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Originally Posted by t0lkien
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EverQuest was/is epic. Nothing about EQN appears or feels epic (with a proviso below). They have gone for technological "advances" without any of the broad unifying sweeps of the original EQ. Notice how no-one cheered at the concept art or flybys until they were asked to do so? It's because we've all seen it before. It's all tight, small, and intensely detailed while looking careful controlled and contrived - just like every other modern console shooter. The style? How much more like Blizzard/Warhammer can everyone go and keep a straight face about it. Really, it's perplexing. Good grief, even the Dark Forces/Jedi Knight games from 10+ years ago felt more epic than this.
The multi-class thing? This was all tried and failed in paper systems before computer games existed. The only game to get it anywhere near right was Daggerfall/Obsidian franchise, and it was/is a *single player game*. Anyone building a new RPG should at least be aware of what has gone before it so it doesn't try to go down all the already disproven dry gullies that looked good initially but didn't work in the end. Class distinction is lost when you can be anything. The gameplay as a result is blurred and unsatisfying. Limitations are what makes great gameplay, not the lack of them. RPGing 101. And anyway, as has been said, everyone will figure out the optimal build and use it. Remember D3's "billions of builds"? Yeah. I'm wondering how many times this lesson has to be learned.
The animation system is nice. I don't mind the touches of Disney in the character facials. But these things do not make a game. We are here playing a 15 year old square-limbed game because it looks great, right? Gameplay. Gameplay is king. That does not mean a Diablo-esque combat system with lots of noise and action, and single player focus. Destructibility - the only way this can work in an MMO is where everything is instanced (so the world doesn't end up a pile of ash within the first day). Goodbye MMO; hello MO.
The usual journalistic sycophantism aside, even the crowd was underwhelmed. It's a mish-mash of secondhand ideas and "cool tech" thrown together. It's a game built around potential "tent pegs" of hyperbole and marketing, and hyped into absurdity before even this small reveal. What they did show was carefully constructed tech demos, nothing more. Lots of it will change before launch as they try to build the thing and find out why certain ideas don't work (again), and when it ships it will be smaller than even this presentation promises. EQN is a business idea before it's a game.
So the writing's on the wall. If anyone is going to make the game many of us are waiting for, it's going to have to come from the indie/kickstarter crowd, because the established companies are now officially out of ideas and out of touch with their roots.
Addendum: Rallying Call and the idea of a minecraft-esque physical depth to the world, along with emergent AI are solid ideas IMO. They will still revolve around set pieces (you'll dig down to discover another encounter piece precisely the same as you have encountered previously, with some level/power changes etc.) It won't be as "emergent" as they are selling it to be, but the procedural aspects of it that they do pull off could be compelling. You lose as much as you gain with this direction, but it has the potential to create a new type of experience i.e. a different type of game. Not better, different.
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Don't you still get it? EverQuest was epic to all of us, cause it was 1999 and it was the 1st game of this kind and we were for most, teens. Its like your 1st great love, its a feeling you always try to come back to but somehow just never can.
Sad truth mate is we all grew old and we just don't see MMO's now the way we used to, all stuck deeply in nostalgia acting like it's still year 2000 and Kunark was just released...
EQ Next is as epic as a MMO can get, you just don't see it. If you were 15 right now and hadn't ever known either EQ, EQ2 or WoW, playing EQN for the 1st time would be forever a fond memory and you'd be looking for it all your life.