Coolest Gamer Experience Ever

Coming up on April this year, I've played MMO's (Think online game with lots of folks hehe) for elven years. (Damn...that makes me feel old.) My current game that is near and dear to my heart, is Everquest 2 (EQ2). The new expansion for EQ2 is currently in beta, and you better believe my geeky arse signed up for it the second registrations opened. Go go laptop that is on at all times. hehe.

So I wait. Patiently. Well, sort of. Finally! I get my email. Download. Install. Copy my character. Attempt to wait patiently. BAM! Leiloki (my character) is copied over and ready to go. So I'm running around, and one day I see in the beta chat one of the developers of the game (Devs) asking for 6 folks for some special testing. I send a tell (message) as fast as my little fingers could type. He tells me to go make a new toon and wait to be summoned.

*faint from Gamer shock while I go make a new toon*

I send Gninja (The dev) a tell with my new character. He summons us to Vasty Deep, one of the new instances (dungeons) in the expansion. I'm to the point of being "Oh my...wow...yay! Neato!" *insert random OMG Shiney talk* Once all six people are there, he gets us into the first dungeon, then beta buffs us. (Beta buff is basically taking you from level 1 to max level + gear instantly for the purpose of testing.) There begins our little adventure.

I got to spend several hours running through two of the three Vasty Deep dungeons with one of the developers from a game that I've spent over a decade playing some form of. It was very cool to get to talk with the dev that made one of the largest (and the first area) you come to in the new expansion. It was neat to hear the other side of the table's views on things, and to put a voice to the folks we only ever see on the forums.

Now when we went through, things were of course buggy, but I swear, that will probably be the neatest run through of Vasty Deep dungeons I will ever do. Gninja also gave us all the panda illusion items. So needless to say, when my panda loving daughter woke up from her nap, she was bouncing off the walls with all the pandas on my screen. It was just an awesome way to spend a Saturday, and I'm thankful I got the chance to get to talk to a dev.

Oh, and if Gninja happens to ever see this - Thank you and GO SAINTS!