4 days and no reply, maybe that's your answer?

EQ2 was my game for years (since beta) I just got so frustrated with it last fall. It was really hard for me because i've always been a passionate player, not hardcore. But that is what the game forces any vet to be now because if you don't raid everything else is so baby land.

Over the last couple years the spamming of SC purchases for cosmetic stuff ended up be the entire focus of the game. These features are actually really cool, but the way they shove it down your throat constantly just seemed almost desperate. Even at gold member status.

From a development aspect the game has so much potential. The stories are good, the features are richer than anything I've seen. From a production standpoint it's just been poorly executed, and the consumers are constantly being milked at every end, especially the veterans paying the sub fee. This has been a negative trend that SOE has implemented to try to get surge income from new players instead of actually building a player base. The populations show this, the game became a waste land, unless you were signed up for high end raid zones or the occasional new zone which forces you to compete with everyone else trying to complete quests etc.

There were also several other fails in pvp based around weaknesses in the platform and programming that I can't imagine is easy. 

I got Guild Wars 2 as a gift as I was about to swear off playing all together. Amazing game. No sand boxing yet like in Eq2, but.... 

1. The game actually doesn't punish you if you are not grouped. ie, you can harvest the same node as someone else, you can run up to an event or mob that another player is hitting and share all of each others buffs and loot w/out being grouped.

2. Even though the graphics are 10x better it still runs smoother than EQ2 even though it's running on a ten year engine. And the game is just beautiful and massive.

3. PVP, yes PVP and good PVP, not open world ganking, you zone to pvp but it's amazingly fun. And World vs World vs World, is insanely fun.

4. Leveling / level. Personally when I made my toon, I never felt a "need" to grind up. The game was so engaging I just played and before I knew it I was max level. Going to zones that are below your level remain challenging... personally I like this a lot. Doing any of the pvp your toon is auto adjusted and you remain competetive. If you don't quite know how to play your character you will have difficulties, being lower level will not give you some skills or extra armor buffs, but it is no way game breaking. Plus there are still a huge amount of things you can do as you learn the game w/out insta death. Either way even at level 80 from launch I only have 40% world discovery, and even with good gear I always find a good challenge in every area I explore.

5. Population - two fold. I might be in an annomaly here because I somehow hooked up with the most amazing guild. We have about 400 some members, that we've been kind of picky about inviting and have a system to root out those that play for a bit then quit. We usually have at least 100 active members on at all times, and usually at least half of that in voice. Living in a PVE server and being a PVP type player mostly, we have a pretty split guild here. Split but active and mostly mature :-P because of the standards the leaders made. But just having made a new "alt" and trying to level in zones i've never seen I still see dozens running around with me in even the most newbie areas, or unusual places or anywhere. And the mechanics are actually inplace to encourage helping those around you. This is what an MMO should be about I never saw in EQ2.

6. FTP. EQ2 now has 6 xps ftp. They are amazing and diverse. Good luck finding a group to roll with though. Once you quickly level up to "relevant" content you will need to purchase that expansion at full price. If you're just with your bud then you probably won't have any problem even doing raid content in legendary gear. GW2 is pay to play, not any different after those free parts. Except GW2 has NO requirements on a monthly sub to have a certain membership level at all. Gear, level, etc. You purchase the disk you are good to roll. And no pressure. In fact GW2 is actually a FTP game (after original purchase) but they do not shove "buy this crap down your throat or else" on top of a monthy sub. They don't even have a monthy sub option. And their version of SC store is actually kind of weak.  I will probably buy the next GW2 Xpac like i did the previous 12? EQ2 ones, but will do it knowing exactly what my purchase was and no strings attached nor a montly payment to actually be able to play it.

7. Fun! It's my personal opinion, the game in GW2 is just more fun and electric.

I love EQ2, i have many fond memories over the last 10 years. I'm not sure how it failed so badly tbh, even before their ftp illusion. Personally i would suggest spending a few dollars to buy GW2 because it will save you hundreds shortly.

EQ2 is now for those that like decorating (I do miss my houses sometimes), you can create your own dungeons if you buy those expansions too which is cool. Unless you make it to the hard core raider you won't find much challenging/fun after a while IMO. 

These are just my opinions.

Citadelli ~ Destroyer of Ordanach

http://eq2.wikia.com/wiki/Destroyer_of_Ordanach_(painting)

I persionally enjoy the game. Story line is not like George RR Martin by any means, that's a bit extreme for an MMO to be honest, but I've found it enjoyable. Leveling... First MMO i honestly didn't feel like I was trying to level, it just happened, fairly painlessly and decently timed. 

WvW is my favorite part. I understand why some people think it's mindless zerging if they don't look into the entire science and mentality of it, and don't have an active wvw guild community. Mine's not huge maybe 20-30 active at any given time most of them in vent chat. Really changes the dynamic. I couldn't imagine it any other way anymore. It's a blast, and we're a beat up tier two team.  They're relaxed and have no tolerance for exploits. It's just plain fun.

As a guild who has always stuck to our server regardless of ranking, I'm really happy about the added restrictions of server transfers. I think this will honestly be the biggest improvement to the WvW that will have the most impact. I honestly am glad we aren't a tier one server, but I think it will help balance the playing field without seeing extremely dramatic change in power in only a weeks time.

I haven't done too much of the sPVP, but play a ton Wv3 on Tarnished Coast, it's been super fun imo. I think a lot of it does have to do with being in the right kind of guild for you, which I think I am lucky to have found and we have a great time together. I'm also the "crappy" class everyone says is gimped, the Ranger, but still enjoy it, kill more than I die.

I don't know the dynamics of other servers and imagine the different tiers you get placed in each week depending on your rank might create completely different environments. For our server's rank we've been matched with the same other servers I think at least the last 4 weeks running. We've been on top all of those, but barely, and have to give it to the other guys they fight us hard. It would be nice to have more servers be in the same tier to mix things up from week to week, because it's not too hard to learn major strategies that come into play by the leading guilds. But at the same time we've been building a couple great rivalries, despite flames on the forums of teaming up, I guarantee there is no love lost on the battle field.

Also Zerging is only one part of the Wv3, you can have the best Zerg, and just get smoked runnig up against a well defended Keep, or even camp.

They do need to eliminate free transfers though, and some class balancing tweaks would be nice. But honestly the game is only a few months old... I'm impressed with how it rolled out and how it will evolve.

Well writen article with some good points.  But I think the true challenge for MMO's nowadays is and the way corporations are handling a new player base and it is completely and uterly ignored in these forums.

I'm guessing the majority of people on MMO post sites are similar to me, age 30's-40's. People who used to play D&D and were the pioneer role play gamers on Genesis and the PC etc. Now have jobs, kids, and are driven dedicated people. 

The MMO landscape has evolved along with those of us. The 1 to 2 million of us, who are still here looking for "the"game in a genre that has drastrically changed.

How did it change? WoW. Blizz did the most amazing gaming marketing campaign to draw in a new type of MMO player by the tenfold. Straight up brilliant, but changed our landscape forever. But they are only one part of the change. As us original MMO gamers evolved so did the next generation that didnt grow up on MOGS, and table top games, but rather XBOX and PS2's etc in a digital world.

IMO WoW is only popular because people went to it.  You look for an MMO that has population, friends bring in friends and have a good time. WoW was good in many ways, shallow in most others, but they had people, which draws people and the marketing behind it to boasted that at every chance. Honestly WoW has only been successful because of their marketing, which was completely ignored from SOE and majority of titles that hosted games like UO or DOAC at that era. Blizz really didn't have anything revolutionary or drastically different beyond easy leveling and lots of instant gratification which takes us to the other point.

As we aged and changed so did the genre. Don't forget this is a commercial and capitalistic Genre, as is well pretty much everything. Point in case would be the music industry, look back 60-70 years then move forward, you have the Beach Boys, you have the Beatles, you have Manudo, New Kid's on the block, Nsync?, Justin Beeber and so on. An ever changing cycle with the majority of popular sales world wide targeted towards a certain demographic. Is the MMO market much different?

Well first we used to be more of a "cult" market really. Some might call us nerdy techy types, on the leading edge of hype trendy technology that was actually pretty expensive and complicated. Now those are given out pretty easily. New box's are pretty cheap, technology and interfaces easily understood by most. One of my coworkers was setting up a computer for his youngest daughter last week like he did with all of his other kids, and she couldn't get past the keyboard because of her previous interactions with the iPad. Again another change.

I think what we're seeing is the continued surge of those evolving from the Xbox360/PS3 environments where they were continually conditioned people to beat the game on a linear track and move onto another title, hence the "locusts" people mention. Honestly the market and development reflects this in every way. Unfortunately most game developers also seem to be trying to keep up with these trends only to a negative affect to their product in the MMO world scape. And lets not even mention the foriegn asian market because I know very little about those games but has quadroupled the player base.

Why wouldn't they? Let's look at a few facts. Most major console title's like Halo, or MWF, are dishing out more than major motion pictures for production, and bringing in way more revenue than them. Selling hundreds of millions of boxes at around 60 bucks a pop, at least tripling the sales of the most popular movies on the market.

From a story line, these games are very linear, from a pvp aspect they are dead as soon as the next release comes out. They don't even stack like MMO's. But these are the clients who have been merging into the MMO world over the last decade, our "locuts"; Beat it, on to the next; follow the popular herd to a new game and or release that doesn't allow for you to carry your character or continue to build your hero any more.  It's a very different world. The different MMO companies seem to be trying to catch up to this and continually try to suck in the billions of dollars being used for gaming entertainment.

Probably no different than why I can't understand my X-wife, or why my kid wants/NEEDS a new $60 game every month :-P

How have we seen this affect our games?

Well most of my complaints would revolve around poor marketing for most major titles, and the success of marketing for other titles that have kind of ruined the genre. But beside that there are crucial differentiators that are obvious.

IMO there are a few titles over the last couple decades that had stood out as true MMOs. UO, EQ2, SWG, VG. Each of these had had their good stuff and eventually major short fallings.

UO absolutely revotionary, simply couldn't compete with upcoming major devolepment titles and progressive systems, poor management and dissruptive ownerships.

SWG could have been would have been the next evolution of this. This is literally the biggest proprietary title on the planet, and should have gone so far. NGE did kill this game, but why? Battlefronts had come out and did amazing on the consols selling millions, they twitch played production to try to replicate that, not realizing those people were'nt MMO'rs yet (check the timeline). That was really what that was about. NGE failed and almost no production money was put into the title after that, and the few remaining developers did their best to make the best game they could, but unfortunately it wasn't enough, and was then killed because of the next fail of the new SW MMO SWTOR.

VG, which I really think "physically should be" what an MMO is, was again just sabotaged by many poor desicions and never received much love after it's poor launch.

EQ2 was MY game forever. I loved it and was dedicated to it since beta. I just think they swung way to far to left over the last couple years and now the game being "ftp" has only added a dozen ways to make you pay for it. Management dummied it down so much that you either are playing it as a newbie locust, are a Sim City crafter/decorator or are left with raid grinding. The game had so much to offer, but they completely yanked out the core game play aspect. No matter how much candy you throw in, once you lose the real game play, the core, there is no back bone to hold it up. If SOE had half the smarts that Blizz did this game would have rivaled WoW. But now SOE has chosen to completely disregarded their original player base and proves to only play "twitch" development to find everyway they can to cash grab from customers instead of continue to make them loyal.

What I am currently playing is GW2. It has honestly been refreshing over the last three months. I don't feel any level grinds, and when I am over powered for a zone I am quickly put back in my place even in zones way below my level. The PVP is amazing and I spend most of my limited time there. I paid to buy the game (as almost all FTP games do, but have actually saved hundreds of dollars over the last few month from my last game that was "FTP"). There is no monthly sub, no constant barrage of market items.  Simple and fun.

FTP is an illusion to suck in new people, simply an illusion.

To any publishers out there. Just make the game fun please, make it easy. If you want a serious and dedicated player base, don't keep changing subscription rules, just stand up for what you believe in continue to develop the story. That will keep your players active and loyal. I don't honestly see how the "fly by night" players bring in real non-spurt revenue, aka most of the "locusts" people are complaining about should become the complete focus.

Being new to the GW franchise, specifically GW2, I think they are hitting on most of the points. Except it's certainly not "sand box" yet having been out for a couple months, but Sand Box is over rated in my opinion. But are absolutely on top for price model.

EQ2 or SWG was the closest I know of on the market at the moment for Sand Box, which I played the heck out of from launch until recent. Unfortunately the people who want to play sand box are the ones who want to create it, and usually for their own self created content. Outside of small pockets a true sand box only satifies those people who just want to create Sim City environments (single player mentality). In an MMO environment with everyone creating quests, dungeons, environments - even a couple hundred people doing that creates an overwhelming number of unknown options as a player. EQ2 was on the right track in this regard, but their main game got so dumbed down and irrelevant over the last couple years, and again then to the player created content. To me it's like shooting yourself in the foot.

Eventually your only trying to cater to either the hard core raider's and making them farm the same raid zones all the time for the best gear or cater to the Farmville people who wish they were solo game developers with a bunch of fancy tools. But doing so they have lost their entire game play system and story, that allows random active challenges keeping people engaged in that game system and story line, which is supposed to be the fun part of playing and escape.

If for example you look at anything that SOE or Turbine or Funcom has put out as "FTP" compared to Arena Net's GW2 (and maybe GW1?) they are anything but FTP. This is probably why you get so many people trying so many FTP games and vanishing so soon. It's an impulse model, having very little sustainability.

This is why they all not only require an advanced subscription model to simply be able to wear good gear to be competitive or relevant to go into the content all the few dozen people are at. But ALL of them also do require expansion purchases, costing on average $40-50 USD, then constantly bombarding you with cash store purchases on top of it. Is this because they know they're desperate and know the game isn't fun enough to just enjoy instead of sucking off the long time skittle eaters or are they greedy trying to prey off of their own main fans?

GW2 may have only been out for a few months, but I'm still excited I got the game as a gift and have been extremely surprised. GW2 is so much more FTP than any model I've seen. Sure you buy the box - again if you want the real content in anyother game you need to as well... (unless you want the first 8 or 10 expansions for EQ2 that got so watered down. now you will solo level to max in a week or so to get to where the entire population is at with said paid for expansions).

I did get to max level pretty easily IMO in GW2 being a casual player now over the last couple months, but I never "felt like I had to" I just enjoyed the ride - It's beautiful and lively, the world always feels active and huge even only standing around NPC's only. I still only have about 40% world explored. But regardless of where I go in the world it is always a challenge. The auto-leveling is very well done. This keeps it a game and keeps me on my toes, just very fun that way. 

GW2 actually encourages an MMO environment, you don't need to be grouped to be "grouped" in the world unless you're hitting an instanced dungeon. You can be running around and all of a sudden surrounded by dozens of people doing the same thing. That is very cool. Even NPC's seem a bit real... The world just seems to be different from anything I've seen.

PVP, forget about it... It's crazy fun, the only thing they need to fix is WvWvW server hoping. But still this is insane fun. Literally hundreds of people playing with you at every moment in a fast paced crazy way, all kinds of tactics or play styles, I'm still trying to figure out that game play aspect alone - whoot I have to think and try!!! No script plugins to make sure I'm ducking or running or taking a potion at exactly the right moment, WHOOT!!!. I just think they did a really good job at it and the number of people playing prove that point.

Not trying to sound like a GW2 coolaid drinker, but I did buy every EQ2/EQ1 expansion until recently, and spent hundreds of dollars on top of that over the last year alone, of that since it went ftp to really play a "FTP" game, only to get more and more discouraged with hugely declining populations even despite constant merger servers.

 I get a game like GW2 that is compelling, fun, and I can play the game with no worries of a monthly fee of any kind, any thing in a "Cash" store I can buy with what I earn in game, or I can cheese out and do it the easy way, It's there but I've never seen anything I actually would need or want to do that for. I will happily keep paying for a full box version for new expansions - was doing the same for any other FTP game. But this is just fun, it's out on the table and there's no guess work or tricks in between so far.

Also I was never very good at decorating my houses, in EQ2 i had about 10 of them on my main, there was just piles of crap everywhere to get them out of my bags.... Well I did have one that's cool ;-)

Can someone please PM me what a real sandbox is? (Threads are just getting too long) Vanguard is very similar to SWG in many ways, just lacked the player made quests that were put in late in it's history. Only Vanguard was an SOE "token" game taken on and never received any love it truly deserved until recently and even that is based around SC stuff. UO is that a true sand box? Make houses like you want them? 

To me a Sandbox game is something like Roblox my kids play all the time. I don't see how that jives in a truly MMO aspect without instances. 

Having been an SOE fanatic since EQ1 until I got GW2 as a present for my birthday. What SOE has really been doing is trying their best to stay alive. Their games are just dead from a player interaction=MMO. They have completely watered down their titles in the last few years (thanks Smed and Smoke!) and make them "FTP" with a pretty much required extra subscription fee to play the real content which now only exists in EQ2 as repetative raid content. Having played every SOE title from EQ1 to Matrix to SWG to Freerealms, to VG, to PS1+2, etc. They're only goal now is how can we make money off of this in several different aspects? My guess is that their original concept wasn't showing a profitable SC value so they want to tweak it in that regard.

What opened my eyes was GW2, not being a fan or anything of the franchise I was very sceptical going into it. But hey it was a gift so why not... 

The game is equally FTP as EQ2 (my MAIN game since it's beta) you buy an expansion you get to play that content. Differences lie in the fact you don't need a subscription to wear good armor, or purchase tokens through SC store. You are not indated with SC requests. You don't have a business model that has been constantly changing several times within short periods. You buy the game and play. 

And the game play has completely blown me away. Seemless grouping in an area, no invites required. Dozens of players randomly joining together. Relevant content no matter what level you are and where you go, or what you are wearing. GW2 is also amazingly beautiful and just sucks you in. The main story lines are a bit linear but if you just play the game, and forget about grinding etc you come to see it actually feels like a living breathing world. And there is really no need for grinding unless your bent on being lvl "80". I got to max level pretty quickly but didnt ever feel like I had to. It just happened. I was playing PVP or running around exploring the beautiful world and was challenged ever step of the way like a game should do. Have some fun, not a second job. 

Most importantly in GW2 there are people! No matter where you go, you are not playing a solo player game in an MMO environment. As a main raider in EQ2 in one of the top guilds, we would do the same stuff every week trying to make sure everyone could follow the script and have the right plugins which hopefully worked. It just wasn't a game any more. Step outside of a raid or guild aspect the game is completely baren, no matter where you go.  If you go to WvWvW you will always be surrounded by HUNDREDS of players from your server. You think a 24 man Raid is fun... bleh! An MMO should always be spontaneous. Oh and hey, GW2 looks so much better than EQ2, runs so much smoother, has so much more depth and heart than a game that has been out for years. Someone's doing something right, and it shows.

It's so sad. I spent years and hundreds of hours playing it. But SOE's recent models shows they only care about how to suck people in and get money while they can because they have no long term ability to retain them, and their trend has been continuosly been driving that model. And their numbers show it. /cry

Cita

The negative topics on this is null and will be proven in the next couple months. 

The majority of people are still trying to learn game mechanics... we're not even a month into release!? 

In Wv3 you have hundreds of hackers (across a variety of servers) tooling tricks to try to level or what not - you have have power levers w/ no real experience or achievements, and you have a lot of people experimenting with "what is this..?". You also have a few good players who know what they are doing and they are still the minority, but also the ones who are probably the ones complaining about it (not bad, just premature imo).

The player base doubled in size in under two weeks, to well over 2 mill, and while that is probably expected by everyone, the logistics of it is yet a different story. 

I'm just glad I can still run in and have a game that runs great. I'll focus on pvp once I KNOW my toon and have a full understanding of the diversity I can provide... then I'll probably start complaining :-P

they also say that they have at least 400k+ logged in at all times... 2 mill boxes, down peak of 1/4 of that given world wide time zones...? Not too shabby imo.... the game is amazing btw ;-)

Don't forget every FTP makes you play for the next expansion. Every game that comes out is more expensive than the following expansions besides "collector" editions.  LOTRO, EQ2, you name it, ftp has not been ftp - can't exist, they will find a way to pay for development.

The in-between though, this seems really nice!

I admit i kept asking my wife about the lack of quests beyond your story line (What am i doing wrong, where are they?!!!)... I was in the 20s before I even noticed that days into the game and that I had already done probably 100 of them under a different guise. honestly refreshing at least for me.  They just exist. Yes they are repeatable, but if you keep moving and exploring, the world continues to grow around you, and they flow so well you can seem to end up miles from where you began w/out even knowing where you are. It's really bad if you're OCHD! ack! Not good!

I admit i kept asking my wife about the lack of quests beyond your story line (What am i doing wrong, where are they?!!!)... I was in the 20s before I even noticed that days into the game and that I had already done probably 100 of them under a different guise. honestly refreshing at least for me.  They just exist. Yes they are repeatable, but if you keep moving and exploring, the world continues to grow around you, and they flow so well you can seem to end up miles from where you began w/out even knowing where you are. It's really bad if you're OCHD! ack! Not good!

Great article because what a lot of people here forget... (especially at the bottom)....

Is that the demographic is changing/growing/evolving in MMO's. What was sparked from pop-cult followings like D&D to Mogs, is its now an international thing involving 10's of millions of people and growing crossing several genres.  It's a very dynamic place now.

The hard core always post. And nothing new will ever be good enough. EQ2 and WoW have been out for what a decade? Several expansions each. No newly released game will never match that.

But again given what I've seen of GW2 since pre-launch, I'm ultra impressed. Actually beyond that, I was a HC raider in EQ2 for the last year - which after playing the game casually since launch; HC since my new girlfriend joined in a couple years ago, is all you could get to be any challenge, it became a job and trust me if you have my job like mine or period i suspect, a second one is not where you want to spend your off time. And I only tried it because it was gifted to me for my 40th bday...

I believe most of the players (non-foreign gold farmers aside - err no bias intended) are those people who have live's, families, jobs, and other responsibilities. For these gamers it's becoming our only way to have a social life almost... But we're busy have fun as can escape and remain the silent majority.

Things I've enjoyed the most in GW2 are basically just the game... "playing". They did the best job I've personally ever seen in any game at blending their talented conceptual art staff into the actual game itself, from a personal aspect this blows me away. From all aspects i think this is a beautiful game, and finally enjoyable to log into for the first time in a long time. I think this helps the immersion factor, at least for me since UO.

I've been challenged at every step, never felt a rush to grind something, enjoyed the ride. I finally did my first true group experience outside of PVP (one of my favorite aspects of MMO), and the level of effort was amazing, despite hints from a great experienced tank type, always spontaneous, and more exhilarating than anything I've personally experienced in a long time - and no one jumping on anyone because a "script" went bad, and yes we died many times it was awesome!

Sure it's not gonna be that hot south american model from Victoria's Secret that you will never get to taste or whatever fantasy we cook up in our minds, but for me your average guy, it's been cool, and my posts are always pretty balanced, I'm extremely critical if I think it will help.

But I also especially appreciate your openness to high-five what many others would consider a rival or competitor.  Being in a similar field in this day and age, too many seem to be more offensive towards successful peers instead of just saying yeah that's cool! After all if you can't accept it, you will never grow yourself ;-)

Cita

Um 2% so far and only one toon.  Can't wait to fully get the grip on game play and try PVP!

Got the game for m bithday, haven't played GW  before at least since its beta..... Not a fan boy,

but after a couple days of playing.... I'm really impressd on this release!

it plays smooth it seems a bit different and it's beautiful. I've gotten to level 11 since yesterday but  I've not had this much fun playing in years.  And I hope I've only scratched the surface. 

With so little info, it will be interesting to see.  UO was my first MMO, but that was after my first real fall into an MMO after my first PC game Diablo 2, I liked the similar display etc. They said this is no UO or true MMO at this point but might be fun to play Britannia again - I played it for many years before jumping to EQ, then EQ2 where I've been stuck since launch.

The cross platform to mobile has me most excited.  Maybe graphically challenged, but potentially more enthrauling. I spend a lot of time on my mobile device and have been looking for something fun, combining the two in a cool way is not only innovative, but down right mean!

Cita

No Planetside 2?  Looks pretty cool....

Not sure if this is a review of EQ2 as a game or the "expansion".

As a game it is the hidden gem well worth a 9.  

As an expansion... hardly a 5 when you consider past expansions and all they offered.  This was a feature pack that hardly had any beta testing and has been riddled with bugs especially with the FTP model being morphed into the existing Live gamer model.  It took almost 2 days just for the players to be able to play it once it went live and there has been hot fixes almost every day because of the lack of beta.  There are neat features, but nothing game changing, or adds to the core game experience except extra easier mode things.  Still not sure what we are discovering in this new "Age of Discovery" XPac...?

Our family waited till x3 station cash and purchased it for $10 with change left over... for that a good value... $40 no.

Community - 10! No doubt, it may be small, but you won't find better peeps anywhere.  Maybe small, but it is good and solid, just need a good guild regardless of server.

Biggest disappointment has been the amount of bugs lack of completing the last expansion that is promised to come out now until 2013... and how many subs till then?  

Customer service and account status is really what is going to kill them now though.  SOE used to be extremely awesome at this.  Now it's all foder, and long time players especially the All-Access folks are just screwed.  Very disappointing.

Until they can fix account stuff and rearrange the priority to long standing players the game will have no longevity and the game will fall into a dismal state that really makes me sad discrediting more of the SOE titles the way SWG did hugely a long time ago :-( Another lesson not learned.

Every other day we see new station cash stuff for sale over bugs fixed or new content that was promised long ago...  The game has been losing direction over lots of fluff.  The people who have been providing the game with income over the years are no longer apparently listened to this idea that the new ftp model will provide more income.  Perhaps it will upfront.  But the ftp model has been active for a year now Freeport, and managed to fill an entire Single server.  This isn't going to add a much higher active pop.

Unfortunate, EQ2 is THE diamond in the rough.  A game that has literally almost everything.  It's now either too easy (which leads to boredom fast) or too focused decorating like Sim City online... and that went super...

gah that was fast, my son will be busted... 

no trust in the dev staff?  these things take time, there was so much potential... out of genre league i guess.

I would say at least half the MMO community is probably one of the most globally cyber savy communities out there.  I think a lot of people's concerns does not just have a solo-centric perspective of their own security/privacy issues, but also inclined towards those who have no clue what they're up against online.

From Funcom's perspective this kind of information they can gain (even filtering those who create fake accounts) can be invaluable to them from a marketing campaign.

It's actually really smart but in my opinion a little dirty and declines the integrity of a company.

UO was my first, very cool took me in because of Diablo II.  Lasted a couple years before i jumped to EQ1 with a friend, then fell in love w/ EQ2 when it came out, did WOW and the rest but always stuck with EQ2. No better game now than eq2 IMO.

I've read before, your first MMO is like ur first love... gives a strange high, nothing will ever compare to it, no matter what you think i still have that feeling to this day after 6 years even though i never went back. But really it takes lots of experimenting to find your right match.

I think a lot of folks playing either love or hate because of those their playing with (the massive part), and sometimes u just get lucky and find the right match ;-)  Most of the MMO's out there are awesome with loyal followers and passionate developers.

Originally posted by finnmacool1

Originally posted by citadelli

  Not to mention flying up to floating islands hovering above the continents, this was at least 2 years before WoW even introduced flying mounts.  Plus you have the ability to get boats and sail all over the world. 

MOUNTS: They were the first MMO to introduce flying mounts, and they have really cool race specific mounts you can earn through extensive questing.

 Wow expansion that introduced flying mounts was released jan 16 2007, vg was released jan 30 2007.

 

 I do stand corrected!  It just seemed like VG came out before Burning crusade... time flies!  It was built into their original game concept early on in development I think and the seamlessness of the world appears designed to take advantage of such a feature fully.

Well I'm off to see if there's any cool free crap i can get off the LoTRO store....