As the MMO genre has grown and matured, demands for convenience have seen massive increases in solo-able content. Instant group finders abound, and community ideals erode in the glare of instant access group content, designed to be completed without any need for communication.

Many people see this as a problem, the strength of the MMO genre is the persistent nature of the experience, what good is it if all its parts are disposable?

What is the answer to this problem? Many think it is to wind the clocks back to a pre-World of Warcraft state, but this is simply not possible. The realities of making online games has changed dramatically, playing with other people over the internet is now no longer a novel concept. This was a time without YouTube, when social media was in its infancy and people thought Steam was something that came out of a kettle.

Like over 900,000 other people around the world, I have been celebrating the New Year with the alpha release of DayZ, the zombie themed survival sim from the imagination of Dean 'Rocket' Hall.

In DayZ, players are thrown into a hostile environment with no direction or encouragement other than their own will to survive. A gaming experience like no other, DayZ forums have been full of player stories since the first days of the Arma 2 mod version.

This is exactly what sandbox games are all about, emergent experiences that come about through players interacting with the game and each other, creating pockets of narrative as spontaneous as they are unique. These are the stories we remember most vividly, even in games that weren't designed to include them.

Players are demanding ever-increasing levels of agency in their games; we want our actions to impact our environment in meaningful ways. But what if we, as players, don't know what actions we can perform? 

There are many things that go into making a great game. Story, art, sound and mechanics come together to create wonderful backdrops and tools for us to live out great adventures in an artistic medium quite unlike any other. But as MMO gamers, we know none of that matters if you don't have Endgame.

It is Star Wars: The Old Republic's second birthday this week, and it's pretty safe to say it's not been as smooth a ride as many expected, though I will hastily add that I understand why many people like it and continue to play it.

SWTOR was sold to us with the promise of grand, fully voiced story that would lead us across the galaxy we traversed so many times in our imaginations. A grand ambition for any developer, being able to achieve this in an MMO setting pushed even Bioware's abilities to the limits. And by golly, they pulled it off. The stories were compelling, the characters were rich and the settings were well sculpted and felt authentic. Only later did we realise it was all for nothing.

In single player games, a lovingly crafted interactive experience can be an absolute joy. I could have cried at the ending of Telltale's The Walking Dead (though of course I didn't as I'm a big tough guy), and the world of Fallout has been my home for more hours than I care to think about. But MMOs are not bespoke solo adventures, you are not a beautiful and unique snowflake. 

It's been difficult to ignore YouTube's new content matching system this week, especially for those of us who enjoy watching game related content. While I respect the right of a creator to control who uses the product of their work for profit, this system has the potential to hurt both the end-user and the creator. So while publishers and content creators continue their ideological struggle, people who make games and people who play games suffer too. War, war never changes.

What does this have to do with EverQuest Next? Even if you have no interest in making or watching online content about SOE's new fantasy sandbox, this affects you. More importantly, however, it will affect the success and quality of both EverQuest Next and EverQuest Next Landmark. 

As many gamers know, Reddit can be a dark and terrifying place, so where else would the idea for a deep black and dangerous night come from?

In the land of EverQuest Next discussion we see many posts and commentators advocating a return to older 'hardcore' MMO values, and arguing for the sake of that elusive, some say mythical beast known as 'immersion'. As these ideas and values go merrily hand in hand it's no wonder that the day/night cycle has become a hot topic in the community, and for once we all seem to agree! Time of day should matter in a persistent world game; beyond that we move into the difficult terrain of 'how', but for now we're all on the same page! Isn't that nice?

Less than six months after Dave Georgeson stunned the crowd at SOE Live, players will be getting their hands dirty building in EverQuest Next Landmark. With such a short turnaround, it seems the fundamental purpose of Landmark has been lost on many of us, I still see the big questions asked: 'What is the difference between EverQuest Next and Landmark? Why is it a separate game at all? Is it just a fancy housing system?

These are pertinent questions that need to be answered, but underneath the true nature and purpose of Landmark is hidden, and it is this hidden nature that gets me so excited for what's in store. And I want you to share that excitement because I'm a massive nerd and that's what we do best.

So with that in mind, it's time to talk about Landmark, and how it's so much more than a way to build your EverQuest Next Guildhall.