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EQ2 vs WoW: An Initial Comparison
fuzzbrain
Member Posts: 70
Now that I have a level 16 character in both WoW and EQ2, I thought I would offer a comparison of the two games for those that might be curious. I will try to be as objective as possible.
ARCHITECTURE
The richness of WoW is hard to overlook once you're placed into the environment. The WoW architecture is extremely creative and very vivid. I was very impressed with the Undercity and Thunder Bluff. Two very different types of cities with visual candy that can only be imagined. The architecture has personality! A job well done. The EQ2 architecture is more medieval looking and blocked, for the most part. Baubleshire was a nice change from say any of the Qeynos zones (South Qeynos, North Qeynos, and Qeynos Harbor). Overall there were differences but nothing to extreme aside from Baubbleshire as I just mentioned.
Winner: WoW
CRAFTING
The crafting system appears to be better defined in EQ2. I really like the fact that you have to depend on either your guildies or others to craft advanced items. WoW doesn't truly go this route since they can virtually create all the pieces to an item themselves. However, in both EQ2 and WoW, you can obviously buy a hard to find ingredient if necessary.
Winner: EQ2
GATHERING
As a crafter, you will find yourself gathering materials and ingredients for your items. EQ2 could have done better with the resources in the newbie lands. I understand they pumped up the resources but that still didn't help much considering the zone was full of people trying to take eathother's resource node. The best times to gather were late in the evening when most were not awake. But I still remember running endless laps around the newbie lands just to chop some wood, gather from an animal trap or mine a chunk of ore. That was frustrating. As like most of us in EQ2, reaching that golden number of 40 meant freedom....freedom to roam Antonica for resources. That was the number...40. How can we forget? That was so ingrained, I could not mistake that for one second.
Gathering in WoW isnt as competitve as EQ2 but its still competitive in a sense because you might have several people in a cave (not zoned) looking for copper, tin or other metal. There's so much more land to look through and you aren't restricted to a particular 200 x 200 yard cell. There are still level restrictions as to what you can mine though. For example, if you've selected one of the two professsions to be a miner, at level 1, you can mine copper, at a level of 75 in mining you can mine tin, at level 150, silver and so on. The beauty is you can roam wherever to look for the resource.
Winner: WoW
ZONING
The zoning in EQ2 puts a toll on you. In an attempt to resolve lagging issues, SOE zoned too much it seems. If you're in the Graystone, you have to zone 3 times to get to North Qeynos or take 2 zones if you travel via the docks. The experience is contrary in WoW. There is virtually no zoning done expect when you travel to other islands via the Zeppliin, the ship or instanced dungeons. Otherwise the world is seamless and you hardly ever zone.
Winner: WoW
LATENCY
Otherwise known as lag. Both games suffered lag at launch. That seems pretty obvious right? Now that the games have been in production and the servers have been stabilized, I can't honestly say one game is more laggy over another.
Winner: Tie
GRIFFON RIDES
Why not compare these two right? Both games have griffon rides to travel from point A to point B. The EQ2 ride seemed a little more rough then the ride on the WoW griffon. It just seemed smoother in WoW.
Winner: WoW
THE USER INTERFACE
Both UI's work pretty similar but EQ2 offers the customization that I enjoy and change as I see fit. I have yet to figure out customized UI's in the WoW UI. Perhaps its there but I just dont see it yet or has not been intuitive enough for me to notice it. I can't move windows in the WoW UI or again..have not figured out how to. Only thing I can do is launch them and close them.
Winner: EQ2
FISHING
Yes! Fishing! Both games have fishing and both use the fish to make food. However, the fishing in WoW is more interactive and you can actually catch various goodies (drops) and various fish. The fishing experience can be enhanced by using lures, night crawlers and bobbles. Its great to catch swords and armor that you could actually use....or sell back for coin. I have spent hours on just fishing for stuff. Sounds sick I know but I find it to be fun.
Winner: WoW
QUESTS
How can I not talk about quests. EQ2 wins this one and I'll tell you why. I have several reasons. The amount of quests you can collect is amazing. Double that which you can get from WoW. EQ2 allows for 40 and WoW allows for 20. Both games offer you the choice to delete quests. EQ2 makes you interact with the NPCs around you because they dont have a fat "!" hanging over their head telling you they have a quest. You actually have to interact with NPCs or walk in their vicinity to get the hint that they might have a quest for you. And they talk to you! There is spoken dialogue not just a written paper telling you of your quest. I really enjoy that from EQ2. It was immersive.
The types of quests you can do in in EQ2 also many. There are killing quests, collecting quests, crafting quests, exploring quests, and gathering quests. Am I missing any?
Winner: EQ2
WARRIOR CLASS/GUNS
As a Warrior in both EQ2 and WoW, I need to find a way to pull my mob when the monsters are tightly packed. Solution? The trusty musket in WoW. How many times have you wished you could have pulled a mob to you but couldnt because there were so many close together? No longer a problem. Shoot one! Mages and Hunters have their pulling mechanisms...and now so do warriors. So what if we're not meant to be pros at it like a hunter but the skill serves its purpose and I love it. By the way, you can buy various degress of shot depending what you can afford or what an engineer can make.
Winner: WoW
UNDERWATER
Both games offer you the ability to hunt, explore and swim underwater. Similar experience in both.
Winner: Tie
OVERALL GAMEPLAY EXPERIENCE
I've been playing EQ2 for several weeks now. And been playing WoW for about a week. When you go from EQ2 to WoW, what really makes a huge impact are the colors and richness of WoW. And once you go from WoW to EQ2, you notice the washed out look of the environment. It almost has a bland feel to it. But aside from that, I felt the gameplay in Wow was a bit more enticing and fun to play then EQ2. Its hard to explain but you felt more welcome to play in WoW. The boat rides are cool. The Zepplin is fun. Running elevators going up and down. The Undercity is spooky and ghoulish (Imagine the Haunted House from Disneyland but spookier!) The seemless look and feel of the environment shows extra attention to detail and vivid with color schemes. Job well done Blizzard.
Overall Winner: WoW
Ulfaro
"Mature gamers from the Pacific"
http://www.californiagamer.com
Comments
This is a very good comparison and I agree with most of it. The only thing is I think you need to play each game longer. I've played WoW for nearly 3 weeks, not long enough by any means to give an accurate summary, but I can still say I had tons of fun and that I really enjoyed it.
I've been playing Everquest II for about 3 weeks now as well, and I absolutely love it. I would not say it is better than WoW, it just like it better, to me it is more fun.
Just some things I would add to the comparison:
1) Everquest II is a much more difficult game. If you are level 16 in Everquest II, you should be about level 20 or so in WoW with the same number of hours played doing the same types of things. WoW is more casual gamer friendly and accessable.
2) Colors, architecture, detail - both games have this, only they are different. WoW may have more colors and a different style, but I think it isn't right to say that Everquest II's art is bland, I would say it is just more realistic looking. This is where WoW gets tagged with the "cartoonish" visual quality, because of it's original art. Everquest II's art is not original, it is supposed to look like things would have looked in medeival times. WoW buildings are shaped differently, sometimes to a point where they look like they have no right staying together in one piece, but it works for the visual effect.
Good comparison, but I disagree with your conclusion. In WoW I played a mage to 35, a Warrior to 20, a Rogue to 28, and a druid to 17. In EQ2 I have a 20 Templar and a 9 summoner heading toward Necro.
Personally, I think the WoW graphics are goofy. They are stylistic, but not technical. Bump/normal mapping and many many many many modern graphics effects are lacking in very hardcore ways. At first I thought it was rich because of the colors, but the lack of detail quickly bored me, and I got sick of seeing everything look ostensibly the same.
The world just seemed small too. Most towns you walk into in WoW, the ones you spend most of your time in, are tiny. They have a couple vendors, and everybody else gives quests, or just stands there. In EQ2 it's easy to get lost walking around, the places are huge, and even after your 20th time through a city, you might still see a new NPC who happens to be wandering around at whatever time of day you hadn't seen before. Cats walk the streets, NPC's wander from time to time, and guards on patrol make their way through the zone. EQ2 seems much more alive to me.
Gathering does suck in EQ2. There is a huge bottleneck till skill level 40, and you should spend as much time on the Isle of Refuge skiling up as possible, where many resources are available that will prevent you from having to wander the peat bog and other low level zones for hours and hours. The Isle of Refuge is a great crafting/gathering resource that many people neglect to concentrate on in their rush to get into Freeport or Qeynos.
Combat in WoW got boring for me, fast. No matter which character I was on, I was just pushing the same buttons in the same order for every fight to maximize my DPS. In EQ2, DPS maximization changes drastically with a good group of people paying attention and working together. It takes an exponentially more amount of skill to coordinate these attacks, and when they go off you get nice DPS benefits. I think they could be improved to make them more worthwhile, but the system itself blows the WoW combat out of the water in my opinion. In WoW there is a huge amount of min/max, because you know everything about everything. DPS, spell damage, casting time, recast time, everything. In EQ2, it will all have to be parsed over and over and over to determine what is most effective at what level, and depending on the rank of spell you are casting. I'll take the mystery, thank you. I don't know what spells are next, what order they come in, and it would take quite a bit of work in game to see. In WoW you talk to the vendor, and bam you can see everything you will ever get from them, all the way to the top. It bored me.
I think crafting in EQ2 needs some improvement, but the base design is much more rich than that of WoW. WoW you just find a few components, click combine, done. In EQ2 you can actually die crafting, if you don't counteract the anomolies in teh devices you are using, like a forge. A huge heat spike that you do not counteract with one of your craft abilities in time will burn the crap out of you and possibly ruin your item. It's exciting, risky, and is not merely waiting for a status bar to go all the way across like WoW.
The people in EQ2 have proven to be much more mature, friendly, and helpful than I ever found in WoW, and that more than anything else is likely to keep me from buying WoW.
Habit is not to be flung out the window by any man, but coaxed down the stairs one step at a time. - Mark Twain
Good comparision for the most part, except you left out alot of important areas of the game. Like combat, grouping, solo, guilds, NPCs, leveling in general. Those areas are more important then fishing, I honestly couldnt give a shit about fishing in either games, or could I care about griffons. A griffon is a griffon, they both take you from A to B as you said, so why include it in your review?
EQ2 Qeynos Guild- http://www.imperium-arcanum.com
That is exactly how I feel, you couldnt have said it better. I didnt like in WoW how I could go to my trainer, see all of my rogue abilities, how much they cost, what they do...
The game really lacked having any goals. When I would level my rogue, I would have to force myself to level him, I had no goals once so ever. It was always the same, hide, backstab, hit a few times, wait for power, then hit the button right when it lit up again to use. After that, I would skin it, take its ruined hide, and go kill some more. This is not fun for me, its repetitive combat and crafting that bores me.
In WoW's towns, all of the buildings are the same inside. They would have 2 vendors, one normal NPC, and stairs that lead to the second floor with nothing on it. ALL of the building were this way. Even in the Orc town it was similar to the humans. Blizzard left out any interior architecture that would differ from all other buildings.
I think the game was just to easy. A quest would give me 1000xp at lvl 15 when it only took me 15 mins to do it. I would have to do 10 or so quests before I would level. Then once I dinged, I would repeat the same boring concept.
The areas werent all that pretty, once you get to Westfall in human lands its all desert and brown. When you get to Darkfall its all dark and gloomy and all the trees look the same. The only area I did like was the one past Darkfall, I never got a high enough level to go there, but I did run through it to get to booty bay and died 100 times or so.
This game is definately not for me, I havent bought EQ2 yet but I plan to in December when I get my new computer. I hope this game will not let me down as much as WoW did. So far what I hear from EQ2, even the negative posts, appeal to me more then WoW ever did.
EQ2 Qeynos Guild- http://www.imperium-arcanum.com
You know the problem with EQ2 vs WoW threads.
It is like troll and fanboi bait.
Please don't feed the animals thank you
WoW maxes at 60.
If you add in server stability, community, and bugged features to your review. EQII would win hands down. Otherwise both games are a lot of fun and quite good.
I miss DAoC
I haven´t played WoW yet and i have a account in EverQuest II so don´t take my comments to serius. I will also tell Im from Sweden so Im sorry for my bad Englsih.
In grafik EverQuest 2 wins easly because I dont like so happy coulors games.
In fighting Im not sure but what I have read it goes fast to kill a enemy so EverQuest 2 win.
In grouping EverQuest 2 win but one bad thing is that is more difficult to solo in EverQuest 2 so I guess WoW win in soloing.
In crafting in EverQuest 2 is it very hard to find resourses and I dont know in WoW
In sound I think EverQuest 2 wins good music and speaking NPC
PvP WOW wins
Overall Im a EverQuest fan so EverQuest 2 I want a new computer EverQuest 2 wins
its down to opinion for christ sake :P
I like WoW you like EQ2 nuff said :P.
Heres my comparison:
1,They both have problems that can be improved
2. They both are generally class system mmorpgs
3. They both have large fanbases
4. They both have their fair share of fanbois
5. They both are fun to play depending on the player decides which is more fun, not comparisons :P
6. EQ2 Graphics Engine IS better than World Of Warcraft Engine
7. EQ2 Graphics aren't neccessarily better than World Of Warcraft. Its down to personal preference
8. WoW does run on More systems MORE smoothly than EQ2. (not more as in number but i.e 800 MHZ p2)
9. Both have grypfons
10. Both have plenty of characters and choices to last a good 2 years of enjoyment
11. Most likely both will release MANY expansions to keep the fanbase
12. They both dont break from the general MMORPG system or grind/quest system set in stone ages ago.
13. EQ2 doesn't localise players and delay EU and other parts of World release by 3 months ^ ^. Amasingly many players like me will however wait for it rather than deviate from their chosen mmorpg.
Like my comparison? :P
Beta Tested: Lineage 2, Ryzom, City of Heroes, RYL, EverQuest 2 World Of Warcraft European
Truly Loved: World of Warcraft
Beta Tested: Lineage 2, Ryzom, City of Heroes, RYL, EverQuest 2 World Of Warcraft European
Truly Loved: World of Warcraft
I have to say this doesn't feel like a totally unbiased review, but maybe that's because I'm biased the other way
. I did have some comments on some of your comments.
Originally posted by fuzzbrain
Now that I have a level 16 character in both WoW and EQ2, I thought I would offer a comparison of the two games for those that might be curious. I will try to be as objective as possible.
ARCHITECTURE
The richness of WoW is hard to overlook once you're placed into the environment. The WoW architecture is extremely creative and very vivid. I was very impressed with the Undercity and Thunder Bluff. Two very different types of cities with visual candy that can only be imagined. The architecture has personality! A job well done. The EQ2 architecture is more medieval looking and blocked, for the most part. Baubleshire was a nice change from say any of the Qeynos zones (South Qeynos, North Qeynos, and Qeynos Harbor). Overall there were differences but nothing to extreme aside from Baubbleshire as I just mentioned. Winner: WoW
I think you're missing a lot here. The style is a little more dark in EQ2 opposed to the light-hearted style of WoW. I mean if you look around in the towns of EQ2 with the castles, the ivy on the castles the stained glass windows, all make things very interesting. The NPC's (which you mentioned) also help with the feel of the town. I think EQ2 did an excellent job of capturing the feel of the medevil setting. I'm not saying WoW did a bad job, it's different style.
CRAFTING
The crafting system appears to be better defined in EQ2. I really like the fact that you have to depend on either your guildies or others to craft advanced items. WoW doesn't truly go this route since they can virtually create all the pieces to an item themselves. However, in both EQ2 and WoW, you can obviously buy a hard to find ingredient if necessary. Winner: EQ2
The whole reason I play MMO's is the interdependance on others. There has to be a reason for others to be online with me other than just socializing. This is one of my favorite things on EQ2.
GATHERING
As a crafter, you will find yourself gathering materials and ingredients for your items. EQ2 could have done better with the resources in the newbie lands. I understand they pumped up the resources but that still didn't help much considering the zone was full of people trying to take eathother's resource node. The best times to gather were late in the evening when most were not awake. But I still remember running endless laps around the newbie lands just to chop some wood, gather from an animal trap or mine a chunk of ore. That was frustrating. As like most of us in EQ2, reaching that golden number of 40 meant freedom....freedom to roam Antonica for resources. That was the number...40. How can we forget? That was so ingrained, I could not mistake that for one second. Gathering in WoW isnt as competitve as EQ2 but its still competitive in a sense because you might have several people in a cave (not zoned) looking for copper, tin or other metal. There's so much more land to look through and you aren't restricted to a particular 200 x 200 yard cell. There are still level restrictions as to what you can mine though. For example, if you've selected one of the two professsions to be a miner, at level 1, you can mine copper, at a level of 75 in mining you can mine tin, at level 150, silver and so on. The beauty is you can roam wherever to look for the resource. Winner: WoW
This is a little misleading. You can go to your starter towns and go to starter zones and get your skill to level 40. It is a pain and I hate it when someone who would have walked right past, but sees you gathering so they start. I wish gathering locked the resource like it does when you fight. Resource stealing is just as bad as kill stealing.
ZONING
The zoning in EQ2 puts a toll on you. In an attempt to resolve lagging issues, SOE zoned too much it seems. If you're in the Graystone, you have to zone 3 times to get to North Qeynos or take 2 zones if you travel via the docks. The experience is contrary in WoW. There is virtually no zoning done expect when you travel to other islands via the Zeppliin, the ship or instanced dungeons. Otherwise the world is seamless and you hardly ever zone. Winner: WoW
This is the biggest problem with EQ2. It is really annoying having to wait for a new zone (or 6) to load when trying to go anywhere.
LATENCY
Otherwise known as lag. Both games suffered lag at launch. That seems pretty obvious right? Now that the games have been in production and the servers have been stabilized, I can't honestly say one game is more laggy over another. Winner: Tie
This is the part where I think you're being a little lenient on WoW. EQ2 had very little lag at launch, WoW's servers were brought to thier knees. I would say WoW has quite a bit more lag than EQ2. It's not severe and I would gladly deal with it, if EQ2 would get rid of the zone every 5 feet.
GRIFFON RIDES
Why not compare these two right? Both games have griffon rides to travel from point A to point B. The EQ2 ride seemed a little more rough then the ride on the WoW griffon. It just seemed smoother in WoW. Winner: WoW
I haven't taken a Griffon Ride on either one, so I'm not sure what you mean by smooth, but I wouldn think ridinhg on the back of a Griffon would be bummpy. Again, I haven't seen the implimtation so you're probably right on this one.
THE USER INTERFACE
Both UI's work pretty similar but EQ2 offers the customization that I enjoy and change as I see fit. I have yet to figure out customized UI's in the WoW UI. Perhaps its there but I just dont see it yet or has not been intuitive enough for me to notice it. I can't move windows in the WoW UI or again..have not figured out how to. Only thing I can do is launch them and close them. Winner: EQ2
FISHING
Yes! Fishing! Both games have fishing and both use the fish to make food. However, the fishing in WoW is more interactive and you can actually catch various goodies (drops) and various fish. The fishing experience can be enhanced by using lures, night crawlers and bobbles. Its great to catch swords and armor that you could actually use....or sell back for coin. I have spent hours on just fishing for stuff. Sounds sick I know but I find it to be fun. Winner: WoW
This is right on. Fishing in EQ2 is just double click. WoW's is a lot more interactive.
QUESTS
How can I not talk about quests. EQ2 wins this one and I'll tell you why. I have several reasons. The amount of quests you can collect is amazing. Double that which you can get from WoW. EQ2 allows for 40 and WoW allows for 20. Both games offer you the choice to delete quests. EQ2 makes you interact with the NPCs around you because they dont have a fat "!" hanging over their head telling you they have a quest. You actually have to interact with NPCs or walk in their vicinity to get the hint that they might have a quest for you. And they talk to you! There is spoken dialogue not just a written paper telling you of your quest. I really enjoy that from EQ2. It was immersive. The types of quests you can do in in EQ2 also many. There are killing quests, collecting quests, crafting quests, exploring quests, and gathering quests. Am I missing any? Winner: EQ2
This is where EQ2 really shines. I mean there was a quest where you had to interview 3 people and figure out what really happened. All 3 had a different point of view. It was pretty cool.
WARRIOR CLASS/GUNS
As a Warrior in both EQ2 and WoW, I need to find a way to pull my mob when the monsters are tightly packed. Solution? The trusty musket in WoW. How many times have you wished you could have pulled a mob to you but couldnt because there were so many close together? No longer a problem. Shoot one! Mages and Hunters have their pulling mechanisms...and now so do warriors. So what if we're not meant to be pros at it like a hunter but the skill serves its purpose and I love it. By the way, you can buy various degress of shot depending what you can afford or what an engineer can make. Winner: WoW
Actually, the guns and Zepplins are some of the things that turned me off of WoW. It feels too steam punk and less Fantasy. In EQ2 you can taunt to pull one mob.
UNDERWATER
Both games offer you the ability to hunt, explore and swim underwater. Similar experience in both. Winner: Tie
OVERALL GAMEPLAY EXPERIENCE
I've been playing EQ2 for several weeks now. And been playing WoW for about a week. When you go from EQ2 to WoW, what really makes a huge impact are the colors and richness of WoW. And once you go from WoW to EQ2, you notice the washed out look of the environment. It almost has a bland feel to it. But aside from that, I felt the gameplay in Wow was a bit more enticing and fun to play then EQ2. Its hard to explain but you felt more welcome to play in WoW. The boat rides are cool. The Zepplin is fun. Running elevators going up and down. The Undercity is spooky and ghoulish (Imagine the Haunted House from Disneyland but spookier!) The seemless look and feel of the environment shows extra attention to detail and vivid with color schemes. Job well done Blizzard. Overall Winner: WoW
This is where we really differ in opinions. I like the "washed out" look in EQ2. It makes it feel more like a serious game, and less like a cartoon. The quests and the dependency on other players are the two most important things to me, and we both agree that EQ2 does a better job at those.
DISCLAIMER: This was not meant as a flame, just to illustrate a different point of view.
For once, we have some mature comments on this subject. My two cents...
Originally posted by Jodokai
I have to say this doesn't feel like a totally unbiased review, but maybe that's because I'm biased the other way
. I did have some comments on some of your comments.
Originally posted by fuzzbrain
Now that I have a level 16 character in both WoW and EQ2, I thought I would offer a comparison of the two games for those that might be curious. I will try to be as objective as possible.
ARCHITECTURE
The richness of WoW is hard to overlook once you're placed into the environment. The WoW architecture is extremely creative and very vivid. I was very impressed with the Undercity and Thunder Bluff. Two very different types of cities with visual candy that can only be imagined. The architecture has personality! A job well done. The EQ2 architecture is more medieval looking and blocked, for the most part. Baubleshire was a nice change from say any of the Qeynos zones (South Qeynos, North Qeynos, and Qeynos Harbor). Overall there were differences but nothing to extreme aside from Baubbleshire as I just mentioned. Winner: WoW
I think you're missing a lot here. The style is a little more dark in EQ2 opposed to the light-hearted style of WoW. I mean if you look around in the towns of EQ2 with the castles, the ivy on the castles the stained glass windows, all make things very interesting. The NPC's (which you mentioned) also help with the feel of the town. I think EQ2 did an excellent job of capturing the feel of the medevil setting. I'm not saying WoW did a bad job, it's different style.
While I agree that overall it comes down to personal taste, I do feel WOW has the edge in architecture. There are just more details in WoW. Yes EQ2 does look really good and has a ton of polys. However it looks so bland and lacks attention to detail. The landscape is so barren and devoid of life. I still get a kick out of seeing cobwebs in trees and other things like that in WoW. One thing I do like about EQ2 is the water, just about the best water graphics Ive seen in any game ever.
CRAFTING
The crafting system appears to be better defined in EQ2. I really like the fact that you have to depend on either your guildies or others to craft advanced items. WoW doesn't truly go this route since they can virtually create all the pieces to an item themselves. However, in both EQ2 and WoW, you can obviously buy a hard to find ingredient if necessary. Winner: EQ2
The whole reason I play MMO's is the interdependance on others. There has to be a reason for others to be online with me other than just socializing. This is one of my favorite things on EQ2.
Crafting is very interdependant in WoW in my opinion. Yes one can take up herbalist and alchemy and think they're set. However there are still things they'll need. Also, from what Ive noticed not many players have gone the mining/weaponsmith or skinning/tailor route. Many have chosen two resource collector trades or two crafting trades and therefore there is much social/business interaction going on. I myself am a enchanter who is completely dependant on everyone for stuff. Im also a miner to make back some credits for the cost of doing enchanting. I have 2 contracts and something not mentioned here thats neat is the mail system of WoW. I can go to a mailbox, send a message to my contractor and attach the copper bars and send it "COD" with the amount I want. (think FEDEX) How cool is that. I didnt get into the crafting that much in EQ2 because it was to confining in the newb areas.
GATHERING
As a crafter, you will find yourself gathering materials and ingredients for your items. EQ2 could have done better with the resources in the newbie lands. I understand they pumped up the resources but that still didn't help much considering the zone was full of people trying to take eathother's resource node. The best times to gather were late in the evening when most were not awake. But I still remember running endless laps around the newbie lands just to chop some wood, gather from an animal trap or mine a chunk of ore. That was frustrating. As like most of us in EQ2, reaching that golden number of 40 meant freedom....freedom to roam Antonica for resources. That was the number...40. How can we forget? That was so ingrained, I could not mistake that for one second. Gathering in WoW isnt as competitve as EQ2 but its still competitive in a sense because you might have several people in a cave (not zoned) looking for copper, tin or other metal. There's so much more land to look through and you aren't restricted to a particular 200 x 200 yard cell. There are still level restrictions as to what you can mine though. For example, if you've selected one of the two professsions to be a miner, at level 1, you can mine copper, at a level of 75 in mining you can mine tin, at level 150, silver and so on. The beauty is you can roam wherever to look for the resource. Winner: WoW
This is a little misleading. You can go to your starter towns and go to starter zones and get your skill to level 40. It is a pain and I hate it when someone who would have walked right past, but sees you gathering so they start. I wish gathering locked the resource like it does when you fight. Resource stealing is just as bad as kill stealing.
Not misleading at all. In EQ2, you're severly restricted to small boxed in areas newb type towns until you level up. In WoW, I can go anywhere although its usually suicide to attempt but thats the fun part hehe.
ZONING
The zoning in EQ2 puts a toll on you. In an attempt to resolve lagging issues, SOE zoned too much it seems. If you're in the Graystone, you have to zone 3 times to get to North Qeynos or take 2 zones if you travel via the docks. The experience is contrary in WoW. There is virtually no zoning done expect when you travel to other islands via the Zeppliin, the ship or instanced dungeons. Otherwise the world is seamless and you hardly ever zone. Winner: WoW
This is the biggest problem with EQ2. It is really annoying having to wait for a new zone (or 6) to load when trying to go anywhere.
Agree, and mainly why I quit EQ2...just couldnt stand to zone everywhere. Felt like I was playing a bunch of small games in little boxed in areas. Half the time the group I was in couldnt all get into an area. One would end up in zone 1, two in zone 2, and th rest in zone 3-5.
LATENCY
Otherwise known as lag. Both games suffered lag at launch. That seems pretty obvious right? Now that the games have been in production and the servers have been stabilized, I can't honestly say one game is more laggy over another. Winner: Tie
This is the part where I think you're being a little lenient on WoW. EQ2 had very little lag at launch, WoW's servers were brought to thier knees. I would say WoW has quite a bit more lag than EQ2. It's not severe and I would gladly deal with it, if EQ2 would get rid of the zone every 5 feet.
Lucky me, I didnt experience any lag in EQ2 and a little bit in WoW.
GRIFFON RIDES
Why not compare these two right? Both games have griffon rides to travel from point A to point B. The EQ2 ride seemed a little more rough then the ride on the WoW griffon. It just seemed smoother in WoW. Winner: WoW
I haven't taken a Griffon Ride on either one, so I'm not sure what you mean by smooth, but I wouldn think ridinhg on the back of a Griffon would be bummpy. Again, I haven't seen the implimtation so you're probably right on this one.
The ride is neat to watch for WoW. I didnt get to try the one on EQ2.
THE USER INTERFACE
Both UI's work pretty similar but EQ2 offers the customization that I enjoy and change as I see fit. I have yet to figure out customized UI's in the WoW UI. Perhaps its there but I just dont see it yet or has not been intuitive enough for me to notice it. I can't move windows in the WoW UI or again..have not figured out how to. Only thing I can do is launch them and close them. Winner: EQ2
FISHING
Yes! Fishing! Both games have fishing and both use the fish to make food. However, the fishing in WoW is more interactive and you can actually catch various goodies (drops) and various fish. The fishing experience can be enhanced by using lures, night crawlers and bobbles. Its great to catch swords and armor that you could actually use....or sell back for coin. I have spent hours on just fishing for stuff. Sounds sick I know but I find it to be fun. Winner: WoW
This is right on. Fishing in EQ2 is just double click. WoW's is a lot more interactive.
I made most of my credits fishing and half the armor I wear is from fishing as well. Its very fun in WoW and rewarding
QUESTS
How can I not talk about quests. EQ2 wins this one and I'll tell you why. I have several reasons. The amount of quests you can collect is amazing. Double that which you can get from WoW. EQ2 allows for 40 and WoW allows for 20. Both games offer you the choice to delete quests. EQ2 makes you interact with the NPCs around you because they dont have a fat "!" hanging over their head telling you they have a quest. You actually have to interact with NPCs or walk in their vicinity to get the hint that they might have a quest for you. And they talk to you! There is spoken dialogue not just a written paper telling you of your quest. I really enjoy that from EQ2. It was immersive. The types of quests you can do in in EQ2 also many. There are killing quests, collecting quests, crafting quests, exploring quests, and gathering quests. Am I missing any? Winner: EQ2
This is where EQ2 really shines. I mean there was a quest where you had to interview 3 people and figure out what really happened. All 3 had a different point of view. It was pretty cool.
WARRIOR CLASS/GUNS
As a Warrior in both EQ2 and WoW, I need to find a way to pull my mob when the monsters are tightly packed. Solution? The trusty musket in WoW. How many times have you wished you could have pulled a mob to you but couldnt because there were so many close together? No longer a problem. Shoot one! Mages and Hunters have their pulling mechanisms...and now so do warriors. So what if we're not meant to be pros at it like a hunter but the skill serves its purpose and I love it. By the way, you can buy various degress of shot depending what you can afford or what an engineer can make. Winner: WoW
Actually, the guns and Zepplins are some of the things that turned me off of WoW. It feels too steam punk and less Fantasy. In EQ2 you can taunt to pull one mob.
UNDERWATER
Both games offer you the ability to hunt, explore and swim underwater. Similar experience in both. Winner: Tie
OVERALL GAMEPLAY EXPERIENCE
I've been playing EQ2 for several weeks now. And been playing WoW for about a week. When you go from EQ2 to WoW, what really makes a huge impact are the colors and richness of WoW. And once you go from WoW to EQ2, you notice the washed out look of the environment. It almost has a bland feel to it. But aside from that, I felt the gameplay in Wow was a bit more enticing and fun to play then EQ2. Its hard to explain but you felt more welcome to play in WoW. The boat rides are cool. The Zepplin is fun. Running elevators going up and down. The Undercity is spooky and ghoulish (Imagine the Haunted House from Disneyland but spookier!) The seemless look and feel of the environment shows extra attention to detail and vivid with color schemes. Job well done Blizzard. Overall Winner: WoW
This is where we really differ in opinions. I like the "washed out" look in EQ2. It makes it feel more like a serious game, and less like a cartoon. The quests and the dependency on other players are the two most important things to me, and we both agree that EQ2 does a better job at those.
I dont like the interdependance on groups in EQ2. Yes a mmorpg should be social and make players want to group up. I just feel it shouldnt be forced on me. My typical game day in WoW, fishing for an hr, do a few quests solo, heard a spam for an elite quest and joined that for an hr (ended up doing two quests usually), go make some enchantments, hunt for ores and smelt bars..end the day with chat and maybe more fishing. With EQ2, my game day was "/shout lvl 18 rogue LFG PST" and the rest of the time running around in between killing what I could.
I didn't like WOW or EQ2
WOW:
I hated the lack of customization. The lack of character looks, the class restrictions based on race and the fact that every race started with the same weapon/weapon skill based upon their class and no way to change that until already well established in the class, made you feel like a carbon copy of every one else the game allows for very little diversity.
I also didnt care for the cartoonish unproportioned animation
The use of the same animation for mobs of different levels was also disconcerning you could be hunting level 5 wolfs and come up across a level 12 wolf, they would have different names, but with no diference to the animation.
Beyond this and less contextual this feeling of undynamicness continued in other ways.
EQ2:
I also didnt like the animation of EQs races I thought it was substandard, but I did get used it and after a couple day didnt really bother me.
The economy in EQ2 is completely broken mostly due to the fact that the crafting system was completely broken. Crafters could only take one crafting mission and they were impossible to do until after you were of sufficient enough level that you had moved on to the next crafting guild.
Restrictions on ingredients you could buy until you did the crafting missions to have more access, but you couldnt do the missions with out the ingredients.
Recipes missing to make things that should have been able to be made (such as level 3 warrior skills essences)
Bugs were you couldnt belong to both your low level and higher level guilds at the same time.
Many quests that had you contact people with no clue as to where they were. No way points, no description in the text, nothing. Im not saying I wanted it to be easy, but some idea of where to go would have been nice. A zone, a direction any indication.
True to SOE bugs, bugs, bugs
I only played 1 1/2 week and experienced maybe ½ dozen annoying bugs such as screens refusing to close, when buying stacks of items charging you the price but giving you only 1 item, getting stuck, not being able to turn off night vision, ect.
And a again a common complaint of SOE customer service? what cusomer service? eat the bugs and like it cause I never got an response to any issue I was having. I had to even play for 15-20 mins till I finally was able to get myself unstuck from a rock as I randomly jumped around.
Umm you sort of forgot Immersion? I mean EQ 2 wins immersion hand down. Lights turn on and npc's if you watch some of them walk "home" or at least inside of taverns by night time. The Sony developers did alot to make the NPC's appear as real as possible without causing serious server side bog down with AI.
Bland? I dont really think they are bland, if you ramp them up and turn on all the flora the world its rather rich. Plus by lvl 18 you'll see alot of areas that dont look the same when you start traveling more. I mean..hell the Commonlands is like an african safari while Antonica is like the sound of music landscape with hills and grass. Steppes and Nek forest? woosh waaay different. From my experience with Wow, their cartoonish graphics to me were bland, despite the really pretty colors it had to offer.
I like both games, I just happen to prefer EQ2 which is why I didn't buy WoW for now.
(Harvesting sucks in EQ2, especially if your skill is under 40 because the noob zones are over run with harvesters that just harvest there to sell on the Broker lol))
Please Refer to Doom Cat with all conspiracies & evil corporation complaints. He'll give you the simple explination of..WE"RE ALL DOOMED!
As said before its personal choice. I played Wow stress beta and enjoyed the game and all, didnt do a deep analysis but enjoyed it. Bought EQ2 played it and enjoyed it immensely, playing it gave me a sense of excitement that I didnt get from WoW. It simply was a feeling.
While I would prefer a game with PvP my "personal" feeling is that sony realized that they were lagging in were Wow was to completion compated to EQ2 so they dropped implementing PvP at launch. THey then concentrated on making the game the best it could be for a launch date close to Wow. I myself was suprised Sony beat Wow on the launch date. Pvp will come later i'm sure as this is a market they cant neglect nor will neglect.
One other point I wish to make. I read somewhere that EQ2 requires higher end machine and current consumer technology cannot fully utilize the power of the game engine. To me this means that they built this engine to last a long time with the hope the game wont look dated years from now. I wonder how long it will take Wow graphics to look dated...
because everyone knows that fishing is much more important then fighting, and it certainly deserves a space on that list; underwater...........oh........water.........i feel special; warrior class, because we all know that warriors are more important than any other class; and guns?! Eq2 doesn't have guns, guns don't exsist in the time period its set in, and how do you even know they have saltpeter?! to make gunpowder!
zones........i assume you have never gotten out of the cities, the only reason there are so many zones in the cities are because if there weren't, the lag would be incrediable, just due to the sheer size of it. Also, aparently you haven't noticed all the conent in each of those zones
gathering........very important to you i assume...........
and come on, GRIFFON RIDES!!! its not even a major feature in Eq2, hardly a minor feature, there are only 2 zones in the entire game that have them, and only 3 stations each in both of those zones
review is unfair, and you basically you chose upon stuff WoW was best at
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"You sir, are a moron"
I would agree with much of what you said Fuzz but really EQ2 was so thoroughly dissapointing to me and WoW was such a major suprise in how amazing it is that I doubt most of my opinions on EQ2 would be well looked upon here.
I went into the two games thinking WoW probably wouldnt be that great but wanted to give it a try just to see and started EQ2 expecting it to be amazing and the mmorpg I would be playing for years to come. It didnt take long playing for my opinions to change 100%.
The funny thing is that my tastes usually run along the lines of everything that EQ2 supporters tout like the longer leveling times, difficulty, dependency on friends and such. Really though the only aspect that I wish was changed was that it took longer to level in WoW, otther then that its actually a much more involved and entertaining game.
Graphically I dont even want to get started on but I have to roll with Tymora's comment about how they tried to be more realistic and thats where the drab lifeless environments came from. Well if they were trying to recreate a dark ages dirt hole they succeded. Personally I will take the high fantasy world that amazes me every turn like in WoW and the original EQ.
They took the technical aspects and excelled (love the heat distortion) but those are minor things, the overall look and style which is really 90% of visual appeal is missing in EQ2 imo.
I would agree with much of what you said Fuzz but really EQ2 was so thoroughly dissapointing to me and WoW was such a major suprise in how amazing it is that I doubt most of my opinions on EQ2 would be well looked upon here.
I went into the two games thinking WoW probably wouldnt be that great but wanted to give it a try just to see and started EQ2 expecting it to be amazing and the mmorpg I would be playing for years to come. It didnt take long playing for my opinions to change 100%.
The funny thing is that my tastes usually run along the lines of everything that EQ2 supporters tout like the longer leveling times, difficulty, dependency on friends and such. Really though the only aspect that I wish was changed was that it took longer to level in WoW, otther then that its actually a much more involved and entertaining game.
Graphically I dont even want to get started on but I have to roll with Tymora's comment about how they tried to be more realistic and thats where the drab lifeless environments came from. Well if they were trying to recreate a dark ages dirt hole they succeded. Personally I will take the high fantasy world that amazes me every turn like in WoW and the original EQ.
They took the technical aspects and excelled (love the heat distortion) but those are minor things, the overall look and style which is really 90% of visual appeal is missing in EQ2 imo.
That is exactly how I approached EQ2, expecting an amazing journey, only to become bored at Lvl 23. I cannot even summon up the strength to enter Antonica or TS for a second, only to quit when I get to the login screen. What turned me off significantly was not the graphics, zoning, lag (although the known memory leek is quite pathetic), griffon rides, etc etc...it's the actual game itself or lack thereof. EQ2 should be renamed Armorquest 2, no one is around anymore for pickup groups to fight Giants or Cents, they're all LFG to complete armor quest 1-6. Even the frist part requires a group effort. The mere thought of haivng to kill 25 Hunter Stalkers, 8 Acolyte Decayed, 8 something or other in BB, was maddening and all to get a better pair of bracers, lol. I just don;t get it....for me, there is nor was there any sense of excitemnt, exhiliration....pretty much there was nothing at all. I expected WOW to be childish, cartoonish, crapish, only to find the complete opposite. A game in which I can solo, group, laugh, be amazed by the overwhelming bredth of Ironforge....these are not comparable games by any means.
One thing i find is i end up defending EQ2 more then WoW.
Now i wonder why this is considering i like both games and played both .Also had EU WoW on pre order same day it was permitted to pre order in UK.
Currently of course i own EQ2 too.
Then i realised the reason been is that there seems to be much more lies been spread about EQ2 compared to WoW so i end up correcting the lies of EQ2 much more often.
Common lies.
1) i can't solo in EQ2.Big lie.One of the worst classes for soloing is a guardian which i play.In EQ2 group and solo mobs are clearly shown there is plentiful of solo mobs.I was in TS zone and figured there was no solo mobs untill i found 2 places there just filled with solo mobs and i could solo a yellow con with almost no downtime.So it amazes me to see people post you can't solo in EQ2.
You get less exp then grouping yes.But think of it this way if solo beats group who would group.If you enter a bad group in EQ2 u end up with so much debt you would regret group.
2)crafting is too complicated.Took my brother exactly 15 mins to figure out what to do and he never touched crafting in beta.Also there are so many guides out there how to craft its a breeze.
3)boohoo i am level 25 and don't have time to keep up.Only a child can say this sorry.Considering on oasis the highest is level 34 and the number of level 30 and above is under 50 people thats very good .In short to be level 24 on my server is higher then the average.So unless you are racing with the top people on each server who are most likely played by a group of people thus the char is constantly levelling then there is little reason to complain.
Everyone has their own pace in levelling.I can log in for 1 hour and gain a lot.
4)zones.Yes we all like a perfect seamless world but could it have been done with such detail in EQ2 without zones?i don't know honestly my guess is no .If it was done without zones i think the game will lag badly.Take antontica in beta they tried and brought in so many experts to try and keep 500 people in one zone it was not possible.After you leave the newbie zones the zones are actually quite large and so are the dungeons.No i rarely have to zone anywhere for hours since i left all those newbie delivery quests in the city behind me.
To be honest i think the time has come for people to stop bashing or spreading lies and just play their game .Both games have jammed packed servers so there is no shortage of people to play with.In short at peak time USA its almost a curse to play for me because everywhere u got there are so many people and i start to lag in small zones.
So just go play your game.
I agree with Hercules. I am also playing both games and it does seem as if a lot of BS is being spread around about EQII. I like them both, however I must admit I am a bit biased toward EQII.
For the original poster in your last post you made a comment on how you thought WoW had the better archetecture and attention to detail in the world specificly mentioning a spider web. I remember seeing a spider web in a tree in EQII on Isle of refuge.
Not only that but simply due to the greater number of poly's EQII's world stands out over all as the better of the two. The colors are more muted and realistic than WoW's to be sure. But EQII would look garish if the Devs had used all those bright colors WoW devs used. They fit in with the more cartoonish WoW perfectly however.
One thing that really stands out in EQII vs WoW is the water detail. I love the waves and mist coming off the waterfalls. Shadows and lighting effects are also awesome. Quite frankly WoW does not hold a candle to EQII anywhere in the graphics area whatsoever.
WoWs main appeal to me is the easy and quick leveling, however it may also be it's downfall for me. Blizzard had better darn well put in some content for 60 and above if they want me to continue more than 2 months. I won't max until after the first 30 days but I should in about 40 - 60 and PvP won't hold me long after that.
Edit..one more complaint about WoW here. It seems too structured for me in some ways. One questr just leads straight to another.. I feel like the Devs did a bit too much handholding here. I guess that is cool for a newcomer to MMORPG's but I am not crazy about it. Overall it feels like a MMORPG for people who never played a MMORPG before. However I do have to admit it is a fun game
I just don't see myself playing it for very long I suppose.
I miss DAoC
Apart from in creativity, artistry, efficiency of design and pure aesthetic appeal, wherein in my opinion - and contrary to yours - WoW completely blows Everquest 2 out of the picture.
I don't care how many polygons a game has. If it looks ugly, it looks ugly, and EQ2 sure looks ugly.
Apart from in creativity, artistry, efficiency of design and pure aesthetic appeal, wherein in my opinion - and contrary to yours - WoW completely blows Everquest 2 out of the picture.
I don't care how many polygons a game has. If it looks ugly, it looks ugly, and EQ2 sure looks ugly.
That's my exact feeling also. I could barely play the EQ2 Beta due to 2 reasons: The gameplay wasn't as good as WoW's AND the graphics were extremely ugly.
Platemail looks like it's made out of stone... swords look like they were made from stone... and even the landscape looked like it was all made from stone (trees, dirt, etc.)
Looks like some people need to upgrade their video cards if they think EQII's graphics are bad , save your pennies and trash that old Geforce III
http://eq2.warcry.com/scripts/images/view_image.phtml?id=25384&site=68
http://www.blizzard.com/wow/ScreenShot.aspx?ImageIndex=1&Set=0
Neither has bad graphics just EQII aims for realism and WoW aims for surrealism
I miss DAoC