EverQuest II Producer's Letter

EverQuest II senior producer Scott Hartsman has written up a new letter to the community on the game's official website that explains why they've chosen to consolidate the population on several of the game's servers. While he does state that the game continues to see new subscriptions, I'd attribute these server migrations to one thing - World of Warcraft. A snip:
When we first started out, EQ2 had 369 total zones or instances of zones. The game has since expanded to having over 600 of them, just about doubling the playable space.

On some worlds, it can seem like there are fewer people to make friends and group with, fewer opportunities to bump into others. Nothing makes a world feel more alive than other people. When you don't run into enough other people, folks who otherwise love the game are more likely to drift away.

It's no secret. It's a problem that's been discussed on a few of the server forums, and it's one that we've been spending quite a bit of time thinking about as well.