Feldon The ProSieben-Sony Online Entertainment distribution deal announced over six weeks ago has finally got some Frequently Asked Questions answered:
Can players still access the U.S. servers?
Under the new partnership between SOE and ProSiebenSat.1 Games, European players of the above mentioned SOE games will be able to play via ProSiebenSat.1 Games’s service and will not have access to U.S. servers. However, existing EverQuest II players in Europe that have played on U.S. servers before the transition will be allowed to continue playing on those servers through their SOE accounts.Can U.S. players log on to the European servers?
U.S.-based players will have access to the U.S. servers only.Will International servers be merged with the U.S. servers?
No, European and U.S. based servers will exist independently of each other.I’m a European player; after I create my ProSieben account, will my SOE account be shut down?
Your SOE account will not be shut down, but you will only be able to play the above mentioned games through a ProSiebenSat.1 Games account. As discussed above, we will provide a simple way to have your characters and game progress transferred and the value of your Station Cash granted to your new ProSiebenSat.1 Games account. Also, existing EverQuest II players in Europe that have played on U.S. servers before the transition will be allowed to continue playing on those servers through their SOE accounts.Can players continue to use Station Cash?
European players will be able to use a new virtual currency similar to Station Cash.
Will SOE launch the next game in the EverQuest franchise with ProSiebenSat.1 Games?
The agreement between SOE and ProSiebenSat.1 Games includes the publishing rights for the next game in the EverQuest franchise.Will players be able to continue using the U.S. Customer Service Team?
European players will only have access to the dedicated customer and community service team of ProSiebenSat.1 Games.Will European players only have access to German Customer Service?
European players will be provided with support and customer service in their own respective language, including English, French, Italian, Spanish, and German.Will ProSiebenSat.1 Games take over the localization of the games?
ProSiebenSat.1 Games will be heavily involved to ensure localization meets European player expectations.
These are just some of the more interesting FAQ items. Check the links above for the complete FAQs
Dumb decision is dumb. Bye Euros, SOE is giving you one more in a long line of shafts.
Stupid STUPID change
I have been playing on euro servers for over 4 years because I play during the day in the US. This is a bunch Of SOE bullshit!
I’m in the US, but have two alts on the Splitpaw server (UK). Can I keep them there, or must I (can I move them)?
Diabolically stupid. Could only be worse if they’d not grandfathered access to U.S. servers for existing players. If I read it correctly, however, this courtesy has not been extended to U.S. players currently playing on European servers.
I play on U.S. servers from choice. I have no interest in playing on European servers. I very definitely don’t want to transfer my financial information to a company I have never previously heard of.
To add to the stupidity, EQ1 is not included in the deal so even if I didn’t mind opening a ProSieben account (which I do) I’d have to keep my SoE account as well to play EQ1. And how does Station Access fit into this?
Terrible bloody mess this is going to be. Just as well GW2 is on the horizon, that’s all I can say.
SOE and PSS.1 have just created a digital wall to divide the playerbase in a game where the playerbase is not big enough.
None of the other information is of any interest, putting in the region locks now will kill off a large portion of the user base, a lot more will wither away over time.
Extra fun for Freeport server, which was regionless. (It had to be, since it was the only server existing for the ‘separate service’ that was EQ2X.) Lots of Euro players there, doubtless now considered on the wrong side of the line even though Freeport was not considered a US-specific server until now.
Won’t affect current players, unless of course they want to recruit some local friends to play with them… in which case they either have to switch to a Euro server or switch to a different game.
so we will lost half of our raid force, very nice -.-
thats me done shame really
My guild has a significant Euro contingent…this will go over VERY poorly.
Congratulations on another job well FUBARed, SOE.
wonder if they could proxy to a US IP to get around this?
of coarse that option is not for most people.
I assume Australians are still on the North American servers?
hate to see this split happen and to know it is even including the next eq and Planetside2.
I mean PS2 would be crappy if nobody was on in a given timezone =[ since there are no NPC’s it is all players. at least in eq2 can run content.
Maybe if people show their dissatisfaction with the decision on the PSS.1 sites it could help them “hammer out some of the details”
From what I know, Prosieben has an IP lock, so no way US (and a whole bunch of “Rest-of-World” countries) will be able to reach EU servers.
SoE is region locking the US servers but doesn’t seem to add a real IP lock. Question is, will we be able to move our chars from EU to US or US to EU so that we can play without paying 2 subscription…
If we can’t move with at least a discount on server transfers, bye EQ2 🙁
my ears are twitching. No mention of Australia yet. Still wondering which side of the Berlin Wall we will be on, if it is ProSiebensat that its goodnight from me.
Even now with this news ringing in my ears if SOE said you know what long time subscribers can have a free transfer to an American server i’d go like a shot and do but you it’ll never happen.
Madness
ABSOLUTE CRETINS
Do they understand that customers of this game are connected to each other across time-zones?!
Bit late to close the stable door now.
Oh, and it basically wrecks our raiding guild, thanks for nothing!
How in the fark does Smed keep his job after a momentous streak of bad decisions ???
It is like SOE really wants you to quit their game. I mean LOTRO went the other way around and dropped their agreement with codemasters, and that was for the better.
Nothing good can come out of this for the european consumer. Nothing.
Subsciption cancelled for good this time, that’s enough crap from SOE really.
To me it looks like no raid guilds are going to be affected as players are grandfathered to their servers. However there is nothing being said for new toons created weather they will be teathered to their side of the wall, and for sure new accounts are going to be locked to their region. It is certainly going to put a huge inpediment to recruiting, being that large numbers of toons are going to transfer one way or another and for sure people who are on the fence right now are not going to bother to transfer but simply just stop playing. This is NOT a good business decision for a new producer. Her player base is going to take a HUGE hit. Sorry new gal … you are being tossed under the bus again. Get used to it.
Players are not grandfathered to their servers (according to the current FAQ)
Euro players are grandfathered in to their US servers. US players will lose access to Euro servers.
Well well, I guess me and my wife should be happy that we moved back to the US in time, but this is bad and will break up several guilds on both AB and Freeport. If the EU players even wants to continue to play their US toons when they can not roll new toons on US servers (obvious in the FAQ if you read between the lines).
This is a HORRIBLE idea.
This has got to single handedly be the stupidest decision SOE ever thought of. A good way to segregate the community… I’m in the US and I have a low level alt on Splitpaw, but I won’t be able to play them now? Smooth move ex-lax! I have friends in the UK, and now we can’t play together. So much for that merging of EQ2 and EQ2X to try and bring the community together. That was a total flop.
is it just me or does it sound like soe just sold of the european market to them?
If this region locking actually happens without SOE grandfathering in all euro and N.american players on there current servers I’m done. My guild that I have helped build and keep alive for 7 years is on splitpaw, all my firends are on splitpaw, all my toons and my raid force are all on splitpaw. This will only hurt EQ2 as a whole, any gains in new subs and re-subs they just got are about to disappear.
It’s getting to be hard for even the most blind SOE lovers to stand by this company’s decisions.
Wow, just…..WOW
Ok my lad has just asked me a question,if he wanted to say leave his main on splitpaw and go to an american server will he be allowed to stay and pay his subscription to SOE still,i cant really make head nor tail of the FAQ
It’s not a case of whether SOE knows this or knows that, the point is SOE doesn’t care. They’ve exceeded their target for the return on EQ2, anything they get now is bonus, so why not just get rid of European customers, and get paid for the priviledge! Those who persist in giving SOE money will be funding EQ3 and stay on in what’s becoming a worse bugfest than Vanguard, where they’ll serve as paying testers for assorted ideas for EQ3. GW2 is looking better by the day.
I just find it amusing that SoE doesn’t bother with PR when it comes to community messes. Time and time again they just ignore us and we keep playing. I enjoy EQ2 and the EQ universe, it is just a shame I have to deal with such a crack-pot company.
/Counts the number of nails left to have a completed coffin. Almost done!
One has to wonder now that eq2 is being sold out over there to a no name company, will we see eq2 stateside being sold out to gamers first or something like that. With all the free to play stuff going on it looks almost like they want to get out of the software game industry.
screwed for good. US-based with everything on EU-server. RF, lvl60 guild, every toon and twink and friend and enemy all gone. Is this even legal to grandfather EU-players on US-servers but not US-players on EU-servers? I wonder what it takes to convince a California judge to get an injunction on this?
They did this to me on EQ1 with their venril sathir server i don’t recommend transfering as it will be a failure as they fail to patch properly, handle issues with the server in a timely manner or manage to increase sales at all… in the end i really regretted moving from the nameless server and never found my way back
Wow what a step backwards. How could anyone thing segregating a 7 year old community could be a good thing. I’m Australian and play on US so I’m safe but wow that is is the worst move ever. I feel for all the players who played on Euro servers and are not in the list of 40 countries.
My interest in the game is fading after many years, if this move had affected me I’d be gone for good (taking a break till the delayed game update atm)
STEVET what makes you think you are not effected?
We know what is happening to the Europeans, we think we know what is happening to the North Americans: but not a single syllable about Asia Pacific (which includes Australia and New Zealand).
They must have decided Europeans didn’t have sufficient access to Station Cash cards to explain people not buying curly-toed appearance shoes. I’m sure they see it as a beneficial thing, because they ignore the piles of data they gather and only look at sales.
In the FAQ it lists the countries (The other countries may be added later line does worry me though. If Australia gets added I’d be done without hesitation. The thought of leaving for good has alread crossed my mind lately but I’m holding off to see what the next “free content” game update brings.
Which European territories will be included under this new partnership between SOE and ProSiebenSat.1 Games?
SOE has secured a multi-year partnership with ProSiebenSat.1 Games Group to distribute eight online U.S.-based games in more than 40 European territories, including Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, San Marino, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, and the United Kingdom. Other countries may be added later.
LOL I noticed on the FAQ feedback thread the red names keep popping in to delete people’s posts for containing swear words, but they horribly neglect answering any of the questions asked. It’s just full of dagnasty evil…
This is really bad, mkay.
This game will soon hit rock bottom.
I guess they finally listened to players – chances are you’re finally gonna see TV ads for EQ2 (in Germany, at least)…
*scnr*
Well,at least I won’t have to bother with EQNext now.Why would I,since it will be region locked,and half my friends are Euro?
Great idea SOE.
So now I can’t invite my friends from the UK to play with me on Nagafen. That sucks, since they were getting interested.
just a thought as Feldon is Euro based and they are locking Euros behind the Iron Curtain does this mean the end of EQ2Wire and EQ2U??
stupid, stupid, stupid…
May i had : stupid !!!
If SOE starts IP blocking me from connecting to Butcherblock without a VPN, you can expect an article about it. 😉
I do actually have a VPN for Netflix, but I’d rather not route all my traffic over it. For one thing, I’ve heard the lag of playing an online game over VPN is painful. And for another, I’d probably only get 1-2Mbps of bandwidth out of my 30Mbps connection. One of the nice things about Europe that I will miss when I move back to the US — proper broadband.
As for EQ2U, we don’t know if the EU servers will be isolated from the Data Feeds or if there will be any change.
@Feldon : you dont have to. You can route only the traffic you need to access Butcherblock. Just need to know the ip 🙂
2Mbps should be enough to play without much trouble, this is not a fps after all
Melpheos,
I’ll report back on whether there’s 3 second spell lag. 😉
That it for me, I play at time where US player sleeping so must of my friend are from EU. I feel realy shame to say that but maybe it time to finaly go to WoW =( gonna try it todays with my eq friends, make me very sad to say that !
Incredibly stupid, when SOE raised a little more care to their players instead of punishing them both?
sorry me english …. European player here … spanish …
This is most likely the deathblow. Going to cancel soon
These points i have posted on the official feedback thread on SOE forums. I wonder when i will get an answer..
– My one year sub started in january. What will happen to the remaining 11 months when we get transfered to Pro7? Will I get a rebate for the time I can’t use it at SOE? Or will it be transfered over to Pro7?
– If i want to play at a US server with my toons there, do I have to pay twice? Pro7 and SOE? So we get nothing more for double the price?
– What will happen to the free LON cards we got? Will Euro players just lose them cause we are not at SOE anymore?
– What will happen to the free 500 SC we got subbing for a recurring one year sub? Lots of people took this sub just for that reason. Europeans will thus loose this just cause they are european and being sold off to another company.. This smells discrimination.
– What will happen to our veteran rewards? Will europeans just loose them cause they are now at a different company?
One has to ask does Sony corporate know the specific details of this agreement made by SOE? And how much money did smed get under the table to turn a blind eye?? Bueller…Bueller?
play rift, none of this nonsense happens!
I’m not sure where the Australia worries are coming from. I live in Australia and can’t recall ever hearing of ProSieben or anything like that. Furthermore, I didn’t realise people thought Australia was in Europe. We’re not in the same boat as the Euro players because we don’t have our own local servers. I think Japan, Guam, etc. would be in a similar situation.
Suffice it to say, that I’d be VERY surprised if any non-Euro AND non-US players were forced onto the Euro servers when the US servers are still their primaries.
Give it a year or two and it will be SWG all over again for EQ2 and the other sony titles, enjoy it while you can, that is all I can say.