Lineage 2 Essence Brings Classic Lineage To Players (SPONSORED)

System · March 2020

Lineage 2 Essence Brings Classic Lineage To Players (SPONSORED)

Lineage 2 Essence is an alternative version of the legendary Lineage 2, and it brings with it many quality of life features to help a busy MMO player stay engaged.

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Panther2103 · March 2020

"Lineage 2 hasn’t felt like the “good old days” for quite a while. Lineage 2 Essence gives solo players and those who want to experience the old Lineage without the grind that comes with it."

You aren't experiencing the old Lineage 2 without the grind.

That was an essential part of the experience. Taking that out and having a built in botting program essentially makes it nothing like original L2.

Sure you can PvP, but the character growth was part of the game as well. Grinding for hours or even days to get that level and finally getting it was enjoyable as hell, especially in a party while chatting. Botting to get it makes it largely anti social and pointless.

mcrippins · March 2020

Is this just a Lineage 2 Private Server?

Utinni · March 2020

Panther2103 said:

"Lineage 2 hasn’t felt like the “good old days” for quite a while. Lineage 2 Essence gives solo players and those who want to experience the old Lineage without the grind that comes with it."

You aren't experiencing the old Lineage 2 without the grind.

That was an essential part of the experience. Taking that out and having a built in botting program essentially makes it nothing like original L2.

Sure you can PvP, but the character growth was part of the game as well. Grinding for hours or even days to get that level and finally getting it was enjoyable as hell, especially in a party while chatting. Botting to get it makes it largely anti social and pointless.

Built in as opposed to third party. Botting is classic L2. If you were actively grinding 100% of your xp you were in the extreme minority of players.

Panther2103 · March 2020

Utinni said:

Panther2103 said:

"Lineage 2 hasn’t felt like the “good old days” for quite a while. Lineage 2 Essence gives solo players and those who want to experience the old Lineage without the grind that comes with it."

You aren't experiencing the old Lineage 2 without the grind.

That was an essential part of the experience. Taking that out and having a built in botting program essentially makes it nothing like original L2.

Sure you can PvP, but the character growth was part of the game as well. Grinding for hours or even days to get that level and finally getting it was enjoyable as hell, especially in a party while chatting. Botting to get it makes it largely anti social and pointless.

Built in as opposed to third party. Botting is classic L2. If you were actively grinding 100% of your xp you were in the extreme minority of players.

I can say I only botted one time ever, and it wasn't during C2-C5. Sure there were plenty of people who did but you could definitely get EXP faster by grouping with real players in places. The only real benefit of a bot at that point was it could run 24/7. I was always in clans that were all active players (at least the people I played with).

Panther2103 · March 2020

mcrippins said:

Is this just a Lineage 2 Private Server?

No it's the 4game version of the game trying to pull players back as they lost a lot of them to the NCwest version.

mcrippins · March 2020

Is there an NA version of this? I'd be curious to check it out.

deniter · March 2020

The only thing this game needs is WASD movement. Leave the rest of the game as it was when it was in its prime.

Panther2103 · March 2020

mcrippins said:

Is there an NA version of this? I'd be curious to check it out.

Not at this time. There's an NA version of Classic and Retail but not this version.

mcrippins · March 2020

Panther2103 said:

mcrippins said:

Is there an NA version of this? I'd be curious to check it out.

Not at this time. There's an NA version of Classic and Retail but not this version.

Gotcha - thx for the info

Allwynd_01 · March 2020

Never played Lineage 2 back in the day. Since summer 2019, I tried numerous times to play Lineage 2 Classic in hopes to get into an old school Korean game with some grinding. Little did I know, the grinding becomes almost impossible around level 10 even on the starting island (Talking Island?).

I had to kill some mobs that were my level, but felt so much more powerful than I am. I was level 10 and they were level 13 spiders or something. I could kill one, but my health would drop to around 30% and I had to rest before I fight the next one. I had my skills leveled up to the maximum. I went back to town to try and buy better gear only to find out that even basic vendor gear is insanely expensive... I literally didn't know what to do or how to progress properly. They updated the UI, added some basic tutorials, but nothing to guide a new player how to get started. And I also never played such an Asian game from the 2003-2006 era that was so cryptic and I felt like I was directionless. I've played on some other private server where it gives you buffs from the start so you one-shot everything and gain more XP and I reached some town called Gludio or Gludin or something and I already had to fight like 50 mobs for a simple quest and even with all the buffs and everything, I just couldn't stand playing that even though the music and the visuals looked somewhat nice.

It reminds me of an MMORPG that launched and shut down around 2015. It was called ASTA Online - The War of Tears and Winds. It was published by Webzen and I heard some people saying it was being called "The Korean WoW" and the game did play a lot like WoW. It had something like a Wuxia-like fantasy setting, tab-targeting, fluid controls, beautiful world and straightforward progression, but with every level the amount of kill/gather quest items increased in parallel to your level. At level 5 you had to kill 5 mobs and collect 5 items. At level 15 - 15 and so on. At level 37 or so, I had to kill like 35-40 mobs and collect 35-40 items respectively and at that point my sanity was at the brink of collapsing so I quit the game.

I can't believe how they copied almost everything from WoW and made a beautiful world and nice gameplay, but screwed up quests so bad... They could've just made you do a 4 quests for 10 mobs/items rather than one for 40... so stupid.

And to this day not a single Asian game got this right. Even now Black Desert Online is a huge and mindless grind, which is a huge shame. I guess I will be playing Western MMOs till the end of time.

Wizardry · March 2020

Botting is the very reason i wouldn't touch this game with a micrometer.

QOL just means they likely endorse botting now even though the publisher never did a damn thing to stop botting back in the day either.Besides botting,if i want to go back in years i would play FFXI over L2 without a second thought.

Even if not FFXI then i would likely play EQ2 and if not EQ2,well i'd never play L2 again,it is not a very good game.

Sovrath · March 2020

Allwynd_01 said:

And to this day not a single Asian game got this right. Even now Black Desert Online is a huge and mindless grind, which is a huge shame. I guess I will be playing Western MMOs till the end of time.

The grind helps with the social aspect. You used to have to stop, you'd talk, learn about some war and then when you were ready you'd start up again. It was relaxing, fun and quite frankly you were doing something.

not like "modern" mmorpg's where you kill, collect, "whatever" 4 times and run back.

I prefer Lineage 2's leveling over most any game today. It was a lot of fun and one of the few games where things mattered, where your actions mattered.

Also, as for the botting statement above, sure there were people who botted but I don't think it was the majority. There were so many live groups going on, at least in the first few years, and the only botting I saw were the farmers (though at first they were actually playing their characters) and those who were trying to bot in out of the way places so they wouldn't get caught.

Also 10 hard? wow. Try level ... what did I get to ... 86? This was back in the day when that was just about cap. I think it took me half a year to level.

Darksworm · March 2020

Sovrath said:

Allwynd_01 said:

And to this day not a single Asian game got this right. Even now Black Desert Online is a huge and mindless grind, which is a huge shame. I guess I will be playing Western MMOs till the end of time.

The grind helps with the social aspect. You used to have to stop, you'd talk, learn about some war and then when you were ready you'd start up again. It was relaxing, fun and quite frankly you were doing something.

not like "modern" mmorpg's where you kill, collect, "whatever" 4 times and run back.

I prefer Lineage 2's leveling over most any game today. It was a lot of fun and one of the few games where things mattered, where your actions mattered.

Also, as for the botting statement above, sure there were people who botted but I don't think it was the majority. There were so many live groups going on, at least in the first few years, and the only botting I saw were the farmers (though at first they were actually playing their characters) and those who were trying to bot in out of the way places so they wouldn't get caught.

Also 10 hard? wow. Try level ... what did I get to ... 86? This was back in the day when that was just about cap. I think it took me half a year to level.

The grind doesn't help in the social aspect in a game like this.

Everyone just basically soloed with their boxed buffers, even in high end zones you could just eBay Adena and then buy the gear to just plow things with your boxed buffers.

Rose tinted glasses. Played this game from C3 until... God knows how long.

People grouped for PvP and seiges, for the most part. That was about it.

I'm sure some casuals did parties with other casuals, but that is not the way people who actually wanted to be, or were, competitive XP'd in this game.

And God forbid you encroach on their "XP Spot."

Hell, even I used to routinely kill people who tried to XP in my spot, or encroached in an attempt to force you to invite them to party to share the XP.

This was normal.

At the very high end, people did group, but the manner in which XPing was done in this game left very little room for socialization. You basically had to be on Ventrillo/TeamSpeak to do so, and at that point... you don't need to be in a group to get the same experience.

L2 gameplay is mindless button mashing with little reward. That is why people botted. Not just cause of the free XP, but because actually playing the game was never that fun outside of Seiges and PvP - which was completely out of balance, but the politics were fun to play around with.

L2NA has been allowing people to bot legally for years, now. The new macro system was basically designed to allow this.

When you have to stoop to this level to get people to play your game, perhaps you should "actually" address the issue. Constantly raising the level cap and adding more expensive gear grades in a game that is supposed to be about politics, territory control, and PvP - basically allowing a subset of players to race 10 miles ahead of everyone else, works for a few years... but people eventually wisen up and take their business/playtime elsewhere.

Sovrath · March 2020

Darksworm said:

Rose tinted glasses. Played this game from C3 until... God knows how long.

Well I played from Prelude. Through Chronicle 5, maybe a bit longer. Just saying. Had lots of groups and sure, lots of soloing. Maybe it was just you and yours?

I'll add I wasn't casual, I was always just below if not nailing the level cap. But I had an active guild and we grouped and had a lot of fun.

I did solo a lot, won't say I didn't but I had a lot of groups in this game.

Sure people cheated and I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of high levels cheated but for the first few years of this game grouping was the better way to get xp.

Groqstrong · March 2020

Grouping was a major aspect of this game. Sure you could solo with a buffer bot and SS or BD, but you werent going to the best xp spots.

Datcyde · March 2020

So there's Lineage 2,Lineage 2 Original , and Lineage 2 essence?

tadams2tone · March 2020

Definitely tempting as, deep down, I still love L2. I would likely play if it was an NA server.

Octagon7711 · March 2020

L2, I soloed and boxed a lot in the game. Soloing was doable it's just that grouping was faster and more fun as pointed out by a few people.

Datcyde · March 2020

tadams2tone said:

Definitely tempting as, deep down, I still love L2. I would likely play if it was an NA server.

Yeah but now its ptw on levels.

lindenmeyer · March 2020

haha, only change is the auto hunting .. grind still there and without adding money(for adena,itens) forget about pvp

Kia_Starscream · March 2020

ROLL CALL: I was Raviel, first BD on Hindemith server ^^ Nazgul came in second....It's been a while since I had so much fun playing an MMO *sigh....**

Sovrath · March 2020

Kia_Starscream said:

ROLL CALL: I was Raviel, first BD on Hindemith server ^^ Nazgul came in second....It's been a while since I had so much fun playing an MMO *sigh....**

Sovrath on Hindemith! I think I remember both of you. And I agree, it was a great mmorpg experience.

Amathe · March 2020

coretex666 said:

L2 C1-C4 was the best time I have ever had in an MMORPG. We always went to a spot with a bunch of friends/ guildies and just grinded mobs for hours. You had to rest every now and then and generally the pace of combat was relatively slow which gave us plenty of time to just talk and have fun.

Offline exping wouldnt be for me, but I understand why it may appeal to some people.

It was the same in original EQ. You rounded up some friends, staked out a spot where some mobs spawned (and preferably a spot where a named mob with treasure spawned), and just pulled and pulled for hours for xp and the occasional shiney. Meanwhile, you talked and laughed and frequently drank. It was great fun.

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Lineage 2 Essence Brings Classic Lineage To Players (SPONSORED)

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"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey

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Lineage 2 Essence Brings Classic Lineage To Players (SPONSORED)

Comments

"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey