Returning Player

If you played during the old 3DO days, you know what Meridian 59 is like. Or, perhaps not.

Things have changed in the past few years. First of all, a team of people who are enthusiastic about the game now own it. Instead of having to endure $30 per month charges and bugs that linger in the code, you get a much more reasonable price and a group of people that are dedicated to improving the game. Near Death Studios, Inc. was formed in 2001 to create online games. The founders were Brian "Psychochild" Green and Rob "Q" Ellis II, game industry veterans that worked on Meridian 59 in the past. In the last part of 2001, NDS purchased all rights to the game from 3DO. The game was finally in the hands of people that understood and cared about the game.

The game was relaunched in March, 2002. Since then we have done numerous patches fixing every major bug in the game and adding cool new spells, skills, and scenarios to the game. We have worked on a major revision to the rendering engine, allowing the game to take advantage of 3D hardware acceleration, while keeping the old software rendering engine so that the game can run on lower-end computers. We have also worked to include new features in the client including mouselook and key rebinding. Near Death Studios, Inc. continues to add new features to the game even now in order to keep the game interesting, vibrant, and well-balanced.

Our goal is to make the best PvP game possible. We have maintained a focus on enhancing PvP options in the game for people that want it, but eliminating a lot of the random PKing that made the early history of online games distasteful. We've worked to add consequences for attacking other people unprovoked, so that the game world has more depth and balance than in the past. If you enjoyed Meridian 59's PvP in the past, then this is still the game for you.

"Meridian 59 rocked back when I played it on 103 and it still rocks today." -notKythe, Meridian 59 player.

Some highlights of what we've added:

More than 15 new, unique spells and skills.  We have also reworked dozens of others. These new abilities and dozens of reworked spells and skills add completely new abilities to the game, and have increased the viability of Faren, Riija, and Jala in particular as useful schools.
Countless tweaks and balances to make the game more fair and interesting.
Adding in new cheat prevention and detection routines. We take cheating very seriously, and have banned many accounts that have cheated.
A new system for guilds to declare war on each other so that their members can fight without being flagged as an outlaw or murderer.
A new system for faction shields, an advanced PvP scenario that allows players to fight faction enemies and that gives larger bonuses based on the number of enemies killed. This system also allows for PvP without outlaw or murderer penalties.
Improved the economy of the game. Shillings actually have value now!
Added new areas, including the Marion Crypt that adds new low to mid level hunting areas.
Added new items, and functionality to older items, such as: Necklace of Jala, Fine Lute, True Lute, Long Bow, Practice Bow, and Chalice of Rain.

As you can see, we have been very busy improving the game. Don't worry, even though there are a lot of changes to the game we've worked to make sure that the soul of Meridian 59 lives on as the original developers intended. We're sure that once you try the game again, you will find it to your liking. Your old friends are probably already here and can help you learn the changes quite easily!

"NDS (bless their hearts) brought back my favorite game and much to my disbelief, made it about 10 times better than what it was when I loved it before. Thank you NDS. I've finally come home. And I'm here to stay!" - Vixen, Meridian 59 player.

Pick a topic you would like to learn more about.
What makes Meridian 59 such an excellent game?
How do Meridian 59's developers improve the game?
Why is Meridian 59 better than other online games?
Ten things that will convince you that Meridian 59 is the game for you.