Our Preview of Everquest 2
Luclin has been destroyed and the debris from the destruction has transformed the world of Norrath into a much harsher place. Of the cities we know, only Freeport and Qeynos still remain standing. Freeport has become the center of evil and the new home of the dark races. Qeynos continues to stand out as a beacon of civilization in a dangerous world. A new race of half man/half rat has emerged and all of the races, however reluctantly, look to the humans to lead them out of the darkness. The classes have learned to further specialize and new tradeskill only classes have emerged. This is the changed world of Norrath that you will find in Everquest 2. What does this mean to the players of Everquest? Well for those who decide to pick up this new offering, it looks like it will mean more fun and many, many more hours spent exploring the world of Norrath. I spent almost two hours in the Sony booth during E3 watching the demonstration and peppering the developers with as many questions as I could think about concerning what we can expect from this new world. Here is what I found.
First let’s start with the graphics. Visually, this game is simply stunning. Since the specifications were not being released, I can only guess that to get this level of graphical detail you will need a very high end computer and video card. Lower end machines may not get the full effect, but than again, this may just be the excuse you have been looking for to go out and upgrade your computer. The world is vividly detailed. Unlike many of the new games coming out, EQ2 is being rendered completely by hand, with no auto-generated world areas. Much like the original Everquest, this lets Sony overwhelm you with one visual surprise after another. In this case, the graphics are so realistic that I could almost feel the characters getting wet when they entered the water. Humaniod movement, including that of all the player characters, has been rendered using motion capture photography, allowing a surprising sense of emotion and expression to come into the models, and an array of simply jaw dropping battle effects.
The character models are themselves a work of art worthy of a museum. During the creation process, you can customize multiple aspects of the character. This is no longer a world of beautiful people. You can play anything from Tom Cruise to Freddy Kruger. I know I missed a few of the customizations available, but those I jotted down were sex, race, height, weight, musculature, age, hair style and color, facial hair style and color, skin color, eye, nose, ear and chin shape and size, and the ability to add scars, freckles, tattoos where you wish. There are probably tens of thousands of different looks you can create for your character. In fact, one thing that stood out to me is that they are seriously considering removing the names that appear over the player’s head in Everquest because they assume players will be distinct enough that you will be able to recognize them simply by their appearance.
One of the great experiences of playing Everquest is entering a new zone and suddenly running into that amazing building or landscape or seeing a really cool looking creature you had never seen before. It looks to me like Everquest 2 is going to not only recapture that feel, but try to top it. The artists and animators have obviously spent an insane amount of time working on even the most minute detail of the world, and it really shows the effort. Captivating textures and shadows are everywhere, and every landscape they showed leapt to life before your eyes. In one scene, they showed a Treant that blended into the woods of the zone so well that it was a shock when it sprang to life next to the characters. During the battle, it then waved its branches and moved its leaves in an amazing display of animation. Another showed the dragon, Lord Nagafen, rendered in amazing detail as he moved around the screen and breathed fire upon his foes. Graphically, this is truly a step further towards total immersion into a fantasy world. More and more, online fantasy gains in reality.
Of course, the real test of any game is how it plays. Graphics are great, but it is the story and character involvement that truly make the game. Unfortunately, not much of the game play was actually on display at E3, so I have to go off of what I learned by grilling the several producers I was able to corner. I have to say I liked much of what I heard, but I do want to inject a note of caution that words, no matter how enticing, cannot match the actuality of just logging in and playing the game. Much of what I say here must be revisited after I play the beta. According to the producers, Everquest 2 will contain much of what makes Everquest the game it is today. The biggest difference will be that the original Everquest was never thought to be a long lasting, adaptable game, and thus the coding of the game has made it very difficult for the current EQ team to make some of the changes the players want. EQ2 will be made from the start to adapt and change and evolve, and thus it should be much easier to develop this into the ideal MMORPG.
Everquest 2 will remain a zone based game, and will not move to the seamless world that is popular in most of the new generation of MMORPG’s. This means that the current game play styles that have evolved in Everquest to take advantage of the zone lines will continue to work in EQ. Personally, I think that is a good thing. Zoning and Everquest are synonymous and I am glad that will continue. EQ2 is also going to remain class based, not skill based. Thus, unlike a true skill based game where you really have no idea of the capabilities of a stranger when considering grouping with him, you will know the basics of what any character can do simply by knowing his class. I have always maintained that this is part of what keeps Everquest popular, and again am glad to see them retaining this element.
There will, however, be more specialized classes than in EQ, and thus more ways than ever to play the game. The class system is set up so that when you start out a character you simply choose a race and start playing. You can then choose to start specializing. Over time each general class branches into more specialized subclasses. Thus a fighter can become a monk and a monk can become a ninja or pugilist. There will ultimately be 48 different classes that you can play. Leveling will be faster than in EQ, mainly because the game will start with a base of 100 levels rather than the 50 of the original Everquest. It is expected that it will take about the same amount of playing time to reach level 100 as it did to reach 50 in the original version of Everquest. They have also pre-designed the game so that expanding the level cap will not break the game like it first did with EQ.
Combat will retain much of what is now available in EQ, but there will be some changes. Expect a similar give and take amongst the classes and similar set of skills and spells, but with a number of new things thrown into the pot. I think the producers realize that the combat system of Everquest is one of its strong suits in comparison with the rest of the MMORPG’s, and they don’t want to mess with it too much, but at the same time they see an opportunity to add more depth to the system. I kind of gathered that this was still being tweaked and that it could see some significant changes in beta.
The experience system is going to get a major revamp. Those who have played EQOA will recognize the new group experience system. Currently in EQ, when you kill a Mob, the experience of the mob gets divided up amongst the group after getting a bonus based upon the number of people in the group. Thus, killing a mob solo is still the best way to get the most xp in EQ, if you can do it and avoid the down time. In EQ 2, much like currently in EQOA, you will actually get about the same amount of experience that you would have gotten if you had killed the mob solo. Thus, a character who joins a group and suddenly starts killing yellows and reds will gain a significantly higher amount of experience than if he simply hunted on his own. The result is that while you can play solo, you will gain both experience and loot much faster in a group.
The plan for the world in general is to make it more dynamic. They are going to give the players much more leeway in what they can do to try to take away from the total hunt and kill focus. Trade skill players will be able to advance totally on their knowledge and skill within the trades, and will no longer have to rely upon hunting and killing to level up. Players will be able to own and personally customize apartments and houses and guilds will finally get guild houses. The guild houses are something Everquest players have been clamoring for years to get and it looks like they will get it in spades in EQ2, with a large amount of customizability and some sort of location system that will help guilds establish their pecking order amongst the other guilds on the server. In addition, players can own their own ships and use them to explore the oceans. I am assuming that means certain sections of some zones will only be able to be reached by player owned shipping. They can also stage shows such as poetry readings or music and even sell tickets to other players to come watch the event.
Dungeons will have a new customization feature as well. While the bulk of a dungeon will remain communal, the final battle will spawn off a separate group dungeon to allow multiple parties and even multiple raids handle the same battle at the same time. Thus, if you plan your raid and assemble your guild and reach the final goal only to find some other guild there ahead of you, you simply let them zone into the final battle and then zone into your own version and you can both fight the fight parallel to each other without the long wait and scheduling hassles that currently plaque Everquest. There will even be some scripted animations, such as walls falling down or buildings burning, that happen during the fight and reset for the next one. This was part of the demonstration they showed at E3 of a fight with the dragon Nagafen. Walls shook and fires raged as Lord Nagafen fended off a battle with a group of players. There was a much higher level of realism to the battle when the very environment reacted to what was going on.
Another major difference between EQ2 and EQ is the addition of item decay. Like many of the features of EQ2, you can actually look to EQOA to see how this will work. I gathered that item decay in EQ2 will be almost identical to how they have it in EQOA. As they get used, items will reduce in quality and after a time, you will need to take them to either a player or NPC tradesman to get fixed. Items will be given a durability value and a set number of hit points. Ones of higher durability will decay slower and ones with more hit points will take longer to reduce to uselessness. This is basically a way for the developers to drain money out of the economy to try to fix the deflation that is found in most other games, including Everquest. It also gives tradesmen another vital role in the game economy. How effective this will be remains to be soon. However, they do have the advantage of having EQOA using the same system, which will allow them to tweak the EQ2 system as they see how it evolves in the other game.
Quests will also see some changes in Everquest 2, although the basic system will stay pretty much the same, with you able to go up to random NPC’s, hail them and accept a quest from them. Unlike Everquest, players will be given a quest book that will keep track of which quests they are working on and where they are in each quest. I didn’t see an example of this book, so I am not sure about the detail level. I would assume it will be similar to how they do it in EQOA where as you complete a step the book updates to tell you what you are supposed to do next without giving so much detail that you just step through blindly with no thought. One nice change is that you will no longer have to search for the perfect trigger word in EQ2. Instead, there will be dialogue boxes that step you through each step of the quest.
The quests will also form a much larger part of the newbie experience. One of the points of emphasis in the discussion I had was how they want to make EQ2 less intimidating to start for the new gamer, while not forcing the experienced gamer to go through a series of easy quests he would just as soon avoid. Thus, they plan on using an adapted form of what you now get in EQOA. A new player will immediately receive a quest from his guild master and can then play through a series of quests that both gain him skills and equipment and teach him how to play the game. This to me is one of the best features of EQOA and I am glad to see them bringing it over to EQ2. It gives you a sense of purpose the minute you enter the world and helps immerse you into the game in a way that is both fun and educational. However, unlike EQOA, where the low level quests can get kind of tedious on your third or fourth character, experienced players will be able to skip past the newbie quests without experiencing any penalty or missing any spells or abilities only available through those quests.
An improved newbie experience is actually quite vital to this game. As they explained it, they understood that a game like Everquest 2 would get a fairly unique blend of experienced players who know the game system in good detail and new players who have been lured in by the reputation of the original Everquest. They are attempting to gear the game so that both types of players could dive in at the level they feel comfortable and just start playing. This is one reason you don’t choose a class at the beginning. The thought is that a new player will not really know what class he wants to play, so he can just get in and play a while and decide over time what suits him best. I think this is a great attitude to have and hope they can actually pull it off.
You may have noticed somewhat of a theme through this preview. I know I noticed a theme as I listened to them describe many of the proposed changes to Everquest 2. It dawned on me that we already had a way to get a preliminary glimpse at many major features of the EQ2 game play through the current version of EQOA. Thus, I asked if EQOA was actually a bridge in ideas between EQ and EQ2 and they said that in some ways it was. Some things, like the combat system in EQOA, are not going to translate, since those are geared towards the console nature of that game, and of course the graphics and design are completely different. But many other features of EQOA – such as the experience system, item decay, the quest system, the newbie experience and others -- seem to be finding their way into EQ2. Which others will also follow remain to be seen. I found this interesting to note, and as a person who happens to really enjoy EQOA, I also found it to be encouraging.
Finally there is that crossover between EQ and EQ2 that was announced last week. I asked several people for more detail on this feature and eventually came to the conclusion that nobody really knows what it means. It may be that it was more of a marketing decision than a programming decision and none of the designers really know yet what they are going to do with it. The best impression I got was that in certain limited zones where only quests could be done, you would be able to chat with friends playing Everquest and that certain actions they would do would help you complete a quest in Everquest 2. Nobody really seemed comfortable saying more than that, so I guess we have to wait and see what actually gets developed.
This is it. I have seen the future of Norrath and it looks like it may well be the future of Online gaming as well. Everquest 2 has the look and feel of a real winner. The graphics are amazing, character customization is incredible, and the game itself looks to be shaping into a truly fun experience. Of course, it is still early in development. Beta testing is not scheduled to start until at least this summer, and more likely won’t actually start until sometime this fall. Many things can change, but if this continues to develop and expand like it has up to now, look out everyone. This may well be a game that will dominate the next four years of your life in the same way that the original Everquest has dominated since it came out in 1999. Kiss the wife and kids goodnight and make friends with the late night pizza delivery guy, because you are going to stay in Norrath a whole lot longer than you originally thought.
