Everquest Next - News Roundup

When it comes to EQ, Verant started a trend that Sony and others have continued. That is, devising gameplay that exponentially requires more and more time the deeper you delve into it. I can't go there anymore.

But I am keeping a hopeful eye with TES Online and now EQ Next. I need to be able stop playing on a dime, that is my first and most important priority. If either of these games allow this without unwinding perhaps hours or days of effort or pissing off other players who have no recourse if you up and leave, I'll give them a try. Until then, I'm sticking with single player games that let me save and stop on a moments notice.
 
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Skills are way too-actiony for my tastes and fights are over all too soon.

No comment about the skills look, but the fights were over too soon, because the mobs had their AI disabled (beside the Earth Elemental and the Void Goliath). It was a tech demo and not actual in-game combat.

We will have to wait for a while before we get actually in-game none-staged stuff. Unless, they show something in tomorrow's video (video taken inside the Black Box where they are making the game).
 
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Very cool graphics and boss fights! One question though, with destructable terrain I recon this game won't be one big open world?
 
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Very cool graphics and boss fights! One question though, with destructable terrain I recon this game won't be one big open world?

Full vertical seamless open world, including player house and Guild cities. The underground have multiple layers of content, but accessing it just mean to "dig" or find a passages down. There might even be sky content, the dev talked about flying fortress at SOE Live.

Like I said in a previous post, the world has an heal rate when damaged by players.
 
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It isn't WoW.....which is a good thing. I'm not sure it will lure me away from EQ 2 or one for that matter, but I will most likely at least try it. The sheer ambition is admirable....and I really wonder if they might take to KS at some point on this. Not that they'd have to, but the word of mouth alone might make it both worthwhile and lucrative.



-Carn
 
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Things I liked from the video:
- Cities and stuff being developed by the players over months, and staying there.
- I liked the camera-based emoticons I think.

Things I didn't like from the video:
- Art style, definitely didn't like at all.
- Multi-classing everybody-is-everything, definitely didn't like this, at all. I liked EQ *because* of its class-based system.
- Twitchy combat. Just this alone would kill it for me.
- No levels… ok? I liked EQ1 because of the levels and how long it took to reach max (in fact, after playing it like 2 years, I never made it to max).
- Woosh/Waash/Kaboom! Again, when every action you perform goes with a super-animation, then they lose their shine.
- Double jump, SERIOUSLY???

About a year ago SOE opened an old-school Everquest 1 server, with the original ruleset, and each expansion occurring every month or so in the order they came. I tried it just to see… I hadn't had so much fun playing an MMO since many years before. It wasn't nostalgia at all, it was really fun to play EQ1 as how it was, with required grouping, with the down-times, with the slow-leveling, etc. I guess that's what I was hoping EQ Next would be, back to the awesomeness of EQ1 with refreshed lore, graphics, UI, but maintaining the core gameplay. Alas, I couldn't have been more wrong. What I got instead was some sort of Minecraft/Golden Axe hybrid.
 
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Things I liked from the video:
- Cities and stuff being developed by the players over months, and staying there.
- I liked the camera-based emoticons I think.

Things I didn't like from the video:
- Art style, definitely didn't like at all.
- Multi-classing everybody-is-everything, definitely didn't like this, at all. I liked EQ *because* of its class-based system.
- Twitchy combat. Just this alone would kill it for me.
- No levels… ok? I liked EQ1 because of the levels and how long it took to reach max (in fact, after playing it like 2 years, I never made it to max).
- Woosh/Waash/Kaboom! Again, when every action you perform goes with a super-animation, then they lose their shine.
- Double jump, SERIOUSLY???

About a year ago SOE opened an old-school Everquest 1 server, with the original ruleset, and each expansion occurring every month or so in the order they came. I tried it just to see… I hadn't had so much fun playing an MMO since many years before. It wasn't nostalgia at all, it was really fun to play EQ1 as how it was, with required grouping, with the down-times, with the slow-leveling, etc. I guess that's what I was hoping EQ Next would be, back to the awesomeness of EQ1 with refreshed lore, graphics, UI, but maintaining the core gameplay. Alas, I couldn't have been more wrong. What I got instead was some sort of Minecraft/Golden Axe hybrid.

Golden Axe is awesome! :)

Multi-classing: you can choose to completely develop a single class instead. So at least you have that option.
Combat: No details on this yet. Personally I would like an involved, deliberate combat mechanic. Not just mindlessly mashing away when a timer returns to 0.
No Levels: It seems to be a different way of improving your character. Details are rather sketchy on this as well. All they've pretty much said is that they are are going for horizontal rather then vertical progression.
Combat Animation: I actually like it but of course there is a fine line between conveying a satisfying combat animation and over the top silliness.
Double Jump: I have mixed feelings about this. It does seem out of place but then again characters have magical abilities like teleporting and firing missiles out of their bare hands. On the plus side, it might imply that exploration is important and this mechanic might be useful to traverse the landscape and find some interesting nooks and crannies..

Everquest Next seems to be a modified blend of features from a variety of games:
Terrain Deformation/Construction/Procedural Subterranean Levels: Minecraft
Multi-classing: Final Fantasy XIV: ARR
Swappable Skills/Weapon-based skills/Dynamic Events: Guild Wars
Double Jump: Wildstar

I can understand the polarised views from Everquest fans. The art style and mechanics seems to have completely changed. But for better or worse remains to be seen.
 
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About a year ago SOE opened an old-school Everquest 1 server, with the original ruleset, and each expansion occurring every month or so in the order they came. I tried it just to see… I hadn't had so much fun playing an MMO since many years before. It wasn't nostalgia at all, it was really fun to play EQ1 as how it was, with required grouping, with the down-times, with the slow-leveling, etc. I guess that's what I was hoping EQ Next would be, back to the awesomeness of EQ1 with refreshed lore, graphics, UI, but maintaining the core gameplay. Alas, I couldn't have been more wrong. What I got instead was some sort of Minecraft/Golden Axe hybrid.

What are you not just playing EQ1 then?
 
No Levels: It seems to be a different way of improving your character. Details are rather sketchy on this as well. All they've pretty much said is that they are are going for horizontal rather then vertical progression.

Classes have tiers, but these are not raised with XP or killing mobs. From what I can deduce of interviews and the class panel, you have to perform "class challenges" to be able to advance a tier. The devs didn't call them class challenges, but that's the closest I came up with to "do various things to get to the next tiers". I even think that these "challenges" are given to you by the class trainer, this is why you can't advance a Paladin class if you are doing evil things. You lose access to your trainer.

and the horizontal progression is collecting more classes and abilities. While the vertical one is raising your class tier, but the way they are talking there are only 4-5 of them.

Also, while you can learn lots of classes. You have to be "in a specific class" when playing and this will define what armor and weapons you can use and the type of class ability slots you have (different for all classes, but there are only 24 combos and over 40 classes, so they are redundancy). The slot types are movement (leap, dash, teleport, etc), offensive (damage dealing stuff like a fireball or mana burns), defensive (spell reflect, shielding, etc), utility (unsummon spell is the example they used).
 
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Why are you not playing Gothic 1 or Wizardry 4?

Because when I go back to them, I'm not "having the most fun I've had in years". I realise they're rather old and worn - and it's time for something fresh ;)
 
You could just freshen up EQN but they decided for a complete overhaul. Only time will tell if Sony made the right choice. Sony has to understand that long time fans of EQ are going to have many reservations.
 
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I must admit that Everquest is the last game I would have expected to evolve in such a bold manner - but I'm glad that it's happening.

I was never a fan of EQ, though, and I remember being much, MUCH more impressed with UO at the time.
 
That is one of the most untrue statements I have ever read on this site. Evergrind my butt. When EQ first came out it was whatever you wanted it to be. I would stay in zones for weeks just helping people out. I was a cleric and I would go around Norath rezzing people and helping groups that needed a cleric. If you chose to grind then that is how you wanted to play.
 
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That is one of the most untrue statements I have ever read on this site. Evergrind my butt. When EQ first came out it was whatever you wanted it to be. I would stay in zones for weeks just helping people out. I was a cleric and I would go around Norath rezzing people and helping groups that needed a cleric. If you chose to grind then that is how you wanted to play.

I could see your point if there was a way to play the game that didn't involve grinding.

I guess staying at level 1 doing nothing but helping people is theoretically possible, though ;)

Truth be told, however, you're right. No game in the entire world has grind if you "don't choose to play it that way" - but then the concept kinda loses its meaning, doesn't it :)
 
Every rpg ever made has grinding then. Even if you only need to kill one kobald to gain a lvl you still have to grind that one kobald :)
 
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That is one of the most untrue statements I have ever read on this site. Evergrind my butt. When EQ first came out it was whatever you wanted it to be. I would stay in zones for weeks just helping people out. I was a cleric and I would go around Norath rezzing people and helping groups that needed a cleric. If you chose to grind then that is how you wanted to play.

Cool, so you were part of the 1% that wasn't just looking out for themselves. That doesn't change the fact that Everquest was synonymous with grinding.
 
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Every rpg ever made has grinding then. Even if you only need to kill one kobald to gain a lvl you still have to grind that one kobald :)

Sure, because to level up in EQ you only had to kill one kobold :)

It's exactly the same and you're making a TON of sense!
 
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