Originally posted by asmkm22
SOE has a history of proclaiming their latest games are going to be the biggest/best/greatest ever released.  I remember he was dancing to that tune back when EQ2 was coming out, talking about how revolutionary it was going to be.  Instead, we just got "/pizza".

The best pizza i ever had. EQ2 is even today is an amazing game. Dwarfs every other PVE MMO in content and features.

Originally posted by hercules

Dunno  if this has been posted already but as we all suspected the failure of swtor was the main reason for soe to take a new direction in the design

http://www.pcgamer.com/2012/10/23/sony-online-everquest-next-design/

But they scrapped their work before any of those games came out... I think he's using those more as supporting evidence of his idea that themeparks(WoW clones) are done.

Originally posted by nate1980

Originally posted by pvpirl

Now, I never played SWG, what was it about that game, from those that played it, that made it such a good game? such a good sandbox? What elements would you like to see in EQN?

1. Being able to build the character you wanted, since it had a skill-based system.

2. Playermade cities governed by player Mayors

3. Being able to own your own house

4. Player made economy, complete with full-time crafting professions. Almost everything you wore was player crafted. It wasn't a loot based game.

5. Clothing, lots and lots of different kinds of clothing, so you could look unique.

6. Flag yourself PvP system.

7. The community. Very helpful, and almost everyone RPed every once in a while. Image Designers, Interior Decorators, Crafters, and Entertainers all acted the way you'd expect one in their respective professions to act. Some people, encouraged by the freedom the world offered, RPed 100% of the time. 

8. Entertainers and other non-combat full-time professions. 

There's the part that made me originally unsub from SWG, /flag PvP restricts a player too much. Some of you fulltime crafters may not want it. But all the real good stuff (thievery! banditry! mercenary work! assassinations! piracy! warfare involving politics!) are out once flagged PvP happens. The world may turn into a more grim state, but a sandbox requires the option to be the villain, as there is always the bully to smash your sand castle into bits, but its up to you whether to call forth your big brother, or grab that shover and stick it up the ass of the one who broke your castle.

Originally posted by rungard

Originally posted by pvpirl

I just installed and played EQ2 for the first time. The EQN team better, BETTER, forget any of those design concepts ever happened. And post luclin EQ1 frankly.

 well after having a really good look at planetside 2's systems i have this feeling that the entire eq next gameworld will have a major territory control component to it and aside of starting cities there will be no safezones in the world and the game will be FPS.  

i have this feeling that there will be frontlines for war and the teams will be as follows. The frontlines will be constant battles but behind the lines it will be relatively safe with guards and patrols.

 

Good	Neutral	Evil
Dwarf Fae Froglok Halfling High Elf Wood Elf	Barbarian Erudite Gnome Half Elf Human Kerra	Arasai Dark Elf Iksar Ogre Sarnak Troll

 

The original EQ PVP servers had factions: Blue: Human, Barbarian, and Erudite. Purple: Gnome, Dwarf, and Halfling. Yellow: Wood Elf, High Elf, and Half-Elf. Orange: Dark Elf, Ogre, and Troll. I think it was one too many factions, so your faction list could be interesting, but with the world of Norrath being reinvisioned, they could go farther than simply Good vs Neutral vs Evil.

Originally posted by Scot
The title, hopefully that will change. EQ Next. It sounds like a cosplay clothing store and shows no creativity what so ever.

They said thats the code name of the project and not its acualy name i beleikve you will get the acualy name of the game when they show it off at the fanfair next year. They did state its just tempory name atm.

Originally posted by halflife25

Originally posted by asmkm22
SOE has a history of proclaiming their latest games are going to be the biggest/best/greatest ever released.  I remember he was dancing to that tune back when EQ2 was coming out, talking about how revolutionary it was going to be.  Instead, we just got "/pizza".

The best pizza i ever had. EQ2 is even today is an amazing game. Dwarfs every other PVE MMO in content and features.

Tried EQ2 at least 4 times, even tried the f2p version.  I found the game to be the most boring MMO I have ever played.  Sure it has lots of content, just not very interesting content IMO.  The only SOE game I ever got into  was SWG and we all know what they did with that game.  Smedley's idea of a good MMO and mine have a huge chasm between them.

So I will take a wait and see attitude on EQNext.  All the decent developers they had at SOE have left long ago and I have not been impressed with the ones they have there now.

Originally posted by rungard

 

 This is accurate. I dont agree than you cant use a class system in a sandbox, but eq certainly has a skill based system underneath its levelling system. eq had soo much fun stuff that no one talks about. That stuff was the magic. Not the levels and not the raids. Weve seen what magic is created from levels and raids.

lets see what the other magic can do.

I've found the bit in orange to be true of most MMOs I've played.

It's always baffled me when people would call Final Fantasy XI (pre-Abyssea) "nothing but a level grind to end-game". They'd complain about doing nothing but grinding on mobs all the time. There were, when I stopped playing, 23+ different activities to participate in. Each had their own content, rules, rewards and requirements, and they were spread out across many levels, not just "high level".

So, *I* knew the game offered far more than just "grinding levels" and "end-game raiding". The problem is, players coming into the game had this idea firmly stuck in their head that "MMOs = grinding to level cap, then raiding endlessly". This has been the case for pretty much every new MMO to come out for the last 7 years or so.

The stranger part is, they'd complain about it. They'd complain about the games being nothing but an endless level grind, and how they were sick of it. Thing is, the game was like that for them because all they spent their time doing was grinding levels. But then when you'd point out "well, you know, there's all these 20+ other activities you could also do... You don't have to spend all your time grinding xp", you'd get your head bitten off with some tirade about how "all that other content is useless because it doesn't help you level faster and the rewards aren't worth it". I'd be told, quite firmly, that MMOs were all about end game and that getting there as efficiently as possible was all that mattered. All that other content was "useless filler".

Yet they complained about it.

It became apparent to me a long time ago now that players are demonstrably their own worst enemies. The one thing they claim to hate is the one thing they'll argue vehemently that "the games are all about", to the exclusion of almost anything else.

Funniest thing (in a sad way) is, they'd eventually get burned out, fed up and move on to another MMO - to do exactly the same thing: grinding levels non-stop and doing only content that helped them level faster or got them "the best rewards". And once again, they'd blame the devs/game for making the game "nothing but an endless grind-fest", even though there was all this other stuff to do.

It was the classic definition of insanity: Doing the same thing repeatedly, and expecting a different result.

And it still happens to this day. The obvious cause of their frustration is staring them in the face, yet they never see it. Or maybe they do, but in their conceit, believe they've got it right and the devs have it all wrong; that they know what the game is "all about" more than those "clueless devs" who spent years designing and developing it in the first place.

Just look at some of the most common questions people ask when they're just starting a game, or even just interested in checking it out: "How much end game is there?" and "How long does it take to get to level cap?". They haven't even launched the game for the first time yet, and they're already concerned about end game? Really?

I think that's the biggest hurdle Smed and SOE have to contend with. I'm sure they can come up with some really interesting concepts/ideas. But until MMO gamers are willing to take a step back, re-evaluate their own preferences and proclivities and are willing to unchain themselves from their own treadmill... it's going to be an uphill battle. I have no real expectations of that happening. MMO gamers, many of them, are far too conceited and set in their ways to ever see what they're doing as being the problem. Far easier to blame those "clueless devs who don't know how to make a MMO". 

I think the best hope SOE and Smed have is to settle on the fact that they aren't going to attract a huge, WoW-like fan-base, that the game will likely end up with a smaller, but solid and loyal playerbase that will stick with them and grow steadily over the years - like Eve Online did.

Smed says they want to make a MMO that lasts 15 years. That longevity won't be supported by the fly-by-night, "game of the month" MMO hoppers. It will be supported by the long-term players who really dig in, plant roots, and call the Norrath of EQNext "home" for the long term. He just has to stick to the vision they have for the game, and not cave into trying to appeal more to the typical "themepark crowd" who just want more of the same.

he could start by getting rid of the levels or at least split them up enough and put them in the background so the gameplay isnt decided by them.

He might as well, they only last a month anyway.

Originally posted by TangentPoint

Smed says they want to make a MMO that lasts 15 years. That longevity won't be supported by the fly-by-night, "game of the month" MMO hoppers. It will be supported by the long-term players who really dig in, plant roots, and call the Norrath of EQNext "home" for the long term. He just has to stick to the vision they have for the game, and not cave into trying to appeal more to the typical "themepark crowd" who just want more of the same.

Unfortunately, you are only going to see that mentality in old school vets. And out of the old school vets, some, like myself can no longer do this type of gaming.

AAA dev + niche following != 15 years

I haven't seriously played an MMO in years. Oh here or there I'll try something to scratch the itch, from Runescape to the latest title to go f2p, I try it but never stay.

EQ Next (barring any miraculous Ultima Online 2) will be my last MMO. If it fails, I'm done with this as a hobby. If it succeeds, I'll stick around for 15.

On another note, as much as I am fanboi-ing over EQN, every time I read an article about it and see this quote

“The fans need to realize that if you don’t change the nature of what these games are, you’re not going to change that core behavior."

I'm like BRO WE'VE BEEN TELLING YOU THAT FOR FUCKING YEARS. You don't have to make us realize. We know.

Originally posted by Ozmodan

Tried EQ2 at least 4 times, even tried the f2p version.  I found the game to be the most boring MMO I have ever played.  Sure it has lots of content, just not very interesting content IMO.  The only SOE game I ever got into  was SWG and we all know what they did with that game.  Smedley's idea of a good MMO and mine have a huge chasm between them.

So I will take a wait and see attitude on EQNext.  All the decent developers they had at SOE have left long ago and I have not been impressed with the ones they have there now.

Pity you don't find 'content interesting'. I have played every themepark MMO but nothing comes close to RP, lore, classes, content, atmosphere, AA progression, Housing etc. I mean i can make a huge list and go on and on.

I am completely burned out on EQ2 becaus i played it way too much. But i still think about it and once i meet my goals in GW2 i am going back to EQ2 for good. Best themepark MMO ever made (atleast for me it is)

Originally posted by Ripostethis
Not enough funding to make it a big theme park mmo like Everquest 2 was. Will be something like GW2 , sounds like it will suck and be boring if you are into PVE, but will be based on pvp.

GW2 is not a sandbox mate. At least TRY to understand what you are talking about.

GW2 is a "Carnival". A bunch of minigames and the most kid glove PVP I have ever seen short of not having any at all.

Just a thought, if one can destroy terrain, it would be reasonable to assume that the opposite is possible.

Originally posted by pvpirl

Just a thought, if one can destroy terrain, it would be reasonable to assume that the opposite is possible.

 that was my thoughts as well. Need 2 more earth mages to build a mountain.

also take a look at this snippet fro the 2012 live:

"MMO means something now, and it means the same thing to everybody because it's the same game. EverQuest, WoW, SWTOR all use the same core loot gameplay, which is kill stuff, get reward, get loot, level up. Very few games have broken out of that mold. One or two have. EVE Online is a great example; it's not standard level-based gameplay, although I'm not saying we're going to a big skill-based system."

would this suggest to you that eq next will NOT be  "kill stuff, get reward, get loot, level up" game. I wonder what they have in mind...Faction system anyone????

With alot of these cool concepts being mentioned with magic in mind, I hope prospective melee player such as myself, don't get the shaft in terms of world interaction.