Anyway, the point of this post is not to talk about my experiences in EQ2, it is to talk about EQ2 in relation to the rest of the MMORPG market. Now, it is no secret that Everquest 2 was a bad game when it came out. Most of the players will freely acknowledge that, and in some ways the stigma of EQ2 appears not to have washed off even after nearly three years. However, the game has changed greatly since release. Some would argue it is for the worse, but the game has become much more solo friendly and casual-friendly, and the new development team have taken the game in a new direction after the relative success of Echoes of Faydwer. They are intentionally bringing back familiar EQ1 content (though usually with a fair few changes), and they've started to take longer over expansions to make them more polished. This can only be a good thing, as the new expansion recently announced brings back Kunark, probably the most distinctive and well-loved continent of the old Everquest. This isn't just good for nostalgic EQ1 players, because Kunark was well loved for a reason - it was awesome. If they can capture the forlorn grandeur of the original Kunark, this expansion will be an excellent experience for EQ2 players.
Everquest II - now officially not shit.
Now, that's slated for a November release, nearly six months away. In the meantime, however, the dev team are churning out monthly game updates. And, no, we're not talking little changes to balance and bugfixes in each update. Last Game Update saw the return of the Dark Elf city from EQ1, Neriak, and the starting zone Darklight Woods just outside it. This brings the number of starting cities up to 4, with at least another one slated for release in the expansion. And I have to say, I LOVE Neriak and the Darklight woods. They're both very characterful and well designed, with Darklight easily being my favourite starting zone in EQ2 so far. It's almost a shame when you zone out into the lvl 20+ zones around it (which have both been there since the start of EQ2), as it really shows how much the devs have improved since release. In the next Game Update, coming out four weeks later, the features include a complete revamps of AA trees (similar to talent trees in WoW), an addition of the 'dressing room' feature to allow you to preview what armour looks like when worn, as well as another entirely new zone - this one a high-level raid zone. Tradeskills are also being revamped.
Despite their hard work, the dev team have still not quite got around to implementing gravity.
Seeing this kind of workrate in the dev team is really something, and it really gives you a lot of hope for the future. If the Rise of Kunark turns out to be a really good expansion pack (and the devs keep working like this for the next 6 months), I imagine that EQ2 might honestly be a genuine challenger to WoW and AoC in terms of popularity. I'm not saying that the game is flawless, but I definitely think it is underrated. As said above, if you want a more detailed analysis of the game, read the first week of my play diary on the sidebar to the left.
Hektor.
1 comment:
I agree with you. I recently came back to EQ2 after a year long hiatus. It's always a different game when I quit for a few months and come back. And if they're going to start taking more time between expansion releases to make sure that everything is in place, then I'll have a lot less to complain about.
I also have to grudgingly agree that there's a stigma on the name of EQ2. I doubt very much it will ever be what EQ1 was or what WoW currently is. Hopefully they could attract back some kind of a player base to make it not so much of a ghost town.
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