Now, before you start assuming that I'm wearing a big phat SOE money hat, please believe that I bring this up for a reason -- a reason a bit more legitimate than to write a facetious introductory paragraph that's probably only marginally funny. Here's the question I'm asking myself: do game publishers really need another platform through which to do this kind of promotion? And even if they do, should they be charging us for the privilege of being exposed to it? We already have their official websites, which, at least in SOE's case, are already pretty substantial. Why pay for any of this? Only Station Access members will get it for free, by the way -- everyone else has to pay $4.99.
An examination of SOE World's "Zero Issue" will perhaps draw us closer to an answer. If you want to peep it for yourself, it's freely available for download here.
EQ2Players.com is a great resource. Does it really need an offline supplement?
Naturally, all the content is pretty SOE-centric, with EQ, EQII, and Star Wars Galaxies getting more or less equal treatment. Planetside gets a one-page skim-over. Maybe SOE has scientifically determined that PS players ain't the readin' type?
Anyway, let's look at the content in the Zero Issue. Two stories on EQII -- a "face-off" between two players, one pro-soloing, and one pro-grouping, and series of tips on how to make your play sessions more efficient. Decent stuff, I guess. There's one big story on EQ Live, and it's a player profile, of sorts. This one's easily the most ambitious in the book, and it's actually pretty cool. Three separate players are spotlighted, all Druids, and the article touches on their individual approaches to the art of druiding. It gets pretty in depth, and in my opinion, it's the kind of stuff that a magazine can thrive on -- stories on the people that play the games, and how they personalize their experiences. There other EQ piece was pretty cool in concept, but wasn't pulled off too well. It's a news-bulletin of sorts, highlighting the month's most significant events on each server. It goes on for several pages, and each entry reads like a variation of "Guild X raided Zone Y and killed God Z, allowing Warrior1 and Magician2 to each acquire on of their elusive epic pieces." That one needs to go back to the drawing board, IMHO.