First let's get this out of the way - AO should NEVER have been releaseed in the shape it was in. If I released a piece of software like this to my customers at work I'd be out of work. OK, small flame over.
Let me say I've played EQ from day 1 of retail release and I've played AO from day 1 of retail release. I have a lvl 52 cleric in EQ and have my nanotech up lvl 19 in AO.
Allakhazam's review has a few facts in it but mostly it doesn't seem like he's played the game very much.
Playability
Yep, pretty right on here. I have a P3 1GHz/512MB/GeForce3/DSL and I still get hideous lag if I'm anywhere near a large group of other players. The stability of the game has improved drastically over the first weeks since release, but the performance still sucks. Mission bugs with shooting through walls are slightly annoying but largely playable now. The first few days I lagged out frequently in missions and couldn't even get transported back to my reclaim terminal when I got killed because zoning wouldn'g work. Those problems seem to be largely resolved now.
Graphics and Sound
AO blows EQ away on graphics. The graphics at 1600x1200x32 are just amazing even with options turned down to help with the lag issue. As far as sound goes, I turned off the music on EQ almost as soon as I got it, and did the same on AO. Everybody I talk to did the same. Not sure how having a techno pop soundtrack enhances your immersion in a virtual world unless that's what happens to you in the real world when you get into a conflict. If it does you should seek professional help.
Soloing and Grouping
Most of the statments in this section are just outright wrong. Once you get past the mid-teens soloing for experience is very time consuming compared to grouping. I went from level 18 to level 19 in about 25 minutes when I got in a full group which took me about 3 minutes to get into. Since then I've been doing solo missions for credits which have been successful for that purpose, but I've put in probably 6 hours of time and only finished half of level 19. No comparison. The one statemen in this section that is accurate is that so far the game is much better for casual gamers like me. Playing a level 50 cleric in EQ is a pain. I'm hoping the trend of being able to solo continues into the later levels in AO, even if just for credits.
Classes/Professions
You're way off in this section. The different professions in AO are very, very different. The lowest level nanos do some similar things but by mid teens they're very different based on which class you play. There are some general nanos that everyone can buy, but they're extremely weak compared to the specialized ones. For example, my nanotech can get a heal spell....a wimpy 10-25 pt heal spell that is virtually meaningless at mid teens level. The docs get much higher level ones, but then again they don't get Accelerated Titanium Pellet like I do :) Also, since all the classes have major differences in which skills are easy to raise, it becomes nearly impossible for anyone to be successful doing a generic character which uses all skills. If you don't specialize in something that's cheap in IP to raise you're toast. For example, my nanotech is already at 139 comp lit and hopping the grid all over, for a soldier to get to that level they would have to dump all their IP into comp lit and would basically be useless as a soldier since they couldn't use any high level weapons or armor. The comment about everyone being able to use the same weapons and armor is also wrong. All the good armor and weapons have skill requirements that rapidly become out of reach for professions for which they aren't appropriate. Someone gave me some heavy duty tank armor, but my wimpy little nanotech couldn't wear it for lack of Strength. However, my soldier buddy will never be able to wear the Nano Armor for the opposite reason.
Items/Quests
I have to agree the AO mission system is far and away a better system that EQ's quests. Having played EQ for quite some time I don't think AO having some broken missions is any worse than EQ which seems to still have quests that are broken from the original release. Also, since I can just delete the offending mission and go get a different one these bugs are much lower impact than in EQ. Another thing I disagree with is that everyone can just get all the items themselves. Just try to build that spiffy quality level 100 implant without the appropriate skills and you'll see what I mean :)
I should also mention that I love the level specific armor.
Overall Game Play
It's hard to tell at this point. I've played EQ for a long time and AO only for a few weeks. I must say I haven't logged back onto EQ at all since AO was released but that's probably just because it's new. I think the PVP concept of AO is much better than in EQ. I like the idea of having certain zones (not just arenas) where you have differing levels of PVP; none, political or mayhem. EQ's PVP system for the non-team servers is useless especially for RPers.
See you in Rubi-Ka.......
Everquest versus Anarchy Online (A Review)
Anarchy Online has been out almost a month now. I know there have to be some Everquest players out there wondering about Anarchy Online and how it compares to EQ. I beta tested Everquest and have been playing it ever since. I also beta tested Anarchy Online and have been playing it since it was released a few weeks ago. Of course, I have seen a lot more of EQ than AO, so there are things that I can’t compare quite yet, but I still thought I would give you my initial impressions to help you decide if AO is a game you might want to try. So here is my comparison and review.
Playability
This is something I feel needs to be stated right up front, because I am going to try to ignore it for the rest of the review. At the moment, Anarchy Online is not a quality, playable game. The game was released with Funcom fully knowing that it was bugged, incomplete and unplayable. I was a beta tester and I was astounded when I discovered that the version we were playing those last weeks of beta was truly just a step from the release version. Frankly, I believe that any legitimate company should hang their heads in shame after releasing a game in this bad a shape. Funcom then rubbed salt into the wounds of even their most loyal customers by announcing that the game was “110%” playable two weeks after release, setting off the clock on the 30 days you get with your purchase and assuring that they will start charging people for a game many cannot yet play.
The lag in the game is horrendous. Anytime you get close to more than a handful of other players, your frame rate drops to almost nothing and you find yourself standing in place. What’s worse about this is that you can’t sit or move your curser enough to even log out of the game, and you are often forced to stand there for five minutes or more hoping to just get out of the game. Of course, you can always alt-tab to windows and control-alt-delete the game closed, but that seems like a pretty extreme measure. Basically, this means that you are better off just not trying to play during the typical prime time hours.
The pathing in the game is so bad that when you are in a mission your best chance is to move to a room, stand still and wait to see what starts to shoot at you. Of course, then it is often in another room and shooting through the walls, but at least you can shoot it back that way. Mobs can attack you through walls and across the playing field without you even seeing them or knowing where to go to fight back. Quite often you will lag out during a fight, which makes it impossible to use your special attacks, and then come back in and find out that you died.
High patience and a low frustration level are required to play this game right now. A high performance machine and high speed internet connection are also a lot of help. If you go in expecting a beta quality game, you will probably still be amazed at the problems. Still, many people are able to play the game, so for those of you who are willing to overlook the obvious problems and want to delve into the actual game lurking behind the bugs, I’ll try to give you my view of how it plays.
Graphics and Sound
The graphics of Anarchy Online are crisper and more realistic than those of Everquest. There are nice little touches that really add to the feel of the world. The sky effects are pretty amazing and there are things like little robots and flying birds that add a touch of realism to the game. The player models are stunning and the number of outfits you can wear are astonishing. I created a female character just to experiment with the rather racy outfits you can buy at the store. This is definitely a PG game. With all the variety, I don’t doubt that you could really get to the point where you can recognize a person just by his or her looks. They also programmed some fun emotes into the game, letting you really express yourself. I know I got a lot of work out of the /anger command when the zones weren’t working right after release.
Still, even with such crisp graphics, I find the world to be a little drab. I am sure it is by design, since Rubi-Ka is defined as a dead world that is slowly being terraformed, but there is very little color and variety amongst the cities and zones. Part of the fun in Everquest is zoning into a new zone and seeing how different it is from the rest of the world. Everquest has forests, plains, jungles, oceans, lakes, mountains and a whole variety of other types of terrain. From what I have seen so far, much of Anarchy Online is the same. So, while I like the individual graphics in AO better then EQ, overall I think I prefer the look of Norrath to the look of Rubi-Ka.
When it comes to the sound track and sound effects, AO has EQ beat by a mile. I always thought that the music in Everquest was almost an afterthought by the developers. If I recall correctly, music was not even introduced into the game until several months after its release. A good soundtrack can help get the heart thumping and add to the excitement of a battle. AO has this and EQ doesn’t. When I play EQ, I find myself turning down the sound, but when I play AO I like to really crank it.
Soloing and Grouping
This is an area where these two games differ significantly. Everquest is strictly a group game. While soloing is possible, it is difficult to do and time consuming. In general, groups are easy to form and, because the classes are so well defined, you can form a group of total strangers and fairly quickly figure out everyone’s role in the fights to come.
Anarchy Online is just the opposite. It is very easy to solo, and in many ways it is preferable. I have found it very difficult to find a group because most people have quickly discovered that you can get higher experience and better rewards by soloing. Moreover, when you do get into a group most people are confused about what they are supposed to do and in the end everyone basically just blasts away at the mob until it is dead. I assume as people get higher in levels and more specialized that things will change, but groups will never be as easy to define as in Everquest simply because the professions in AO are not so easily pigeonholed into defined roles.
This has led to an interesting development in the game. Anarchy Online is simply not as social a game as Everquest. There is no general chat like the zone chat of Everquest and with fewer groups and faster leveling, it is much harder to meet people and make friends. It is more like a bunch of single player games being played simultaneously on the same server. Some of this is due to the lag, which causes most people to do everything they can to avoid other players, but even without the lag, I doubt this will ever be much of a group game.
The advantage of this soloability is that Anarchy Online is able to be played in short bursts. If you only have an hour or two to play Everquest, it is almost not worth playing. By the time you log in, get to a zone, find a group and get into a rhythm it is time to log back out. However, with Anarchy Online, you can grab a mission, play it through and gain a half a level’s worth of experience and a nice reward all within about a hours playing time. This alone makes it a far better game for the casual gamer than Everquest.
Still, I like the social aspects of Everquest and find Anarchy Online really lacking in that regard. Without more chat features and more incentive to group up with other players, the game will never really seem like a MMORPG to me. What I have discovered is that when I have an hour to play and just want to play a quick solo game, I log onto Anarchy Online. But when I know I can really sit down and immerse myself into the game, a find myself going back to. So far, I don’t think AO has the same addictive hook that EQ can exert on you.
Classes/Professions
In my opinion, Anarchy Online went the wrong way with their profession system. I don’t doubt that there will be some significant changes as they start to see how the players deal with it. Anarchy Online tried to overlap the professions and also, through a skill system encourage diversity even within the professions. In and of itself, this is not a bad thing. This supposedly lets the players determine their own destiny rather than be pigeonholed into a role determined by the game designer. Unfortunately, from what I can see, it has had the opposite effect. First, the professions don’t vary that much from each other at the start. Because of the easy availability of healing and nano restoring devices, everyone in the game can heal themselves and cast multiple spells. Plus, everyone can wear the same armor and use the same weapons. Naturally, everyone is going to start to figure out the best weapons, armor, nanos, etc and use their skills accordingly. This is especially true because you get so few improvement points that you feel you can’t waste any on any skill that is not strictly necessary. So what you get are few actual variations in classes. Maybe they will vary more in later levels.
Also, with the sole exception of the doctor, all of the AO classes are attack classes. With the exception of the doctor class, there are no true support classes. There are classes that could be used in support roles, but because most players will spend a lot of time soloing, players who choose those classes will inevitably end up spending their improvement points on attack skills rather than support skills. This really hurts the grouping process and also reduces the variety in the game.
In contrast, Everquest’s class system is very well defined, with each class getting their own specialties, armor, weapons, spells, etc. This can sometimes be frustrating, but it builds up a very well developed reliance upon other players and encourages grouping and interaction. It also makes it easier to know who and what you are dealing with. When you meet a level 25 barbarian shaman, you pretty much know what he can and can’t do. That certainty is not present in AO.
On top of that, EQ’s variety increases replay value. The class and race you choose in EQ will significantly effect how and where you play the game. Play an Ogre Warrior and then play a High Elf Wizard, and you will find your aproach to the game to be completely different right from the start. In AO, the breed and profession seem to have little effect on how you play the game. Everyone gets weapons and spells. They may vary in name, but they all work pretty much the same. Are you really going to stop playing your level 150 character and start over with another profession that does much the same thing, only shoots pistols instead of machine guns?
So I have to give Everquest’s system the nod over Anarchy Online. I have a feeling others may disagree on this. There is something to be said about having the ability to diversify your character. Still I know that when I switch from a Rogue to a Warrior in Everquest, I will get a completely different game experience, whereas in AO switching from a fixer to a soldier will not really change your style a whole lot.
Items and Quests
This is an area where Anarchy Online has really improved over Everquest. I love the generated mission system. You go up to a mission generator, put in your parameters and request a mission. You will then be sent to an area to perform a duty, whether it is fixing a machine, killing a traitor, finding a lost item, or some other similar quest. When you get there, your own private dungeon is created. It generally takes an hour to finish and at the end, you usually get a nice reward. You can do missions privately or in a group. This sure beats Everquest’s go camp 10 monsters for a cheesy reward quest system.
However, the missions are better in concept in execution, which is a general theme running through much of Anarchy Online. I know I promised not to mention this again, but right now AO is a truly flawed game. Missions are often broken and can’t be finished. The pathing is so bad that you have no idea which Mob will start to shoot at you and you can often find yourself firing at a Mob through a wall while another one stand right in front of you oblivious to your presence. When you lag, the doorways disappear and can’t be crossed, stranding you in the middle of the mission. Still, assuming all of this gets fixed, the missions may well be the best part of Anarchy Online.
Anarchy Online also gets a huge thumbs up for making their equipment level sensitive (well actually skill level sensitive, but it works the same way). There will be no twinking in AO, so a newcomer will not find himself wondering why everyone else in the game his level seems to be decked out in great gear while he’s scrounging for enough credits to buy the basics. Plus, equipment drops randomly in accordance with the level of the mob, so there is no camping in AO either. And on top of that, just about everything can be bought in the stores. You are not going to be forced to sit in one place for 15 hours just to get that Phat Lewt. These are huge plusses in Anarchy Online’s favor.
There is a negative side to this though. Because it is so easy to get the items you want by yourself, there is little trade going on. Also, there seem to be few, if any, unique or rare items. I always thought items in EQ should drop more randomly, but that doesn’t mean they should become more common. I think that the lack of rare items in AO will somewhat take away from the competition that a true game player likes to feel. While a game should not be all about Phat Lewt, that is still a fun element of EQ that seems to be missing from AO. Still, overall I like the way AO handles quests and items better than the way EQ handles them.
Overall Game Play
So which game is more fun to play? That’s really the bottom line in evaluating a game. When you are sitting at the computer looking at the AO and EQ icons side by side, which one are you more likely going to click?
Well, that’s a complex question.
They are both fun games. If you can afford both, I recommend you play both. Why? Because of the differences. While they are supposedly of the same genre, in many ways these are completely different games. AO is a nice solo game that has the added advantage of having other people around to occasionally chat with and interact with and even group with. You can play it for an hour and actually accomplish something. Plus, I haven’t even mentioned the pvp aspects, mainly because I have not tried that yet. EQ is a great group game where you can really lose yourself in a group experience. When you have enough time to truly immerse yourself, this is the game to play.
In all, even after setting aside the bugs and lag and lack of playability of AO at this time, I definitely prefer Everquest over Anarchy Online. Of course, EQ’s had more than two years to polish and hone itself to relative perfection, and I’ve also played EQ a lot more than I have played AO, but I doubt that even in four months or so when Anarchy Online finally reaches its potential and becomes a truly final product it will surpass Everquest. This does not mean Anarchy Online is a bust. If you can get past the bugs and the lag there is a pretty nice game in there. If you only have the ability to purchase one more game this year, then by all means save your money and wait for The Shadows of Luclin expansion or perhaps Dark Age of Camelot. If you don’t mind paying $50 for something that is flawed but still kind of fun, then this game is worth a try. Whatever you do, don’t cancel your EQ account though, because you may find yourself wanting to come back in a month or two and you will want that level 60 warrior still sitting there when you return.
Tags: AnarchyOnline, News