SatelliteOfLove
Member
Jiro, Ashodin: MMO + Hype == Trainwreck. Expectations and mindset are the vast majority of MMO enjoyment.
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SOE Live 2013 - EverQuest Next Thread: Return of the Sandbox [free2play]
- Thread starter Ashodin
- Start date
aliencowz7
Member
I feel like people should probably remain pretty skeptical about this game until enough info is out to prove otherwise, SOE hasn't really been the same company for a long time now.
They haven't really done anything worthy of the hype EQ Next is getting ever since early EQ and early SWG. EQ continued to get progressively worse the further it got exspansion wise until it was pretty much unrecognizable from what it originally was as well as taking a huge quality hit once it went F2P.
EQ2 was kind of just a huge let down in general coming off EQ, they took alot of the weak points of WoW without most of the good points and just crafted a very generic game. It also ended up with really awful encounter design and poor itemization. F2P later further reduced game quality.
SWG was fantastic to start out and they then went on to completely destroy the game over the course of 2 content updates to the point that the game became pretty much completely unplayable. Went from a modest population to a complete ghost town entirely due to the second big update.
Vanguard was a complete trainwreck, it was the FFXIV 1.0 before FFXIV 1.0 was FFXIV 1.0. Just not a very good game in the least.
Planetside 2 was nowhere near as good as Planetside 1 was, and even Planetside 1 got progressively worse as they tryed to "fix" balance issues over time. Planetside 2 is probably the best thing they have come out with since early EQ1 and early SWG but even that wasn't really super impressive and was just kind of average to above average for me.
I think the expectations that are being put on SOE to completely redefine the genre are something they have been proving they cant deliver on over recent years. As much as I want EQN to be all of the things they are promising and all of the things people in here want, I will remain skeptical until they reprove themselves capable in order to keep myself from getting to hype.
They haven't really done anything worthy of the hype EQ Next is getting ever since early EQ and early SWG. EQ continued to get progressively worse the further it got exspansion wise until it was pretty much unrecognizable from what it originally was as well as taking a huge quality hit once it went F2P.
EQ2 was kind of just a huge let down in general coming off EQ, they took alot of the weak points of WoW without most of the good points and just crafted a very generic game. It also ended up with really awful encounter design and poor itemization. F2P later further reduced game quality.
SWG was fantastic to start out and they then went on to completely destroy the game over the course of 2 content updates to the point that the game became pretty much completely unplayable. Went from a modest population to a complete ghost town entirely due to the second big update.
Vanguard was a complete trainwreck, it was the FFXIV 1.0 before FFXIV 1.0 was FFXIV 1.0. Just not a very good game in the least.
Planetside 2 was nowhere near as good as Planetside 1 was, and even Planetside 1 got progressively worse as they tryed to "fix" balance issues over time. Planetside 2 is probably the best thing they have come out with since early EQ1 and early SWG but even that wasn't really super impressive and was just kind of average to above average for me.
I think the expectations that are being put on SOE to completely redefine the genre are something they have been proving they cant deliver on over recent years. As much as I want EQN to be all of the things they are promising and all of the things people in here want, I will remain skeptical until they reprove themselves capable in order to keep myself from getting to hype.
Whole lot of opinions going on there. Also, SOE didn't create Vanguard. They saved the game from disappearing a couple of months after it launched.
aliencowz7
Member
Of course they are opinions, mine in particular. Whenever anyone talks about the quality of a product as subjective as an MMO its probably pretty safe to assume its an opinion.
Developed or not them attaching there name so prominently to it shows bad decision making.
I am not saying EQN can't live up to expectations or that it won't be a fantastic game, just that personally after all the letdowns they have provided me in recent years I am not going to expect it to do these things before I know anything about the game. I will remain skeptical until I feel they have proven to me enough that the game is legit, if anything I would say some skepticism is the most healthy stance to take for any game or product with so little information available regardless of who makes it or what they say it will be.
I'm just excited over the prospects of a sandbox developed by a big developer with money and experience. We haven't had a sandbox worth a damn since 2003 (EVE/SWG). Shadowbane sucked, Fallen Earth sucked, Darkfall sucked. At this point I'd take EVE copied 1:1 in a fantasy setting and I'd be satisfied. So really all it will take for me to be onboard is a couple things already done in the genre coupled with some good presentation. If it ends up being something even greater than that well that's even better.
You're telling people to be skeptical because of your opinions... I guess that's fine.
Artemis-Thoth
Member
You misread, I was comparing EQ1 to what he knew with WoW.
your entitled to that opinion, and I can understand why you are given SoE later track record. But I am hyped for the reveal and am thinking positive, trusting the SoE that gave us EQ1, Planetside 1 and SWG. I am not thinking about the company that destroyed EQ with poor expansions, EQ2, the combat patch in SWG, and so on lol.
aliencowz7
Member
Its a friendly suggestion, I'm not going to show up at your house and demand you state your doubt about the game. I am fine with people being hype over what it could be. I just felt the need to bring up that they don't exactly have a spotless record anymore when it comes to MMO games. You can agree with that or disagree with it, and you can then choose to take it into consideration or not. That is all entirely up to you.
SatelliteOfLove
Member
I'm just giving gentle advice to be careful. The last 8 years of launches have taught us this.
I agree. But, I also think it's okay to be excited for new things. I'm sure many of us have played enough MMOs and been around long enough to know not to get our hopes up.
While you make good points, you are aware that EQ2 came out before WoW, right?
aliencowz7
Member
Yeah, I didn't particularly mean what was available at launch. Over time they added stuff that wow did / added to there game like flying mounts etc without making it fit as well within there own game. Really even outside of that part of the point EQ2 just wasn't a very good everquest game I felt. The world and lore felt really lacking and almost like it was out of a totally different series. It had some really good ideas but not many that really shone through enough to drive an entire game.
Yep, I've been playing MMOs for a loooooong time now. I'm just damn excited for a good sandbox that isn't 16 years old or isn't in space.
8 years of launches of games that have been nearly the same. Uh huh.
Exactly!
King Mystery
Member
Looking forward to this. Never played the original EQ, but I played a decent amount of EQ2. Even though I didn't get far in the game, it was a lot of fun.
Betrayed Freeport on my Dark Elf and became an outcast to both factions. Everyone was always trying to kill me. I banded together with a bunch of other outcasts while we did that long ass quest to join Qeynos. Eventually I finished the quest and became a Paladin. Did some quest grinding and a ton of PvP at the same time. Eventually I found out about Ghoulbane started on the quest to obtaining it. That led me to Nektropos Castle and some other raid instance I joined for one of the quest requirements. After I got Ghoulbane, I quit a month later for some reason. Don't remember why, but years later when the game went free-to-play and I tried it again, every thing felt different. It was a LOT easier to level, XP penalty for dying was either very low or gone, and there really weren't a lot of people playing. So it no longer held my interest.
What I really liked about the game was the "open" feel the environment had. The areas in the game were massive, with all sorts of nooks and crannies to explore. You could actually get lost. The fact that dungeons like Stormhold were just as large, open, and could be extremely dangerous even though you were within it's level range, was also great.
Speaking of Stormhold, there's a well in there that you can actually jump inside of. I think I jumped in it once just to see what would happen, but I can't remember if I died or not. Oh well.
Betrayed Freeport on my Dark Elf and became an outcast to both factions. Everyone was always trying to kill me. I banded together with a bunch of other outcasts while we did that long ass quest to join Qeynos. Eventually I finished the quest and became a Paladin. Did some quest grinding and a ton of PvP at the same time. Eventually I found out about Ghoulbane started on the quest to obtaining it. That led me to Nektropos Castle and some other raid instance I joined for one of the quest requirements. After I got Ghoulbane, I quit a month later for some reason. Don't remember why, but years later when the game went free-to-play and I tried it again, every thing felt different. It was a LOT easier to level, XP penalty for dying was either very low or gone, and there really weren't a lot of people playing. So it no longer held my interest.
What I really liked about the game was the "open" feel the environment had. The areas in the game were massive, with all sorts of nooks and crannies to explore. You could actually get lost. The fact that dungeons like Stormhold were just as large, open, and could be extremely dangerous even though you were within it's level range, was also great.
Speaking of Stormhold, there's a well in there that you can actually jump inside of. I think I jumped in it once just to see what would happen, but I can't remember if I died or not. Oh well.
Dude that story is awesome. I hope to have experiences like that in the game.
Boss Man
Member
I like this and I'm going to play:
Dynamic environments based on player interactions. You might build a thing or leave some mark that actually exists in the world. This is tied to questing somehow. Big emphasis on the idea that this is a living world.
Maybe some larger emphasis on PvP that blurs the line between itself and PvE. Perhaps there are several factions and the core game revolves around the interactions between them. There may be a guild in one faction that attacks and destroys a castle or village that another guild in another faction literally built.
Fewer 'gamey' mechanics. Definitely no duty finder or instances.
Jira and I actually came to the consensus that they would do well to avoid "gamey" mechanics and make it realistic as possible in fantasy, if that makes any sense
For the people saying we should all "remain skeptical". It's free to download and has no subscription fee. I'll be as hyped as I want to be because there is no repercussions for me trying the game and liking or disliking it other than my time. This isn't like other EQ's with money coming out of my pocket each month after a healthy initial cost.
Well Planetside 2 is a shooter, so it's all about the gameplay, who cares about the characters
It will be on both
That would be awesome!
To be fair, the people who worked on PS2 have nothing to do with EQN.
I hope we don't kill gods, or avatars of gods. The planes of power expansion, while pretty good overall, was essentially the end of the game as far as I was concerned. When you kill the gods, where do you go from there? People often cite Luclin as when EQ jumped the shark, but I think it was PoP. Again, I enjoyed PoP, but from a lore standpoint, it was pretty daft.
Also, stats. I remember starting out with banded. I think that just had armour class and weight, they were the only stats on that gear. As you leveled up and started getting phat lewt, stuff like WIS, INT, AGI etc got added to the stats. But it was still pretty sparse and the numbers were low. Golden Efreeti Boots were to die for, and they had 5 AC, 9 Wis and 9 Int. Thats it.
Unfortunately, the current trend with itemisation is to load a piece of armour with resists, ac, hp, mana, dodge, etc, so a breastplate reads like a damn book. So something like: 200 AC, 150 HP, 350 MANA, 150 Save vs Poison, 200 SVD, 100 SVsomelementhere. Stat bloat gets more ridiculous the higher level you get to, and even more so when the expansions roll in. Loot in the latest EQ expansion is just insane. So I'd really like smaller numbers that mean more, not high numbers that never feel like they're affecting your performance.
Also, stats. I remember starting out with banded. I think that just had armour class and weight, they were the only stats on that gear. As you leveled up and started getting phat lewt, stuff like WIS, INT, AGI etc got added to the stats. But it was still pretty sparse and the numbers were low. Golden Efreeti Boots were to die for, and they had 5 AC, 9 Wis and 9 Int. Thats it.
Unfortunately, the current trend with itemisation is to load a piece of armour with resists, ac, hp, mana, dodge, etc, so a breastplate reads like a damn book. So something like: 200 AC, 150 HP, 350 MANA, 150 Save vs Poison, 200 SVD, 100 SVsomelementhere. Stat bloat gets more ridiculous the higher level you get to, and even more so when the expansions roll in. Loot in the latest EQ expansion is just insane. So I'd really like smaller numbers that mean more, not high numbers that never feel like they're affecting your performance.
the SOE Live schedule was changed: https://www.soe.com/soelive/lineup.vm EQN reveal extended, and panels were moved around.
EQN reveal is still Friday August 2 at 12 PDT, but it lasts until 1:30 PDT.
The welcome reception on Thursday August 1 that starts at 7 PDT will now include EQ1 and EQ2 instead of combining them with EQN.
EQN reveal is still Friday August 2 at 12 PDT, but it lasts until 1:30 PDT.
The welcome reception on Thursday August 1 that starts at 7 PDT will now include EQ1 and EQ2 instead of combining them with EQN.
Artemis-Thoth
Member
I've been playing PS2 the last few days just to admire the scenery, wonder if I should say "Lightning Bolt!" every time I shoot someone...
This is what lead me to quit in the end. Gear just got so insane. Like 20 stats, 1000hp/mana/end, and it all felt like it was just generated by a script somewhere. Nothing like the old feeling of finally getting a fungi or flayed barb leggings or something. 100h/m/e should've been the cap.
Travel everywhere by foot and before running from one station to the next, beg everyone for SoW.
GameSeeker
Member
This can't be helped in any loot-based game that lives for several years. Remember EQ1 has been around for 14 years! Mudflation, like inflation in Real Life, will make numbers bigger over time. Yes, some folks will always pine for the time for when your Fungi Tunic with AC:21 and STR +2 was overpowered or you could buy gasoline for 50 cents a gallon. But those days cannot and will not last. You have to learn to live with progress
I really liked PoP, but from a lore standpoint I kind of agree. It was cool as hell though to see the gods as these giant entities up close. Definitely agree about stats on items, but this seems to be a common problem with every MMO. Looking through Allakhazam database they did a good job keeping stats low till about Luclin/PoP. That's when things started to get crazy. Most of the top items from Kunark and Velious era were still low.
This..... I like this...thanks for the happy forgoton memory.....I miss my Druid.
This can't be helped in any loot-based game that lives for several years. Remember EQ1 has been around for 14 years! Mudflation, like inflation in Real Life, will make numbers bigger over time. Yes, some folks will always pine for the time for when your Fungi Tunic with AC:21 and STR +2 was overpowered or you could buy gasoline for 50 cents a gallon. But those days cannot and will not last. You have to learn to live with progress
Yes, but new games start off with bloated numbers. 500 hp, 250 mana, etc etc at lvl 10. Start with small numbers. What happened with EQ1 was inevitable, but don't start off with big numbers on release. The bigger the numbers, the less they mean.
I used to pride myself on knowing every piece of loot and its stats my druid had at pretty much every level throughout the game. You can't really do that if the loot you have has 15 different modifiers and numbers up to 500. Your eyes tend to glaze over when a tooltip looks like a page of a book, and that piece of loot is no longer memorable.
In this thread there are people who can't read.
From the SOE Live Lineup
So we know there are classes. I'm less hyped than most. If I had a nickle for every time a developer crowed about how they weren't going to be a WoW clone, and how they wanted to fundamentally change how MMOs are played, and yet we still got another diku, I'd fund my own sandbox MMO.
From the SOE Live Lineup
So we know there are classes. I'm less hyped than most. If I had a nickle for every time a developer crowed about how they weren't going to be a WoW clone, and how they wanted to fundamentally change how MMOs are played, and yet we still got another diku, I'd fund my own sandbox MMO.
At the very least it has sandbox features, which means it's not a WoW clone. Also, WoW wouldn't exist without EQ... so, there's that.
I think old school EQ players get absurd amounts of enjoyment from telling old stories, thinking about to the way it was and listening to just about anyone reminisce about the the game (particularly the classic, Kunark and Velious era). I love EQ nostalgia.
Yep, D3 is the best example of this.
Schweinehund
Member
Pretty butthurt after SOE and how they handled SWG, this + F2P modele makes me wary, but I feel as if there aren't any MMO's I'm looking toward right now except maybe Camelot Unchained.
What about World of Darkness? :> If there is one MMO to wait for, it is definitely WoD imho.
terrisus
Member
Rogue_Ledr
Banned
I'm just fearing that they are gonna set this thing up as the "next big thing in MMOs" and then it follows the typical pattern of coming out, having a few good months before it drops off rapidly.
Another pretender to the throne.
Another pretender to the throne.