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Unexpectedly Brilliant !!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 12 / 19
Date: November 30, 2004
Author: Amazon User

After playing EQ1 for 5 years and being unable to find any other game compelling(believe me, I tried); and reading the sometimes sketchy reviews from Beta testing, I must say that I was VERY skeptical of SOE and their offering of EQ2. You must remember that SOE (Sony Online Entertainment) did not invent Everquest. They simply bought a great idea from Verant Interactive and proceeded to ruin a perfectly wonderful MMORPG. The constant expansions and unwillingness (or was it inability?) to fix the multiple problems within the game itself, led even the most gullable of gamers to doubt their intentions. I must say however....I was very pleasantly surprised.

EQ2, in my humble estimation, addressed and fixed EVERY SINGLE MAJOR PROBLEM with EQ1. Gone now are the days of Power Leveling your characters from 1-50 in a week. Gone are the days of some a-hole Kill Stealing that precious mob you've been waiting 8 hours to spawn. Gone are the days of hoarding items in the bank so that you can pass them on to your waiting army of "alts". Gone are the days of meaningless copper currency. Gone are the days of naked corpse runs through hostile armies of monsters just to recover your irreplaceable gear. Gone are the days of fending off dozens of worthless "green con" mobs which generate no experience but prevent you from getting to your ultimate destination. EQ2 fixes all of these things and more.

For example, upon death you spawn at your choice of locations with all gear intact (albeit with some minor damage). You simply find your way back to your corpse (eg. Spirit Shard) via a guided waypoint, and most of the lost experience is regained. Non-experience mobs (which now con grey) no longer attack you no matter how bad your faction may be. Fighting encounters now are "Locked" such that no one can take your kill once you've engaged it, and should you choose to run, no one else will benefit from the 90% dead monster either since it will regenerate back to full life instantly. Items, weapons and armor, are setup to "con" just like monsters and are only useful for a certain period of time, then are outgrown; or may be unusable due to the player not having the experience to utilize the item/armor. This is much along the lines of DAoC.

The economy is setup on a 100's basis and obtaining 100 copper to gain one silver, or 100 silver to gain one gold, actually means something. Monsters no longer drop cash but instead items which can be crafted into meaningful purposes to increase your tradeskills. Tradeskilling is actually interesting and meaningful and is much like battling an enemy since you do stand a chance of death during your crafting.

Another major shift is in the Guild system. Guilds now are able to level just like individuals by performing "writs" which are guild-related quests that give your guild honor and status points. This experience is decaying, so that once gained it must also be maintained. Guild status points give you the ability to purchase items from special vendors which you otherwise would not be able to get.

This is just a small sampling of reasons that EQ2 is truly revolutionizing MMORPG's for years to come. It goes without saying that the graphics are astonishing. I find myself stopping to stare at places or landmarks that I simply cannot believe are so realistic.

I highly recommend this for anyone who ever played EQ live, or anyone who simply wants to escape to the most realistic, compelling, fun and exciting world ever created by a computer video game.

Not for superficial players

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 11 / 17
Date: January 13, 2005
Author: Amazon User

To position where I come from - I have been playing MMOG since 97 and saw them more or less all - UOL , EQ , AC , AO , DAoC ...
That gave me a quite an experience .

So first what EQ2 is NOT :

- it is not a game that you run on an average computer (I have an Athlon 64 FX55 with GeForce 6800 Ultra , 2 GB RAM and can't still put everything on maximum) .

- it is not a game where you get valuable things for nothing , you have to earn them

- it is not a game for impatient people .
Those that are of the kind "I want everything and right now ." better stay away .

- it is not a game that you can play one hour every now and then .
A time investment is necessary , the learning curve is steep .

- it is not a game for people who look only after some quick hack&slash and have no clue or interest in the world's consistency and history .
On the same line it is not for people unable to cooperate and care for others .
Soloing here , even if feasible , is not a very fun option (but then why would somebody buy a MMORPG where the M stands for Multiplayer to play alone against environment ?)

Now what it is :

- an absolutely impressive , graphically stunning and extremely consistent fantasy world .
It is a real RPG .
There is a history of the world, the NPC have all a story to tell , they have their jobs , interests and worries - everything totally consistent with each other .
The feeling of immersion in a believable , consistent fantasy world is really huge .
Admittedly like with every MMORPG this feeling of immersion and wonder lessens somewhat at higher levels (above 30) .
However like mentioned above , you need a good computer .
To compare with another popular MMORPG , WoW , on a scale 1-10 if EQ2 scores 10 on this point , WoW would score perhaps 4 .

- Simply the best trade skill system I have ever seen and I have seen them almost all .
Unique , original and providing a real sense of achievement .
If you are of the less action hungry type , if you hated Diablo and feel like retching when hearing "let's go out and kill stuff ." , if you like to invest time in intelligent and cooperative crafting then EQ2 is DEFINITELY the best choice .

- Quests are in numbers and the concept is extremely interesting and fun for levels 1 - 20 .
Without the player noticing it , the quests introduce him to the history of the town and of Norrath , to the geography and to the important NPCs .
So they take off the burden of having to look up tons of web pages to find a place or a person .
Some of the most rewarding quests (red) must be done with groups and that enhances again the cooperation .
The Quest journal is well thought out and usefull .
Not to forget that ALL quests give interesting reawards in XP , money and/or items .

- the fight system is a bit more than only to klick on a button , there is actually a little thinking involved but that aspect is surely not the strength of EQ2 .

CONCLUSION
==========

If you have a good computer , some 15 - 20 hours/week to play , a liking for cooperation , playing in groups and immersion in a consistent graphically beautiful world , a distaste to only "kill stuff" , an interest in the Tradeskills then EQ2 is by far the best buy for you .

If you want to mostly solo and to "kill stuff" then there are better alternatives than EQ2 .

Ever-crack

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 11 / 17
Date: January 06, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I saw this game in Best Buy, online and various other places many, many times. I had people recommend the game to me saying it was phenomenal. Still, I didn't buy it.

Our office had an auction of items shipped to it during the year, and I finally caved in and bought Everquest II at the auction. It actually sat on my shelf for a good week, the number of discs for installation was kind of daunting.

Then I had a week off. And that therein became the downfall of my addiction to this game. The first day I was so consumed by all the different things to do, I think I played 10 hours (I know, crazy, but it was that consuming). When I returned to work I was so eager to get back to the game that I found myself sneaking in a few hours before work and playing into the wee hours after I got home from work.

It's why many members refer to this game as Ever-crack. It's that addictive.

The beauty of it is that because it's played online you meet other people in avatar form from all over the world. You learn to cooperate and work together as a group to tackle tougher quests or monsters, and it's fairly easy to make friends, if you're considerate and pitch in yourself.

There are people who wander this mystic world just for the sole purpose of helping out new people to the game when they're trapped by animals or monsters that are killing them. Most people who play will help out another in need if they yell for help. That's what so nice about this game. In fact I've run into so many gallant men, been overwhelmed by their chivalry and kindness that it makes me wistful -- that I wished these men existed outside of game play.

I've met comical warriors, serious dwarves, humans, druids and clerics. The quests are challenging and you get rewarded with upgraded weapons, secret books, new armor and, of course, money.

You start on a newbie island and you learn how to use your weapons with a few short and easy quests. The more you do, the better and stronger you become. Then, depending on what character you chose to depict your avatar (there is a selection of about 10 different species), you are sent to the outskirts of the great city of Queynos, until you pass your citizenship challenge and are allowed inside.

What's overwhelming about this game is that you never run out of adventure. There is always that "just one more quest" before I go to bed, or the "I just need one more of these bad guys" before I run to work.

I've never played a game that I so anticipated getting back to. That I was eager to find out "what happens next" ... because it's always changing. Most PC games have a finite level of adventure. But go online and play Everquest II and the adventure literally never ends.

I could go on and on and on about this game, but just let me say that you should buy yourself a copy and start your quest for yourself.

You really won't be disappointed.

Not to fun

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 10 / 15
Date: November 23, 2004
Author: Amazon User

The game has some very nice graphics to it in my opinion, but the game its self i found slow and boring. There is not much for the players who like to solo and the game in a way forces grouping taking away alot of fun. {EDIT}

EverQuest is for certian people

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 16 / 30
Date: December 20, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Jeese, why do so many people have bad things to say about everquest, and how dumb the new EQ will be? If you ask me this is a great game for many differant types of people. EQ1 was a great game, i have playe dit for over a year now, but its not like it is my life.

Some good things about the upcoming EQ2 is that there is no experiance bars, or certian hit points. Everything is within the game. There are no stats accept general things like good strangth, or good intelligance. This provides the player with a more relistic view of the game. Also there is a new way to distinguish your class. As you go through the levels you will begin to make decisions tward a certian class, that will fit you the best. There is no guessing in the begining what class you will like or not like. durring the game if you are killing somthing, there is no way to know how many hit points the mob your killing has, or how many you have, because face it, there is nothing of the sort in real life anyways. Another feature is that items can be broken if you dont have the proper training to use them, or they just get old.

There is a new zoning experiance too. If you accedently get a mob on you and maybe a entire train, if u keep runing they will acually give up on you and leave, this gets rid of the "zone" idea. Also Im, not positive but, i think that mobs can and will follow you through a zone, so you no longer have a zone to save you, as you dont in real life either.

In conclusion I would say this will be the best online role playing game to hit the market. Although many will disagree, its just not their thing, because everyone is differant. So dont take advice from the people who hate it, because they are not you, so they will not know if u hate it or not. Thanks for time, and i hope like it ), /bow and i cant wait myself.

Resource HOG!

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 9 / 13
Date: November 11, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Lets face it, this game has been designed with systems that do not even exist in mind. This can be taken two ways, 1. You can call it "stupid" and a waste or 2. Appreciate them looking forward to systems that will be on us in no time.

I look at it like a gift at this point. I will be working it with the lower settings and as I upgrade in the future this game will give me a bit more, and subsequent upgrades will still yield a better game BUT I will have high level characters as opposed to those that only want in when the technology is there to run it maxed. I've played EQ for years and can tell you that if you come in "late" you'll have missed A LOT. The game will appear to be barren as most loyal players will be high levels and not many noobs will be coming on line to fill out the lower level zones.

Played for a bit last night and it's a whole nother beast then EQ. I like it...so far. Still tweaking settings for the best possible play quality. Lots of stuff to adjust or just plain turn off.

I'm running..

2GHZ P4
1 Gig PC2700
TI-4600

Lots of chop at the default setting (medium), most from my system and some I would assume from lag. The later I'm sure will be addressed as they tweak load handling on the server side and optimize code. It will get better on its own over the next few months I would assume (from past experience). Still quite playable.

Great MMO Game if you have the setup

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 12 / 20
Date: October 30, 2004
Author: Amazon User

This game is better than the first, I've been in the beta for just under a week now and love the game a lot. It's really easy to get into and the graphics look amazing even on balanced settings.

I look forward to this game should be great. Don't listen to the WoW fanboys this game is going to be just as good as the last. Don't get me wrong WoW is a good game too, I was in the stress test for that. Sadly I won't be picking it up because I already have a subscription to SWG and I just couldn't get into WoW until the very end of the stress test

An unimaginative game by irritating developers

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 14 / 25
Date: December 09, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This game was a very disappointing release by SOE. There seems to have been minimal effort put into it. Allow me to elaborate...

Each armor class has but one model, so every armor upgrade varies only by color. Furthermore, don't even think about being fashionable in this game. Even if you do somehow manage to achieve the look you want, the devs will change it on a whim (they have made black robes for evil-aligned players pinkish purple and left it that way permanently...calling it an "improvement" in the patch notes).

They have "Adventure Packs" which cost 5-7$ and are so-called mini-expansions. However, they are merely just a few rooms (where the walls, ceiling, and floor are all the same boring color/texture) that have quite literally been cut and pasted over and over again to create a dungeon. Best 7$ you ever spent?

Mounts are very unimaginative - again, just 1 horse model with different colors for each upgrade. The uberest horse is probably the gaudiest one of all (a "spirit horse" they call it - though it's basically just the same horse model with a faded out texture - like they were on a budget and couldn't create something special).

They recently came out with an expansion, Desert of Flames, but the expansion offers no new variety (it's all just recycled content with different names for the loots and spells). They raised the level cap from 50 to 60, but all the new spells are just the same as old ones they are supposed to upgrade, with a different name and slightly boosted damage, etc. Furthermore, in some cases the upgrade is so small as to leaving you wondering why you just spent weeks of your life leveling up at all.

Soloing is viable to a degree in this game. You can solo to 60. There are a couple of solo dungeons (or "solo rooms", more accurately) that offer no special reward or adventure. Once you reach 60 as a solo player you will find that there is nothing left for you to do. You only receive reward for killing an enemy if it is 10 levels below you or higher. In many cases something 10 levels below you that's intended for a group will beat you senseless. So you can forget soloing lower level group-intended enemies for loot. If you want to get ahead as a solo player, your only option is to buy loot from other players, but NO upgrade you can possibly get in the game will open up new soloing power and adventures (there's simply nothing to do solo but kill dumbed down enemies).

There is a bit more to do for groups and raids, but it's mostly just physically larger versions of soloable creatures that hit harder and have more hitpoints. Nothing really inspiring or creative. There aren't many uber items to go after, and much of the content is just recycled zone maps (same map with different opponents in it), recycled items (same graphic, different stats and name), etc. The game is inherently dumbed down, so there is little tactics or skill involved in killing anything in this game. There's not really anything you can do to improve your odds. Just "point, click, and pray" is pretty much the name of the game.

Crafting, I have to admit, was given more attention by the devs than most MMO's, but they ruined it with what could be the worst crafting system ever conceived. There is 0 automation, which would be fine if the system was interesting, but it's not. You have to sit there and click 1 or 2 buttons repeatedly while staring at a progress meter. Considering the sheer volume of things you need to make to level up your Artisan class, it begins to feel like a shameful waste of life after a while - just stare at a progress meter, click...repeat process 500 times.

The storyline is extremely pitted with potholes (too many to list). There is hardly a sense of immersion, considering the thrown-togetherness feel of the world (it feels more like an FPS multiplayer map than an immersive fantasy world, honestly). At times, when changes are made to the game that make it less fun, you begin to wonder whether the developers even play their own game.

The original Everuqest it is not :o(

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 17 / 33
Date: October 12, 2004
Author: Amazon User

I have actually edited my prior review which led me to give this game both 5 stars in fun and overall. My new ranking would be 2 stars for both fun and overall. Here is the edited review after playing my character to 50 and spending some time in the game:

I played this game both during beta and after it went live. After playing the original Everuqest for over 5 years, I really wanted to enjoy this game. During the entire beta process I kept telling myself, "This will get better...They will add more quests...They will tweak the game so that it doesn't feel like WORK." I continued to tell myself after beta, when the game was rushed into Live status in order to be competitive with the release of World of Warcraft. As a result of this, you have a game that has beautiful graphics, but lacks anything substantial.

Upon creation of your character, you must choose wether you want to be good and go to the city of Qeynos, or evil and go to the city of Freeport. Qeynos is the land of happy halflings and all things daisies and sunshine. Now imagine the exact opposite and you have Freeport. The graphics in this city are so drab and depressing that you can hardly stand to even run through the streets. The NPCs do little other than call you names or threaten to pummel you in the face/kill you. Sony really neglected to realize that there are beautiful evil empires. People that will talk nicely to you and then stab you in the back. Where Qeynos is almost sickeningly sweet, Freeport leaves you wishing that you had never left the refugee island. The good news is that you are allowed to betray your starting city and move to Qeynos. At least there you don't feel like you are trudging through the sewers.

The first 5 levels of playing the game is basically a tutorial. You run around an island that is dedicated to those level 5 and below and you slay goblins. You slay LOTS of goblins. It was a decent enough tutorial for someone that is just starting the game, but I left the island thinking, "Couldn't they have found an island without goblins to take these poor refugees to??"

The game walks you through the entire process of getting to level 10 as though you're a child. There are quests that give you alot of information, and some that give you almost none and leave you wandering the streets of the zones for longer than you'd like to. The class quests that allow you to chose your very first archtype are simple, but the story line is not very well thought out. These are all things I had really hoped they'd have fixed by beta, but again, the rush to release shattered those hopes.

I've read alot of reviews that talk about how it is impossible to solo or duo. That simply isn't true. There is ALOT of solo and duo content. I think that I duo'd with someone all the way up to level 35. And we were both priest classes. We didn't stop duoing because the game didn't allow for it, we just realized it was much faster to group if you could get into a good one. A GOOD GROUP is absolutely key. The games experience pentalty upon your own death or that of a party member is ridiculous. If you end up in a poor groupo, you can easily end up having to spend hours working off the experience debt because of the foolish behaviour of a single party member. As a result, I never grouped with anyone I didn't know. One of the wonderful things about Everquest was that you could easily meet so many new people just by going into a zone and calling out that you were looking for a group. Trust me, don't do this in Everquest 2 if you are planning on playing it.

I played my character all the way up to level 50. I was in a guild that raided almost nightly and dedicated their time to doing the high end of the game. There is a single quest that can take you over a month to complete. You are sent off to find a dragon who has stolen something, only to have what you were supposed to find destroyed at the end. Not only that, but you encounter so many bugs during the final fight that it makes your head spin. Sometimes the encounter bugs, sometimes it doesn't. You never know which one you're going to get and it leaves you frustrated. It seemed like that was it for the high end. The game is mostly instanced, so you lose alot of the competition that you found all the way up through Plane of Time in Everquest 1. The fact that Sony can't seem to stop tweaking/nerfing the encounters also leaves you wondering what you're going to be fighting from week to week. A mob that your guild can go in and kill one day, may very well be unkillable for your the next. The addition of waves upon waves of spawns that continue to come without any chance of controlling them made them not fun for me.

Tradeskills. I don't even know where to begin. They took what was a fun crafting system, and hit it with the nerf bat until I finally stopped tradeskilling altogether. Being that I loved that asp[ect of the game, it really lost alot of appeal at that time. It seems that they can't just leave well enough alone and allow people to enjoy something that will be "easy". Everything must be an uphill stuggle to the end. I'm all for making people work for the best things in the game, but there is a point where you really just want to be able to do something easy.

You are simply taken back to the beginning of Everuqest time, with better graphics. You have more gnolls to kill than you could possibly imagine. You have the ice giants of permafrost. A whole bunch of goblins. And..Yes..Lizard men in Cazic Thule. The one good thing that an EQ2 player can look forward to, is that there is no chance of space gnolls since they have blown up Luclin.

Needless to say, it was a sad day for me when I cancelled my last Sony account and ventured on to World of Warcraft. I had been a customer of theirs for 6 years. Through all the bad customer service, through all of the encounter nerfing. I loved the storyline that they had built in EQ1, and it seemed non-existant in its sequal. After truding through the game to its less than glorious "end game quest", I felt like I had really accomplished nothing. At the end of the day there was little substance. All I had was a pretty 3 room apartment, a couple baby dragons and a shiny weapon to make me feel like I had accomplished something in my time there.

Had possibilities, but sinking fast

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 8 / 11
Date: April 12, 2005
Author: Amazon User

EQ2 is my first MMOG. I previously stayed away from any sort of graphic game, preferring strategy games instead.

EQ2 had some very nice graphics, extensive and interesting cities and quest zones, and a nascently innovative crafting system that would have allowed it to break away from the "thud and blunder" genre of Dungeons & Dragons descendants.

Unfortunately, teeny-boppers and Beavis & Butthead fans seem to be running the company. Over the weekend of April 8-11, a "plague" hit the entire EQ2 game world. No corner was left untouched (except for their introductory free trial area, the Isle of Refuge). The plague consisted of characters getting green fuzzy stuff all over them, explosive vomitting, and the appropriate accompanying retching noises. This condition could be cured by allowing it to wear off over the course of an hour or two, but the infection was reintroduced by the slightest contact within 25 feet of anyone else. As of April 12, the plague continues unabated.

The ultimate impact was that infection was effectively permanent, and unless players enjoyed the sight and sound of the continually retching characters, it was impossible to focus on or enjoy any other aspect of the game. There was supposed to be some sort of "quest" to discover and create a "cure" for the disease, but clues were poorly placed, confusing, and excluded all but a handful of players from participating.

This plague was billed as the first of many such "live events" that were supposed to get the entire gaming population involved in cooperative ventures beyond what they might normally do. In the meantime, feel free to enjoy the sight and sound of vomit-covered characters vomitting even more vomit on everything that isn't already covered in vomit.

Update (Apr. 13): No sign of relenting on the plague event. It's now been 5 continuous days of vomit, vomit, vomit. I suppose Sony considers this fun. I don't. I have heard this sort of "plague" is a common theme in MMOG's, and that one MMOG game lost half its players as a result of such a stunt. I can imagine that there is an unofficial "contest" among programmers to see which team can get their company to allow the grossest game effects. Doesn't seem as though this would help their bottom line though.

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