Everquest 2 articles

[Morreion]

That's my Fury fighting a magical tree!

EQ 2 official site

EverQuest 2 (Wikipedia)

EverQuest II (EQ2), based upon the popular EverQuest, is a fantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) developed by Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) and shipped on 8 November 2004. It features graphics and gameplay vastly updated from its predecessor.

EverQuest II: A Look at Sentinel's Fate
MMORPG.com's Phil James takes a look at the most recent expansion to EverQuest II, letting us know the ups and downs to the latest addition.

Sony Online Entertainment loves expansions. Everquest and Everquest II have been turning them out once a year in gnomelike clockwork fashion. However, 2009 saw a break from this routine and no EQII expansion arrived. 'Sentinel's Fate', the sixth expansion, was put back until this year. For the first time in Norrath's history, the release came when it was ready instead of arriving by a strict deadline. I've said it before, but it's worth repeating that if a bit of a wait means a bit more polish, then that's fine with me.

So what did we get for our money? Well, as with all Sony expansions, we get access to all previously released content - which is good value for money. Simply buy the most recent version and you have the whole thing. When compared to the expansion practices of some of its competitors SOE comes off very well.

In-game features were more welcome. We had a level cap increase to the tune of ten, moving the endgame to level 90. The previous expansion, 'The Shadow Odyssey', didn't add new levels, so this is overdue. The cap for alternative advancements (EQII's talents, quirks, feats or whatever they may be called in your native MMO) was raised to 250 with more abilities available to spend your points on.

[Morreion]

EverQuest II: A Noob's Look at EQII
MMORPG.com writer Chris Higgins takes a look at the first 20 levels in SOE's classic MMORPG EverQuest II, focusing in on the game as someone completely unfamiliar with the EverQuest franchise.

Final Thoughts

I never played Everquest or Everquest 2 so I started playing this game not knowing what to expect. Upon logging in I thought the music was amazing and the graphics were not that bad. As I progressed through the tutorial I was having fun and the game play seemed easy and straight forward. The game was hand holding me through the first ten levels while teaching me the game.

Once I got to Freeport that hand holding was gone and I had problems getting used to the interface and finding what I was looking for. I had assumed my spells were updating themselves to more powerful versions. This was not happening automatically so at one point I started dying a lot and was wondering what I was doing wrong. I discovered all my spells were still the basic ones that I received in the training area. After I updated the spells manually I was fine but it took me a while to figure it out and if I had not been playing for the purposes of this article, odds are I would have logged out.

By the time I got to the common lands though it became painfully obvious there was so much to learn about this game. So much that it felt overwhelming at times. While the game itself isn't really hard, there is just so much information you literally have no idea where to begin or how to learn it. There were times I was digging the game and others where I was cursing at the computer.

The PvP servers were so brutal I was amazed this system was still left untouched due to the way the industry overall has evolved. I normally play on PvP servers and have a the mentality that, "If you don't like it go to the care bear servers," but even I was shocked about the brutality of the PvP. Mind you I am not complaining because if I had the time, I would love to really learn this game inside and out and join the fun. In this game, getting into a good guild would be very important and questing with groups would help a lot.

Overall I think Everquest 2 is a solid game which caters to the hardcore gamers vs. the casual gamers.

EverQuest II: Why EQII? Character and Quests
MMORPG.com EverQuest II expert Phil James writes this look at EverQuest II and some of the reasons that people who may have missed the game might want to try it out. Today, he focuses on some of the character and quest elements.

Lore and Legend quests let you study mobs in order to become a more efficient killing machine. Sounds gruesome? It is. These quests used to begin when you found the book regarding a specific mob type. This has been updated so that you can examine a drop from the creature and begin the quest that way. You will be given a list of parts to study such as an eye, ear, the brain and so on. The idea is that the more you study a creature's anatomy, the better you get at dissecting it. The reward is an ability that can be used specifically to hurt that mob type. There is a lore and legend quest for just about every category of beastie in the game, and each one completed adds that species to the list of victims that your attack affects. Another reward from the quest is a book and a trophy weapon to decorate your character's home with.

EverQuest II: Why EQII? Additional Features
MMORPG.com EverQuest II expert Phil James writes this look at EverQuest II and some of the reasons that people who may have missed the game might want to try it out. Today, he focuses on some of the additional features the game has to offer.

The amount of items you can store in EQ2 is staggering. Your character has six slots for carrying stuff, and not long into your adventures these will hold bags, then bigger bags, until you are carrying six backpacks or strongboxes with 40 plus slots each. That's a whole lotta swag. Even with all this storage space you may run out of room if you are anything like me and hold on to items for sentimental reasons. That's where the bank steps in. Your bank gets you 12 slots for your character plus eight more slots to share between your characters giving you potentially over 400 spaces for your junk. Still not enough? Your home also has some vault spaces for you to fill up and also you can place more containers on your Market Board.

EQ2 nerfs Qeynos and Freeport starting areas (Massively)

Lost amid the lengthy patch notes for Everquest II's recent Halas Reborn update is a curious decision by the developers at Sony Online Entertainment. The game's two traditional starting locations, the Isle of Refuge and the Outpost of the Overlord (which feed into the capital cities of Qeynos and Freeport, respectively), have been removed as choices at character creation.

On the surface it doesn't seem like such a big deal, as the game has several unique starting locales including Neriak, Timorous Deep, Kelethin, and the newly minted frozen north of New Halas. That said, nostalgia can be a powerful thing, and a titanic thread lamenting the changes has erupted on the game's official forums. The epic post (clocking in at 68 pages as of press time) is overwhelmingly against the change, with a few dissenters piping up to say good riddance to the venerable newbie islands.

[Morreion]

EverQuest II jumps on the F2P bandwagon (Massively)

EverQuest II Extended is slated for a beta launch on August 17th, and features a separate server set providing all of the game's original content via the insanely popular F2P business model...

Extended will allow access to all zones through The Shadow Odyssey, sans subscription, credit card info, or software purchases. Players will be able to purchase additional perks (such as races, levels 80 - 90, statistical gear, and potions) through the marketplace. Existing EQII subscribers will also be able to transfer their characters to the F2P servers, albeit without their gold. Bags, no-trade items, and attuned items will be transferred.

Exclusive: EQII F2P interview with Dave Georgeson (Massively)

How many servers are you running with this? Is it going to be traditional EQII servers or will there be merges?

The options are still there to play the game exactly the way you played it on the subscription service. We didn't re-balance the game to make it where you have to have these items.
We're opening up new servers for this. We're not merging servers, in fact we just bought new hardware to upgrade the original servers so they can perform even better than they are now. Over time people have copied their characters to the more populated servers so we're upgrading the hardware so there's no performance issues. We're very committed to keeping the subscription servers how they are. Later on if people decide they want merges we can maybe do that, but it has nothing to do with the F2P stuff.

The Tattered Notebook: Worth your time? (Massively)

The game engine and graphics are largely subjective affairs. Spend any time on EQII forums and you'll hear a lot of armchair developers decrying the game's animations and engine performance. To be honest, I don't know or care what they're talking about, as every time I log in I see a huge world with pleasing textures, foliage that reacts to my character, fun fantasy spell effects, and a boatload of beautiful armor and cloth options. Does the eye candy approximate Age of Conan (arguably the MMO graphical benchmark)? No, but it also doesn't crash or experience anything less than 50 frames per second. Your mileage may vary on this, of course, depending on personal taste and the hardware available to you, but the point is that you can safely ignore the squeaky wheels waxing on about how their superior programming kung-fu could have done it better.

The other advantage to being a six-year-old title, one that was ironically lost on my friend as we were playing WoW (which launched virtually on top of EQII in late 2004), is the amount of content that is generated over time. EQII has an absolutely ridiculous amount of quest and character-progression content, easily enough to keep your humble author busy for years. I already feel like I've missed huge chunks of the game in my early 30s, and happily I've got several more character slots to fill in the blanks.

While there is no shortage of players running around the world of Norrath at any given time, quality is much more important than quantity. EQII's general population is a pleasing mixture of veterans and a dash of new blood. In observing the global chats and partaking of a few pickup groups over the last month, I have come to the conclusion that all of the game-hopping tourists who swell the population numbers of newer games have moved on to the next big disappointment, leaving behind those who actually care about the title.

The Tattered Notebook: What's a sandbox guy like you doing in a themepark game like this? (Massively)

Due to the dearth of good sandbox titles on the market over the last little while, I've become a bit of a themepark connoisseur, almost against my will. I won't bore you with my pining for the days of Ultima or SWG, but suffice it to say that the one-sidedness of this particular genre has finally won me over, and I've begun to enjoy the questing, dungeoneering, and character progression that many (most?) of you have been addicted to for years. My personal epiphany in this regard happened a couple of weeks ago while skulking around Freeport and powering through the Commonlands quest timeline (on a character that I'd made some years ago and thankfully left sitting on the Isle of the Overlord, inadvertently thwarting SOE's nefarious plan to deny me the classic starting experience).

So what is it about EverQuest II that's brought so much enjoyment? It's honestly hard to put my finger on it. If I had to break it down, it would be something like the diverse locales (and huge world), the deep progression options, the absurd amount of PvE content, and ratongas (not necessarily in that order). Yeah the experience is a bit more directed than your traditional sandbox, and yeah the player economy can't be manipulated in quite the same way that it can in games like EVE Online or old-school Star Wars Galaxies, but there's just so damn much content in EQII that it almost doesn't matter. While gorging on the leveling orgy that is an extended double XP weekend, I find myself tempted to turn off the experience and just run around exploring, doing quests, and collecting those wonderfully addicting Legend-and-Lore dings, as it almost feels like I'm progressing too fast to see all of the story and quest content.