I have been less than impressed with EQ2. Restrictions aside, they don't limit the game that much. I thought the crafting was some evil machiavellian plot foisted on the playerbase. I love to craft, but that system does not belong in a MMO.
Otherwise I did not find anything that separated the game from any of the other. Tthe graphics were sub par and I run everything at max resolution.
I tried all the starter quest areas and found then all to be wanting. Well I found the game to be wanting. Lotro makes this game look like it was coded by a bunch of rookies.
I am pretty darn good at reading between the lines,i would say many here are still bitter because Eq2 is not exactly EQ1.I was there when it was launched and it was ridiculous how bitter so many were that they were lsoing Eq1,time to move on people.
As far as complaining or trying to knit pick,unless you are comparing the game to the ONLY different game [FFXI]then it is as good or not better than the most populated game on the planet,so go figure.It does EVERYTHING the same as WOW if not better ,looks better has better crafting,it took Wow about 5 full years to fully capture all the same ideas as Eq2/Eq1,so before people go off complaining,they had better realize that 90% of the games are exactly the same as EQ2.
There was ONLY one game that actually had an eventful starter experience and that was Vanguard,seemed that it doesn't matter at all,since there is not a lot of people playing VG.All other games except a very small chunk ,start you off in some puny small village,with npc's waiting to hand out some useless boring quests.So as far as the MMORPG genre is involved,there is no such thing as an exciting beginners experience.VG had it,FFXI was challenging,all other games pretty mcuh group you into total boredom and super easy fights with literally no risk of dying,arows pointing directions or icons over top of npc's heads.
As far as the topic goes,New Halas is just the same old generic beginning that all games have.It is also very noob friendly,no risk of dying ,very easy fights.I would say New Halas is exactly like stating in Timorous Deep,the same kind of rewards for quests,the same sort of linear pattern.TD/Gorowyn at least had the high lofts,with lifts to take you high up into the city,New Halas is basically flat except for a few cliffs yo ucan dive off of using Feather Fall.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I am pretty darn good at reading between the lines,i would say many here are still bitter because Eq2 is not exactly EQ1.I was there when it was launched and it was ridiculous how bitter so many were that they were lsoing Eq1,time to move on people.
To be completely honest, I think you do a poor job of infering reasons into what people say.
For example: no one lost EQ1 when EQ2 released, because EQ1 was still there exactly like it was when EQ2 released. It seems like you are just looking for a reason to dismiss what people say.
Seeing that eq2 lost most of its playerbase in the first year after release I think it is easy to see that people just didn't enjoy the game. Seeing that they didn't return to EQ1 (as it lost most of its players also) I don't think they were to upset at losing EQ.
Everyone is always talking about how great EQ is. So I just tried it and quit after a few minutes. Its bad. Unoriginal, ugly, and boring. Severely dated.
Agree with the New Halas feel. The ice/snow theme isn't my favorite, and have yet to complete the whole area questline. (FYI - there is a shortcut to town from the first 'settlement' after the start area. You have to know it's there, but it drops you in the town proper.)
I have a fondness still for the original island setting for Q and F, and liked the distinctively different feel of the two major cities (now ghost towns), and would love to see those revamped and return.
Any alt I've rolled this past year it's Gorwyn over Neriak or Kelethin area. Although all the start areas are a bit boring for anyone that's played more than a handful of MMO's - it's the learn your character, get your gear time, run around kill 10x - so not very inspiring. Most MMO's get interesting about level 20+ or later IMHO.
Indeed. I actually really enjoyed having to earn your way into Qeynos or Freeport after launch (also liked the class change system and its associated questlines... but that's another story). Then you finally get into the city proper and its omg huge... I guess at launch, EQ2's design was much more anchored in RPG gameplay, which SOE promptly began moving away from as soon as WoW hit the scene and they saw the $$$. I still remember the hours-long discussions that would take place in my guild at the time about how ticked off people were to see SOE changing the game they chose to play *because* it wasn't WoW to become something more like it.
I mean they make these massive cities that are, ostensibly, the capitals of each side... yet they're ghost towns. I think instead of adding new starter areas (and I agree Halas is far less inspired than previous ones), they should give an eye back to the two main cities and make some changes to give people a reason to go there again. They could be social centers, trade centers, etc... but they're just sprawling cities with no purpose other than Writs and a handful of other things. Such a waste of space.
"If you just step away for a sec you will clearly see all the pot holes in the road, and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
I used to love Eq2, but eventually I started playing wow instead since so many rl friends played it, and no one played eq2. But I always went back for a few months once in a while. But this new halas, oh dear, I hate to say this, but I did not like it at all. Eq2 has really fallen in my estimate, I still have my great memories but I think this game is dead to me now
I like the New Halas story arc. It was the first that had house items and unique armor as rewards. Then they just recently added the same armor to all the other noobie zones which is weird cuz who needs heavy fur in the grassy fields of Darklight Wood? The should have added unique armor that looks like it was made by dark elves. They did add unique dark elvish house items & a mount which was awesome (same for Timorous Deep & Kelethin).
I've heard rumors that they will revamp freeport & qeynos noobie quests to give better rewards as well & eventually make them starting zones again. Queens Colony needs to come back. It's too much a part of the lore just for them to yank it out. It just needs a revamp. It's possible, but I think they need moneys from the Extended crowd to make it happen. I hate to say it, but I'm sure they have gained a lot more revenue from the Extended Server.
I have been less than impressed with EQ2. Restrictions aside, they don't limit the game that much. I thought the crafting was some evil machiavellian plot foisted on the playerbase. I love to craft, but that system does not belong in a MMO.
Otherwise I did not find anything that separated the game from any of the other. Tthe graphics were sub par and I run everything at max resolution.
I tried all the starter quest areas and found then all to be wanting. Well I found the game to be wanting. Lotro makes this game look like it was coded by a bunch of rookies.
If you want to judge a game by it's graphics/animations, then yes, EQ2 is not for you. I do have to say that the artwork & detail is still pretty awesome in this game compared to other games from it's era.
The crafting system is super easy if you know how it works. It's really grindy, but it's nice to play a game where you can feel like a true merchant, making stuff that people really want. The time spent on the grind is worth it. It sounds like you played on EQ2X where I would assume crafting isn't as important because people are buying their gear from marketplace.
My only complaint about the starting area (and this is coming from a complete noob to the game as a whole, Silver membership) is that, exactly as was said in the article, I have a crapload of crafting items and nothing to do with them. My bank space is filled with furniture, and as far as quick leveling, I haven't reached New Halas yet and have been playing for 3 or 4 long sessions. Level 16 or 17 and no city with crafting or whatnot in sight for another few sessions. Ugh.
This thread is about EQ2, not EQ2X and no....they're not the same game, no matter how much someone (including SoE) tries to tell you they are. The game has so many restrictions that it is but a DIM shadow of EQ2, imo.
If you were playing EQ2, you woudn't have some of the issues you just referred to....no offense, but the bag limitations and whatnot for EQ2X are just STUPID. But so far as I know.....(I don't play EQ2X, I play EQ2) there are crafting areas in EVERY starting zone. So the crafting stuff that you have "nothing to do with," unless they also removed crafting areas in EQ2X (wouldn't surprise me, since everything else is so restricted and NOT like EQ2)....you should be able to use those things, you just need to find the crafting area.
Furniture...same thing. Go get your apartment or house in the city you live in....unless EQ2X also is keeping people from doing THAT. There's a quest by the housing. You'll get the house for free with the first week's rent paid.
You can get to most zones in the game from either a dock, or a spire, including New Halas which is a city IN a zone, not a zone name itself.
Ya, you can get your house right up the hill from where you are questing, and get rid of most of the stuff taking up space. You also can get bags/boxes to put inside your bank slots. I didn't know that when I was first playing. That will increase your space a ton!
If you want to judge a game by it's graphics/animations, then yes, EQ2 is not for you. I do have to say that the artwork & detail is still pretty awesome in this game compared to other games from it's era.
The crafting system is super easy if you know how it works. It's really grindy, but it's nice to play a game where you can feel like a true merchant, making stuff that people really want. The time spent on the grind is worth it. It sounds like you played on EQ2X where I would assume crafting isn't as important because people are buying their gear from marketplace.
Yeah, the graphics is fine enough. But the coding isn't great, the games worst feature. I get worse performance in it than AoC, a lot worse in some zones (both games maxed out to compare). Neriak have been OK for a year but new halas give me 15 in FPS (Hexa core with 8GB ram and 480 GTX, never had problem in other games).
The crafting systems problem is 2 things: First you have to make a lot of unsellable junk to make something useful. The second thing as that you make the same thing as everyone else. You would think that a dwarf and an elf would make rather different swords. It id better than most games however.
EQ2 is a pretty good game, EQ2X isn't SOE is just too gredy to make F2P working.
They should optimize the engineand revamp the AA trees to make it better.
Besides thta is my main problem with EQ2 that they raised the levelcap too much. Before you actually did a lot of questlines, now you run through most zones in a very short time and that hurts the story.
Some of the quests are epic byut they also have a lot of kill X quests, someof them really stupid like when they forces you to kill 50 animals to look after book pages they have eaten to make a book. They should delete the worst ones as well.
I played the game for about 3 years until 2 months ago. I had fun most of the time.
Comments
I have been less than impressed with EQ2. Restrictions aside, they don't limit the game that much. I thought the crafting was some evil machiavellian plot foisted on the playerbase. I love to craft, but that system does not belong in a MMO.
Otherwise I did not find anything that separated the game from any of the other. Tthe graphics were sub par and I run everything at max resolution.
I tried all the starter quest areas and found then all to be wanting. Well I found the game to be wanting. Lotro makes this game look like it was coded by a bunch of rookies.
I am pretty darn good at reading between the lines,i would say many here are still bitter because Eq2 is not exactly EQ1.I was there when it was launched and it was ridiculous how bitter so many were that they were lsoing Eq1,time to move on people.
As far as complaining or trying to knit pick,unless you are comparing the game to the ONLY different game [FFXI]then it is as good or not better than the most populated game on the planet,so go figure.It does EVERYTHING the same as WOW if not better ,looks better has better crafting,it took Wow about 5 full years to fully capture all the same ideas as Eq2/Eq1,so before people go off complaining,they had better realize that 90% of the games are exactly the same as EQ2.
There was ONLY one game that actually had an eventful starter experience and that was Vanguard,seemed that it doesn't matter at all,since there is not a lot of people playing VG.All other games except a very small chunk ,start you off in some puny small village,with npc's waiting to hand out some useless boring quests.So as far as the MMORPG genre is involved,there is no such thing as an exciting beginners experience.VG had it,FFXI was challenging,all other games pretty mcuh group you into total boredom and super easy fights with literally no risk of dying,arows pointing directions or icons over top of npc's heads.
As far as the topic goes,New Halas is just the same old generic beginning that all games have.It is also very noob friendly,no risk of dying ,very easy fights.I would say New Halas is exactly like stating in Timorous Deep,the same kind of rewards for quests,the same sort of linear pattern.TD/Gorowyn at least had the high lofts,with lifts to take you high up into the city,New Halas is basically flat except for a few cliffs yo ucan dive off of using Feather Fall.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
To be completely honest, I think you do a poor job of infering reasons into what people say.
For example: no one lost EQ1 when EQ2 released, because EQ1 was still there exactly like it was when EQ2 released. It seems like you are just looking for a reason to dismiss what people say.
Seeing that eq2 lost most of its playerbase in the first year after release I think it is easy to see that people just didn't enjoy the game. Seeing that they didn't return to EQ1 (as it lost most of its players also) I don't think they were to upset at losing EQ.
Everyone is always talking about how great EQ is. So I just tried it and quit after a few minutes. Its bad. Unoriginal, ugly, and boring. Severely dated.
EQ2 should be in a museum somewhere, not seeking new players.
Seriously... how many new starting zones are they going to add?
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
These "realistic" graphics really didn't age well. Ah well.
Indeed. I actually really enjoyed having to earn your way into Qeynos or Freeport after launch (also liked the class change system and its associated questlines... but that's another story). Then you finally get into the city proper and its omg huge... I guess at launch, EQ2's design was much more anchored in RPG gameplay, which SOE promptly began moving away from as soon as WoW hit the scene and they saw the $$$. I still remember the hours-long discussions that would take place in my guild at the time about how ticked off people were to see SOE changing the game they chose to play *because* it wasn't WoW to become something more like it.
I mean they make these massive cities that are, ostensibly, the capitals of each side... yet they're ghost towns. I think instead of adding new starter areas (and I agree Halas is far less inspired than previous ones), they should give an eye back to the two main cities and make some changes to give people a reason to go there again. They could be social centers, trade centers, etc... but they're just sprawling cities with no purpose other than Writs and a handful of other things. Such a waste of space.
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
Yeah I think a lot of these games need to shrink playing space as subs decline. Ghost games are not fun.
I used to love Eq2, but eventually I started playing wow instead since so many rl friends played it, and no one played eq2. But I always went back for a few months once in a while. But this new halas, oh dear, I hate to say this, but I did not like it at all. Eq2 has really fallen in my estimate, I still have my great memories but I think this game is dead to me now
I like the New Halas story arc. It was the first that had house items and unique armor as rewards. Then they just recently added the same armor to all the other noobie zones which is weird cuz who needs heavy fur in the grassy fields of Darklight Wood? The should have added unique armor that looks like it was made by dark elves. They did add unique dark elvish house items & a mount which was awesome (same for Timorous Deep & Kelethin).
I've heard rumors that they will revamp freeport & qeynos noobie quests to give better rewards as well & eventually make them starting zones again. Queens Colony needs to come back. It's too much a part of the lore just for them to yank it out. It just needs a revamp. It's possible, but I think they need moneys from the Extended crowd to make it happen. I hate to say it, but I'm sure they have gained a lot more revenue from the Extended Server.
If you want to judge a game by it's graphics/animations, then yes, EQ2 is not for you. I do have to say that the artwork & detail is still pretty awesome in this game compared to other games from it's era.
The crafting system is super easy if you know how it works. It's really grindy, but it's nice to play a game where you can feel like a true merchant, making stuff that people really want. The time spent on the grind is worth it. It sounds like you played on EQ2X where I would assume crafting isn't as important because people are buying their gear from marketplace.
Ya, you can get your house right up the hill from where you are questing, and get rid of most of the stuff taking up space. You also can get bags/boxes to put inside your bank slots. I didn't know that when I was first playing. That will increase your space a ton!
Yeah, the graphics is fine enough. But the coding isn't great, the games worst feature. I get worse performance in it than AoC, a lot worse in some zones (both games maxed out to compare). Neriak have been OK for a year but new halas give me 15 in FPS (Hexa core with 8GB ram and 480 GTX, never had problem in other games).
The crafting systems problem is 2 things: First you have to make a lot of unsellable junk to make something useful. The second thing as that you make the same thing as everyone else. You would think that a dwarf and an elf would make rather different swords. It id better than most games however.
EQ2 is a pretty good game, EQ2X isn't SOE is just too gredy to make F2P working.
They should optimize the engineand revamp the AA trees to make it better.
Besides thta is my main problem with EQ2 that they raised the levelcap too much. Before you actually did a lot of questlines, now you run through most zones in a very short time and that hurts the story.
Some of the quests are epic byut they also have a lot of kill X quests, someof them really stupid like when they forces you to kill 50 animals to look after book pages they have eaten to make a book. They should delete the worst ones as well.
I played the game for about 3 years until 2 months ago. I had fun most of the time.