ZAM interviewed two Landmark producers earlier this week. Here's the highlights!

33:54: Linear vs complex decision making in games; ripple effects; more Storybricks and many analogies ensue.

36:33: Lock fishes for a response about seeking valuables in the depths and supply chains in EQN but Georgeson declines to comment, saying to ask at SOE Live.

37:14: (Reddit question) Will liquids have different degrees of viscosity?

(Georgeson) "Dynamic water?"

(Terry) "That's definitely something that... oh, you mean like slime, or something like that?"

(Lock) "Or, will lava flow slower down a hill than water would, for example?"

(Terry) "Once we get to dynamic liquids that's a very good question. We'll have to see what we're capable of doing once everything is in and ready to go. But... it's a great idea! What I know of our plans for that, it doesn't sound like something that's out of the question, but we'll have to evaluate a little closer to when it's ready to go."

(Georgeson) "Materials will have toughnesses, but we haven't talked about viscosity."

40:29: (Reddit question) Does the team perform many tests with virtual reality (VR) equipment?

(Georgeson) "The answer is no, not yet, but yes, we have every intention to do so. I'm one of those guys that buys all that gear [...] we're just trying to keep abreast of all that stuff. We understand that if we want this to be the world's first true VR, the immersion needs to be really, really fantastic, and so as we go forward we'll keep playing with that stuff."

42:04: Nearly another "DaveRant"... Georgeson has a choice quote around 42:58:

"Landmark is your game. Our game is EverQuest Next, where you get to help determine what the outcomes of the stories and everything [is], but we're the ones crafting that. Your game is Landmark, whatever you want it to be."

43:15: Lock inquires about what tools Landmark could potentially continue to get after EverQuest Next is made. "...what's next for Landmark?"

(Georgeson) "The answer to that question is 'what do you want?'"
(Terry) "The thing is that, just like we're working with [the players] now in order to make Landmark and, in the process, make EverQuest Next, we're going to continue that process as we move forward. We get great ideas every single day for things people would like to see in the game. This is an MMO. MMOs are never done. Landmark will never be done, nor will EverQuest Next, nor will whatever the next game is."

44:39: An impassioned discussion on the future of Landmark occurs.

(Lock) "It's something I often point out, that if Landmark as a tool can be used to make a game, it doesn't just have to make one game."

(Georgeson in "DaveRant" #2!) "THAT'S IT! That's exactly right! See, this is why I like to follow your Twitter. That is exactly right, because if you can do everything, if you can do everything that devs can do, you can make any game you imagine. That's exactly what we want to build. You can do everything. I know nobody believes us, but you'll see, that's what's happening in front of you."

(Terry) "Some of the things that will come to Landmark after EverQuest Next are things that we'll need for whatever that next game is! We'll find something else we want to do that we didn't do for EQN and that will have us creating more tools, more pieces of the puzzle for people to put together in whatever way they want. It's gonna be great!"

47:26: Lock mentions his first column for ZAM, which explored how other games that spawned from within other games, and posited how that could work with Landmark.

(Georgeson) "Featuring it... we'd help you become famous for helping build that game. We have no intention of taking your games and running with them. What we want to do is we want to setup Landmark so that the cream can rise to the top.
"If Landmark has all these tools in it, and you can not only create something cool in Landmark but also immediately show it off to other players, [then you can] get feedback on what you did right and what you did wrong, as well as being able to see its popularity score against other games that are being created by other players, you could demonstrate your worth as a game designer at that point.
"It's not our focus or anything like that, but it's definitely one of the aspects of which Landmark can be utilized, to kind of really change the way that industry runs."

49:16: Terry mentions that players have and will find plenty of techniques to utilize existing tools in Landmark in ways that the team has never dreamed of. Georgeson talks about giving the power to the players and the Voxel Farm engine, stressing that "they don't work for SOE... we're allies."

52:58: Won't we be able to drown soon?

(Georgeson) "It just means we'll need air bubbles!" [laughs]

53:50: More discussion on virtual reality; the goal of keeping gamers truly entertained in a VR world. Some chatter on Second Life, Minecraft survival mode, and ArcheAge.

57:18: Accumulating fame in a game; how to make players that are not "famous" or on the top feel included.

(Georgeson) "Absolutely there is. That's by making more ways to 'win'. Right now, we just have the building stuff, so if you're not a fantastic builder you're going to be a little bit bummed, because there's really no other way to show off in the game right now. But... and guess where that's going to change!" [much SOE Live joking ensues]

58:57: How will crafters eventually stand out from other crafters?

(Georgeson) "Crafting is honestly the hardest one to talk about because we haven't gone into the specific details of how a crafter is going to be better than another crafter. We do know that we have some pretty elaborate sub-systems that have a huge amount of depth, and the intent is to... well, you know about EverQuest Next classes, right?

"So.. classes have a certain number of abilities to go with them, and a couple of weapons they can go add, which develops kind of a play style. Well, when you're crafting in EverQuest Next, one of the directions we've been talking about is that there's also classes for crafters. For instance, you might become a cabinet maker, and you would get access to all these really cool cabinetry elements and maybe a couple of little tricks that would be appropriate to building those things. So... somebody can become specialized in that and go down all the depth that they can with cabinet making, and find all the different ways they can make secret compartments, and cubby holes, all these really cool things, so that they can actually make cabinets that are better than everybody else's. But they would then... to be a specialist in everything would take a huge amount of time.

"You know from our approach with EverQuest Next we're intending to let you specialize horizontally. So you can, over time, accumulate lots and lots of specialization, but most people won't do all of it. That will mean that they're always looking for people who are specialists in those things that they don't choose to pursue. [This] allows people to find cubby holes where they can become famous and well-known, so what we have to do for our game to be like that, we just have to build more, and more, and more of it. Then those elements take care of themselves."

(Lock) "So by that, you mean more horizontal possibilities, more horizontal progression, just... things to do?"

(Georgeson) "Yeah! More horizontal progression, more kinds of systems, more ways to do things. You know, like... AI templating is probably fairly narrow, because there's only a certain amount you can do with the AI templating storyblocks and stuff like that, but scenario creation? Get out of town! Any game that you can imagine you can make, right?

"Different people are going to be better or worse at different things. It's... kind of like life. It's a virtual reality. Everything that you can do will be represented in there, and people will find ways to become famous."

(Terry) "That's going to be across the board in Landmark. We all have friends or know people who, for instance, play the economies in other MMOs. We know people do it in EQ and EQII, and I've seen it in all the other MMOs I've ever played. That's one way that people can 'win', just by the accumulation of in-game wealth. That's something that anybody can do even if you couldn't put two voxels together and make a shape that you cared about.

"That's just one other way of doing it. You could go collect things for your friends, you could participate in things that are larger than a single individual. We want to give everybody as many ways to win as possible so that everybody can find [something] that they enjoy that allows them to 'win'. Maybe it's not all the same way for everybody, like some games make it.. like there's only one real win condition."

1:02:35: Time to wrap things up! Parting words:

1:03:55 (Terry) "For me personally, I love the fact that it's always great when somebody latches onto the visions that we've had for so long. That's definitely something that you [Lock] have done more than once in the various times we've talked, and it's really great to see that other people are 'getting it'. That's the most exciting thing to me about it."

1:04:22 (Georgeson) "The thing that I want to leave is that we fully understand that only about 20% of the people that play this game are going to be people that build stuff. I don't just mean building like, you know, Kerran structures or something like that, but I mean people that mess with AI templates, do the PvP battlefield, and everything like that. Really, that's going to be about 20% of the people that play.

"The other 80% of the people that play this game are the ones that are going to want to be consuming that vast amount of constantly new content that's available and easy to find. The gallery and everything like that is going to expand; as we add all these different things we'll give you all kinds of different ways to find all this stuff. To recognize who's really good, to follow the creators that are making enormously cool stuff, so that you can get the experience out of this game that you desire as an end player.

"The game is much more than just building. It's just all enabled because you can build anything."

1:05:19 (Terry) "Yeah, and to go along exactly with what Dave was saying, and I've said it many times before but I can't reiterate it enough... my goal, not just for this game but in my career in games is, I've always wanted to make an MMO [where] you never have to do the same thing twice unless you choose to. That hasn't happened yet, but this has the potential to be exactly that kind of game, where I can pick something new every single day, and that's something that excites me more than I can really put into words."

You can give the entire recording a listen by watching the video below. Keep up with all the highlights of SOE Live 2014 here on ZAM from August 14-17 and grab a Founder's Pack to get in-game today!

Ann "Cyliena" Hosler, Managing Editor