Everquest is still alive and kicking. So many Massive Multiplayer Online Games have come out since EQ went live in 1999.
I've liked the TSS expansion overall except for the "faction work" you must do to get into the final instanced raid zones. The faction work takes a lot of time because it's done through completing several tasks and the mobs are not always up or take a long time to spawn, which makes it a struggle for new members or returning old players to catch up. We dedicate our time to help friends and guildies get caught up but it feels like a constant chore sometimes. If they were smart they'd make it so that when a guild gets flagged, then everyone in that guild is flagged. But guilds are having to backflag people who were not on the night they beat a flagging event. New members and members coming out of retirement are having to get tasks done to catch up to where a guild is in progression and be on or be botted on the night when we do the flagging fight again. In my opinion the EQ/SoE staff have gone stale. Their wells of imagination, common sense, and foresight are drying up. Maybe they want to end EQ. Maybe they're tired of working for the same game they've worked for these past eight or more years. If they played the game as much as the actual players and could experience what it's like to play then it would be a much better game. They play a little but not as much as the EQAddict.
The time/effort equals reward factor is off balanced for some things. A lot of the items from raid content in the previous two or three expansions could us some tweaking. The person doing the itemization for the previous expansions should have spent more time determining their need/want values and their usefulness for the classes the items were intended for. But we cannot blame the one doing the itemization. I cannot imagine having to oversee the creation of hundreds of thousands of items. They have done A LOT better with TSS itemization. A lot players agreed SoE was striving to put out quantity over quality, as they were releasing a new expansion every six months for a while there and there would be lots of bugs and patch after patch to fix the problems. That was too soon for the majority to experience one expansion before the next was out. I heard through the grapevine that there won't be another expansion after The Buried Sea for a full year.
Besides the itemization and minor bugs they need to focus on bringing the fun back to the game. In the begining there was a magical kind of fun about the game. GM's had a lot more power and freedom and helped create some of the fun and mischief. I don't know what the problem is.
EQ is still a monster of a game. It is huge and has an overwhelming amount of content. I've been playing Everquest since Nov 2000 and there's a ton of stuff I still haven't experienced. I'm hoping it keeps going for many more years to come. That would be something. I hope it never dies.
The game is easy to learn the basics, but it's difficult to rise to the top of your game. I rank the Difficulty as Hard because there's a lot of research and playing that you must do to learn your class, spells, abilities, and polish your skills. Everquest is not a kids game, though I've met a few young players. Most players are in their 30s. I've met some in their teens, and some all the way up into their 70s. It's a social game. The friends I've made over the years keep me coming back. After EQ, I guess we'll go to Vanguard hehe.