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Is EQ just nostalgia, or was it really that good?
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This is too much awesome for the internet.
I don't care which version ppl are talking about.....
IT WAS REALLY THAT GOOD!!
Wish more were like it
"This may hurt a little, but it's something you'll get used to. Relax....."
EQ was great for the fact that you needed other people. You know... the multiplayer part. It also rocked for the fact that getting items could take months, so it actually made others go "wow, look at that bard!" if they saw you in your shiny gear.
Convenience "features" in modern MMOs eliminate these points, so current MMOs suck.
Edit: Hell YES it was and IS that good.
MMOs finally replaced social interaction, forced grouping and standing in a line while talking to eachother.
Now we have forced soloing, forced questing and everyone is the hero, without ever having to talk to anyone else. The evolution of multiplayer is here! We won,... right?
Wow...not biased at all
So....no....
AC RULED to those that loved the sub par. Sub par everything. But hey...you had a following of people that couldn't afford better or just "fell in love".
"This may hurt a little, but it's something you'll get used to. Relax....."
I play a shitload of MMOs and I started EQ back in 2012. Out of all the MMOs (including recent ones) NO MMO has come close to what EQ offered. If you can get over the antiquated graphics and control scheme you are in for a great, challenging, exploratory experience. Some of the things you can do in EQ you STILL cant do in today's MMOs. The grouping. The role play. Housing. The Gear. The progression. It truly is a virtual world.
So I can't speak to Nostalgia but I can tell you as a recent gamer this game still rocks.
JokerChyld - Vox Server - Knights of Vox
I have said it many times before. EQ has been the only mmo that really made you afraid. Fear was a huge part in that game. Fear of death. exp loss, corpse loss, item loss. Folks today get things handed to them on a platter and they dont really appreciate it. Sure it makes life easier, you dont have to spend an entire day trying to work your way into a dungeon and then spending the next day trying to recover your corpse. If a fight with a mob lasts more than 10 seconds people start bitching the game is to slow. Seriously? what is up with that?
Community was also a huge part of EQ. You got a bad reputation, you simply couldnt get in groups. As Wil Wheaton likes to say, Dont be a dick! This was very important for grouping in EQ. How many here remember the good ol fire giants hollering YOU WONT EVADE ME SOANDSO!!! The cheers from others in the zone telling you to kick its ass! How many folks remember being in a huge fight and having folks standing around watching the fight and see spawns pop up that could wipe your group and the bystanders jump in and grab the adds so that you can win? Nowadays people stand and watch you fight waiting and hoping for you to die so they can jump in and steal the kill, that is if you are in a game that actually isnt instanced.
Without these 2 main elements, Fear and community, the mmos of today will and continue to fall short!
You make me like charity
From reviewing this lovely thread of times remembered I see a couple of very common themes that I whole heartedly endorse. If someone parsed this I think two ideas I've been pushing around various forums and communities would be common to many of these posts:
- Smaller Communities.
- A dangerous world that encouraged/almost forced grouping.
Both of these are missing from modern MMOs that currently strive and focus on MASSIVE and ACCESSIBLE.
However much I and many other espouse how much these simple concepts can change a game, current developers are largely ignoring them. I see some glimmers of hope: Wildstar's focus on challenging raid content & even the more challenging world that ESO presented are both improvements on the more face-roll friendly games that have plagued the genre lately.
I want a world where you get to know those around you, not just guild mates. Give me a smaller community, with a world that feels larger and more dangerous. Build a challenging environment with lots to do and lots to create by the players and turn us loose.
The argument from solo players doesn't hold up, there are plenty of games that are solo friendly in the MMO space PLUS the single player games out there and ARPGs etc.
I'd be willing to pay more for a niche friendly game that wouldn't have huge sub numbers. People will spend money on a game they want: See RSI/Space Citizen if you have any doubts.
Here's to hoping!
It was really that good - at the time - and there's some nostalgia. It's a mix.
EQ was amazing at release since it was pretty much a new toy - Ultima online (didn't play it) wasn't 3D 1st/3rd person and obviously it was a bit more visual than text MUD style games. So there was a lot of impact. For me, coming from pnp D&D, it felt like heaven - it was like being able to play D&D nonstop. D&D was all about me and a GROUP of friends doing PVE stuff - EQ was all about grouping and PvE stuff (EQ had PvP servers but it was like, here, have a server, no balance, ,no attempt at balance, nobody cares, kill each other, play at your own risk, crying gets you nowhere).
The keys were you grouped - all the time. There was challenge - all the time. No hand outs. No hand holding. There was danger all the time. Leveling took time and required effort. Death was punishing.
Community was strong because you had to group for everything - so you met and dealt with more people every day. You had to behave and be decent at playing so people wanted you in groups. When you endure the hardships, overcome the challenges, and do it with other people you make memories and forge communities. It's something you absolutely will NEVER have in the modern MMORPGs full of soloists doing mundane ez mode on the same server.
There are some memories from my EQ days I'll never forget. Like all of the open dungeon zones ("train to zone!") like Crushbone, Unrest, Befallen, etc. Gameplay is so different now and there's never anything remotely like those zones anymore. The "open world" dungeons in new MMORPGs aren't remotely close to the same vibe.
Some of the love of EQ is nostalgia. I don't think I'd want to endure camp and grind style leveling again, for ex. The plus with it is that you sometimes have brief downtimes while playing and you actually interact with the people you group with - instead of what you have in newer MMORPGs where you queue into and instance and spend an hour with strangers you don't even say "hi" or "bye" to. But just parking for hours at a time and pulling mobs to mow down isn't exactly all that compelling - but yet - is doing 500-1000 ultra easy quests for idiots with quest trackers that do everything for you any more compelling? For me it sure is not.
Some of it is the nostalgia of EQ being your first MMORPG - and the "oh wow" moments of experiencing some things for the first time. Other MMORPGs of that time didn't really "wow" me - until WoW itself, which was such a huge step up for the genre in so many ways - while also being the ruination of the genre in transforming it away from being niche and group-oriented into going for wider/casual appeal and heavy solo. For all the respect and love I had/have for WoW (6.5yrs of playing) I also truly hate it for ruining my favorite gaming genre.
MMORPGs went from being a niche genre of challenge, grouping, danger, and being the best genre of all to being a crapfest of solo heavy games that barely resemble MMORPGs at end game and worse, lots of F2P trash not even worth playing. And it's pretty much Blizzard's fault.
What I'd LIKE to see, since I feel like the WoW clone vomit formula of fail for MMORPGs has been done and flogged to utter death, is for SOME dev of quality to do an MMORPG more rooted in the classic style. Forget about casuals, solists, BG PVPers, and wider appeal, and go back to niche. Make a modern MMORPG that's group PVE heavy, full of challenge, and danger, and consequences for failing - like the EQ and similar games of old - but with the modern graphics and trappings and maybe with some modernized takes on conent to take it beyond simple camp and grind - yet without going full retard with the 1000's of generic and repetitive idiot-mode quests grinds that's ultimately no better. There are some bright people out there in gaming design. SURELY someone can come up with a group/challenge/danger filled MMORPG that extends leveling beyond ADD time frames.
I think what is most upsetting to me is that the crappy trends in MMORPGs just get worse and worse. Games like WildStar ship with built-in RMT - something that has always been bannable cheating - is now not only accepted by devs but facilitated by devs and players just don't care anymore. F2P is pure rubbish for MMORPGs. It's a model for more profit, and for lower quality games - and the fact that some players are confused on this and support F2P just shows how far the genre has fallen for player quality (and intelligence).
Saddest of all, EverQuest is THE granddaddy of the genre. When most people talk origins of MMORPGs, it's EQ they're thinking of. And soon SOE is going to come out with a new EverQuest named game that's F2P, solo heavy, action-arcade style, part minecraft, and almost no part MMORPG. And they're going to call it an MMORPG, and it's going to have EverQuest in the name even though it's nothing like EverQuestt, and is kind of the culmination of everything that sucks about modern MMORPG craptastic design.
Premium MMORPGs do not feature built-in cheating via cash for gold pay 2 win. PLAY to win or don't play.
Most of the design is honestly great. That's why most MMOs still use the blueprints (but miss all the details that made it actually work)
A lot IS nostalgia though, as it was the first big 3d simulated D&D world. There are design aspects that were a bit too harsh, like how long you needed to rest, how long respawn was, how slow xp was, and how harsh the death penalty was.
But those are all dials that can be tweaked. The core of the game, was great. The only real flaw in design was the item centric nature, which caused everyone to go to the same dungeons for the same items and end up waiting in a virtual line. This same exact flaw got copied into WoW, more or less, with an endless raising of level cap and more loot replacing more loot.
The strong point of EQ was that it was new and felt frsh... the first AAA+ 3D graphics MMO...
Compared to the current MMO´s it felt much more like a virtuall world and much less like a themepark... You went out to discover and make friends.
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
Pretty much this. Only it wasn't Blizzards fault everyone and their dog tried to copy them. Also EQNext voxels look like a cool innovation.
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/You know, I never played EQ. I played UO, but back then, if you really wanted a crisp, 3d experience, FPSes were the way to go - Quake II, Rainbow Six, etc.. I recall seeing the blockiness of the EQ graphics and thinking I'd prefer a game like UO... after all, that's what RPGs were back then! I wasn't until technology improves a bit that I really got into the 3d First-Person MMOs like DAoC and AC.
On point - I think the EQ feel most people ring up is the sense of never having done something before. It was new, different and also difficult. Then WoW came along and homogenized the entire market. Today there are MMOs coming out a dime a dozen each year, many of them "indie" games. Problem is, companies now take it seriously and view it as a business, not just a hobby, so the indie developers are always going to be overshadowed by the AAA titles.
It's like the history of Rock & Roll. Back in the 60's it was rare to meet someone who onwed a drum set, bass or guitar and played Rock music. Those few that did grouped up and formed bands. Those bands became famous simply due to the lack of any commercial competition. 20 years later, record companies moved in and these people's hobbies became multi-million dollar businesses. Today, almost everyone seems to play an instrument and has formed a garage band at some point that went nowhere.
So... were The Beetles really that good, or do people like them for the nostalgia factor? from a musician standpoint, their music was simple and almost elementary. They happened to be in the right place at the right time and the rest is history.
I view EQ and games like it to be like the Beetles; they happened in the right place at the right time in history/technology. It doesn't make them good, it just makes them successful.
EDIT sorry didn't notice the necro...oops
I truly believe it really was that good. To this day no other game can come close to offering the challenge or risk of doing PVE alone, let alone pvp.
Most modern MMOs give trophioes just for participation. Welfare loot. They make even the bad players feel like they are doing well which is horrible. Come to think of it, society in general is doing the same thing.
It was unique for its time, it was 8. out of 10 for a game, but what made it great for its time was technology (or the lack of).
It was the world 1st community where you could make a 3d person and communicate with others and play a game. Today we have fb, instagram, twitter and all sorts of social media, EQ was the social media of that time and place. We would run quests in a group and our 4th person had 6 chat windows up and typing at 90 wpm, they left their account up almost 24/7 because they could talk to anyone, anytime. I remember hanging out on the grassy knoll outside some bank casting spells for people that stopped, all the while chatting to friends about this or that. I was not playing the game, I was chatting to good friends because we only had one phone in r/l and long distance was expensive.
Yes it was a good game, corpse runs are nostalgic however, the community and more importantly communication was what made the game. All you have to do is look at the stories about guild gatherings, in game / real weddings, divorces, threats, turf wars, anger, tears, laughter even if they were just across the street or in Australia 3,000 km away.
This thread is so large and I doubt the op even reads it anymore. As someone who left my favorite game (UO) for it and played for 3 years from the start I feel I can comment for whatever it's worth.
It was a difficult game that almost required grouping.
Dieing was painful. You lost experience, respawned miles away naked and had to return to your corpse to get your stuff. Some corpses became landmarks.
It had a charm in being called Everquest when it had few quests (at least early on).
Great sound effects especially with spells. They still haunt me today.
Long zone times for me with my slow computer.
Weather
Giants roaming some zones.
Trains! (mob trains chasing folks to the zone line as you couldn't break agro otherwise. And unlike now days where they run back harmlessly to their starting point these killed everything in their path. Great fun in dungeons.
A very regional game in that it was hard to travel across the map without a port from a wiz during the first few months as leveling could be slow unless you had a regular group.
Atmospheric feel to the starting zones for each race.
Swimming!
No restricted equipment like in most games today so you could 'twink' your new characters with great equipment (if you had great equipment). And crafted stuff was sought after.
Evil races like dark elves, trolls and ogres.
Those were some of the good points.
In my experience you sat naked a lot at your bind point many zones from where you died hoping for someone to recall you back to your corpse which tended to be next to the mobs that killed you unless someone drug your body to safety.
Lots everything I owned once due to a crash that left me underground and naked only to respawn way above the ground so I could fall to my death. Followed by gm telling me they could do nothing for me. It was a difficult game to play naked and many times you worked long and hard to get your equipment.
The class mechanic was tough as a healer really couldn't function without a group and spent most of their time sitting (and medding up mana) during fights. It could be pretty boring just healing. Tanks just tanked and were almost unplayable solo without long periods of sitting in between fights to heal up.
Aggro was easy to get if you healed too much or did too much damage.
Camping for hours, days ect just to get rare equipment competing against many others also waiting. They had waiting lists.
That's some of what endeared it to its fans. It wasn't pretty sometimes and it was a challenge. Games that make you work and strive tend to make memories. There isn't much of that now days as everything is a rush to max level and that "ENDGAME". In EQ playing was the reason you logged on and not the endgame. That changed though of course later on and it was these changes that chased me away.
Agree its mostly nostalgia. AC and DAoC were far superior. I don't enjoy games where trash mobs are significantly stronger than players. Stats didn't matter in EQ. A str of 10 is the same as 250. Attack score did and still does nothing. HP is the only stat that matters. Some claim AC but only if you're a warrior, SK or Paladin. And it literally takes 1000s and 1000s to make a difference. Most AAs are again not going to increase your power significantly. Mainly, because the mobs increase in power at such a ridiculous rate it negates those fancy AAs that work great on green and gray cons.
AC and DAoC stats actually mattered, you could customize your characters, and there was an economy since the best drops weren't no drops. Then WoW came along and did what EQ should have done. Still WoW isn't and never was for me. I like games with an economy, and were fights are fair. In WoW without the raid weapons and arena weapons you're fodder. I don't have time for that crap.
Mostly nostalgia; because face it- if people were truly craving that 'feel'; they'd still play EQ.
After all, even with all the changes, the game available for play that feels most like EQ is still EQ. And we don't play it.
Don't get me wrong; the old days hold my fondest memories. But there is a reason I quit and never returned; which is virtually true for most posters here.
If that's what we wanted; that's where we'd be.