I think some of the reasons EQ2 is not growing as fast as Wow is ppl who have spent 2+ years in another MMO will find it hard to leave 2 years of work for another game.
Second "Friends" After playing a game for 2+ years you make alot of friends on that game, and if none of them come over its not going to be as fun as your old MMO.
Word of Mouth I would say * and this is a guess from playing both* that the average age of EQ2 players is MUCH older then the average age of WoW players. So it is more likely for someone who is 24 and under to talk about a MMO to co-workers....friends....family... what have you then someone in their late 20's early 30's.
The older MMO players have more patients then the newer Gen who want everything and want it now..... EQ2 is not that kinda game. Examples are the LONG quest lines... like the one for the Prismatic weapons....the Peacock questline.... claymore..... etc etc that could take months to finish. *** And with the expansion being group heavy I hope it will being back the Old EQ I remember.***
The average age of WoW's playerbase is 28 years old (32 for females).
The reason EQ2 never achieved even EQ's player numbers is simply because MMOs rarely recover from bad launches. EQ2 was in horrible shape when it was launched, mainly because SOE decided to rush it out the door to launch before WoW (John Smedley has admitted they rushed EQ2 out for that reason).
Much like Vanguard, EQ2 was a high profile launch, being the successor to the, at the time, most successful MMO, and much like Vanguard, EQ2 launched in very bad shape. There are too many MMOs around for folks to feel they need to stick around a broken game in the hopes it will someday become good. EQ2's chance was blown when it was released.
I think some of the reasons EQ2 is not growing as fast as Wow is ppl who have spent 2+ years in another MMO will find it hard to leave 2 years of work for another game.
Second "Friends" After playing a game for 2+ years you make alot of friends on that game, and if none of them come over its not going to be as fun as your old MMO.
Word of Mouth I would say * and this is a guess from playing both* that the average age of EQ2 players is MUCH older then the average age of WoW players. So it is more likely for someone who is 24 and under to talk about a MMO to co-workers....friends....family... what have you then someone in their late 20's early 30's.
The older MMO players have more patients then the newer Gen who want everything and want it now..... EQ2 is not that kinda game. Examples are the LONG quest lines... like the one for the Prismatic weapons....the Peacock questline.... claymore..... etc etc that could take months to finish. *** And with the expansion being group heavy I hope it will being back the Old EQ I remember.***
The average age of WoW's playerbase is 28 years old (32 for females).
The reason EQ2 never achieved even EQ's player numbers is simply because MMOs rarely recover from bad launches. EQ2 was in horrible shape when it was launched, mainly because SOE decided to rush it out the door to launch before WoW (John Smedley has admitted they rushed EQ2 out for that reason).
Much like Vanguard, EQ2 was a high profile launch, being the successor to the, at the time, most successful MMO, and much like Vanguard, EQ2 launched in very bad shape. There are too many MMOs around for folks to feel they need to stick around a broken game in the hopes it will someday become good. EQ2's chance was blown when it was released.
Do you have a link or some info to back up the age you are stating?
Not saying you are wrong but i have always wondering who had the older players ( as in age)
Plus the fact that each expansion is vastly different in one way or another. It seems every time they get something working and everyone likes it, they chuck it all out the window and try something completely different w/o using any of the ideas that worked from last expansion.
Hey bahamut1,
I'm lost on this one. I can see where ROK went in a different direction (far too powered-up compared to the other, older starting zones), but could you explain a bit more about what you meant?
With EOF the devs hit a spot where more or less every playstyle was catered for but then in ROK for some reason they thought no lets do something different and made it very solo heavy,even as a soloer i could see it wasnt fair to the group based players,there was dungeons of course but the miniscle ammount of xp you got from them hardly made it worthwhile.
Now with TSO they seem to have thrown out the ROK template and said bugger off to the solo player (the very crowd that SOE have been charming all year long) by making a (more or less) group based expansion,theres little to no cintinuety between expansions and this one fact drives me mad about EQ2,choose path and stick to it,stop trying to cater to just certain sections of your player base,cater to them all,they can do it you only have to think back to EOF to see that.
Graphics are overaged *they need to be updated like EQ1 or Wow or DaoC catacombs*, no gamecards (for users that don't want to use credit cards) or paypal payment system, no large pvp chapter like wow, frequent lags. (Correct me in those if I am wrong since I only played the 14 day trail). :P
overaged? I just do not see that. I see great graphics. Just my opinion but they are some of the best in the business. One of my game play screenshots riding through Thundering Steppes.
Plastic ugly horse
Plastic ugly character models
nasty looking armour
Barren generic environment
The birds even look sooo generic and I bet they still have the horrible stiff wing animation too.
Great engine but a Horrible looking game, WOW just looks sooooooooooo much better and thats just a great example of how art style makes all the difference.
Graphics are overaged *they need to be updated like EQ1 or Wow or DaoC catacombs*, no gamecards (for users that don't want to use credit cards) or paypal payment system, no large pvp chapter like wow, frequent lags. (Correct me in those if I am wrong since I only played the 14 day trail). :P
overaged? I just do not see that. I see great graphics. Just my opinion but they are some of the best in the business. One of my game play screenshots riding through Thundering Steppes.
Plastic ugly horse
Plastic ugly character models
nasty looking armour
Barren generic environment
The birds even look sooo generic and I bet they still have the horrible stiff wing animation too.
Great engine but a Horrible looking game, WOW just looks sooooooooooo much better and thats just a great example of how art style makes all the difference.
Looks about 500X better than WoW does.
The reason not many play EQ2 is because its slowly being replaced by Vanguard :P
I think another big reason is because the graphics engine is horrendous, people with awesome, top-spec PC's still can't run this game maxed out because of the way the graphics engine handles things. That is one of the main reasons I quit, I have a system that is capable of running all of the modern PC games yet when it comes to this I get crappy framerates at some of the top graphics settings. I know that graphics don't make a game but I think in EQ2's case the graphics engine plays a big part in why people don't play the game.
this is the main reason (and truth btw) i dont play it much. as far as i know it does NOT support multi core OR sli/crossfire. i even called SOE and asked if they had any intentions of adding this or if i should just find another game and their response was "the game came out before dual core processors and there are more important things to work on". i cant max the settings and get good frame rate because of this (dual core cessor @ 3.2ghz, 8 gigs ram, sli 8800 ultras. built for UT3, but it runs EQ2 like crap with EVERYTHING on), of course there will always be people that think 24 fps looks "great".
other reasons include:
the game is just too easy (not like ANY mmorpg is actually hard, its just sequencing).
seems like they need to have maintenance EVERY fkn weekday morning.
the community is not great, better than WoW, ok but nowhere near great (RYZOM).
the world IS big...and boring to have to walk/fly across.
who wants to START a game people have been playing for years? i could see if there were no character transfers and they opened new servers every 6 months, but you know you are walking into an overinflated economy.
SOE does suck, if MXO wasnt such a damn interesting game i wouldnt waste my time on any of them. i have station access too! just because MXO isnt worth 15/mo, atleast this way i get 7 trash games for the price of 2.
crafting sucks
it is worth mentioning i just paid for station access so i could diss ALL SOE games (i dont see talking trash about something as an option unless i know wtf it is im talking about..played wow for the exact same reason), i got EQ1&2 for free from getting it (with all expansions) bought all the other games on amazon for a song and honestly the word i see used the most with SOE is potential...every sperm cell has the POTENTIAL to be the next George Washington or Albert Einstein...it does not amount to even 1 of them existing today. SOE has the worst rep in gaming after SEGA, it definately cant be countered with "potential".
I played EQ2 for a couple of months and i must say i loved it, the crafting is so imba, only the zoning sux.
I am a wow player from beta untill now, and seriously, EQ2 is much better imho.
BUT... I also played SWG which is also a SOE game and i played that game for 3 years. Then our dear SOE took the game, smashed it into a wall, blended it repeatedly into a grinder and pooped out some horseshit what they called SWG NGE (new game engine). all that happened in a few weeks time and every1 who was playing swg quit and made place for 8 year old little idiots. Now, im not saying this will happen to EQ2, but the possibility that it is possible makes me wanna throw up and when i read the name SOE on some sort of game i wont ever ever ever want to have anything to do with it ever again.
So what is the reason not many players play this beautifull game? SOE!
Plus the fact that each expansion is vastly different in one way or another. It seems every time they get something working and everyone likes it, they chuck it all out the window and try something completely different w/o using any of the ideas that worked from last expansion.
Hey bahamut1,
I'm lost on this one. I can see where ROK went in a different direction (far too powered-up compared to the other, older starting zones), but could you explain a bit more about what you meant?
I also do not get this one. I been playing since release it is the same game now as then. They have change leveling issues made bigger zones (small zones people complained about so SOE did something about it). Funny how people playing the same game can see it totally different. EQ2 is the same game we loved when it was released only better.
Graphics are overaged *they need to be updated like EQ1 or Wow or DaoC catacombs*, no gamecards (for users that don't want to use credit cards) or paypal payment system, no large pvp chapter like wow, frequent lags. (Correct me in those if I am wrong since I only played the 14 day trail). :P
overaged? I just do not see that. I see great graphics. Just my opinion but they are some of the best in the business. One of my game play screenshots riding through Thundering Steppes.
Plastic ugly horse
Plastic ugly character models
nasty looking armour
Barren generic environment
The birds even look sooo generic and I bet they still have the horrible stiff wing animation too.
Great engine but a Horrible looking game, WOW just looks sooooooooooo much better and thats just a great example of how art style makes all the difference.
The first part your feeling about the graphic I totally disagree with. So I will not try to sell you on it. I love the look of EQ2, you do not. However I am curious as to why you needed to compare EQ2's graphics to WoW's. I been playing both games since their release. I love both games. I think both have great graphics. The addition of dynamic shadows to WoW really helped the look of WoW. I love those shadows. Comparing their graphics is ridiculous, they have totally different looks. There art direction are not even close, so comparing them really does not make sense in an artistic evaluation. WoW is great EQ2 is great. Yes, you can love both game despite what many claim here. Although if asked I think EQ2's graphics are better and they immersme me into the game world far better then WoW. EQ2 feels alive to me and the graphics are the reason.
this is the main reason (and truth btw) i dont play it much. as far as i know it does NOT support multi core OR sli/crossfire. i even called SOE and asked if they had any intentions of adding this or if i should just find another game and their response was "the game came out before dual core processors and there are more important things to work on". i cant max the settings and get good frame rate because of this (dual core cessor @ 3.2ghz, 8 gigs ram, sli 8800 ultras. built for UT3, but it runs EQ2 like crap with EVERYTHING on), of course there will always be people that think 24 fps looks "great". other reasons include: the game is just too easy (not like ANY mmorpg is actually hard, its just sequencing). seems like they need to have maintenance EVERY fkn weekday morning. the community is not great, better than WoW, ok but nowhere near great (RYZOM). the world IS big...and boring to have to walk/fly across. who wants to START a game people have been playing for years? i could see if there were no character transfers and they opened new servers every 6 months, but you know you are walking into an overinflated economy. SOE does suck, if MXO wasnt such a damn interesting game i wouldnt waste my time on any of them. i have station access too! just because MXO isnt worth 15/mo, atleast this way i get 7 trash games for the price of 2. crafting sucks
it is worth mentioning i just paid for station access so i could diss ALL SOE games (i dont see talking trash about something as an option unless i know wtf it is im talking about..played wow for the exact same reason), i got EQ1&2 for free from getting it (with all expansions) bought all the other games on amazon for a song and honestly the word i see used the most with SOE is potential...every sperm cell has the POTENTIAL to be the next George Washington or Albert Einstein...it does not amount to even 1 of them existing today. SOE has the worst rep in gaming after SEGA, it definately cant be countered with "potential".
Does not support multicore? Also SOE told you that they were not going to support it? As you say in your red highlighted quote you do not know. You obviously do not play the game or even keep up with it. EQ2 does support multi core as of GU #49. The dual core support has really help the game performance. Before you go on about EQ2's graphic and dual core support you might want to get your facts straight. Just because your system does not like EQ2 does not mean others do not get great performance. I play at 1920 x 1080 with most graphics maxed and i get 45 fps in raids and well over 70 out soloing in the wild. Here is another example of the crappy EQ2 graphics.
I've played about a grand total of a year worth of EQ2, there's only ever been one glaring issue for me, and of course the usual gripes a gamer might have.
My issue was the graphics, I'm a fan of developers that put more emphasis on art than their engine. While calling EQ2's graphics plastic is slightly exaggerated, it's not far off the mark. The graphics are fine, excellent when you consider the age, but they are lifeless with no soul. This is where art comes into play, because it can give any game, good or bad, soul.
Visuals are all subjective, but it's one reason why me and my clan have long abandoned EQ2 and have yet to look back.
Art brings otherwise fake worlds to life, which is very important to roleplayers like me.
I think some of the reasons EQ2 is not growing as fast as Wow is ppl who have spent 2+ years in another MMO will find it hard to leave 2 years of work for another game.
Second "Friends" After playing a game for 2+ years you make alot of friends on that game, and if none of them come over its not going to be as fun as your old MMO.
Word of Mouth I would say * and this is a guess from playing both* that the average age of EQ2 players is MUCH older then the average age of WoW players. So it is more likely for someone who is 24 and under to talk about a MMO to co-workers....friends....family... what have you then someone in their late 20's early 30's.
The older MMO players have more patients then the newer Gen who want everything and want it now..... EQ2 is not that kinda game. Examples are the LONG quest lines... like the one for the Prismatic weapons....the Peacock questline.... claymore..... etc etc that could take months to finish. *** And with the expansion being group heavy I hope it will being back the Old EQ I remember.***
The average age of WoW's playerbase is 28 years old (32 for females).
The reason EQ2 never achieved even EQ's player numbers is simply because MMOs rarely recover from bad launches. EQ2 was in horrible shape when it was launched, mainly because SOE decided to rush it out the door to launch before WoW (John Smedley has admitted they rushed EQ2 out for that reason).
Much like Vanguard, EQ2 was a high profile launch, being the successor to the, at the time, most successful MMO, and much like Vanguard, EQ2 launched in very bad shape. There are too many MMOs around for folks to feel they need to stick around a broken game in the hopes it will someday become good. EQ2's chance was blown when it was released.
Do you have a link or some info to back up the age you are stating?
Not saying you are wrong but i have always wondering who had the older players ( as in age)
My wife and I tried the game out about a year ago. The first issue we had with the game was the performance. The second was how bland the game world looked. (Lack of color) The thrid was the UI.
The forth was the little things in the game that were just so annoying. For example the coins adding up as weight making you travel back to town just to convert copper to silver or what ever it was called. To many annoying things like this add up for a painful gaming experience.
The last was a mix on the community for I found both good and bad. The bad was almost cultish for if you even mention things in chat about how they could improve something you would get blasted about being a wow fanboy and get the hell out of their game. Well guess what we did.
What does this add up to for us? A game that lacked in all those areas that drove us away.
Well I have been in and out of this game since beta. I am currently subscribed and playing. I find there are a few things that this game has that cause poeple to leave on a regular basis. I agree with your points exactly... they're most of the reasons I no longer play EQ2. The first thing is the reputation that Sony has in the MMO community. They own the biggest mistake in gaming history, namely the CU / NGE disaster of SWG. In that case you had a very loyal and interested fan base that was playing a very unique game. The developers wanted to capture some of the WOW market and drastically changed the game several times. This was viewed by the vocal majority and an epic failure and the shock wave can still be felt to this day. IN fact MMORGP.com had to start an "I'm angry at SOE flame thread" for every game this company puts out. Some people will not go near a Sony game for this reason and they have friends that have friends and so on. Even after the fiasco of SWG, I still played EQ2 for almost a year... but it just never got any better. Sony screwed themselves with their lack of attention to the customer base and their TERRIBLE customer service. The second reason is that the developers change the game on a regualr basis. I have been back over a month and so far there have not been any huge changes and this surprises me a great deal. The developers use to alter the game a lot on a regualr basis. While all games change and evolve, the Sony developers dropped the ball on a regular basis and some people just don't like to invest time in a game to see their hard work nerfed out of existance. A lot of that went on the first year, as did with SWG. Sony liked to change the way professions worked. One day you could solo something and then a patch came out and the next day you were nerfed into oblivion. I remember that happening to my Warden. The third reason is they tend to release a lot of expansions in a very short time. Instead of releasing one major expansion they prefer to release a lot of smaller ones and charge for each one. This gets old fast. In contrast, other games provide updates and upgrades for free. Sony does do a lot of things in the game for free also but this is overshadowed by the constant marketing blitz for their latest expansion. They will usually offer a bundle deal for new players at a much lower price than existing players can buy the new content for. Yup.. very true. The DoF expansion was a mess when it first came out. There were lockouts in specific zones because those areas weren't even in game yet, but Sony never admitted to it... even when there were screenshots from people who made it into those zones only to see white areas with nothing in them. In the one year I played, there was an expansion and two adventure packs... you paid for it all. Finally I think that in the past, Sony showed little interest in the customer base. They were more interested in making you like what they put out rather than exploring what we wanted. People have a choice and this tactic will not work for long. They use to have the worst customer service bar none. Since I have returned to the game I have found just the oposite to be true now. Customer service will bend over backwards to help you in the game today. I have only used them once and was amazed at the level of service and how much it has come up. This is the area that finally made me leave EQ2 and vow never again to play or purchase an SOE game again. Their customer service was rude and accusatory... the worst CS I have ever experienced in *any* situation. Their community managers at the time were arrogant (I think it was Thunderguard and Blackguard.. or something like that). When DoF came out, they had a quest that rewarded a Master Spell (which at that time was VERY difficult to come by). All of the top guilds did the quests and received the spells. After people complained that it was too good of a reward, they changed it to an Adept 1 spell and allowed whoever had received the Master spell to keep it. The community was outraged. I remember reading about 25 pages of one topic and the community managers ignored it. Overall, if you have not played EQ2 you are missing one of the best MMOs ever produced and a ton of content. I am glad I came back and I see evidence that perhaps Sony has finally gotten a handle on some of the flaws that have held this title back for years. I play on the PVP server and it is a blast.
I'm sure EQ2 is a great game today and I'm happy to hear they've taken care of the Customer Service mess. Unfortunately for them, I gave them two chances with two of their games and both times it ended up to be a fiasco. There won't be a third.
These days, there's games and companies out there who appreciate their customers and treat them well. I'm glad Sony has decided they can't compete with other companies unless they clean up their act.
_________________________________ JonMichael
Currently: AION, an MMO Beta under NDA Played: WAR, LOTRO, Hellgate: London, CoX, GW, SotNW, DAOC, EQ2, SWG, WoW, AO, Horizons, Second Life, There, TSO Beta'd: There, Second Life, EQ2, DAOC:LotM, LOTRO, Tabula Rasa, Gods and Heroes, Hellgate: London, Requiem:Bloodymare, AoC, WAR, DDO, Fallen Earth
My wife and I tried the game out about a year ago. The first issue we had with the game was the performance. The second was how bland the game world looked. (Lack of color) The thrid was the UI. You obviously weren't playing any of the new expansions (EoF and RoK) or Qeynos. The only place that has a lack of color is Freeport because its all brown. There's a reason I never play Freeportian. The forth was the little things in the game that were just so annoying. For example the coins adding up as weight making you travel back to town just to convert copper to silver or what ever it was called. To many annoying things like this add up for a painful gaming experience. Coins do not add up as weight any longer. You DO NOT have to run back and forth to convert, its happens automatically so you don't know what you're talking about. They changed that about a year ago, maybe longer. The last was a mix on the community for I found both good and bad. The bad was almost cultish for if you even mention things in chat about how they could improve something you would get blasted about being a wow fanboy and get the hell out of their game. Well guess what we did. The community is the best thing about the game. You must have gotten a bunch of bad apples because I've never had a problem with any of them. What does this add up to for us? A game that lacked in all those areas that drove us away. What does it add up to for me? That I'm looking at a post by someone who thinks they can judge the current game by things that have no merit whatsoever because they don't happen in the game.
I would say, they don't attract more because EQ2 is old and boring as far as todays game standards go, oh and when you have everything on max, its really ugly, trees shouldn't reflect light like water does.. gross.
Well I have been in and out of this game since beta. I am currently subscribed and playing. I find there are a few things that this game has that cause poeple to leave on a regular basis. I agree with your points exactly... they're most of the reasons I no longer play EQ2. The first thing is the reputation that Sony has in the MMO community. They own the biggest mistake in gaming history, namely the CU / NGE disaster of SWG. In that case you had a very loyal and interested fan base that was playing a very unique game. The developers wanted to capture some of the WOW market and drastically changed the game several times. This was viewed by the vocal majority and an epic failure and the shock wave can still be felt to this day. IN fact MMORGP.com had to start an "I'm angry at SOE flame thread" for every game this company puts out. Some people will not go near a Sony game for this reason and they have friends that have friends and so on. Even after the fiasco of SWG, I still played EQ2 for almost a year... but it just never got any better. Sony screwed themselves with their lack of attention to the customer base and their TERRIBLE customer service.
I've NEVER had a bad customer service experience and I've been with the game almost since the day it opened. If you did, then its something YOU did, not SOE CSR's. As for this insanity of SWG, get over it already. Its just a bloody game. Incidentally, if any of you bothered to try SWG again, you'd find that much of the things that they took out are now back because Lucas involved himself in it. The second reason is that the developers change the game on a regualr basis. I have been back over a month and so far there have not been any huge changes and this surprises me a great deal. The developers use to alter the game a lot on a regualr basis. While all games change and evolve, the Sony developers dropped the ball on a regular basis and some people just don't like to invest time in a game to see their hard work nerfed out of existance. A lot of that went on the first year, as did with SWG. Sony liked to change the way professions worked. One day you could solo something and then a patch came out and the next day you were nerfed into oblivion. I remember that happening to my Warden. Interesting how it never did to mine. Regardless whining about it over and over and over again just gets annoying to hear and it doesn't change anything. If you don't like the game, then go elsewhere just like normal people do when they don't like something. The third reason is they tend to release a lot of expansions in a very short time. Instead of releasing one major expansion they prefer to release a lot of smaller ones and charge for each one. This gets old fast. In contrast, other games provide updates and upgrades for free. Sony does do a lot of things in the game for free also but this is overshadowed by the constant marketing blitz for their latest expansion. They will usually offer a bundle deal for new players at a much lower price than existing players can buy the new content for. Yup.. very true. The DoF expansion was a mess when it first came out. There were lockouts in specific zones because those areas weren't even in game yet, but Sony never admitted to it... even when there were screenshots from people who made it into those zones only to see white areas with nothing in them. In the one year I played, there was an expansion and two adventure packs... you paid for it all. DoF was the first expansion... again, get over it. That was years ago. Finally I think that in the past, Sony showed little interest in the customer base. They were more interested in making you like what they put out rather than exploring what we wanted. People have a choice and this tactic will not work for long. They use to have the worst customer service bar none. Since I have returned to the game I have found just the oposite to be true now. Customer service will bend over backwards to help you in the game today. I have only used them once and was amazed at the level of service and how much it has come up. This is the area that finally made me leave EQ2 and vow never again to play or purchase an SOE game again. Their customer service was rude and accusatory... the worst CS I have ever experienced in *any* situation. Their community managers at the time were arrogant (I think it was Thunderguard and Blackguard.. or something like that). When DoF came out, they had a quest that rewarded a Master Spell (which at that time was VERY difficult to come by). All of the top guilds did the quests and received the spells. After people complained that it was too good of a reward, they changed it to an Adept 1 spell and allowed whoever had received the Master spell to keep it. The community was outraged. I remember reading about 25 pages of one topic and the community managers ignored it. Once again, if you had that experience, then it was something YOU did, not SOE. Neither I, nor any member of my 654 member guild, has EVER complained about having a bad CSR experience. Overall, if you have not played EQ2 you are missing one of the best MMOs ever produced and a ton of content. I am glad I came back and I see evidence that perhaps Sony has finally gotten a handle on some of the flaws that have held this title back for years. I play on the PVP server and it is a blast. Exactly.
I'm sure EQ2 is a great game today and I'm happy to hear they've taken care of the Customer Service mess. Unfortunately for them, I gave them two chances with two of their games and both times it ended up to be a fiasco. There won't be a third.
These days, there's games and companies out there who appreciate their customers and treat them well. I'm glad Sony has decided they can't compete with other companies unless they clean up their act.
Then you are hearing what you want to hear and not the truth. Either that or you're making things up.
I would say, they don't attract more because EQ2 is old and boring as far as todays game standards go, oh and when you have everything on max, its really ugly, trees shouldn't reflect light like water does.. gross.
rofl.... I have been playing the game almost since the day it opened and I have never seen a tree reflect light like water so you're making that up.
As for graphics... they look exactly like LOTRO except for the characters who actually look more realistic. How do I know? I've played both, thats why.
To me the reason is clear..its because of the success of Vanguard .People are leaving EQ 2 to play Vanguard....or are just playing Vanguard instead of EQ2 .Its not a bad thing as both games are owned by SOE so revenue will benefit development for Vanguard
Ok i was going over the top with the tree thing, but I seriously don't like how light reflects off stuff in EQ2. It makes everything too shiny and plasticy looking. I've played LOTR also, and LOTRO has way better graphics than EQ2.
But seriously, EQ2 kept you playing for so long? Once my char was in his 20's I could barely find people in the MAJOR cities. Neriak for example was vacant, as was freeport. This was about a year ago.
I've heard a ton of pandering on how and why EQ 2 has failed.
Focusing on a more positive side of things, the lack of more players actually makes me like EQ2 more. I enjoy not having to deal with a poor community, because that's what a game is all about, aborption and community. The end result is a dedicated, more intellient community that welcomes new players and provides a better base for indirect marketing.
The main reason EQ2 hasn't had commercial success is because of two reasons. First impressions are lasting impressions, and lack of direct marketing. But this does not mean, and most will inaccurately argue, that EQ2 isn't a successful game.
In life, perception is 9/10ths of reality. For those of us who have remained loyal to the EQ franchise, we enjoy the other 1/10, also known as what's really going on. EQ2 is a fun game, I enjoy the community more than WoW, and WAR. I feel SoE have made great strides since the days of Verrant Interactive. SoE will hopefuly start separating itself from the likes Vanguard-esque partnerships with Microsoft Games, and begin publishing titles made by dedicated third parties like it used to.
There's a rather long, and somewhat relevant blog I posted about MMO's and the direction that EQ and EQ2 have taken and where they should go found here: www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Craz_z
My wife and I tried the game out about a year ago. The first issue we had with the game was the performance. The second was how bland the game world looked. (Lack of color) The thrid was the UI. You obviously weren't playing any of the new expansions (EoF and RoK) or Qeynos. The only place that has a lack of color is Freeport because its all brown. There's a reason I never play Freeportian. The forth was the little things in the game that were just so annoying. For example the coins adding up as weight making you travel back to town just to convert copper to silver or what ever it was called. To many annoying things like this add up for a painful gaming experience. Coins do not add up as weight any longer. You DO NOT have to run back and forth to convert, its happens automatically so you don't know what you're talking about. They changed that about a year ago, maybe longer. The last was a mix on the community for I found both good and bad. The bad was almost cultish for if you even mention things in chat about how they could improve something you would get blasted about being a wow fanboy and get the hell out of their game. Well guess what we did. The community is the best thing about the game. You must have gotten a bunch of bad apples because I've never had a problem with any of them. What does this add up to for us? A game that lacked in all those areas that drove us away. What does it add up to for me? That I'm looking at a post by someone who thinks they can judge the current game by things that have no merit whatsoever because they don't happen in the game.
Moirae, I think he is describing you if you would take a moment to step back and look how you treat anyone that says anything not positive about this game.
I only played EQ for 6 months but did manage to get a Fury to 70 (pre RoK)........One thing I noticed is alot of people see this game differently........To me these are the weaknesses of EQ2 that could be an issue:
1. It isnt EQ1. EQ2 actually started as a pretty hardcore game, much like EQ1, but never quite had the same feel to it that EQ1 had...The characters in EQ2 felt plastic and out of place with the world.....Also the lore felt like a different game in that when I made a Dwarf my home town wasnt kaladim......There were jsut too many things about the game that made me feel out of place.
2. Technical issues....When EQ2 first released you basically had to have a super computer to run it....They said at the time that they were designing it to take advantage of PCs taht were coming in the future...The problem was that very few could run it well at the time and it turned off alot of people right off the bat.....Even now I still know players that leave EQ2 because they cant run it.....
3. WoW. EQ2 rushed their game to beat WoW to market......It backfired.....WoW was much more polished and it had a much smoother feel to the gameplay......I think what shocked me most was WoW won over more EQ1 players than EQ2 did...SOmething I never would have guessed pre launch......
4. Character models/graphics.......While the graphics were pretty good in the game I always felt the character models were flat out awful.....I tried tweaking about everything I could and my characters still felt "pixelated"......They always had a plastic feel that felt so out of place.......
5. the gameplay. I felt there was too much soloing and that EQ2 was too centered on DPS and not enough about strategy......There was no skilling to pulling like there was in EQ1......EQ2 felt too much like WoW in that everyone jsut grabbed their quests and went on their way to level 70......I always struggled to find groups and all my characters were in guilds.....The raids also were too much of a DPS fest where everyone just stared at the damage meter and made judgements on players based on wehre they ranked....IT didnt matter if you were debuffing, spot healing, buffing, etc if you didnt fall in the top few of the parse you sucked.......
I only played EQ for 6 months but did manage to get a Fury to 70 (pre RoK)........One thing I noticed is alot of people see this game differently........To me these are the weaknesses of EQ2 that could be an issue: 1. It isnt EQ1. EQ2 actually started as a pretty hardcore game, much like EQ1, but never quite had the same feel to it that EQ1 had...The characters in EQ2 felt plastic and out of place with the world.....Also the lore felt like a different game in that when I made a Dwarf my home town wasnt kaladim......There were jsut too many things about the game that made me feel out of place. 2. Technical issues....When EQ2 first released you basically had to have a super computer to run it....They said at the time that they were designing it to take advantage of PCs taht were coming in the future...The problem was that very few could run it well at the time and it turned off alot of people right off the bat.....Even now I still know players that leave EQ2 because they cant run it..... 3. WoW. EQ2 rushed their game to beat WoW to market......It backfired.....WoW was much more polished and it had a much smoother feel to the gameplay......I think what shocked me most was WoW won over more EQ1 players than EQ2 did...SOmething I never would have guessed pre launch...... 4. Character models/graphics.......While the graphics were pretty good in the game I always felt the character models were flat out awful.....I tried tweaking about everything I could and my characters still felt "pixelated"......They always had a plastic feel that felt so out of place....... 5. the gameplay. I felt there was too much soloing and that EQ2 was too centered on DPS and not enough about strategy......There was no skilling to pulling like there was in EQ1......EQ2 felt too much like WoW in that everyone jsut grabbed their quests and went on their way to level 70......I always struggled to find groups and all my characters were in guilds.....The raids also were too much of a DPS fest where everyone just stared at the damage meter and made judgements on players based on wehre they ranked....IT didnt matter if you were debuffing, spot healing, buffing, etc if you didnt fall in the top few of the parse you sucked.......
1) You are right about that. However only thing that bothered me was group penalty, and perhaps corps run. After KoS they gradually made game easy to solo, with RoK being purely solo , and thats what made me stop playing.
2) Heh i remember when i couldn't run accros Begar's Court in FP due to being lagged out.It was mostly memory leeks ,but high requiremnts didn't help either.
3) They did rushed out game because of WoW, not sure why , because those 2 are like apples and oranges.Most of EQ1 players were RPGers in heart and Lore in WoW was something to hard to resist.
4) They did look "plastic", but SOE (can't believe that i am saying something positive about them) worked to fix that.
5) That was change that came post-KoS and was SoE attempt to lure (assumed)kiddies from WoW, not quite it worked that way.In order to cater sufficiently for WoW players (mostly) you have to provide quick, flashy battle with big numbers. But EQ2 was not designed for that and it showed.
Raids were noty DPS test for serious guilds, but inb order to finish certain raid , you need to achieve specific minimum of DPS.If not, you are not getting anywhere.However, every serious guilds (i was in one )were also checking debuffs and such.
It looks to me that guild you were in was heavily casual guild, or RL was not knowledgable enough,beacuse no other way that raid would not check all stats that you mentioned.
Overall, raid is where EQ2 really beats WOW and such by high mile,content and strategy is just plain excellent.Almost every raid member has to multitask, which you can't see in WOW in that extent.
I would still recomend EQ2 as MMO with most content , meaningfull and overal.Exception would be VG, if it survives. That is what EQ2 should have been originally(meaning, if VG ended up what was suppose to be).
For me recomending EQ2 over WoW and such is no brainer.No chance i can suggest WoW to someone with EQ2 being around.
WoW on the other hand is cherfull game that is simplistic enough to provide interest for public from 5 to 75.
I'm sad that this has become and perhaps always was a solo game... when I started my illusionist I was picturing groups yelling out (Need CC then we can do this level 30 dungeon)
I'm level 72 and till now no one has asked for CC, I started thinking "Oh CC is for raiding I guess" Come to find out CC won't work on epic mobs... hmm.
Heck groups don't even get angry in this game by mez breaking... eq1 chanters must have been soo disapointed when their (don't break my mez) macro's were met with "stop spamming plz"... heheh
Then I start hearing about illus's that top dps charts ... huh dps ... so now I have to learn how to dps as an illusionist ... next they'll be saying dps classes can mez or charm ... wait a sec ... they can can't they?
ps: I've heard WoW groups req CC for certain dungeons and raids ... hmmm
Comments
The average age of WoW's playerbase is 28 years old (32 for females).
The reason EQ2 never achieved even EQ's player numbers is simply because MMOs rarely recover from bad launches. EQ2 was in horrible shape when it was launched, mainly because SOE decided to rush it out the door to launch before WoW (John Smedley has admitted they rushed EQ2 out for that reason).
Much like Vanguard, EQ2 was a high profile launch, being the successor to the, at the time, most successful MMO, and much like Vanguard, EQ2 launched in very bad shape. There are too many MMOs around for folks to feel they need to stick around a broken game in the hopes it will someday become good. EQ2's chance was blown when it was released.
The average age of WoW's playerbase is 28 years old (32 for females).
The reason EQ2 never achieved even EQ's player numbers is simply because MMOs rarely recover from bad launches. EQ2 was in horrible shape when it was launched, mainly because SOE decided to rush it out the door to launch before WoW (John Smedley has admitted they rushed EQ2 out for that reason).
Much like Vanguard, EQ2 was a high profile launch, being the successor to the, at the time, most successful MMO, and much like Vanguard, EQ2 launched in very bad shape. There are too many MMOs around for folks to feel they need to stick around a broken game in the hopes it will someday become good. EQ2's chance was blown when it was released.
Do you have a link or some info to back up the age you are stating?
Not saying you are wrong but i have always wondering who had the older players ( as in age)
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Hey bahamut1,
I'm lost on this one. I can see where ROK went in a different direction (far too powered-up compared to the other, older starting zones), but could you explain a bit more about what you meant?
With EOF the devs hit a spot where more or less every playstyle was catered for but then in ROK for some reason they thought no lets do something different and made it very solo heavy,even as a soloer i could see it wasnt fair to the group based players,there was dungeons of course but the miniscle ammount of xp you got from them hardly made it worthwhile.
Now with TSO they seem to have thrown out the ROK template and said bugger off to the solo player (the very crowd that SOE have been charming all year long) by making a (more or less) group based expansion,theres little to no cintinuety between expansions and this one fact drives me mad about EQ2,choose path and stick to it,stop trying to cater to just certain sections of your player base,cater to them all,they can do it you only have to think back to EOF to see that.
overaged? I just do not see that. I see great graphics. Just my opinion but they are some of the best in the business. One of my game play screenshots riding through Thundering Steppes.
Plastic ugly horse
Plastic ugly character models
nasty looking armour
Barren generic environment
The birds even look sooo generic and I bet they still have the horrible stiff wing animation too.
Great engine but a Horrible looking game, WOW just looks sooooooooooo much better and thats just a great example of how art style makes all the difference.
overaged? I just do not see that. I see great graphics. Just my opinion but they are some of the best in the business. One of my game play screenshots riding through Thundering Steppes.
Plastic ugly horse
Plastic ugly character models
nasty looking armour
Barren generic environment
The birds even look sooo generic and I bet they still have the horrible stiff wing animation too.
Great engine but a Horrible looking game, WOW just looks sooooooooooo much better and thats just a great example of how art style makes all the difference.
Looks about 500X better than WoW does.
The reason not many play EQ2 is because its slowly being replaced by Vanguard :P
Darkfall Travelogues!
this is the main reason (and truth btw) i dont play it much. as far as i know it does NOT support multi core OR sli/crossfire. i even called SOE and asked if they had any intentions of adding this or if i should just find another game and their response was "the game came out before dual core processors and there are more important things to work on". i cant max the settings and get good frame rate because of this (dual core cessor @ 3.2ghz, 8 gigs ram, sli 8800 ultras. built for UT3, but it runs EQ2 like crap with EVERYTHING on), of course there will always be people that think 24 fps looks "great".
other reasons include:
the game is just too easy (not like ANY mmorpg is actually hard, its just sequencing).
seems like they need to have maintenance EVERY fkn weekday morning.
the community is not great, better than WoW, ok but nowhere near great (RYZOM).
the world IS big...and boring to have to walk/fly across.
who wants to START a game people have been playing for years? i could see if there were no character transfers and they opened new servers every 6 months, but you know you are walking into an overinflated economy.
SOE does suck, if MXO wasnt such a damn interesting game i wouldnt waste my time on any of them. i have station access too! just because MXO isnt worth 15/mo, atleast this way i get 7 trash games for the price of 2.
crafting sucks
it is worth mentioning i just paid for station access so i could diss ALL SOE games (i dont see talking trash about something as an option unless i know wtf it is im talking about..played wow for the exact same reason), i got EQ1&2 for free from getting it (with all expansions) bought all the other games on amazon for a song and honestly the word i see used the most with SOE is potential...every sperm cell has the POTENTIAL to be the next George Washington or Albert Einstein...it does not amount to even 1 of them existing today. SOE has the worst rep in gaming after SEGA, it definately cant be countered with "potential".
I played EQ2 for a couple of months and i must say i loved it, the crafting is so imba, only the zoning sux.
I am a wow player from beta untill now, and seriously, EQ2 is much better imho.
BUT... I also played SWG which is also a SOE game and i played that game for 3 years. Then our dear SOE took the game, smashed it into a wall, blended it repeatedly into a grinder and pooped out some horseshit what they called SWG NGE (new game engine). all that happened in a few weeks time and every1 who was playing swg quit and made place for 8 year old little idiots. Now, im not saying this will happen to EQ2, but the possibility that it is possible makes me wanna throw up and when i read the name SOE on some sort of game i wont ever ever ever want to have anything to do with it ever again.
So what is the reason not many players play this beautifull game? SOE!
Hey bahamut1,
I'm lost on this one. I can see where ROK went in a different direction (far too powered-up compared to the other, older starting zones), but could you explain a bit more about what you meant?
I also do not get this one. I been playing since release it is the same game now as then. They have change leveling issues made bigger zones (small zones people complained about so SOE did something about it). Funny how people playing the same game can see it totally different. EQ2 is the same game we loved when it was released only better.
overaged? I just do not see that. I see great graphics. Just my opinion but they are some of the best in the business. One of my game play screenshots riding through Thundering Steppes.
Plastic ugly horse
Plastic ugly character models
nasty looking armour
Barren generic environment
The birds even look sooo generic and I bet they still have the horrible stiff wing animation too.
Great engine but a Horrible looking game, WOW just looks sooooooooooo much better and thats just a great example of how art style makes all the difference.
The first part your feeling about the graphic I totally disagree with. So I will not try to sell you on it. I love the look of EQ2, you do not. However I am curious as to why you needed to compare EQ2's graphics to WoW's. I been playing both games since their release. I love both games. I think both have great graphics. The addition of dynamic shadows to WoW really helped the look of WoW. I love those shadows. Comparing their graphics is ridiculous, they have totally different looks. There art direction are not even close, so comparing them really does not make sense in an artistic evaluation. WoW is great EQ2 is great. Yes, you can love both game despite what many claim here. Although if asked I think EQ2's graphics are better and they immersme me into the game world far better then WoW. EQ2 feels alive to me and the graphics are the reason.
Does not support multicore? Also SOE told you that they were not going to support it? As you say in your red highlighted quote you do not know. You obviously do not play the game or even keep up with it. EQ2 does support multi core as of GU #49. The dual core support has really help the game performance. Before you go on about EQ2's graphic and dual core support you might want to get your facts straight. Just because your system does not like EQ2 does not mean others do not get great performance. I play at 1920 x 1080 with most graphics maxed and i get 45 fps in raids and well over 70 out soloing in the wild. Here is another example of the crappy EQ2 graphics.
I've played about a grand total of a year worth of EQ2, there's only ever been one glaring issue for me, and of course the usual gripes a gamer might have.
My issue was the graphics, I'm a fan of developers that put more emphasis on art than their engine. While calling EQ2's graphics plastic is slightly exaggerated, it's not far off the mark. The graphics are fine, excellent when you consider the age, but they are lifeless with no soul. This is where art comes into play, because it can give any game, good or bad, soul.
Visuals are all subjective, but it's one reason why me and my clan have long abandoned EQ2 and have yet to look back.
Art brings otherwise fake worlds to life, which is very important to roleplayers like me.
The average age of WoW's playerbase is 28 years old (32 for females).
The reason EQ2 never achieved even EQ's player numbers is simply because MMOs rarely recover from bad launches. EQ2 was in horrible shape when it was launched, mainly because SOE decided to rush it out the door to launch before WoW (John Smedley has admitted they rushed EQ2 out for that reason).
Much like Vanguard, EQ2 was a high profile launch, being the successor to the, at the time, most successful MMO, and much like Vanguard, EQ2 launched in very bad shape. There are too many MMOs around for folks to feel they need to stick around a broken game in the hopes it will someday become good. EQ2's chance was blown when it was released.
Do you have a link or some info to back up the age you are stating?
Not saying you are wrong but i have always wondering who had the older players ( as in age)
electronics.howstuffworks.com/world-of-warcraft1.htm
My wife and I tried the game out about a year ago. The first issue we had with the game was the performance. The second was how bland the game world looked. (Lack of color) The thrid was the UI.
The forth was the little things in the game that were just so annoying. For example the coins adding up as weight making you travel back to town just to convert copper to silver or what ever it was called. To many annoying things like this add up for a painful gaming experience.
The last was a mix on the community for I found both good and bad. The bad was almost cultish for if you even mention things in chat about how they could improve something you would get blasted about being a wow fanboy and get the hell out of their game. Well guess what we did.
What does this add up to for us? A game that lacked in all those areas that drove us away.
I'm sure EQ2 is a great game today and I'm happy to hear they've taken care of the Customer Service mess. Unfortunately for them, I gave them two chances with two of their games and both times it ended up to be a fiasco. There won't be a third.
These days, there's games and companies out there who appreciate their customers and treat them well. I'm glad Sony has decided they can't compete with other companies unless they clean up their act.
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JonMichael
Currently: AION, an MMO Beta under NDA
Played: WAR, LOTRO, Hellgate: London, CoX, GW, SotNW, DAOC, EQ2, SWG, WoW, AO, Horizons, Second Life, There, TSO
Beta'd: There, Second Life, EQ2, DAOC:LotM, LOTRO, Tabula Rasa, Gods and Heroes, Hellgate: London, Requiem:Bloodymare, AoC, WAR, DDO, Fallen Earth
I would say, they don't attract more because EQ2 is old and boring as far as todays game standards go, oh and when you have everything on max, its really ugly, trees shouldn't reflect light like water does.. gross.
PLAY WURM ONLINE!! www.wurmonline.com
I'm sure EQ2 is a great game today and I'm happy to hear they've taken care of the Customer Service mess. Unfortunately for them, I gave them two chances with two of their games and both times it ended up to be a fiasco. There won't be a third.
These days, there's games and companies out there who appreciate their customers and treat them well. I'm glad Sony has decided they can't compete with other companies unless they clean up their act.
Then you are hearing what you want to hear and not the truth. Either that or you're making things up.
rofl.... I have been playing the game almost since the day it opened and I have never seen a tree reflect light like water so you're making that up.
As for graphics... they look exactly like LOTRO except for the characters who actually look more realistic. How do I know? I've played both, thats why.
To me the reason is clear..its because of the success of Vanguard .People are leaving EQ 2 to play Vanguard....or are just playing Vanguard instead of EQ2 .Its not a bad thing as both games are owned by SOE so revenue will benefit development for Vanguard
"stirs the pot with EQ2 fans "
"after the time of dice came the day of mice "
Ok i was going over the top with the tree thing, but I seriously don't like how light reflects off stuff in EQ2. It makes everything too shiny and plasticy looking. I've played LOTR also, and LOTRO has way better graphics than EQ2.
But seriously, EQ2 kept you playing for so long? Once my char was in his 20's I could barely find people in the MAJOR cities. Neriak for example was vacant, as was freeport. This was about a year ago.
PLAY WURM ONLINE!! www.wurmonline.com
I've heard a ton of pandering on how and why EQ 2 has failed.
Focusing on a more positive side of things, the lack of more players actually makes me like EQ2 more. I enjoy not having to deal with a poor community, because that's what a game is all about, aborption and community. The end result is a dedicated, more intellient community that welcomes new players and provides a better base for indirect marketing.
The main reason EQ2 hasn't had commercial success is because of two reasons. First impressions are lasting impressions, and lack of direct marketing. But this does not mean, and most will inaccurately argue, that EQ2 isn't a successful game.
In life, perception is 9/10ths of reality. For those of us who have remained loyal to the EQ franchise, we enjoy the other 1/10, also known as what's really going on. EQ2 is a fun game, I enjoy the community more than WoW, and WAR. I feel SoE have made great strides since the days of Verrant Interactive. SoE will hopefuly start separating itself from the likes Vanguard-esque partnerships with Microsoft Games, and begin publishing titles made by dedicated third parties like it used to.
There's a rather long, and somewhat relevant blog I posted about MMO's and the direction that EQ and EQ2 have taken and where they should go found here: www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Craz_z
"Woah....Wait......Dude, am I driving right now?"
Moirae, I think he is describing you if you would take a moment to step back and look how you treat anyone that says anything not positive about this game.
I only played EQ for 6 months but did manage to get a Fury to 70 (pre RoK)........One thing I noticed is alot of people see this game differently........To me these are the weaknesses of EQ2 that could be an issue:
1. It isnt EQ1. EQ2 actually started as a pretty hardcore game, much like EQ1, but never quite had the same feel to it that EQ1 had...The characters in EQ2 felt plastic and out of place with the world.....Also the lore felt like a different game in that when I made a Dwarf my home town wasnt kaladim......There were jsut too many things about the game that made me feel out of place.
2. Technical issues....When EQ2 first released you basically had to have a super computer to run it....They said at the time that they were designing it to take advantage of PCs taht were coming in the future...The problem was that very few could run it well at the time and it turned off alot of people right off the bat.....Even now I still know players that leave EQ2 because they cant run it.....
3. WoW. EQ2 rushed their game to beat WoW to market......It backfired.....WoW was much more polished and it had a much smoother feel to the gameplay......I think what shocked me most was WoW won over more EQ1 players than EQ2 did...SOmething I never would have guessed pre launch......
4. Character models/graphics.......While the graphics were pretty good in the game I always felt the character models were flat out awful.....I tried tweaking about everything I could and my characters still felt "pixelated"......They always had a plastic feel that felt so out of place.......
5. the gameplay. I felt there was too much soloing and that EQ2 was too centered on DPS and not enough about strategy......There was no skilling to pulling like there was in EQ1......EQ2 felt too much like WoW in that everyone jsut grabbed their quests and went on their way to level 70......I always struggled to find groups and all my characters were in guilds.....The raids also were too much of a DPS fest where everyone just stared at the damage meter and made judgements on players based on wehre they ranked....IT didnt matter if you were debuffing, spot healing, buffing, etc if you didnt fall in the top few of the parse you sucked.......
1) You are right about that. However only thing that bothered me was group penalty, and perhaps corps run. After KoS they gradually made game easy to solo, with RoK being purely solo , and thats what made me stop playing.
2) Heh i remember when i couldn't run accros Begar's Court in FP due to being lagged out.It was mostly memory leeks ,but high requiremnts didn't help either.
3) They did rushed out game because of WoW, not sure why , because those 2 are like apples and oranges.Most of EQ1 players were RPGers in heart and Lore in WoW was something to hard to resist.
4) They did look "plastic", but SOE (can't believe that i am saying something positive about them) worked to fix that.
5) That was change that came post-KoS and was SoE attempt to lure (assumed)kiddies from WoW, not quite it worked that way.In order to cater sufficiently for WoW players (mostly) you have to provide quick, flashy battle with big numbers. But EQ2 was not designed for that and it showed.
Raids were noty DPS test for serious guilds, but inb order to finish certain raid , you need to achieve specific minimum of DPS.If not, you are not getting anywhere.However, every serious guilds (i was in one )were also checking debuffs and such.
It looks to me that guild you were in was heavily casual guild, or RL was not knowledgable enough,beacuse no other way that raid would not check all stats that you mentioned.
Overall, raid is where EQ2 really beats WOW and such by high mile,content and strategy is just plain excellent.Almost every raid member has to multitask, which you can't see in WOW in that extent.
I would still recomend EQ2 as MMO with most content , meaningfull and overal.Exception would be VG, if it survives. That is what EQ2 should have been originally(meaning, if VG ended up what was suppose to be).
For me recomending EQ2 over WoW and such is no brainer.No chance i can suggest WoW to someone with EQ2 being around.
WoW on the other hand is cherfull game that is simplistic enough to provide interest for public from 5 to 75.
I'm sad that this has become and perhaps always was a solo game... when I started my illusionist I was picturing groups yelling out (Need CC then we can do this level 30 dungeon)
I'm level 72 and till now no one has asked for CC, I started thinking "Oh CC is for raiding I guess" Come to find out CC won't work on epic mobs... hmm.
Heck groups don't even get angry in this game by mez breaking... eq1 chanters must have been soo disapointed when their (don't break my mez) macro's were met with "stop spamming plz"... heheh
Then I start hearing about illus's that top dps charts ... huh dps ... so now I have to learn how to dps as an illusionist ... next they'll be saying dps classes can mez or charm ... wait a sec ... they can can't they?
ps: I've heard WoW groups req CC for certain dungeons and raids ... hmmm