I took it upon myself this year to check out whatever holiday festivities were in each MMO or game I am currently playing (or in some cases, currently have installed and taking up space on my hard drive).
Guild Wars: Wintersday 2007. As always, ArenaNet has their Wintersday festival with quests and random drops from mobs such as Candy Cane shards which can be collected and traded for Wintersday items from special NPC merchants. All the same quests from last year are back and a couple new ones in some Eye of the North dungeons. Wintersday comes to a close today as the avatars of Dwayna and Grenth battle it out in Lion’s Arch and Kamadan — Grenth vies to keep winter across the lands while Dwayna yearns for a spring thaw. The players vote for their favorite diety and win gifts and a holiday hat for their characters. I took Benjeth into Lion’s Arch at noon to vote for Grenth and win the Ice Crown then later I took his little sister Tawny to vote for Dwayna and win the Wreath Crown. Damn was Lion’s Arch crowded! The holiday festivals are always popular but wow, there were well over 150 districts of Lion’s Arch; I didn’t check Kamadan to see how busy it was.
Lord of the Rings Online: I actually didn’t play LOTRO at all this month other than to run around and see if there was a holiday festival. Surprisingly, for a game with so many festivals this year, I didn’t see any. They did announce the free Bree Ponies for Founders. I only have one character over 25 — my Captain is sooooo close! — although I noticed all my lowbie characters also have the token for the horse. My lore-master is only two levels from getting a normal, full-speed horse so we’ll see if I decide to cash in the Bree pony token when I return to LOTRO. There was a quest line to win a Yule tree decoration to place outside (will it go inside too?) your house. I don’t yet own a house (good thing too, since I’m on break) but I did stop by the Exodus kinship house and someone did place a Yule tree outside! Too bad Turbine didn’t decorate them, but… I guess Christmas in Middle Earth is tricky with the lore?
Everquest 2: Yeah, I know. Still haven’t gotten around to canceling my sub. I didn’t play at all again this month which isn’t surprising considering I normally dislike each moment in the game. My highest level character is only 9 and has only made it as far as Freeport which was not exactly the most festive city. I don’t know squat about EQ lore but I get the feeling Freeport is supposed to be a “bad guy” city? Either way, it’s a frickin’ holiday. Lighten up already! I did manage to find a few ugly snowmen in the ugly city of Freeport. Ugh, EQ2 is just such an ugly game overall…
Vanguard: Looks like the “main cities” (although my home city of Martok is a bunch of Grinches and didn’t decorate, unless I completely missed it) decorated with trees and gifts. The main attraction was Randolph the flying reindeer! I had thought I’d need to go through at least one quest, if not a whole quest chain, to win Randolph but no, all I had to do was talk to the Reindeer vendor NPC. Of course, as with all things Vanguardian, finding the damned NPC was a self-imposed quest unto itself. Unlike the temporary flying mounts occasionally found for rent, Randolph can fly anywhere mounts are allowed with no time limits during the entire Festival of Glorian which ends January 3rd. I was always broke-ass poor when I stumbled upon a flying mount NPC but now that Randolph has shown me the genius and freedom of free-flying mounts, I’m going to go check one out after Randolph goes away.
Archlord started its Christmas on the 10th which included trees and Christmas music in every town. Players hoped for the random holiday drops of Xmas Bells and Bell combination coupons to get the Xmas Socks which in turn could be traded for in-game items. Additionally the Animal Breeder NPC’s had a quest to find Rudolf’s replacement and were rewarded with a special gift. Unlike most fantasy games where the Christmas season is renamed to some all-encompassing holiday, Archlord was Christmas, including carols such as Jingle Bells and God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen in each town. The music was fun and well done.
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