When did Everquest start to really decline in quality of experience?

[RecondoJoe]

Originally Posted by Knuckle [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I find that very interesting, I didn't even touch EQ 2 because at that point EQ 1 had evolved into such a joke, EQ 2 appeared to be a progression of that at a glance, as someone who quit during free trial a few years after it was out. Never met/knew someone who I played with on EQ that played EQ2. Definitely played WoW starting in TBC era after college.

A lot of people on my server, and real-life friends quit to play EQ 2 together. But also a lot of people kind of became adults while playing and seemed to have moved away from online gaming altogether. I don't know too many of my high school friends who still play games 20 years later, and even though there are a lot of 30-40 year olds I meet on WoW, meeting anyone who actually played EverQuest seems to be extraordinarily rare.

It feels surreal when you have self-proclaimed experts at MMO like Asmongold talk about how inferior EverQuest was despite having never played it. The first thing I realized when I played WoW classic last summer was how many WoW players would have loved EverQuest, but are completely oblivious. Like all of these kids want a more traditional, old school MMO, but few of them have actually experienced it or know how amazing it can be. When I play EQ and I hop into a dungeon or any zone, I'm completely drawn in and feel like I'm in that environment, and could die or be greatly rewarded at any time. I never get that same feeling from WoW or any other MMO I've played. Just a bunch of instanced grind for loot rewards that don't feel rewarding because they're flat-lined and handed out to everyone, and none of them are unique or interesting.