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Originally posted by Papadam
I dont understand why people care about the EQ franchise, its just extremly generic fantasy. Why not creat something new with a more unique lore/world.

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In essence that's what Vanguard was supposed to be.

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Originally posted by Luxumaru
So THATS why EQ II is going free2play, I knew SOE had to have some other money maker in progress to do such a thing. I bet they only did it so people could come in, like EQ II, then ditch it to buy this "new" game when it comes out.

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Keep in mind, Everquest Next was talked about well over a year ago and teased in the EverCrack Videos, so EQN wasn't a surprise to fans. SOE going with EQII as a F2P is just another marketing plan. I'm sure the F2p will attract a fresher group of players who could potentially be lured to EQN. Its a little to soon to tell.

I'm looking forward to hearing a little bit more about it. Naturally speculation and knee jerk reactions will ensue.

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Originally posted by Milky
Edit: More info/videos of the panel at SOE fan faire. 
http://www.massively.com/2010/08/07/fan-faire-2010-john-smedley-and-the-soe-crew-talk-everquest-nex/
Everquest Next was teased at SOE fan faire.  Here is what is claimed to be an in game look.  I have been waiting for more details about the game and more information is expected to come out today and over the weekend.  Truthfully I am very skeptical of the game given SOE's recent history in how they are treating their games and players.  They really haven't done it 'right' since the original EQ.  There is a chance of this game taking a page from the past and recapturing the magic, but knowing SOE's recent past, they likely will not have learned anything from previous lessons.  At this point I'm either going to be very surprised or extremely dissapointed.  What are your thoughts?
 

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Thanks Milky! Ever since I first heard about EQN I've been trying to find as much information as I could, realizing that there probably wouldn't be any 'substantive' information till this years Fan Faire. As a member/subscriber of Ten Ton Hammer, I was able to present a question for the TTH team to submit and of course I asked about EQN.

I do appreciate you posting this!

Its great that you guys took action and decided to work with what you have. Good luck to you guys!

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Originally posted by Interesting

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Originally posted by SaintViktor
Thats like letting the inmates run the prison. Too much chaos and gaming is big money. Most devs will not hand over the controls to the players. I wouldn't either.

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Yes. There is Chaos. Gaming is big money, but thats something noone made yet that many would like to see implemented.
There is a ridiculous market for a game that offer such life like social structure.
 
You are wrong in thinking that everyone on the internet are criminals due to anonimity. With freedom everyone can choose to play sheep, wolf or dog. Things will balance each other, people in this organic living breathing system will addapt.
 
All we have to do is give them the tools for that. For everything that doesnt work, we have to give people tool to do try it again, or in a different way, in a better way and so on. People can not feel that they are out of tools.
 
If a group of players make a town near some good natural resources and a river. The city starts to grown, more people come, eventually bad people come. We have to give those players the tools to deal with the bad people with their own strenght/organization. It will be ultimatelly the power of the group in organizing themselfs and using the tools at their disposal, working together that will beat random criminal individuals.
If the law is not good enough, let them change it to another laws with difference requisites/punishments.
If they cannot enforce their own law, they will have to seek refugee in another town. They will have to organize under a wider group of people.
What I say is...
let the nature run and eventually we will have built virtual societies greater and more organized than real world societies.

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Let this thread or forum(s) sever as your litmus test. In this thread you have people with varying philosophies, ideologies, concepts about game mechanics and play style. Ultimately what you're left with is power a struggle. You'd be spending a majority of your time delineating and all the while people are most likely going to disagree with your method, this is assuming that you are the 'ruling class'.

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Originally posted by Copenhagen
Damnit,   I was sort of hoping I could play my charactor, with this.
 
Why would someone want to play for free 1-80, then subscribe to it, and still not get the rest of the content to the game (80-90)?  Sounds like another Big Fat SOE Rip Off to me.
 
Much like them charging us Planet Side players 14.99 or is it 15.99 for the sub on it.   A 7 year old game they don't even support any more.
 
 
SOE is a Big Fat Rip-Off-And-Duplicate Company that Overcharges on it's services.
This is part of the reason why Blizzard was able to so greatly over take them with World of Warcraft.

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At least we'll always have the option not to play/pay :)

I've not seen anything regarding minimal requirements. I wonder if this will run better than live.

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Originally posted by tigris67
I find it funny how EQ1, the game that came out 5 years before this one by the same company, isn't FTP, when this one is...

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This is the most compelling argument in this whole thread.

24" 1920x1200.

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Originally posted by popsideath

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Originally posted by cyphers
About Vanguard. The more I hear about the game like the really vast, seamless world and the diplomacy system, the more I think it's a shame that it didn't get the same development attention post-launch as other games as EQ2 got. I think it had the potential to be something awesome.

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Sadly, Vanguard IS A good game... and the only game on earth where fans and players say that it's 'sad' that it's good.
 
90% of the issues at launch were technical.  Crap was broken.  There were bugs, broken quests, etc.  But the main culprit was just that it was technically unplayable.
 
And SOE has fixed most of that, and nicely.  The crew (not Sillius) was dedicated and skilled.  It's just there was so few of them it took AGES to get things fixed, and by the time the game was playable and polished, it was too late... way too late.
 
A full dev crew could have gotten Vanguard to the point it was after 2 years in about 2 months.  Launch was a mess though, and the first thing SOE did was put Vanguard on a skeleton crew.  But for those of us that played beta extensively and could actually run the game on launch, it was never a question of the game having promise.  We say it.  It was a question of whether SOE was going to actually give it a chance to be good or simply let it rot as another crappy title to pimp for their station access.
 
How embarrassing would it have been if they gave Vanguard attention--via publishing/supporting Sigil fully or even after aquiring the game and throwing as much funding into it--and then it blew their flagship MMO EQ2 out of the water?  The thing is, even on life support with a skeleton crew staff, Vanguard IS a better game than EQ2... thankfully for Smed, SOE, and prideful egos, people only started realizing that years after Vanguards launch and reputation ensured it would never be popular or respected as a AAA title.

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Lets not forget the Brad McQuaid factor. When the leader decides to essentially abandon the project and the team is left leaderless it can present a lot of challenges. Then to add insult to injury a good many of them were fired, in a parking lot. Vanguard had potential, but McQuaid for all his creative talent isn't an effective leader. I wanted Vanguard to succeed, but it just felt like the game had no soul so I didn't play it beyond the Beta. I'm glad to hear that it does have a decent following and that there is a niche group of players that are still enjoying it.

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Originally posted by uquipu
They can't compete with WoW.
.
EQ2 never recovered after WoWs launch gradually losing customers.
.
Vangaurd was touted as a WoW killer but Vanguard was destroyed by WoW.

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I've never bought into the idea that WoW is the measure of all MMO's. WoW is a fun game, however to suggest that its the template for all MMO's is grossly over generalized. Perhaps it can be argued that its a cash cow and an economic yard stick for the gaming industry, but I wouldn't call it as being the most substantive, engaging or end-depth MMO out there. WoW may be the centrifuge of a massive subscriber base, but that's where the difference lies.

At this point I'm wondering how this will effect Everquest Next, that apparently hasn't had any coverage at all lately. I suppose it can be a little selfish of me to focus on the next new iteration while people are losing their jobs. Its a tough economy and most likely we've not seen the worst of it.

The fan fair is just around the corner and I'm wondering what the mood will be like with this recent news.

I came across MMORPG back in 2004 and regrettably didn't join upon discovering it. To me finding a great game site or a fan site has become somewhat of a sport. I like subscribing as soon as I come across them, I suppose that falls in line with my trivial post count preoccupation. Perhaps its kind of a game within in game to participate on forums.

A lot has changed in the gaming community. Some of my first gaming sites where the old EZBoard Forums. This is going back to time when I played TA Kingdoms (RPG) and a year later in 1999 when I started playing EQ. There is a certain mystique about finding a good community oriented game site and a site like MMORPG that has a wide collection of games.

In my three years of participating on MMROPG I've found it be a health community of players. There are going to be those few agitators, but over all I've liked my experience here and that it covers such a wide range of MMO's.

The game looks promising, however I'm cautiously optimistic.

I was hoping to hear more about EN at E3, however we may have to wait till Fan Fair.

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Originally posted by Daywolf

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Originally posted by BuzWeaver
 

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Originally posted by Daywolf

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Originally posted by BuzWeaver
I can appreciate people's love for their favorite Books, TV Shows and Movies, however the IP conversion Bandwagon is getting as uncreative and unoriginal as Hollywood. MMORPG's live and breaths with creativity. Sure some of the IPs have had some successes, but this is based on a selective demographic of players. Its understandable that if these IPs are turned into games it allows people to experience their favorite Books, TV Shows and Movies, however just basing it on personal affection and fandom is hardly a reason that they should be turned into a game. Seinfeld MMO anyone?

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So then you would agree that EQII or EQ Next is as absurd as Seinfeld then?

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That's a rhetorical question. I see no particular comparisons to Seinfeld a TV show and Everquest. A squeal to an existing game is very much inline with the continuation of the lore or other elements of the game. Adapting a Book, TV Show or Movie to a game is a whole other matter.

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Double standard.

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The distinction seems clear enough. Just because someone likes a Book, TV Show or Movie it hardly justifies turning it into a game. It would be less complicated for a developer to create an original product than have to negotiate with an IP over all the legal logistics, production and licensing.

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Originally posted by Daywolf

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Originally posted by BuzWeaver
I can appreciate people's love for their favorite Books, TV Shows and Movies, however the IP conversion Bandwagon is getting as uncreative and unoriginal as Hollywood. MMORPG's live and breaths with creativity. Sure some of the IPs have had some successes, but this is based on a selective demographic of players. Its understandable that if these IPs are turned into games it allows people to experience their favorite Books, TV Shows and Movies, however just basing it on personal affection and fandom is hardly a reason that they should be turned into a game. Seinfeld MMO anyone?

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So then you would agree that EQII or EQ Next is as absurd as Seinfeld then?

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That's a rhetorical question. I see no particular comparisons to Seinfeld a TV show and Everquest. A squeal to an existing game is very much inline with the continuation of the lore or other elements of the game. Adapting a Book, TV Show or Movie to a game is a whole other matter.

I can appreciate people's love for their favorite Books, TV Shows and Movies, however the IP conversion Bandwagon is getting as uncreative and unoriginal as Hollywood. MMORPG's live and breaths with creativity. Sure some of the IPs have had some successes, but this is based on a selective demographic of players. Its understandable that if these IPs are turned into games it allows people to experience their favorite Books, TV Shows and Movies, however just basing it on personal affection and fandom is hardly a reason that they should be turned into a game. Seinfeld MMO anyone?

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Originally posted by Solude
As mentioned EQ2 is CPU limited in a massive way.  The visual upgrades are essentially free with little to no difference between extreme performance and high quality.  Its will only use two cores making things even less fun.  I play EQ2 on an AMD Phenom II @ 3.7GHz, ATi 4890, 4GB, R0 at average about ~40fps on high.  Raids are silly, easily dropping to single digits if particles are enabled.
VG and AoC do perform better, AoC much better easily getting 80+fps on high.  Also while EQ2 looks good up close its forced LoD makes things 20-50ft out look terrible and then pop when you cross the line.  Always found that the most annoying part of the engine since the low res models and high res models don't line up on poly shape or textures.  So one minute its a red chest then pop its dark brown.

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The compiling has been an issue for me to. The game looks fantastic, but when I'm playing in Halas the compiling really detracts from the game. You're running along watching all the MOB's, NPC's and Elements compiling it really detracts from the game.