Originally posted by Guillermo197 

We are talking about games released since 2004!!! Tjeez. And from that period, EQ2 provides easily the most content and features to date.

Ofcourse (and I sincerly hope) that games released in the end 90's like EQ1 has more content by now or it wouldn't be up and running anymore now would it?? But hardly any new player is going to jump on a heavily outdated game released 10 years ago.

SOE sucks at Marketing! Period!

Except of old EQ1 fans, hardly anyone here in Europe knows about SOE (including gamestores employees)! There isn't a single box of any SOE game available in the prominent stores.

Here in Oslo we got dozens of Gamestop stores and they have not a single SOE product in the shelves, while boxes from like WoW, FFXI, LOTRO (and its expansion), CoX, Guild Wars, etc, etc are prominent on display.

That's easy 100-200k potential subs for EQ2 out of the window. Extra subs they could have had along the years if they bothered to look outside their US borders!!

 

EQ2 does not provide the most features of mmos.  It completely lacks pvp worth mentioning which puts it into one of the smaller featured mmos.  It doesn't matter what you, I or the next person thinks, because pvp is an important feature for many people as can be seen by just about every other game on the market.  I can't think of any pve only games that are feature rich or subscriber heavy.  PvP is a far larger part of gaming than instanced housing or some other fluff.  

The quantity of expansions for the game isn't a strong point either.  When the president of the company has to promise to slow down expansions so that quality gets better that says something.

As for soe sucks at marketing, I think you are wrong.  Soe is actually pretty good at marketing and they put out some of the more impressive trailers that I have ever seen.  However that does not give them power to force stores to carry their product.  Stores stock items that sell and if they are not stocking EQ2 it is because the game does not sell.  It is as simple as that.  Soe marketing cannot force stores to carry their products. 

If it was as simple as advertising the game a little bit to increase income by more than was spent on marketing, don't you think they would be doing that?  What would possibly make you think they don't understand that?  Everyone keeps saying "if soe would market their games more people would play them" as if it is some concept that has escaped the attention of soe marketing.  Has it ever occured to anyone that they have stopped marketing, because it has not proven financially viable?  That marketing the games has not had the intended effect of increasing subs, let alone by the numbers people speculate here?

Originally posted by socrates656

Been playing mmo's for 10 years. Played wow for 4 1/2 years. Quit wow because the game is retarded now

Everquest  2 is 10x better then it was before. Why are not more people playing this game? This game is so much better then World of Warcraft in almost every single way.

- More things too do in Eq2 then wow, when you play eq2 you will always have somthing too do. You dont just to have to quest and lvl up all the time.

- Better crafting system

- Better character creation

- Better class system

- Better gameplay

- Better questing system

- Better achievments system

- Player Housing

- More game lore

- Books that you can actually learn stuff about and get special attacks when completing the quests they you get from the books

- Better achievments system then wow, more indepth

- Better talent tree's

 

I could list many more things. So my question is... what the hell is wrong with gamers now a days? Why do more people play wow? what the hell is wrong with gamers? do they like to play shitty games or what?

Well  TBO  the reason more play wow is simple  it can be played on low end systems that can not what so ever run eq2 and this has always been true. I personally got eq2 at release and couldnt play on my P3  1.6  Cpu   But i ran wow just fine  two years after i got a new system that could handle eq2 with out any problems and i quit wow and never looked back.  I was in japan and was in a internet cafe and all the people were playing wow and i ask why all the wow fan bois the person at the counter simply stated that there machines couldnt hand eq2 either so thats why wow is so popular there also.
 

It's too bad alot of people don't like EQ2 simply, because of SOE, or because it has a item mall. I really think EQ2 has alot more to offer then most of the MMO's on the market right now. I have beta tested alot of upcomming MMO's this year and must say most of them don't even compare to this game at all. There are so many things you can do in this game, and there is so much content in it, it's just plain rediculas. And what I like about it is that you don't have to just sit and quest and lvl all the time, there is simply so many things differn't things too do. I havin't had as much fun playing a MMO like this since the original Starwars Galaxies.

It's too bad SOE is so bad at marketing, because if they would of treated their customers better in the past, their previous customers who they treated unfairly could see how much of a great game EQ2 has become since it's original release in 2004. There has been so many things added into EQ2 it's just plain retarded, and I don't think I'll be getting bored of it anytime soon.

Originally posted by Daffid011

Originally posted by Guillermo197 

We are talking about games released since 2004!!! Tjeez. And from that period, EQ2 provides easily the most content and features to date.

EQ2 does not provide the most features of mmos.  It completely lacks pvp worth mentioning which puts it into one of the smaller featured mmos.  It doesn't matter what you, I or the next person thinks, because pvp is an important feature for many people as can be seen by just about every other game on the market. 

The quantity of expansions for the game isn't a strong point either.  When the president of the company has to promise to slow down expansions so that quality gets better that says something.

 *edit* Reponse to Guillermo197:

It doesn't even come close to the most features or content.

*edit* Response to Daffid011
 

The standard accepted number for the MMO industry is that 10% of the market is PvP.  I'd also challenge you to list the western based MMO's that have meaningful pvp and had a higher subscription base than EQ2...  Other than WoW which I'm not sure I see as meaningful pvp.  Lack of PvP entirely would not give a game the smallest feature set...  Tho I suppose size of feature set has nothing to do with total subscribers (I think the thread was about .. the amount of people playing the game).

I like pvp but that is a pretty odd point of view as to why EQ2 is in the state its in.  UO certainly had some of the best PvP in my opinion and its peak of all time was 250,000 subscribers and that was after AoS (what I consider the worst expansion UO ever had when I was still playing..) aka it came after trammel etc

I'm not sure about a general mass perception on the EQ2 expansions.  DoF was probably fine but there was a combat revamp put in there that was not a good choice.. and a lot of people quit then.  However, it wasn't due to the expansion it was due to the moronic combat revamp.  KoS and EoF for the most part were "ok" and well done.  RoK came along with another drop off in developer quality.. as we got all the healer stats put on Leather quest rewards.  Which screwed over Chain/Plate healers and Brawlers.  As there to this day in the "RoK" quest lines a severe lack of Brawler rewards (almost all the leather is healer spec'd).  They did add new quests in recently to these zones so that may have improved but those quests weren't part of the expansion.  TSO is probably the worst expansion so far...

The next expansion is going out the door in Feb with a level cap raise to 90.  So they seem to be on about the same speed of expansion releases they have always had for EQ2...

I tried to do a search for for the "slow down expansions comment" and I can't find it.. so I can't really say one way or the other.  As a still semi active EQ2 player I've never heard reference to that comment about EQ2 expansions release slow down.

EQ2 like many MMO's is a victim of its own development team and design decisions made.

Look back at the archived discussions about various major changes to the game and then look at the various time lines for server mergers for EQ2... You will find a pretty direct and obvious connection.

After all these years developers have still not figured out when you completely change the game people buy... there is a pretty high percentage they will no longer play it.  The only real chance to keep them.. is if the game they bought wasn't the one you advertised...

I don't think the expansions were the problem.  They had some bad re-design choices here and there.  Then around when RoK was released we saw a drop off in developer quality )

The current class developer.. is also one of the most clueless people I have ever seen on a design team.  Luckily the game director came in and dumped his "Tank Overhaul" so they didn't have the same outcome as his Ranger revamp.  (I don't play a tank or a scout .. but when you see a really bad/stupid idea.. you don't have to play the class.  I play a healer ... if it matters).

*edited* to make it clear what was in reponse to who.

Originally posted by DoomsDay01

I have played EQ2 a couple of times and the same thing always gets me about that game. I do not like the fact that you have to purchase your spells from other players. Sure you can get apprentice versions from npc's but lets face it, without adapts most of the powers sucked and you could barely function for your class. The other part that really ticked me off about that was how overpriced the adapts where. Sure there were a few classes that could adapts cheaply but for most of the people playing it was very hard to afford your spells. It was a catch 22, people didnt want you in their groups if you didnt have certain spells at adapt levels yet these are the same people that put the adapts up for a level 10 person at several gold a piece.

Me and a buddy of mine went back and played  last year. he played a swashbuckler and I played a warden. It was night and day for the costs of our spells. He was able to buy adapts of every single power he had up to level 20 and none of them ever cost him more than 50-60 silver and that was when he was near 20 and heck, even when he was up in the 40's his costs still only got to a couple of gold per spell. My wardens powers were costing me several gold a spell before I even got to 10. there were lots of spells I couldn't buy simply because I couldn't afford them.

I hated this model when they put it in EQ1 after the first expansion. I dont mind having to travel around to vendors to get my spells and I dont mind if I have to do some quests to get them, but having them as random drops off of mobs so that people can sell them is just wrong. I had 2 chars that made it to around 60 and a couple that was in the mid 30's. I can honestly say that I never had more than 2 or 3 spells ever drop for my own class and as for master drops, I got 3 total master drops combined with all my characters and yes I know they were supposed to be rare but thats still crazy. Im sorry, there is just no way anyone can justify this type of spell drop system. I still remember my first character (a cleric) that saw his first adapt spell (a level 2 spell) that was selling for 10 gold. This was right at the start of the game. Nobody had 10 gold. Heck I was in the mid teens before I actually had more than 5 gold to my name. Sorry, I just can not play a game like that any more. I am surprised that I lasted as long as I did considering how bad I hated it in eq1. I will say though, I will never play another mmo that has that type of a spell drop system again. Its just not worth the frustration.

 

Making money was stupid easy if you knew how.

All you had to do was sell collectible items, even some of the low level ones in Antonica or Commonlands and WC and so forth could go for up to a plat (sometimes a bit more) each, and usually they went for at least a few gold.

Originally posted by Daffid011

EQ2 does not provide the most features of mmos.  It completely lacks pvp worth mentioning which puts it into one of the smaller featured mmos.  It doesn't matter what you, I or the next person thinks, because pvp is an important feature for many people as can be seen by just about every other game on the market.  I can't think of any pve only games that are feature rich or subscriber heavy.  PvP is a far larger part of gaming than instanced housing or some other fluff.  

The quantity of expansions for the game isn't a strong point either.  When the president of the company has to promise to slow down expansions so that quality gets better that says something.

As for soe sucks at marketing, I think you are wrong.  Soe is actually pretty good at marketing and they put out some of the more impressive trailers that I have ever seen.  However that does not give them power to force stores to carry their product.  Stores stock items that sell and if they are not stocking EQ2 it is because the game does not sell.  It is as simple as that.  Soe marketing cannot force stores to carry their products. 

If it was as simple as advertising the game a little bit to increase income by more than was spent on marketing, don't you think they would be doing that?  What would possibly make you think they don't understand that?  Everyone keeps saying "if soe would market their games more people would play them" as if it is some concept that has escaped the attention of soe marketing.  Has it ever occured to anyone that they have stopped marketing, because it has not proven financially viable?  That marketing the games has not had the intended effect of increasing subs, let alone by the numbers people speculate here?

 

 

What is it with PVP?? When do you people understand that EverQuest 2 was never meant to be a PVP game! Just like it's predecesor EverQuest 1.

That they later put up 2 PVP servers, because some vocal minority requested it. Fine. No problem with that. But the classes aren't balanced for PVP and never will. Simply, because it's PVE game. And the focus will always be there. Period. Get over it.

And YES, YES and more YES! SOE does SUCK at Marketing.

They only promote their games within the US. That's all.

There is no need to force stores to display your product. If you don't bother to distribute any of your games outside US, then you don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure out that basically every prominent store isn't gonna bother to pay heavily to import your game boxes themselves. So far only online stores like Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.de does this.

Gamestop USA has SOE games on the shelves, but Gamestop Europe doesn't have a single box on display. Simply because SOE has no European distribution of their games.

I have seen plenty of games on the shelves that do far worse then EverQuest2, EverQuest1. Hell... I still ran into boxes of Tabula Rasa and Hellgate: London in some stores ROFL. While these games have already been shut down.

Hence, they basically don't give a damn about non-US customers. If we have to use phone support, we are forced to make very expensive phonecalls, as there is only a US number.

Also, you don't want to know how long we European players had to complain and spam the EQ2 forums to get our 2 EU servers moved to Europe to get acceptable PING's.

Then we had to complain and spam the forums for almost 2 years, before they changed the maintainance windows for the EU servers outside our Prime Time hours!

You can put it all you want. SOE just sucks at Marketing and basically any customer care outside US! And they always have.

With all due respect, you live in the US. So you don't know what you are talking about.

Cheers

I personally enjoy Vanguard more than EQII.  IMO it is more of what the EQ replacement should have been than EQII.

Originally posted by Guillermo197 

What is it with PVP?? When do you people understand that EverQuest 2 was never meant to be a PVP game! Just like it's predecesor EverQuest 1.

Yes I understand the EQ2 was not designed for pvp, which also has zero bearing on what I said.  Not having pvp is lacking a feature and one that many people seem to consider a very large feature by the looks of other games.   Perhaps there are numberous other features in EQ2 that I am not aware of, but people who tend to make claims of how awesome this game is and how many more features it offers never really seem to qualify those comments.  Pointing at the lack of pvp easily shows a large void in the game in comparison to other mmos on the market. 

It doesn't matter why it doesn't have something, because that was not the reason it was brought up. 
 

As for your marketing claims, I'll just say this.  Gamestop US hardly carries any PC titles worth mentioning in their strores.  You can find plenty online or even listed as "available" in the store, but what is actually on the shleves is drastically different.  I don't think that has anything to do with soe, but more about gamestop stocking a small selection of pc titles in their brick and mortar stores.  

Some people think there are hordes of potential customers waiting to play eq2 if only soe would market the game.  History has shown they tried and I think this thread reflects the results. I don't think soe is to stupid to miss truckloads of easy money if only they would market a little bit.  Saying things like that really glosses over a lot of real issues. 

Originally posted by Daffid011

Originally posted by Guillermo197 

What is it with PVP?? When do you people understand that EverQuest 2 was never meant to be a PVP game! Just like it's predecesor EverQuest 1.

 

Yes I understand the EQ2 was not designed for pvp, which also has zero bearing on what I said.  Not having pvp is lacking a feature and one that many people seem to consider a very large feature by the looks of other games.   Perhaps there are numberous other features in EQ2 that I am not aware of, but people who tend to make claims of how awesome this game is and how many more features it offers never really seem to qualify those comments.  Pointing at the lack of pvp easily shows a large void in the game in comparison to other mmos on the market. 

 

It doesn't matter why it doesn't have something, because that was not the reason it was brought up. 
 

 

As for your marketing claims, I'll just say this.  Gamestop US hardly carries any PC titles worth mentioning in their strores.  You can find plenty online or even listed as "available" in the store, but what is actually on the shleves is drastically different.  I don't think that has anything to do with soe, but more about gamestop stocking a small selection of pc titles in their brick and mortar stores.  

Some people think there are hordes of potential customers waiting to play eq2 if only soe would market the game.  History has shown they tried and I think this thread reflects the results. I don't think soe is to stupid to miss truckloads of easy money if only they would market a little bit.  Saying things like that really glosses over a lot of real issues. 

 

It's funny that you talk about PVP in EQ2 being terrible. I'm actually on the pvp server for Everquest 2 and it's one of the most popular severs in the game. I agree the PVP in Everquest 2 could be alot better, but I think alot of the things you have said in this thread are pretty ignorant, because most of what you saying is just your opinion. You don't even state any facts to prove your point. And who's to say that SOE have not had bad marketing in the past. Have you ever heard of a guy named John Smedley? John Smedley is President and CEO of Sony Online Entertainment and is a very good example of someone with very bad marketing skills in the past. Do some of your own research and look what he did with Sony's previous games.

To say too Guillermo197 that the marketing is doing well in europe when clearly you don't even live there how do you think you know? how could you know? I don't even know that, because I don't live there! You live in the United States. I live in canada, and I must say I hardly see any EQ2 games on sell in any of the stores here. As a matter of fact the only way I could purchase the game was to get it online. Not to say SOE is bad at marketing, but it does raise some questions. This isn't one or two stores were talking about here, this is alot of stores that should be carrying this product, but it's few and far between compared to Blizzards World of Warcraft. I can get WoW anywere I want too, at any store, and why can't I find any Everquest games, at any stores? I'm not in a small city eather. I'm in Edmonton, Alberta.

You also, talk about history.. well maybe you should do a little research of your own on the history of Sony Online Entertainment, because frankly you are very misinformed Daffid011
 

-> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Online_Entertainment

-> http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/02/21/tech/gamecore/main1335511.shtml

-> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Smedley_(developer)

Originally posted by NovaKayne

I personally enjoy Vanguard more than EQII.  IMO it is more of what the EQ replacement should have been than EQII.

 

 

I couldnt agree more. Vanguard is a great game. I was thinking about comming back too it soon.

Originally posted by socrates656

 

It's funny that you talk about PVP in EQ2 being terrible. I'm actually on the pvp server for Everquest 2 and it's one of the most popular severs in the game. I agree the PVP in Everquest 2 could be alot better, but I think alot of the things you have said in this thread are pretty ignorant, because most of what you saying is just your opinion. You don't even state any facts to prove your point. And who's to say that SOE have not had bad marketing in the past. Have you ever heard of a guy named John Smedley? John Smedley is President and CEO of Sony Online Entertainment and is a very good example of someone with very bad marketing skills in the past. Do some of your own research and look what he did with Sony's previous games.

To say too Guillermo197 that the marketing is doing well in europe when clearly you don't even live there how do you think you know? how could you know? I don't even know that, because I don't live there! You live in the United States. I live in canada, and I must say I hardly see any EQ2 games on sell in any of the stores here. As a matter of fact the only way I could purchase the game was to get it online. Not to say SOE is bad at marketing, but it does raise some questions. This isn't one or two stores were talking about here, this is alot of stores that should be carrying this product, but it's few and far between compared to Blizzards World of Warcraft. I can get WoW anywere I want too, at any store, and why can't I find any Everquest games, at any stores? I'm not in a small city eather. I'm in Edmonton, Alberta.

You also, talk about history.. well maybe you should do a little research of your own on the history of Sony Online Entertainment, because frankly you are very misinformed Daffid011
 

-> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Online_Entertainment

-> http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/02/21/tech/gamecore/main1335511.shtml

-> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Smedley_(developer)

I will try to answer each of your points

Sure Nagefen is one of the most popular servers, but at the same time the eq2 pvp servers have seen more mergers than the regular servers.  My point was that the lack of decent pvp makes the game feature lacking in comparison to many other games on the market.  Many of those games have more pvp servers than pve servers.  It is an important feature in the current market and the lack of that feature is rather large.  One popular server does not equate to the pvp being good. 

As to the marketing of eq2 I think you miss how much we agree on and also confuse some things.  Let me explain.

I think we are all in agreement that soe is not marketing the game to any great degree currently.  Yes even in Europe.  Lack of marketing is almost a death sentence for a product, unless it generates its own word of mouth advertising.  SOE chosing not to market eq2 does not help its potential to grow.  I don't think we disagree on any of that.

What we disagree on is the why and hows of that marketing in the past and how it relates to now.

For example you point out john smedley as an example of poor marketing.  He isn't marketing, he is a stain on the companies image.  Marketing doesn't approve what he says or the direction he choses to take his games.  I agree with you that Smed doesn't help the image of his company, but that is not a result of the marketing efforts of the company. 

You also confuse marketing with what stores decide to stock.  Stores are not forced to stock items based on a companies marekting.  Demand for a product is the big factor here, not advertising. 

As for the actual marketing efforts of the company, we are both speculating and speaking our opinion which differs.

You and others seem to think that the condition eq2 is in right now is partly (heavily?) due to lack of marketing efforts by soe.  Some have even stated that the game is missing out on hundreds of thousands of players just from europe as a result of this.  Beyond that, there seems to be little supporting evidence to these claims.  The common theme seems to be that soe is just to stupid to do a little marketing which would obviously results in millions of dollars.

I am of the opinion that soe has marketed eq2 and their other games. [really you see this same thread in most of their game forums about the lack of advertising being the major downfall]   My opinion is that the marketing results just do not measure up to what some people think they would.   Soe is a company with more marketing experience than just about any other mmo company and I'm pretty sure they have more know how than a few forums posters blindly speculating windfalls from some simple marketing.

• soe has marketing and distributed mmos for mac, pc and console
• they have marketed and distributed over 2 dozen expansions
• they have marketed and distributed over a dozen mmos
• they had a marketing division for other mmo companies which marketed and distributed for 3 other companies
• they have used every media from forums, banners, magazines all the way to television commercials and plenty of "viral"
• they have over 10 years in mmo marketing experience.

So you are going to have to be a little more convincing about soes lack of marketing for eq2 being the problem.  This company has plenty of experience in marketing and if they chose not to advertise for a game then there is a very good reason they don't.  It isn't because they are stupid and don't realize that hundreds of thousands of players will join, it is because the marketing efforts just have not produced results for the game. 

It really is that simple.  Stores are not forced to carry eq2 boxes if soe markets the game.  Stores purchase and stock products that sell and if they are not stocking eq2 then it isn't a product that is selling.  That is part of the reason why they are resorting to digital distribution now. 

The end result is that if this game was as great as the original post makes it out to be then it would sell more copies just on the strength of its gameplay.  Word would spread and momentum would build.  Through out the thread though there have been many reasons listed as to why more people do not play the game.  That is the reality of the situation. 

Originally posted by Daffid011

Originally posted by Guillermo197 

What is it with PVP?? When do you people understand that EverQuest 2 was never meant to be a PVP game! Just like it's predecesor EverQuest 1.

 

Yes I understand the EQ2 was not designed for pvp, which also has zero bearing on what I said.  Not having pvp is lacking a feature and one that many people seem to consider a very large feature by the looks of other games.   Perhaps there are numberous other features in EQ2 that I am not aware of, but people who tend to make claims of how awesome this game is and how many more features it offers never really seem to qualify those comments.  Pointing at the lack of pvp easily shows a large void in the game in comparison to other mmos on the market. 

 

It doesn't matter why it doesn't have something, because that was not the reason it was brought up. 
 

 

As for your marketing claims, I'll just say this.  Gamestop US hardly carries any PC titles worth mentioning in their strores.  You can find plenty online or even listed as "available" in the store, but what is actually on the shleves is drastically different.  I don't think that has anything to do with soe, but more about gamestop stocking a small selection of pc titles in their brick and mortar stores.  

Some people think there are hordes of potential customers waiting to play eq2 if only soe would market the game.  History has shown they tried and I think this thread reflects the results. I don't think soe is to stupid to miss truckloads of easy money if only they would market a little bit.  Saying things like that really glosses over a lot of real issues. 

 

First,

PVP isn't that big in MMORPG's at all. Nor is it that in demand. I don't say there is no demand at all for it. Sure there is.

But the PVE market is far far bigger when it comes to MMO's. As most avid PVP'ers still play FPS games on their consoles and PC's. As that's where the real skilled and only balanced PVP lies! Not MMO's.

I have played WoW for almost 2 years. From wich more then a year on a RPPVP server and I can tell you, that even on a PVP server, the vast majority was more busy PVE'ing then bothering to PVP.

 If I want to PVP, and trust me I do and love doing it, I still fire up one of my favorite FPS games. And funny thing is that the community in these games are better, then the overal stupid ganking/griefing kiddies you encounter in MMO's with PVP. The irony.

Second,

SOE has NEVER EVER done ANY marketing at all in Europe. Period. Not even for EverQuest 2!

The only MMO's I have seen a lot of advertising for, and wich in result, are doing much much better here in Europe, are games like WoW and LOTRO.

Cheers

Yet PVP is still a feature that is a main staple of most pve mmos.  It may not be the single greatest driving force of mmos, but it is still a major feature.   So saying a game has the most features of any mmo on the market, yet lacks pvp is not a very compelling statement.  That is why I mention the lack of pvp.  

I find it hard to believe what you say about marketing in europe for soe games, so I guess we will just have to agree to disagree. 

regarding SOE marketing - they have also been known for having horrible ads

the 2 links below have aired on television in the past

EQOA -- Time to Slay the Dragon

www.youtube.com/watch

Everquest - EQ Girls

www.youtube.com/watch

that said,

having seen the Free Realms TV spots, seems like SOE TV advertising has improved

I totally forgot about the slay the dragon commercial, but it sure does bring back memories.  Honestly I thought it was a pretty good commercial at the time. 

The EQ girls seems like bad fan film or some lame attempt by soe to virally market the game.   Is that really something soe put out?

My previous comments might seem like I am saying the SOE is great at marketing, which is not what I am saying.  I think they are very strong in some areas like video trailers and over all experience with the inside of marketing, but I don't think their marketing campaigns have been very effective.  Be it the content of the campaign of the content of the products being marketed is debatable. 

I've never seen a tv add for the game in europe and the last press advert i saw was for EoF hell up untill TSO you couldnt even buy the game in a local game shop which is a killer for any game,let alone an MMO

Going to answer the OP's original question:

There aren't more people playing this game because it's not that great. It's actually not rated properly, in my opinion, as it should be sitting at around between 6 and 7 out of 10. I'd give Vanguard a higher rating than EQ2, and yes I have played both extensively. EQ2 feels too much like a game, not a living world. It feels closed, tight and unimaginative.

Originally posted by Mystik86

Going to answer the OP's original question:

There aren't more people playing this game because it's not that great. It's actually not rated properly, in my opinion, as it should be sitting at around between 6 and 7 out of 10. I'd give Vanguard a higher rating than EQ2, and yes I have played both extensively. EQ2 feels too much like a game, not a living world. It feels closed, tight and unimaginative.

I agree that the initial areas are tight and compact compared to Vanguard with the zones and "walls", and it's probably one of the biggest contributors to "newbies" leaving at the beginning of the game before they get out into the open areas. Hopefully, when Halas comes out, it will alleviate that feeling of enclosure with huge open city that opens into a very large "super zone" outdoor area. The cities like Freeport and Qeynos can get a little tedious with zoning from one part of the city to another, and I completely understand that.

However, if unimaginative were any indication of subscribership, WoW would have almost no players at all. It is a complete and total copycat all the way through with absolutely nothing innovative, or different, or even new. Borrowed lore from a borrowed game with borrowed concepts and copied mechanices. It is as unimaginative as a game gets, BUT it has millions of subscribers. I don't really think imaginative or unimaginative has anything at all to do with it.

Why is it that everytime someone asks this question, they get mad when people answer it?  It has happened the last several times this question has been asked.

My answer, and it would seem to be the answer from at least a few other posters, is that the folks at SOE seem to be openly hostile towards their customers.  Between the insulting outbursts and the lies, I cannot justify being a customer of SOE.  Thankfully, they have yet to offer a product where I cannot find something similar from another company, and in most cases, the other product is of superior quality.

Maybe someday the folks in charge of SOE will realize they are no longer the leaders of the industry.  There is a reason they are singled out by MMORPG players, on this site and many others across the internet.  From the old days of 'It's not a bug, it's a feature' to the 'I'm not going to delay a publish to change it to something our customers like, because you will bitch about it anyway' days of today, the folks at SOE still show contempt of their customers.

On top of all that, the folks at SOE seem to lie more than any company not involved in outright criminal activity should.  Is there really a reason for them to claim they implemented the Froglok race six months before they actually did?  Is there a reason the regularly release half finished expansions and claim that nobody has found or unlocked some of the content, primarily because they haven't actually implemented it yet (okay, this example skates very close to criminal behavior)?

EQ2 isn't any more deep than WoW or LotRO.  The only real difference is that the folks at Blizzard and Turbine have yet to make it obvious they don't like me or would prefer that I just shut up and continue to pay them.  If I'm buying a car, and have to choose among several similar models, I'm not very likely to buy one from the salesman who shows his comptempt towards me, even if the car he is selling is better than what his competetion is selling (which is definitely the case with SOE).

Add on top of all that the fact that EQ2 was released broken, and with the idea that the game was optimized for systems that would exist some day in the future, and you have the reason why EQ2 doesn't have a larger playerbase.  EQ2 is easily the best game that SOE has, but that isn't really enough.

There not playing it because they are better games out there, I recently started playing eq1 again, and it blows eq2 out of the water.

eq2 after kunark= garbage

If you would like to try a fun game check out eq1 and the new server which starts you at 51 with 50 aa's, Tons of people on the server and loads of fun.

Will they ever make Everquest 3?

I have toons in Eq1, Eq2 but i've not played them for least 3 (5 years eq)  years so I've missed a lot of expansions / content etc, and I think thats what has put me off re-joining. I remember I tried eq2 again years ago and I hardly seen any players around so I'm guessing the lowbie areas are really low population and will be even worse now.

I was hoping seeing as its 5 years (on november) that eq2 has been out, Info about the next Eq game would be out or start to surface but I guess Soe is putting all its resources into DC online and that agents game?

Originally posted by Guillermo197

Originally posted by Daffid011

Originally posted by Guillermo197 

What is it with PVP?? When do you people understand that EverQuest 2 was never meant to be a PVP game! Just like it's predecesor EverQuest 1.

 

Yes I understand the EQ2 was not designed for pvp, which also has zero bearing on what I said.  Not having pvp is lacking a feature and one that many people seem to consider a very large feature by the looks of other games.   Perhaps there are numberous other features in EQ2 that I am not aware of, but people who tend to make claims of how awesome this game is and how many more features it offers never really seem to qualify those comments.  Pointing at the lack of pvp easily shows a large void in the game in comparison to other mmos on the market. 

 

It doesn't matter why it doesn't have something, because that was not the reason it was brought up. 
 

 

As for your marketing claims, I'll just say this.  Gamestop US hardly carries any PC titles worth mentioning in their strores.  You can find plenty online or even listed as "available" in the store, but what is actually on the shleves is drastically different.  I don't think that has anything to do with soe, but more about gamestop stocking a small selection of pc titles in their brick and mortar stores.  

Some people think there are hordes of potential customers waiting to play eq2 if only soe would market the game.  History has shown they tried and I think this thread reflects the results. I don't think soe is to stupid to miss truckloads of easy money if only they would market a little bit.  Saying things like that really glosses over a lot of real issues. 

 

 

First,

PVP isn't that big in MMORPG's at all. Nor is it that in demand. I don't say there is no demand at all for it. Sure there is.

PvP isnt that big in mmos......but not because it isnt popular or wanted. It hasnt been all that big because games companies havent been very successful at implementing it into their games well. Of course people arent going to like PvP in mmos if the PvP is badly done. Yet the games which have managed to do it well are (or were) actually very popular. EVE is a great example of what happens in an mmo when pvp is done well. DAoC is another one.

PvP isnt in demand very much? Yeah sure. Thats why more and more PvP focused mmos are being made. Games companies are well aware of the gaping hole in the mmo genre and now they are flooding in to fill it. That "vocal minority" that you referred to in a previous post (the classic put-down that all PvE fans use when talking about people who like PvP) sure is having a major impact on games developers these days. Oh wait.....hang on a sec.....could it possibly be the case that actually LOTS of people enjoy competing against other players in online games rather than just fighting against the computer? Nahhh surely not.

But the PVE market is far far bigger when it comes to MMO's. As most avid PVP'ers still play FPS games on their consoles and PC's. As that's where the real skilled and only balanced PVP lies! Not MMO's.

Actually thats only partially true. PvE has had a stronger focus in mmos because games companies have had less experience at making multiplayer roleplaying games and lots of previous experience at making single player rpgs. Dont forget that mmos havent been around for that long. The genre is still in its infancy and is still evolving. Games companies are learning from their past mistakes, where they incorporated badly thought out PvP into games that were never really designed for it. Thats all beginning to change now as game devs are learning and designing their games with PvP in mind from the beginning.

Yes a lot of PvP'ers play FPS games as they are balanced and have been available for a long time. As more WELL DESIGNED PvP mmos become available though you will see this change. Maybe anti PvP'ers will start getting referred to as the "vocal minority"

I have played WoW for almost 2 years. From wich more then a year on a RPPVP server and I can tell you, that even on a PVP server, the vast majority was more busy PVE'ing then bothering to PVP.

Well obviously they were. Its primarily a PvE game. You HAVE to do the PvE content to progress through the game. Duh!

 If I want to PVP, and trust me I do and love doing it, I still fire up one of my favorite FPS games. And funny thing is that the community in these games are better, then the overal stupid ganking/griefing kiddies you encounter in MMO's with PVP. The irony.

There's nothing ironic about that at all. When I play BF2142 the community is irrelevant as I have no need to talk to any of them. We all log on to shoot each other as that is all the game offers. So really the community is only better because you dont need to communicate with any of them. In contrast I have met a lot of immature, rude, rascist, sexist and generally stupid people in PvE focused mmos.

As many people keep pointing out to the flawed argument that PvPers should stick to FPS games, PvP'ers dont just simply want to fight other players. They want all the great stuff that comes from playing a roleplaying game too. They want to build empires with like minded people and wage war on their enemies. They want to craft items for their fellow players to help keep their lands safe. They want to go on adventures with their companions......and they want to do all this knowing that elsewhere in the game world there are other players who could threaten their existence and invade their lands.....or even help them and become their allies.

You dont get any of that in an FPS game. Thankfully though there are a bundle of mmos with a heavier PvP focus on the way so we will all have more variety to choose from. The mmos that we have seen so far have been learning experiences for what is to come. People that keep whining about how PvP only leads to ganking are just incapable of seeing it all as such. Badly implemented PvP can lead to ganking sure.....but if its well planned and thought out then it can easily be solved and the positives can outweigh the negatives.  I'm really looking forward to the PvP focused mmos that are on their way actually.

Second,

SOE has NEVER EVER done ANY marketing at all in Europe. Period. Not even for EverQuest 2!

The only MMO's I have seen a lot of advertising for, and wich in result, are doing much much better here in Europe, are games like WoW and LOTRO.

Cheers

Originally posted by syztec

Will they ever make Everquest 3?

I have toons in Eq1, Eq2 but i've not played them for least 3 (5 years eq)  years so I've missed a lot of expansions / content etc, and I think thats what has put me off re-joining. I remember I tried eq2 again years ago and I hardly seen any players around so I'm guessing the lowbie areas are really low population and will be even worse now.

I was hoping seeing as its 5 years (on november) that eq2 has been out, Info about the next Eq game would be out or start to surface but I guess Soe is putting all its resources into DC online and that agents game?

 

I really hope not.........unless it heads more in the direction of the original EQ. The sequal was such a let down. Me and my friend were fans of the first one and we eagerly jumped into EQ2 when it first came out. Within a few weeks my friend quit the game in disgust. He hated the way that all the racial identity was gone from the game. All the "good" races were thoughtlessly dumped into a fluffy good city and all the "evil" races were dumped into a cheesy bad city. Dwarf zone next door to Elf zone next door to Halfling zone next door to Catman zone......what a load of crap!

The game would have been fantastic if each of the races had their own starting cities like in the original but it seemed like the designers just couldnt be bothered to recreat them......or they simply didnt have time. So instead they created two starter areas and made up some flimsy "the world has been blown up" story to gloss over it all with. Years later they finally added a few more starting zones but the game world still isnt anywhere near as good as EQ1.

Also in response to the OP, I find the world of Azeroth to be a much more compelling, believable and well thought out world than Norrath. To me the world of EQ2 just seems far too cutesy, whimsical and contrived.....which is odd really considering that WoW is the one with cartoony graphics. It almost seems to me as though the people behind EQ2 were never really all that compassionate about their world and were simply just going through the motions. Everything just seems so generic. The art direction of WoW is also far superior than what we see in EQ2. The graphics are cartoony and less detailed and yet they work really well. In fact they always have done in Blizzards Warcraft series. EQ2 uses nicely detailed models with great shadow and lighting effects and yet the world just doesnt seem to have any character in my opinion. I have a pretty decent machine with which I can have all the graphics in both games turned up to max......and I always find WoW far more pleasing to look at. On top of this EQ2 just isnt anywhere near as smooth or enhoyable to play for me. It just seems so clunky compared to WoW. I played EQ2 a month ago and then very recently went back to playing WoW (yeah I know I'm going to hell) and the difference between the two games is glaring. Its no surprise at all to me why EQ2 doesnt have a bigger playerbase.

The character customisation is better in EQ2 admittedly, although having said that most of the sliders dont really do anything noticeable so the main difference between the characters is their hair and skin colour......which is kind of the result I get from WoW anyway. Also the armour, clothes and weapons in EQ2 are a bit hit and miss. Some of them look fine but a lot of them look ugly and drab......especially those robes. I saw quite a few high level players while I was in EQ2 and they really didnt look all that great to be honest.......although there were a few exceptions. EQ2 does have player housing which is nice though. The crafting is a lot more involving too, although I'm not sure if I found it to be more enjoyable or not. I could get different grades of equipment through crafting which was nice though.......something which WoW doesnt have.

I dunno.....EQ2 isnt a bad game. It has improved and changed lots since its dismal release. It has a number of things that WoW doesnt have, even if it had to copy and implement a bundle of WoWs design features to help it stay afloat. Then again WoW offers a more enjoyable PvP aspect which is a big draw for a lot of players and a big turn off for a lot of potential EQ2 subscribers (yeah yeah mmo players dont want pvp.......cough....bullshit....cough). The newer SOGA models make a big difference in my opinion as they look great......although its a shame the armour graphics didnt go through a revamp too. In fact Vanguard could do with some of those models to replace their ugly plastic manikins. EQ2 is actually a lot better than most other mmos which is kind of sad really. However for the OP to compare EQ2 to WoW is a bit silly. I can only state my own opinion, but I'm certainly having more fun now in WoW than I was in EQ2 and lots of other people clearly feel the same way.

Blizzard has better advertizing, their patches and extensions are more polished. And some say it's more user friendly.

And the amount of players in WoW just create a bigger 'word of mouth' -snowball than EQII does.

I played EQII for 2 years and it was my first MMO. Loved it. BUT there was something better coming out that I waited. Vanguard.

Loved it even more... until SOE added RMT :( Now I'm in AoC. I'm not planning to go back to SOE games with the way they ignore playerbase. Too bad, I was looking forward to the Agency but nah - not anymore.

Originally posted by Antarious 

*edit* Response to Daffid011
 

The standard accepted number for the MMO industry is that 10% of the market is PvP.  I'd also challenge you to list the western based MMO's that have meaningful pvp and had a higher subscription base than EQ2...  Other than WoW which I'm not sure I see as meaningful pvp.  Lack of PvP entirely would not give a game the smallest feature set...  Tho I suppose size of feature set has nothing to do with total subscribers (I think the thread was about .. the amount of people playing the game).

I missed this a while ago, but anyhow...

I'm really curious where you get 10% of the market wants pvp.   It certainly doesn't look like only 10% of the market wants pvp.  Just for example: Wow has more pvp servers than it has pve.  Two pvp centric mmos broke mmo sales records last year.

I'm not qualifying pvp as meaningful or whatever the opposite is in your view.  If a game offers pvp in an enjoyable way then it is a solid feature to many people.  It isn't like the same standard is applied to pve being meaningful or not, but as long as it is enjoyable then it is a good feature for a game.

Games that have more subs than eq2 that have pvp (meaningful or not).  Warhammer, World of warcraft, Eve, Lotro, Linage I, lineage II, Aion, guild wars (not an mmo and not subscriber, but same principle)... Even age of conan isn't that far behind.  Almost every mmo that outperforms eq2.  So yes I think more people consider pvp an important design aspect of an mmo and that would disqualify any claim that eq2 has the most features of any mmo on the market. 

Is it the reason more people do not play, I think it plays a part, but there are plenty of other reasons.