They're Making an Emu ... of EverQuest Online Adventures?

[Ekco]

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

I didn't know anyone who had a PS2 and actually connected it to the internet.

SOCOM 2 multiplayer was the fuckin shit, most people played that

[Zuranthium]

I beta tested EQOA and got a free month when it came out, it was nothing special, nowhere close to the "new 1999-esque EQ" I wanted. Was easy to run across the whole game world with no real danger and after visting the waypoint in a given area you were able to teleport back there for free.

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

the zones are literally more polished, like compare the freeports

In what world are any of the zones more polished. They don't have nearly as much personality. Less interesting details, boring randomly placed assets, too rounded and evenly spaced out everywhere, and in general a more cartoony feel.

[Ekco]

>In what world are any of the zones more polished
reality? lol

it just objectively looks better... i would honestly flip your criticisms back to EQ1 with the "less interesting details, assests..ect"

basically every zoneline and skybox in EQ looks like complete dogshit and unfinished it's immersion breaking and makes it feel like the zones aren't connected at all

EQOA tech of streaming in the assets without zoning alone makes it a better fucking game lol

[Zuranthium]

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

it just objectively looks better...

Nah. It's impossible to really say "objectively" about this though. But for me EQOA definitely looks worse and felt like something that was artificial and lacking inspiration. Whereas Everquest feels like stepping into a real fantasy world. It's twisty, claustrophobic, expansive, wondrous, and the cities are designed with care for the civilizations there.

Not having zones didn't make EQOA better. Honestly that is a charm to Everquest, you feel transported to a new place when entering a different area, in part because many of the zone entrances visually and physically feel like a clear demarcation. This is important to the game world being an avatar of something more; a game is always going to be smaller in size than an "actual" world, unless you want a game where it takes months to travel across a continent, but it should still give that feeling of largeness and difficulty to traverse.

There still were "zones" anyway in EQOA. The areas of the game were very boxily-conceived, which means that even though the zones are superficially more "open" to each other, it ends up feeling more same-y and less expansive, as things are uninterestingly spaced out and you just take a shortcut to get somewhere.

[Ekco]

no it objectively looks like someone spent 10 minutes doing the geometry on eq1 freeport or most zones for that matter and didn't know what the fuck they were doing and shipped that shit anyway

EQOA had people with actual experience working on it and it shows


>There still were "zones" anyway in EQOA.

yeah okay, Odus and Faydwer and Antonica are 3 separate zones + the planes but the 1 zone of Antonica on EQOA is bigger than Classic,Kunark and Velious fucking combined though i'm pretty sure so yeah the waypoint system was fine considering how fucking massive the world felt

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[Zuranthium]

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

no it objectively looks like someone spent 10 minutes doing the geometry on eq1 freeport or most zones for that matter and didn't know what the fuck they were doing and shipped that shit anyway

EQOA had people with actual experience working on it and shows

What "shows" on EQOA is something that looks worse and is less interestingly designed. Like I said, everything is too rounded, boringly spaced, cartoony, and lacks interesting details. Landmarks weren't as awe-inspiring, nothing felt very scary. It very much felt like just running around in an obviously fabricated environment, instead of a fantasy novel brought to life.

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

1 zone of Antonica on EQOA is bigger than Classic, Kunark and Velious fucking combined

Antonica in EQOA was absolutely not that big. It didn't take me much time to run across the entire width of the continent and there was no real danger doing it, in stark contrast to trying to travel in Everquest (particularly at low levels).

The zones I am talking about in EQOA are the squares you can see on the map you just posted. There were notifications when walking into a new "zone" and MOBs never moved out of their zones, I seem to remember MOBs would never chase very far in general. The game world was more sterile and the zones being more "open" wasn't interesting at all, because everything was clearly designed as a specific square area with "content" in the middle.

[Ekco]

'The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.'

shit's kino idk what else to say

[Ciderpress]

EQOA came out in 2003, EQ came out in 1999. It does "look better" than EQ1 on like a pixels per second basis or whatever, because obviously. Doesn't tell you much about the expertise or talent or abilities of anyone who made either game. Vanilla Quake 1 looks much much better than EQ and came out in 1996. All about the art direction.

[Zuranthium]

That video proves exactly what I was saying - there was not much change in geography or anything interesting to see when running across the entire continent, and it didn't take very long either (obviously the video is sped up but now time running across the continent in Everquest with no buffs, not to mention how dangerous it is).

[magnetaress]

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

shit's kino idk what else to say

This is what my dreams look like except its a combination of lake rathe and highpass


should really be a run from grobb to everfrost tho showcasing the diffrent biomes

the transition of tree types in the karanas was kinda nice wondering if they did that elswhere