I have played eq2 since release and most of our guild has too. We have a lotr branch for those that went to that game and we have a few trying the free version of d&d online.

Our guildies that left eq2 still use our site and still come to meets. For us the guild is more important than the game. If a few try a new game we often make a branch in that mmo. Sometimes branches las sometimes not but the guild always does.

I often end up trying a game with guild mates who were in a game with me before.

I expect to see many again at next years meet. I guess we have been lucky but we have also worked to make it work. Some of the guild have gamed together since eq.

As for cross game chat Xfire works well as you can create a chat channel.

This is only true for a minority of contacts though, but they are the really valuable ones.

It is often a bit shit if your friends babble about WoW raids when you aren’t playing it anymore, sure.

Mr. Sexy

We had a very tight SWG guild where we all knew each other well and liked each other. We moved to EQ2 in 2004 and it didn’t survive. We were all different levels and needed different quests. High fliers got fed up with the lowbies and altoholics, lowbies couldn’t understand why suddenly a group that had been so tight and done everything together in SWG was all separated (because the high fliers wouldn’t come back to do content we could access).

I could go into a separate rant on how strict level systems destroy friendships. But there’s another factor at work too: online gamers need to be all pointed in the same direction.

Eve is potentially a good game for this but I had a hard time moving to it with some real life friends. One guy found it flat out too complex. Another rushed off to join the first corp spamming Jita local and ended up in Griefers Anonymous (sic). I played with them a couple of times they were horrible self-centred American teenage boys. I kinda felt he should have fitted in with what I was doing rather than rush off and start something crap. We’ve always had a herding cats problem in my RL friends playing group – all leaders, no followers, most of us not very good communicators either.

It can be done successfully but I think it’s simpler to play what you personally want and let your friends know you’re there.

Another thing which I’ve heard works well and want to try is the static group. Like an old school Dungeons and Dragons group you meet one night a week and play for a few hours together. DDO online is very suited to this as it’s free so you’re not wasting anything by playing a MMO 3 hours a week then playing other games the rest of the time.