In the common lands there were some quest givers at the front gate so I decided to stop looking for quests in Freeport and go forth and explore the common lands while taking every quest I saw. So I was out killing Carrion Hounds when it happened the first time. I was in the middle of combat when I noticed I was being attacked by another player. By the time I even noticed and reacted I was dead. While questing in the common lands, I was attacked repeatedly and open world PvP is surprisingly hardcore for an MMORPG these days. The game only allows players within four levels of each other to engage in open world PvP, which is fair but what I found out the hard way was a PvP kill entitles the victor to a percentage of coin and maybe an item. When I entered the common lands I had 10 gold but by the end of the night was I down to a few silver.

Much of the PvP I engaged in was groups of people open world PvP hunting. So if you are a solo player out running around on a PvP server it turns into a much more challenging game. Normally I would be killing NPC mobs and a group of two or three players in my level range would arrive on mounts and kill me in five to ten seconds. I suspect these were established players because I found a mount vendor and a mount would set you back forty five platinum. So this made leveling much more difficult and most of the money I made was lost. You can put your money and items in the bank and it will be safe, but sometimes it is hard to get back to Freeport if you are out leveling.

I ran into similar issues with quests in the common lands that I did in Freeport. There was no real direction and sometimes I would find mobs just by aimlessly wandering around. Most quests would give you a general idea of where the mobs were on the map but sometimes it took some exploring to find. The good thing about wandering around was that I would find new quests and remember where I saw certain mobs. Also the game area for the common lands felt big and it was fun running across the map and exploring.

Everquest 2 also has player housing which varies in cost for purchase and weekly maintenance. Some of the upscale tower rooms can run you a considerable amount of gold. However a nice room in the Inn will run you five or so silver a week and your first two room apartment is free of charge, complements of the overlord. You can decorate your room with items you get from quest rewards in the game. One of the unique items I saw was a mirror item that shows your reflection in real time. There is also another item you can place in your home which allows you put items up for sale through brokers in Freeport. You can also search the market for items you might want to buy from this item. I hardly bought any gear because I lost all my money that one night but there are merchants called brokers in Freeport which allows players to buy and sell items.

There is also a market place that sells items for station cash. There are many different items for sale which range from furniture to pets. All of the items seem to be appearance only items and do not upset the balance of the game. There are some XP potions that give bonuses to Adventuring and Trade skill XP but that's about the only items that could be said to upset the balance. There are also items for sale to allow you to change the sex of your character, appearance, and even your name.

Final Thoughts

I never played Everquest or Everquest 2 so I started playing this game not knowing what to expect. Upon logging in I thought the music was amazing and the graphics were not that bad. As I progressed through the tutorial I was having fun and the game play seemed easy and straight forward. The game was hand holding me through the first ten levels while teaching me the game.

Once I got to Freeport that hand holding was gone and I had problems getting used to the interface and finding what I was looking for. I had assumed my spells were updating themselves to more powerful versions. This was not happening automatically so at one point I started dying a lot and was wondering what I was doing wrong. I discovered all my spells were still the basic ones that I received in the training area. After I updated the spells manually I was fine but it took me a while to figure it out and if I had not been playing for the purposes of this article, odds are I would have logged out.

By the time I got to the common lands though it became painfully obvious there was so much to learn about this game. So much that it felt overwhelming at times. While the game itself isn't really hard, there is just so much information you literally have no idea where to begin or how to learn it. There were times I was digging the game and others where I was cursing at the computer.

The PvP servers were so brutal I was amazed this system was still left untouched due to the way the industry overall has evolved. I normally play on PvP servers and have a the mentality that, "If you don't like it go to the care bear servers," but even I was shocked about the brutality of the PvP. Mind you I am not complaining because if I had the time, I would love to really learn this game inside and out and join the fun. In this game, getting into a good guild would be very important and questing with groups would help a lot.

Overall I think Everquest 2 is a solid game which caters to the hardcore gamers vs. the casual gamers.