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EQ2 Voiced By Hollywood Actors
An anonymous reader writes "Sony is going to have well known actors voicing major roles in its upcoming Massively Multiplayer Online Game. Christopher Lee is doing the voice for the Evil Lord Sir Lucan D'Lere, leader of the city of Freeport, and Heather Graham is doing the voice for Antonia Bale of the good city of Qeynos. An interview with Christopher Lee is also available on the Sony site." It will be interesting to see how this affects the fight between EQ2 and World of Warcraft, which are rumored to be coming out on the same day.
I'm in the beta, so I don't want to go and break the NDA but the game is simply amasing all the NPCs have full voice and it really makes a diffrence because it feels more like your there, the graphics are simply stunning and after playing both WOW, and EQ2 I'm having the feeling that sony is gonna keep getting my money....
Loading Please Wait....
This is relatively older news, really..
Unfortionatly, these features are making the game itself HUGE..
In the beta right now, the client download is like 3 gigs..
But I gotta admit. The end result is simply amazing compared to EQ itself..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Like that'll make the game any better.
Especially when Sony is behind it. Ugh. I just have problems giving that company my money. I used to respect Sony... No longer. Their actions in the past few years have not been good.
Does anybody really want to hear actors in a game? I personally think that money could be spent in a better way. I would rather see that money go toward physics engine or graphics or anything else. Or maybe, they could just give that extra money back to us in terms of lower game pricing? Do other people think that paying actors will add that much value to the game?
15 Months Ago: omg swg is just eq in space with teh wookie and ewoks. sux
5 Months From Now: omg eq2 is just SWG with teh elves and count dookie as Sir Lucas!!
Will Heather Graham tell me she's better off her feet?
--- rapper/producer/bachelorette party stripper
I mean seriously...wouldn't it have been more fun if they were voiced by Bollywood actors?
Who's with me here?!
Moo.
I just don't say myself saying "But it has voice acting made by Christopher Lee! I MUST buy it!".
In my opinion, it would have been money better spent elsewhere. Like reducing the horrible monthly price they ask for this. And I don't even talk about the time investment required to 'do good' in these games... I saw numerous friends lose their life (job, wife, friends) to EQ1, playing 6pm-3am everyday. For 20$ (CAN) by month, I'll pass my turn, thanks.
Of course, if he (they?) did it for free (which I doubt), then I have nothing about this...
Eureka Science News - automatically updated
I think the real question is how is the pay structure for this? Do they get paid per game sold or per person that walks up and talks to they character they play in the game?
What if they need to record new dialogue for this characters at some point down the road? It's not going to be easy (I would assume) to get celebrities back into the recording booth just to do a few lines every now and then. Then again I suppose they could just hire people to do impressions of the celebs, but still... seems kinda stupid to me.
--
These aren't the droids you're looking for.
Quest Leader Apu: "I need you to get me the legendary Squishy Recipe from Duskwood Forest. Thank you, come again!!"
Return with said recipe
Quest Leader Apu and hot Indian girl break into 20 minute song that you must pay attention to or you lose the entire plot thread of the quest.
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
You can read more about it here. Aparently this guy knows the person who thought this up. http://www.tristanelliott.com/
Peace
Christopher REEVES died, not Christoper Lee.
Retard.
I mean EQ2 is just the same as EQ except it has prettier graphics. They obviously need *something* to get people to buy it.
- This and all my posts are public domain. I am a Physicist. I am not your Physicist. This is not Physically advice
But what do I know? If Heather Graham can get hired as a voice actor maybe there's still hope for me to make it as a pop star.
Countless times playing City of Heroes, I've wanted to hear SOMETHING other than blips and zaps and pows. Hearing the enemies call out and taunt you, or hear NPCs thanking you for rescuing them, or even screams of terror when people run around... voice beats no voice, hands down. As long as the acting is reasonably good and doesn't stand out for being Resident Evil levels of horribleness then it can add to the atmosphere in the same way great graphics do.
An MMORPG which nails great graphics, an interactive musical score ala old Lucasarts games, and good voice acting... well, then you've got one heck of an experience. As is MMORPGs seem to focus completely on the graphics. The audio side gets third billing at best.
C'mon. "Evil Lord Sir Lucan D'Lere" What is this, EverSmurf?
And you win, "The Trollbated Anonymous Coward of the Day Who Also Happens to Have Shit For Brains" -prize!!!!!!!
What kind of game is this?
--
http://www.aikiweb.com - AikiWeb Aikido Information
I read somewhere that Heather Graham is also going to be doing a cameo (not sure how) in the game with Oliver Clothesov
I was very excited about WoW until I found out two things:
1) They are implementing a rest system which rewards people for not working at the game. In otherwords, the people who are casual gamers should be able to keep up with the hardcore gamers. Sorry but there should be some reward for working your ass off. Instead, they reward you for slacking.
2) At launch, the servers are going to be localized to regions, so guilds that span the country or nations (as my old EQ guild did) will not be able to play together. This is utterly fucking rediculous...absolutely inconceivable. Once they announced that, I immediately lost all faith in Blizzard. I'm not even sure they'll be able to do D3 right at this point considering how big of a clusterfuck WoW is shaping up to be.
This pains me greatly as I'm a long time Blizzard fan but I guess their loss of some key personnel has really hurt them afterall. Either that or their mega-giant corporate owners are putting the screws to them. Either way, it's a very bad sign.
Any man who afflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood. -- H. L. Mencken
Heather Graham with Oliver Clothesov!
Are you...Are you some kind of genius?
No, ma'am, I'm just a regular Slashdot reader.
I will light my genitals on fire and spray myself in the neck with an Uzi before I ever play another SoE game.
Voice acting, give me a break. I'm sure it will be very immersive too once you've hailed some dillshit about 80 times and heard the same crap over and over.
Sigil Games' new MMO is the only thing worth waiting for after WoW.
WOW has great graphics.
WOW seems like a bunch of pointless go out and kill some monsters, or talk to a few NPCS. I really found nothing exciting when I played it.
I wish some game company would employ me. Been sending out resumes for 16 years and I got a plane trip to E3 for 919 once. Problem is I talked about how great MMORPGS will be, and 1/2 their employees split to form Verant... So I didn't get the job.
MMORPGs are just at the start. I'm waiting for an action MMORPG like Planetside
BTW God spoke with me:
www.geocities.com/James_Sager_PA
God spoke to me.
I'm sure that having celebrity voices will make up for Sony's historical lack of responsiveness to its players, tendency toward leaving significant bugs extant for months at a time, incredible ability to back and fill when their community representatives contradict themselves, and so on.
:)
I played EQ for 2 years and while I did have a lot of fun, I was never especially happy with how they handled customer interaction. It didn't help that every single expansion they released had numerous, major bugs, and unfinished content that would get implemented months after launch, and then immediately get broken by players doing things the developers never thought of. Then they'd rebalance that content, and it would still be broken, merely in a new and interesting way.
Then there was the incredibly variable customer service. GMs were given an extremely wide latitude about how they could do things, which led to a lot of situations where someone did X, and was told it was okay, and someone else later also did exactly X, and was warned/suspended/banned for it. I was a Guide for six months on Brell Serilis (Tovarax Two Tone, troll bard), and we had a cool GM (Hi Oribi!) but a lot of other servers weren't so lucky. Even some of our guides were anal-retentive assholes, while others were easygoing. This kind of thing led directly to the impression that EQ customer service was capricious and cruel. It didn't help that there was no guarantee that a CS person would be online at any given time, so you might have an issue and have no chance of it being resolved before you had to log off.
Don't even get me started about the disaster that is Star Wars Galaxies. (It's not a game, it's an economy simulator with a Star Wars-themed front end.) Unless you saw it, you can't imagine the pandemonium on the beta boards when they announced that the game was launching in 9 days. Everyone thought SOE was nuts. The game was released less than half-finished, and over a year later it's still got huge problems.
I'm sure EQ2 will be pretty and flashy and have lots of cool stuff. But I have severe doubts -- well-grounded in history -- about SOE's ability to keep things good in the long run. Certainly wouldn't mind them proving me wrong.
Meanwhile, World of Warcraft in beta is already a better game than EQ was three years after it launched
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
I have been playing EQ for 5 year. I play with no sound and the lowest level of graphics detail. The reason I play with no sound is because years ago the sound could cause problems or crash. So, i turned it off, and have never turned it on again. The reason i play with the lowest level of graphics is so that i can run two instances of EQ. I have more than one account. One account runs a Bazaar selling character which is in a minimized EQ window. The other is the character I am actually playing. For best results I reduce all the graphics options to the lowest level. Also, I have another computer which is fast, and has a nice graphics board with 128 megs of ram. I tried running with all the highest level of graphics options, but ultimately, in a raid situation, it's too slow. So, over time that machine got reduced to the lowest level of graphics options. The story? What story? When i do quests i don't even talk to the NPCs. Just give my my item, thanks. I know there are some people that actually follow the story, or even try role playing. But, for the most part. EQ is not about the graphics, the sound, or even the story. It's about items, items, items, guilds, raids, items, buying, selling, items, and becoming more powerful. So, why bother with EQ2? I guess only to reserve a good name and be one of the first.
There are 10 types of people in the world... those that understand binary and those that don't.
I suggest james earl jones, because its true to life.
There goes my karma.. oh well..
I welcome our new 99% overlords.
Who are Christopher Lee Heather Graham?
They have to add something to try and make up all that goodwill they've blown with the customer base over the years. What with snotty customer service reps and a community liason who took every opportunity to insult the players, its a wonder the game has stayed as popular as it has.
Most people are still playing EQ becuase their friends are. They better count on enough of that carrying people over into EQ2 to make it profitable.
These are the same people that wielded the ban stick far too indescriminately in Star Wars recently and then ruthlessly squashed any in game criticism of the same actions by teleporting their own customers into some very bad situations (outer space, in the middle of bases swarming with enemy).
As Christopher Lee would say...
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Same. I always just turn the sound off and turn the stereo on. Spiffy graphics are neat when noone is there, but when you put 100+ people and a dragon in the same room they render your computer useless.
Michael
Wow, I didn't know that having a life equaled to slacking.
Hardcore gamers will still level up more than casual gamers, but that system will prevent the casuals from being completely overwhelmed. I for one think it's a good thing.
..EQ2 and World of Warcraft, which are rumored to be coming out on the same day.
Anybody wants to buy a girlfriend?
Amen. If I have to hear this gripe from one more "hardcore" gamer. I'm gonna scream. When's a MMO gonna reward me for working at my job 60+ hours a week and then going out and getting thoroughly trashed every Saturday night? That's a helluva lot more work than sitting around clicking the same buttons over and over again grinding out some uber character so I can lord over the newbs with the latest gear that I'll have to replace every time a new expansion comes out.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine...
In the recently released expansion for the original Everquest, titled "Omens of War"( http://everquest.station.sony.com/omensofwar/overv iew.jsp ), SoE (Sony Online Entertainment) introduced a voice system where the sound files reside on the local machine. These sounds were all done by 2 people; 1 male and 1 female. There is also an ability to add your own sound with the caveat that only you will be able to hear that sound (a la Baulders Gate).
The voice system has been generally agreed upon as crap in this expansion. If they were to tweak it so that voice commands could be given during the game, say by your group or raid leader, then it might be worth something. However as another poster said, I never played Everquest with the sound on because the music never used to work on systems running Win2k or XP. Took them 3+ years to get the music to work in Everquest.
Is there heaven? Is there Hell? Is that a Tuna Melt I smell?-Primus
My disagreement here is getting the name-brand actors. Honestly, I could not care less that Christopher Lee is doing the voice. I just want someone who can do good accents and put proper emotions into their performance. Heck, head out to your local theater and you can probably get voice acting just as good for the price of dinner. At that, some will do it just for notoriety and another entry for the acting resume.
This sig has absolutely no significance and serves only to take up screen space and waste the time of the reader.
You should try this other MMORPG called "ebay". It's about items, items, items, buying, selling, and becoming more powerful.
why bother with eq2?
by that standard, why bother using anything besides windows 3.1??? New things come out for a reason, it's called progress. EQ2 has better features across the board. EQL is 5 year old technology being phased out for the next gen of online gaming. That's why you'd switch.
WoW is hardly a "clusterfuck". You're basing your opinion on two misconceptions.
1) The rest system is not a big deal. It doubles the EXP for kills for a short while, but it's not a free ride. If you don't log on for a whole week, you might gain enough "free" doubled EXP for a single level. (Also, I disagree with your premise is that the point of an MMORPG is to "work" at the game. WoW is not a level grind to be the first Warrior to hit 60. We'll always have EQ for that.)
2) The servers are split as follows: Asia, North America, Europe. There is no case where two people from the same continent will be unable to play with each other. The reasons are partly practical and partly business; aside from language barriers and the late European launch, the non-US servers are being run by different divisions and even different companies. Even considering that, Blizzard has publically stated that there will be some way for guildmates to play with each other internationally some time after the European launch.
Really, these are non-issues. WoW is a very enjoyable game, not a "clusterfuck". I do have some issues with the way that Vivendi is handling the launch, but this is not a SOE-level disaster.
Okay, so the voice actor comes into the studio one day, records fifty lines he or she has never thought about before, and leaves. They might sound good the first time around, but these will get so tired, so fast.
First encounter at the camp: "Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; Or close the wall up with our English dead. In peace there's nothing so becomes a man As modest stillness and humility: But when the blast of war blows in our ears, Then imitate the action of the tiger; Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage; Then lend the eye a terrible aspect; Let pry through the portage of the head Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it As fearfully as doth a galled rock O'erhang and jutty his confounded base, Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean."
The next day, arriving at the camp. "Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; Or close the wall up with our English dead. ... " yeah, yeah, whatever, gramps
Ten minutes later, walking past. "Once more unto the breach, ..." shut UP already
Five minutes later, walking past. "Once more ..." mute button
[
Who is Christopher Lee?
What about guilds where half the members are in Europe and half are in North America? Some of these people have been playing MMOG's together since Ultima Online 6 years ago. Now they're being told they should stop grouping together "for their own good".I wonder why they're so pissed off?
How will World of Warcraft differ from other MMORPGs?
As long as it is not as bad as Lineage 2 where you have to:
spend two or three 8 hour days to level up and a week to upgrade equipment.
download 1/3 of the game when there's an update.
scammers & farmers dominate the game.
2 hours server maintenance turns into 8 hours.
We'll be fine.
My penguin ate my sig
Ahem: Blizzard has publically stated that there will be some way for guildmates to play with each other internationally some time after the European launch.
Nobody claimed it was a perfect solution. The European launch will be much later than the US launch, probably delayed by 4-5 months. I'm not exactly thrilled about that. No doubt that Vivendi has something to do with that.
But, all you need a North American billing address to play the US version of the game. It shouldn't be too hard for trans-atlantic guilds to figure that one out.
Still doesn't beat the original Utlima Online, in
the days before they runined it with a series of
everquest clone patches.
If you would take the time to read the EQ2 dev chats/journals, you would realize that for music they intend to play it once to set the mood. For example, whenever you enter a zone, it plays a music score once, then fades it out. I imagine (haven't checked for sure) they'll be doing a similar thing with voices; you hear it once, then the rest of the time is just text. That way it NEVER gets old.
mmmm... hot Indian girl (drools)
ChozSun
ChozSun.com
When there is enough band width problems with online Multiuser gaming. Why spoil the game for new people, because someone with a macro-robot and a t1 line close to the server thinks he is badass for whupping neophytes with his amazing "no better use of time need to get a life" superpowers?
Let the actors talk, it will allow more players to actually interact, rather than whack off by whacking others.
I bet they cut him out of the sequel.
Good thing you AC'd that, since you've just hoisted yourself on your own "retard".
since I haven't read anything suggesting EQ2 is coming to the mac I know what MMORPG I will be buying......actually none since I don't think I'll have time to play while in law school
*DOH*
But if I did....it would be WoW all the way!!!
So what happens - he disappears ten minutes into the game and never comes back?
Kingdom Hearts, the big RPG collaboration between Square and Disney, has several pretty-well-known voice actors in it:
Haley Joel Osment - Sora
David Gallagher - Riku
Hayden Panettiere - Kairi
David Boreanaz - Leon
Mandy Moore - Aerith
Christy Carlson Romano - Yuffie
Lance Bass - Sephiroth
Sean Astin - Hercules
Dan Castellaneta - Genie
I guess this would be the first MMORPG with Hollywood actors, though. Doesn't seem like a real big deal to me.
See the main flaw in your argument is you consider clicking buttons and staring at an MMORPG window for hours on end to be "working your ass off".
Sacré-bleu! Where is me mama?
Why ? Look at what Sony is putting there money in. Actors, fancy graphics and marketing.
... AGAIN. They really don't care what people think, or problems with the game.
Mean while, there combat, quest system, (no PVP) are all badly under developed. EQ2 is Alpha quailty marked with Beta. This game would not be ready for at least another year and a half.
Sony and there great ideas, have decied they are going to release EQ2 on the same day as WoW, ready or not. They don't care if the game works or not. They are going to pull another SWG.
Blizzard on the other hand, is making it right the first time. They aren't going to release until the game is ready, end of story. So far, WoW (yes, I am in the beta) has a serious edge on EQ and EQ2. They fixed all the serious MMO problems. For example: Instead of killing the same mob all day, for 2 weeks straight in order to get 5 levels, you get most of your exp from quests. PVP already works 50 times better then EQ PVP. (I played on SZ for 3 years)
The biggest problem Sony has is QA and customer service. It takes them 8 - 10 hours to respond to an ingame ticket. Meanwhile, Sony cuts there GM force down by half
Blizzard DOES care. I get a response from a GM within 2 mins. The listen to the customers on what they would like to see. Hell, I have personally suggested at least 5 large changes that made it into the game.
With EQ1, there are large problems with the game that have been there for over 4 years. They KNOW how to fix it, they just don't care.
This is why I could careless about EQ or Sony. They will continue to release shit until the end of time.
until (succeed) try { again(); }
That's Christopher REEVE who died recently. Not Reeves.
First, Superman could fly. Then, Superman couldn't even walk. And now, Superman can fly again. Peace be with you, Christopher.
As shocking as it may seem, there are people who don't know what EQ2 means... even ones that read Slashdot. Maybe it's because I've had a long day or because I'm part of the "games are for consoles" crowd, but I had no idea what game that is until I read some comments. It wouldn't hurt to mention it's the sequel to EverQuest in the summary if the official name of the game is EQ2.
"Dave, I stand still--the conclusions jump to me!" - Bill McNeal, NewsRadio
"...Players will be able to complete quests and experience the world at their own pace-whether it be a few hours here and there, or week-long adventuring marathons..."
:-)
Yeah, we've all heard that before. All it means is you're a wimp compared to the no life junkies that play 12 hours a day who own the server and all it's content, holding you back even more.
WOWs graphics look chincy. EQ2's kick it's butt to hell and back. And while there are loads of Blizzard fans, I'm sure as hell not one of them. Warcraft=Starcraft=whoever masters the building algorithm wins. No battle tactics or 'chess games' here. The original warcraft was fun until it just became a battle of the building, then it was boring beyond belief. Same for Warcraft 2, 3 and Starcraft. Only the sprite have been changed to protect the guilty.
And Blizzard has ZERO experience with RPGs. One person here said WOW was already a better game than EQ was after 3 years. Considering WOW wasn't in development until EQ was 3 years old isn't saying much. EQ broke new ground. WOW is just an also ran in a saturated market now.
MMOs have hit a brick wall because developers don't get it. People WANT to slay the dragon without having to play 12 hours a day. Stop holding everyone back with ridiculous chokepoints! Hire more people to create content and people will keep playing and be MUCH happier because they'll feel they can accomplish something.
It shouldn't have to take 5-8 hours to organize a boss raid. You shouldn't need 70 people to kill the boss mob. I sure as hell only need 5 to 7 of my friend when I played D&D so many years ago and we killed all kinds of major stuff. And when we finished that, did we diss the DM and never cancel our game sessions? Hell no! It only got us rearing up to play MORE.
I haven't heard anything about WOW that excites me. The graphics look weak and I know several jerkwads from my old EQ server that moved to WOW, so that's reason enough to avoid it to me!
Go to cookie manager and clean your Slashdot related cookies.
That should help.
Jasmin.
Blizzard must be doing a great job if these two "problems" are the best reason critics can come up with to justify avoiding the game.
1) If you played the game you would know this is a non-issue. At most you get an extra bubble bonus (total) from the first few kills after being offline all night. It's just an incentive to log out at an inn.
2) It's an issue with the way billing is handled. From what I understand they don't have the infrastructure set up for international billing (outside of the native country for the server farm).
Blizzard reps said that they will get it set up, but not in time for launch. Also, they noted that if you have a way to pay for the account with a US billing address you are free to do so and play on the US servers (and vice versa with Euro servers I assume). It's just a matter of being able to do billing correctly.
Unfortionatly, these features are making the game itself HUGE..
In the beta right now, the client download is like 3 gigs..
Dude, I know. I remember when Wing Commander 2 came on FOURTEEN floppy discs, while normal games came on maybe 2 to 4 - and that was before add on speech packs. There's no justification for a game being that big!
Of course, that was a 28mb install, when most people had 40-80mb hard drives. EQ2 is, what, a 3gb install when 120gb drives are $60 in the weekend ads.
Wing Commander 2 is remembered by gamers of the era as one of the great games. Yes, it took up a lot of space - but it was worth it to have a game that pushed new technology and ideas.
EQII is simply following in its footsteps - 3gb seems huge now. Moore's law tells us that, in ten years, the innovations are what we'll remember, not the 3gb install that we could copy ten times over on to our removable storage media, let alone our 100tb hard drives.
Christopher Lee is doing the voice for the Evil Lord Sir Lucan D'Lere, leader of the city of Freeport
When I read "Evil Lord", I immediately thought of Christopher Walken.
Please, children, scootch closer. Don't make me tell you again about the scootching. You in the red, chop-chop.
He'd be great for the role as long as he doesn't start demanding more cow-bell.
don't forget the 300 random red & yellow jumpsuit dancers that pop out of nowhere and being instantly teleported to snowy mountains, green fields, and downtown mumbai in the space of 2 minutes
"I DARE you to make less sense!"
I'd *love* to hear/ watch the Christopher Lee interview, but I'm using a web browser which correctly does what servers tell it to do (I know of only one which doesn't, and I don't have access to it).
The interview is apparently in plain text (the server says "text/plain") so my web browser displays it. It's gibberish, certainly not plain text. What is it? I don't know, and why should I know. Why isn't their server telling me what it *really* is?
This kind of sloppiness puts me off a company's products. Bye, Sony.
The story rocks, too.
yeah but I figured nobody would believe that sort of stuff happens in movies and I'd get modded down for flamebait or troll. ;)
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
Sony Executive: You were selected to do the voiceover for the new everquest game. Are you excited?
Hollywood celebrity: Are you shitting me? No fscking way I do the voice of a troll!
Sony Executive: Look at your contract. You are my bitch.
Hollywood Celebrity (looking at contract): Hey, wait a... I know what I'll do! I'll change my name to the symbol "%&$()*&" and you won't own me anymore!
Sony Executive: Sorry, this is already taken by Matt Damon. You are starting tomorrow.
Hollywood celebrity: arrrrrrgh!
Sony Executive: That's the spirit!
I have about 400 hours (16 some days) in my World of Warcraft character and must say it is the first game I have been excited about since the original EverQuest. I have played just about every MMORPG that has come out in the last few years and really have to say that the lower level (particularly alliance side) portion of the game is brilliant. The higher levels of the game don't have the same polish and "magic" as the lower levels (most likely due to the push for a Christmas release) but WoW is leaps and bounds above any MMORPG on the market. Although I love World of Warcraft the more I played the game the more I noticed that it is nothing really new or revolutionary. World of Warcraft is "evolutionary not revolutionary". It took what worked with MMORPG's and put it together well, but appears a bit rushed (compared to the lower level content) at the higher levels (yet still huge strides over other MMORPGs). Recently I have not been enjoying WoW as much as I once did possibly due the slightly rushed current higher level content (no raid content in the game yet) and the fact that I am in the process of writing a few player guides for the game (which quickly causes burn out). It could also be the fact that my main character (a mage) went from being overpowered to a bit underpowered. Blizzard tends to nerf and fix things with large sweeping changes until they find a proper medium. I have yet to really look at EQ2 yet just because I was tired of the EverQuest world and its unfortunate decline over the years. EverQuest 2's main audience is the 2 million people who have played EverQuest over its lifespan (and quit for numerous reasons). EQ2 and WoW are the most anticipated MMORPG's ever. It will be interesting to see how they play out, but either way new players will want new guides and GameGuidesOnline http://www.gameguidesonline.com/ staff will cover both games.
Did you even read the rest of the post? It stated that guildmates from across the world will be able to play together eventually.
Yeah because the whole Diablo series has never been a time sink.
Sniker..Sniker
Or you could always go and get yourself a copy o Sacred. My first impression of it was that it was
a shameless Diablo rip offand then I realised it fixed everything I hated about Diablo2.
It seems every few months there's another buzz about the next big MMORPG destroying Everquest. This was said about AO, SWG and DAOC and of course WOW. So far, none of EQ's competitors have lived up to the hype. I don't expect WOW to be any different.
In fact, I don't expect EQ2 to be an Everquest killer either, even though it is supposedly the "next generation."
This reminds me of all the hype about so-called "superior products" that never caught on, from NeXT to the Betamax. It's more than just higher-resolution or more features. If you don't have a robust community that rallies around your new product, it doesn't matter how "superior" it may be.
It's also accepted in this area, that many of those who are hyping up the next EQ-killers are ex-EQ players that quit in frustration because a GM wouldn't spawn a mob for them, or couldn't get into the uber guild, or were banned for doing something dumb. When SWG came out, a lot of EQ'ers jumped over, got bored with the "superior game design" and came back.
As I understand it, SOE isn't letting existing EQ players appropriately migrate to EQ2. As an EQ player since beta, with multiple high-level characters and years of online play invested, there's no way I'm going to EQ2 and have to start over. I don't care of Antonia gives me a free massage with release, I picked my hamster wheel and I'm not getting on another one, and I know many fellow players who have the same opinion.
Ironically, the next generation of MMORPGs may have more realistic graphics, but the high-end players tend to turn many of these features off in favor of better in-game performance.
My prediction is that EQ2 will have the same type of impact as SWG had. People will check it out and then come back. SOE won't be able to parallel EQ's success with EQ2 and will have to either upgrade EQ to EQ2 or create a migration path from EQ to EQ2 where players aren't starting back over from the beginning. This is of course, assuming that Christopher Walken doesn't end up doing the voice of Fippy Darkpaw. That might make me change my mind.
I run this on an iMac G3/266
Wow, and they say there aren't any games for the Mac! Counting the little number puzzle game, that makes at least 2 games you can play on your Mac! Ain't life grand?
Christ man, why the fuck do you bother? That's not fun, it's just work.
Or the likes?
I could use a real-fantasy fantasy girlfriend. Sure would make it easy for me to avoid falling prey to all the dudes who masquerade as women in these games!!!!!
Blizzard has repeatedly ignored problems and lied to its customers. For a very long time they denied that duping was possible in Diablo II. In spite of numerous duped "uber" items, Blizzard insisted that its client/server model eliminated cheating. It became laughable after a while. Customers knew that cheating was rampant, and Blizzard knew that cheating was rampant. Maybe they were lying to themselves or maybe they were just trying to save face, but it took them quite a long time to even acknowledge the existence of duped items.
I played WoW in the recent stress test. There was a running contest that promised to award closed beta slots to people who reached high levels in their respective character classes. The contest looked good on paper, but Blizzard kept amending the rules and changing the deadlines. Should I keep competing? Is the contest over? Under one set of rules, I think I've won, but this other set of rules says otherwise--which is it? Is this contest being extended yet again? Your guess was as good as mine Blizzard didn't bother to answer (and in the cases where they decided to, it was often days late and ambiguous at best). Communication on the part of Blizzard devs and moderators was piss poor, and a number of people who were competing for these beta slots were left hanging and had no idea what was going on. In the end, they issued a notification that the contest would be ending only *one hour* before it actually did.
In the end, was the contest snafu a big deal? Maybe to you and me it wasn't, but to the people who were in the running for the competition it was. It was handled extremely poorly and let a lot of people down. If this and the prior Diablo II customer relationship is any indication of Blizzard's post-release attitude, then there are certainly dark days ahead.
Really, people like Blizzard because they put out games that are fun and are nicely balanced. But that's only half of the equation in a MMORPG. Communication and customer relations are just as important. Blizzard has never put out a game based on a subscription model and people's faith in them right now is based solely on their track record with less complicated games like Starcraft and Warcraft. WoW is a different ballgame, and the "just trust Blizzard, they won't screw it up" chant doesn't hold up any longer. Is WoW fun as a game? Sure. But if the level of communication we see during beta carries over to release without any significant improvements, we're in for a disappointment in the long run.
Imagine a city presided over by Tubgirl!
Link not provided because, well, eww.
Well, you don't need 70 people to slay bosses in EQ2. Raids are limited to 24 people, which is very reasonable for a 50-75 person guild.
I'll still never buy another Sony MMOG again. After playing EQ for a year and then SWG for 6 months I can't stand the way that company runs things.
Blizzard has a long track record of focusing on gameplay gameplay develo....err....gameplay whereas Sony has proven time and time again that they will throw lots of money into flashy graphics, this new voice talent, lots of marketing, etc.
Both games will attract different and similar crowds, but I think the mature gamers will appreciate the depth of WoW whereas the younger people who have all day to spend camping and powerleveling will stick to EQ.
Frankly, this isn't such a bad thing. I've been enjoying the recent trend of niche market MMORPGs and hope they continue to be developed as more and more people will find the game thats right for them, which will have the pleasant side effect of getting rid of a lot of the people that they typically don't enjoy playing with for various reasons.
I predict both will do fine, even if for different reasons, although in the end if I ever do pick up another MMORPG, it will most likely be WoW over EQ.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
This is the ultimate game for the MMORPG throngs who strive only to acquire power, riches, and equipment.
:-(
It's great, I play 24x7! I'm so good, I play while I'm asleep and I still persevere!
Check it out:
http://www.progressquest.com
I even play it at work. If you have your own windows box you could to I'd bet. No native linux "client" though.
Personally, I prefer a game that lets me enjoy it without dedicating full 8+ hour shifts just to grind XP on mushrooms.
Yes, I can make fun of my own OS choice, even with stereotypes that aren't true.
Sorry for Heather Graham fans out there, but as pretty as she is, she never struck me as being a great actress. And as a voice actress, it seems to me that she loses a lot of her appeal.
Christopher Lee, on the other hand, is a legend. And he has a fantastic voice.
I viewed the sony release about the new items in EQ2 and it just seems to be that they're adding cute fluff that is irrelevent to the reason that many people play EQ. The adventure is happening in our minds and the EQ environment is just a catalyst to help us visualise it.
I play EQ after the kids are in bed. I have found that I have to play it with the sound off to avoid disturbing the rest of the household. Also, as I often play 2 characters at once I found running two sound streams simultaneously to be irritating and problematic.
It doesnt bother me that I play in silence, and the only in-game downside is that I miss the odd unique sound made by "named mobs" that spawn which lets the other party know theres something exciting around but that hardly ever happens.
The current everquest world has thousands of players online over 120+ zones. Whilst I have only got a selection of people in my friends list and have only visited about 60 zones in the last 4 years I feel these are two of everquests main points that keep me returning to the game.
If there was a "sociable tourist" class that'd be me.
Whilst I'd admit that some of the old content is due for rebalancing and rework. It seems that the new everquest is just adding cute fluff and eye candy whilst reducing the content and community.
I wish they spent their money/effort on EQ1. I'd be more likely to keep my $20/month going to them than some prettyier newcomer.
-- Don't believe everything you read, hear or think