understand how he graduated from high school. Another buddy, Andy, had the knack of befriending random online players. While chatting with a high-level mage, the player mentioned he was thinking about quitting EverQuest. Andy somehow convinced him to hand over the account, and we used the mage to better our other characters.
Everything changed when we graduated and went to different colleges across California. We continued to game together for a few years, but by the time I finished college, gaming with my friends all but ceased. Some of us had moved away, others had gotten married, a few even started having kids. Busy lives and distance made playing and simply staying in touch difficult. We continued to play games on our own, but never all at once like in high school.
This is why the discovery of Project 1999 — Classic Everquest was important. For most of us, EverQuest was the pinnacle of online gaming. The fact that this emulator server only had the game’s progression (The Scars of Velious expansion if anyone cares) up until when we began playing made the nostalgia too hard to pass up. If you know EverQuest, its a huge grind with a steep learning curve that makes games these days look like easy mode. It is also heavily dependent on playing in groups. Soloing is very difficult. With these factors in mind, the band got back together. But this time, there would be some ground rules. Unlike high school, we would only play once a week on at a set time and day (usually a weekday after everyone was home from work). Our own virtual poker night was born. In addition to a Mumble server (a voice over internet protocol service that allows us to talk while playing the game), we created a Facebook chat group to coordinate and discuss the groups progress.
After 1–2 years of Project 1999, we moved on to the World of Warcraft (WoW) emulator server Nostalrius. This server was very similar to Project 1999 because it was WoW from 2005–2006. This era was when I played WoW intensely during my first couple years of college. WoW brought similar waves of nostalgia and opportunities for bonding until it was shut down in April of 2016. At that point, we dumped MMORPGs and moved on to modern shooters. Overwatch was fun, but our group wasn’t as quick as we were in high school, so we got destroyed by kids half our age. Bruised egos ensued.
With Destiny 2 (a game that I worked on) coming to PC, we all got excited and pre-ordered the game. We felt at home in the game because it does a good job of balancing casual and hardcore players. Despite only playing once a week, it is easy to jump in with a group you already know and never feel like you’re falling behind. After many poor attempts and frustration, we are finally farming the Leviathan raid and looking to run it in Prestige mode (not too bad for thirty-something “Casuals”…right?).
After four years, playing online games with my friends has become a fixture in my life. Girlfriends, fiances, and wives have come and gone, but the band remains. Any new significant others understand the importance of this night and respect it…even though they give funny looks when they see us with headphones on yelling at our laptops. Playing together has kept all of us connected and strengthened our friendships, despite the geographic distance between us. So, if you’re having trouble keeping in touch with old buddies who no longer live nearby, think about booting up a game and reconnecting.
Austin Snyder is a producer at Horseless Cowboy, a creative consultancy that helps bridge the gap between technology and entertainment. His credits include casting and voice production on 50+ video game and virtual reality titles.
