Orignal EQ beta zone: Designer Apprentice
 

I'm just wondering out loud if anyone happens to still have a copy of that old beta zone from the original EQ beta.

It's shortname is apprentice

Would be neat to know that somebody still has it :)

I lost my copy in a crash ages ago and have been thinking about it lately.

So I thought I'd just ask.

Are you talking about that demo zone where you explored the inside of a castle?

I think the beta hes referring to is the prototype of north qeynos they had.

Didn't beta run on a diffrent graphics engine though? How would you implement the zone in the current graphics engine without a total rework (fresh build)?

NO, it was part of the live beta. Same engine as the original release.

The EQ LithTech engine has been around forever, they just keep adding more crap to it. It's a terrible graphics engine and eats memory like Rogean eats Wendy's Burgers.

Yup. Same engine they did Blood 2 on. Blood 2 was a great game hehe

If you get your hands on this, I would definately be interested also. =)

Dax

I'm starting to doubt that zone will ever see the light of day again.

Well , heres some cool screenshots while your thinking about it

http://everquest.allakhazam.com/gallery/alphabeta.html

Neat!

Thanks!

None of those shots are of Designer Apprentice, though. Let me try to describe it.

it was a rectangle area with two floors.

On the bottom were rows of weapon racks and barrels. Many boxes too. Most were containers that they put "testing items" in, some weapons, armor, tradeskill items, etc.

Every type of tradeskill was there also.

Some mobs were also up that you could fight and test things on. The repop time was very short (of course, so that you could keep testing).

It was a NEAT part of the EQ beta.

And since I lost my copy, I'm really afraid it's lost forever (just like any solid info on what PoM used to be like so that someone (like me, given the chance) could recreate it and "De-revamp" the travesty that it is now.

Was that the old tutorial zone from the original release of EQ? If so I am sure Skorp2k will may have a copy. If I remember correctly that was the starting zone on the server.

tutoriala was the name of that one. There was also tutorial.

this one was called "apprentice" and if you look at the client zone list, you'll see a slot for it still, to this day.. just no zone to go with it... it seems to be a lost part of EQ history :(

I know it wouldn't be the same thing but if you could draw up a rough sketch I could try to recreate it with openzone for you...just a thought..

Yeah, I lost some of my old discs which had all of my old EQ, EQEmu, and EthernalQuest/Hackersquest files - lost with that were some old zones and the old GM client.

I've been asking around for them for awhile, but no luck. :'(