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Role Playing (Games)

Everquest 2 vs. World of Warcraft Comparison 79

GinoMGG writes "My Guy Games has an interesting EverQuest II vs. World of Warcraft series that includes an interview with a level 50 EQII player and a level 60 WoW character. The series also has a side by side shootout between the two biggest MMORPG releases in November."
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Everquest 2 vs. World of Warcraft Comparison

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  • by nijk ( 781345 ) * on Monday November 15, 2004 @11:36AM (#10820832)
    level 50 EQII player and a level 60 WoW character

    I dunno if I trust his opinion if he plays MMORPGs that much, sheesh.
    • I can't speak for EQ2, but levelling in WoW is pretty fast. There are people who have made it to 60 in 2 weeks real-world time (hardest of the hardcore, obviously) - the first 10 levels can be done in an evening. Blizzard has designed it so that even casual gamers can get to 60, and can experience the high-end content.
  • No Contest (Score:5, Informative)

    by XxtraLarGe ( 551297 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @11:42AM (#10820912) Journal
    Since I've got a Mac, It'll definitely be WoW. Everquest 2 isn't available, and Everquest support for the Mac version was very poor.
    • I'd find a way to try it on your machine before you buy it if you haven't yet. WoW beta performance on my PBG4 1.5/15" (with 128 megs of VRAM, nonetheless) is wretched. I can't even quite reach 30fps indoors, at 800x600 (lowest supported resolution), with graphics turned all the way down.

      The odd thing: none of the graphics settings (aside from the fog distance, which I have to keep low all the time, making the vistas much less scenic on my machine) even seem to affect the framerate by more than few per s
      • I think that's a problem with the mac client in general. I'm running on a 800 g3 ibook and its playable, but not really. if there isn't too much stuff going on its ok, but if there's a ton of people and/or mobs around it starts grinding. Of course, I also think some of those performace things are server side too. Have to wait until retail to find out really.
        • I'm running on a 800 g3 ibook and its playable, but not really.

          You can try adding memory, but it isn't going to get better. From Requirements [worldofwarcraft.com]:

          933 MHz or higher G4 or G5 processor.
          512 MB RAM or higher. DDR RAM recommended.

          I think it's playable with slightly less, but they are essentially covering their butts. I've been playing since April on a 1Ghz Powerbook with 512MB, and the performance is a lot better now. It still bogs down in certain areas, but is pretty good overall.
          • I've maxed the ram in here, so yeah it ain't going to get better, that's why I'm not planning on buying it. I've really enjoyed it, but it doesn't play well enough to be really enjoyable.
  • My take (Score:4, Insightful)

    by shaka999 ( 335100 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @11:48AM (#10820963)
    Well so far I think I like WOW better.

    I'm in the open beta for WOW and bought EQII. At level 9 I'm already feeling like EQII is a bit of a grind. WOW just seems to flow better.

    That said, I'll be playing EQ2 until WOW is released and who knows. Maybe something will change my mind.
    • Re:My take (Score:3, Informative)

      by Naikrovek ( 667 )
      its possible to make eq2 feel like a grind. I found myself doing that just yesterday.

      what I did was go around looking for things to do for people. Before long I had dozens of quests to do, and while I am aware that i'm actually changing nothing, helping the various NPCs has been quite enjoyable.

      What I'm trying to say is that wandering aimlessly trying to get to the next level is much less fulfilling than doing favors for NPCs. You don't level as fast, but that was the whole point. you get decent rewar
      • Too bad quests don't have any impact on the world. Man, I would love to play a MMOG that incorporated that.

        It's always so disappointing to complete a quest, realizing that everyone else before you already got the guy his "4 flasks of water" or whatever.
        • > Too bad quests don't have any impact on the world. Man, I would love to play a MMOG that incorporated that.

          you mean something like a quest to unlock a new playable race? EQ2's got that.
        • The only way quests could have an impact on the world is if they designed GM sponsored events that did this. Can't think of any good examples at the moment, but I think I'm on the right track.
      • Then you ought to play WoW. All leveling in WoW is done through questing. I have yet to go to a random area to kill monsters- I'm always off on a quest of some sort. The quests all give xp rewards, which usually equal or dwarf the xp you make killing to finish the quest. Oh, and you can do crafting with mob drops and items you gather while doing all this.
  • Google Cache (Score:4, Informative)

    by Sux2BU ( 20893 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @11:59AM (#10821083)
    Here's Google's text only cache [64.233.167.104] of the downed site.
  • I play both.. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Pengo ( 28814 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @12:03PM (#10821127) Journal

    And I find that both can have a place on a gamers shelf. One can't really be compared to the other, as they are both MASSIVELY different in scope and design.

    WoW: Great game, fast paced, very simple to understand and navigate. My only grief with the game is that the character development can be quite cookie cutter. The talents are pretty liner, and there seems to be preferred path for PVP performance. WoW does at least have a plan for PVP. Though, it's not all implemented, it looks like it's going to be a lot of fun.

    EQ2: MASSIVE world. Your put right in the middle of an epic-sized story that makes me feel as if I am a key part of the shaping of the world. The character development is quite profound, almost to the degree of Marrowind type games (though, not quite so flexible). I love this and it makes me feel that I am in control of my character and I can make something unique and interesting as I like him. The world is beautiful and I find it a pleasure to walk around and explore. I find that the death penalty is a bit rougher than WoW, and solo play is getting harder and harder at 13-14+. EQ2 has a really neat web-based character report. You can see almost all aspects of your character from the web site.

    Here is mine:
    http://eq2players.station.sony.com/en/pplay er.vm?c haracterId=111621109

    All in all, I find them both a pleasure to play. I have spent the last few years playing another not-so-unpopular game with a very Realm-versus-Realm oriented aspect of endgame. I have found both of these games a huge upgrade over what I hvae been playing, and my wife might even play WoW with me which would be great. The barrier to entry to play previous MOG's where too great for her to feel like she was having fun.

    I don't believe that casual or hardcore gamer types will be disappointed with either. Both of which would definitely give you the $50 retail value if only played for the 30 free days.

    I will likely have accounts open on both of the games and try to divide my free time between them. I will let the game that has the best customer support, interesting game play and a company that cares about the long term playability of their game and not looking to make a short dollar today.

  • differences (Score:5, Informative)

    by Ghent99 ( 556436 ) <ghent@starshadow.com> on Monday November 15, 2004 @12:07PM (#10821171) Homepage
    Having been in the beta for both, I would have to say that there are particular things about both that I like and dislike:

    World of Warcraft
    * Like: Graphics, they are bubbly and cartoony and match all the predecessors perfectly.
    * Like: Gameplay, as always, Blizzard has reduced the normal 'level-grinding' down to almost nothing.
    * Like: Mobs are rated accurately. Finally a game where if the mob is rated as "even" to me, it doesn't actually kick my butt.
    * Like: Raiding! PvP and raiding with a group of people who actually listen and pay attention can be extremely fun!
    * Like: Guilds, they're easy to create and control.
    * Like: Instancing.
    * Dislike: Method of selling crafts. Currently, as far as I know, there's only 1 auction house on each continent, and no method for players to 'display' their wares.
    * Dislike: The auction house. While it is pretty and easy to use, it's barely adequate for doing any real amounts of selling. Auction times are not displayed, no history of items, or how much they sold for, etc etc, all make it hard to determine what the 'going rate' is.
    * Dislike: Lack of control over raid groups. At least give the ability for the raid leader to mute /moderate the damn raid chat channel!

    Everquest II
    * Like: Graphics, very sharp looking game, especially when you turn up the juice in the settings.
    * Like: Crafting, crafting, crafting. I love the crafting in this game. You actually have to pay attention and it is worthwhile to do it!
    * Like: Class subsets. I really enjoyed knowing that I could reach major leveling milestones and still have choices about the development of my character beyond the original class choice.
    * Like: Boat travel, I loved being able to go to a lot of different places via boat, instanteously.
    * Dislike: Flying travel. The griffons, when they were working, looked terrible, had terrible clipping, and seemed slow.
    * Dislike: Inventory control. I know you need to get bags for inventory space, but sheesh.
    * Dislike: NPC hunting. WoW has this too, but somehow it wasn't so bad in WoW for me. In EQII, it really annoyed me.

    There's a few a put together. Ultimately, being a long time Blizzardite, I'll play WoW. I'm a big time crafter, so the decision was actually hard, but ultimately I have more fun playing WoW, and I've been waiting a long time to play it. Plus the extras in the collector's edition are going to be a real treat!

  • WoW (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Austerity Empowers ( 669817 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @12:18PM (#10821287)
    I'm got in the WoW open beta, only level 15 so far, but it seems WoW is superior to every other MMOG I've played.

    To start, it's actually fun. Like levelling up, that tedium in EQ you had to go through to get to where the real content is? Well it's like fun and stuff. Get this, you do quests, and most don't suck. You level up as a side effect of quests. Unlike CoH, you can actually (so far at least) solo all of the quests. There are tons of them, I have not run out (currently have 11 quests active). There are rumors of "elite" quests that require groups, but the one I had I was able to solo. I prefer to level up and quest alone, saving groups/raids for big events or RvR stuff.

    Last night someone from the horde tried to attack us little night elves. I think it was a draw, they had levels on their side, but we had numbers. It was fun regardless. We're on a non-PVP server, which means it's totally optional whether to get involved with that or not, which I like. I didn't like the griefing and other crap in DAOC that you get from xp'ing in RvR zones. The PvP servers exist for people who like that, but I suspect that the non-PvP servers will be the more popular choice. If it's done right, the high level quests will lead you to want to kill the opposing faction NPCs, and draw you in to PvP. The bulk of the high level game will probably center around this. That seems like the way to go, and where I'd at least want to group/guild and spend time. It's a guess, but it sounds like it'd be fun.

    The graphics are of course great, but so are CoH and EQ2. I think WoW has them beat in mechanics and artistry, but it's a judgement call. I think CoH landscape/pathing may be a bit better, but WoW complexity is much higher. I still play EQ for raids, and I have never been unsatisfied with EQ graphics so...

    The tradeskill system seems decent. The system is similar but improved in mechanics from Horizons. You can't exclusively tradeskill, but to my mind that's not a rational plan for a fantasy/adventure game. It is TBD whether it is functional in terms of actually being useful to the game. No game has yet hit the mark on tradeskills except perhaps EVE, but EVE is a different type of game.

    Raiding is still TBD. EQ in my mind is wearing the crown, it's unclear if it will be dethroned. If open beta ran longer, I'd probably be high enough to raid by early december (playing 3 hours a day mind you, in EQ it takes a year to do that). I suspect EQ mechanics will be better for a while, I think they'll end up having to tune WoW. It's supposition but I'm guessing that'll happen. Blizzard seems to have an eye on EQ for that judging by the competition going on, we'll see.

    Anyway after EQ and the total disaster that was SWG, plus my limited but disgusted experience with EQ2...I'm giving that a miss. At this point I think I will be buying WoW. The most important criteria I have is that it seems well thought out, and the developers want the game to be fun above all. Most MMOGs miss that completely, or have only one or two elements that are fun (like say, raiding or RvR), while the bulk of the game is boring.

    $.02

    • Just curious, but what elite quest did you solo and what class/lvl were you? The 2 I tried (human bandit and dwarf wendigo both around lvl 11) I was trashed pretty quickly. I couldn't imagine being able to solo those unless you were several levels above the level the quest was intended for.
      • I'm a Night Elf Priest, the quest was in Tendrassil (sp?). You're correct, I was several levels above the quest.

        The quest is described here:
        http://www.thottbot.com/?q=2933

        I was level 11 when I did it, which is well above the level most people would find it (probably level 6-7). At level 10 I gained a number of new offensive spells, which is undoubtedly why I was able to win. I was about to move out of newbie land, and was just intentionally trying to find missed quests. It was a real hard fight and I bare
    • There are tons of them, I have not run out (currently have 11 quests active). There are rumors of "elite" quests that require groups, but the one I had I was able to solo. I prefer to level up and quest alone, saving groups/raids for big events or RvR stuff.

      They aren't rumors. I've gotten my first 2 elite quests this past weekend. You can tell the difference because in the quest log it'll actaully say "elite" in the entry. The ones that I've gotten so far were from 'linked' quests which I've completed to

      • The first one human characters, and maybe some adventurous gnomes & dwarves that head south, will run across is most like Hogger. He's an 11 Giant Knoll along the border of Elwynn Forest and Westfall, you can get the quest from the wanted poster in front of the tower by the bridge. He was still fairly tough for my group, which was a 14 Mage and 12 Paladin
    • Last night someone from the horde tried to attack us little night elves.

      OK, either this is a really small world, or a very large coincidence. Last night I (my Orc Huntress) was involved in a Horde raid on Alliance territory. It was retallation after a Night Elf somehow managed to sneak into our newb zone. Server was Test29 (MTN zone), so either that was the same raid... or lots of good greenskins all over the world had the same idea that night!


      PS: I love this game. Never actually bought an MMO- before

      • Coincidence I'm afraid.

        Test 36 EST. I don't exactly know what prompted the battle, all I know is I was trying to keep up with some morlock respawn so i could inspect some washed up carcass, and then all kinds of people ran by me killing each other. Shortly thereafter 3. - Local Defense became active with "strategies".

        "Strategies" included getting everyone 11-23 (our highest level I guess) to the druid grove. Dying shortly thereafter to one of the aforementioned morlocks, I had the occasion to wisp back to
  • by Dusabre ( 176445 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @12:21PM (#10821325) Homepage
    if the interviewees were capable of making coherent replies to the questions asked. I was expecting them to switch to 1337 at any moment. The WoW interview was the more painful, a sentence would contradict the one before and after it.

    This is not a flame or troll, RTFA. There's valuable information in the interviews but these gamers lack the ability to express themselves and transmit the information...
  • by The-Bus ( 138060 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @12:28PM (#10821398)
    What? I won't stand this unfounded adulation towards these "Dark Elf Shadowknights" and what have you. Let them match their worthless warriors against DocutronXP, my level 48 Hunter Strangler, hailing from the Land of Enchantment & Good Prices on Leather Sofas [progressquest.com]. You have never met a more brave and stunning Enchanted Motorcycle. Foes cower at my Level XXXVIII Clever Fellow. Those not vanquished by my level XXII Lockjaw will succumb to the one-two punch of my level XIX Animate Nightstnad and/or a Rabbit Punch from my +25 Custom Studded Titanium Gauntlets.
    • Come to Spoltog, wuss. My Demicanadian bastard lunatic [progressquest.com] will...do...something...nasty, I suppose...with his level CXXXII Slime Finger. You will cower as he curses your family (level V), and tremble with fear as you go under the knife for a tonsilectomy (level III)!

      I love this game.
      • You two are both wusses.. I mean, seriously.. Level 48, 56?? What, have you been making progress for only a month?? My Dung-Elf Tickle Mimic [progressquest.com] would wipe the floor with both of you, and then have enough time to do her nails with your lifeblood.. Her Seasick MMCCLXII will make you wish you stayed on shore, for sure!!

        And not to mention that our guild Golden Rat Killers [progressquest.com] is one of the best around.. We are fast outdistancing all competition in the Bands list.. Roofed, I say, Roofed!!
  • by realdpk ( 116490 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @01:13PM (#10821826) Homepage Journal
    OK, I'll have to give it a shot now.

    Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy playing with other players, but I got extremely turned off by EQ 1's group requirement for later levels because I spent literally days (multiple 1 hour periods totalling probably >70-100 hours) "LFG" (announcing and flagged).
    • My experience in the betas of WoW are that finding an ad hoc group for one tough boss or instanced dungeon is very easy. Now, finding GOOD players, like for Ragefire Chasm (go Horde !), isn't so easy. But if you can't find a group in short order either it's 4am in the server's local timezone or you've been a jerk on the channels.
      • Would back that up, that finding a group is not a problem. Usally just go to where the quest starts and you can find a group of people you can join.
        Not sure how this will work out come retail and people are more spread out in levels, could be a little harder then if you are not in the level range of the majority of players.
        Also one other thing is that groups tend to just stay for the quest needed then they break up and everyone is out soloing again. A few times groups have stayed around but that was onl
  • I'm not sure I want to watch a cartoon for hours on end and am going to go with EverQuest II's more realistic viewpoint on the RPG world. WoW looks sharp, but EQII takes everything the original did, and improves upon it. Both will be a hit, but EQII gets my nod.
  • I downloaded the beta completely excited about playing and was soon disapointed. Their ex employees over at arena.net are doing a much better job with guildwars than they are with WoW. This was a little side by side I wrote for a message board I post on. Game Client size: WoW over 2 and a half gigs GW 65kb Advantage: GW Client Download times WoW 32 hours GW 15 seconds Advantage: GW Graphics: WoW Decent graphics but nothing to write home about GW I'm amazed every time I look at them, all the way down to
    • It seems your post has the bias of someone paying unduly close attention to Blizzard/GW politics.

      GW and WoW/EQ2 are very different games. GW is more like Diablo 2, WoW is more like EverQuest. It would be like comparing Madden 200x to Mortal Kombat. At lease this is my take based only on beta-weekend and my experiences there.

      I played GW only during beta weekend and had not heard of it before. It looks promising, my wife loves it, but it's certainly not ready for prime time. Let's give it a chance to brew f
    • You're compararing apples and oranges here. Guild Wars is meant to be a very light client that streams updates to the user's computer. World of Warcraft is supposed to be purchased from a store and installed from a CD/DVD drive (depending on version purchased), not downloaded from the internet. The key thing here is that WoW is in a BETA. Your after-beta mileage may vary.

      The lag was particularly bad this past weekend because they took down a large chunk of the WoW servers to do maintenance, as you ment
      • The key thing here is that WoW is in a BETA.
        So is guild wars, and it will probably not be released until feb of next year. WoW will be playable by this up coming weekend, not much is going to change between now and then(1 major patch) so if you don't like WoW now not much chance it is going to change.
        Also GW will ship on CD, that is how they are going to make money. They are going to be releaseing a few expansion packs a year on the basis that they will make thier money selling thoses instead of the mo
        • Actually, WoW won't be playable this weekend as it doesn't launch until Nov 23.

          Blizzard announced this weekend that the open beta is not just an opportunity for players to play free (which many seem to think it's all about) but an opportunity for Blizzard to continue stress testing their servers. They are intentionally running the servers with twice as many players as they will have post launch. Lag will most likely be bad on launch day (but it is for *every* MMORPG on launch/patch day) and will be gone
          • While the official date is the 23, boxes are already shipping to resellers.
            Have not seen anything on when the open marketing is going to stop and they are going to take down the servers, wipe them and put them back up.(I presume they are still planning to do a wipe of characters for retail) However based on other MMORPGs that will usally happen on Thursday or Friday, and the servers will be up and running by Sunday.
            What happens is that stores "accidently" sell copies to friends, store employees, in addit
            • Opening the servers prematurely to a select few would be a PR disaster. People may not be able to get the guild name they want because someone who knows someone who's brother knows a guy got them in early, etc.

              From everything I've seen in or about WoW so far, I can't believe Blizzard would allow that to happen.

              Just like with Half Life 2, you might be able to buy a box early, but until the magic server genie says you can play, it's just a box with pretty pictures on it, not a game.
    • 65 Kb, dude they really fooled you! Once you launch that small executable, then the real binaries are downloaded. And content is streamed as you zone. So, 65 Kb.... ummmm, not really.

  • In World of Warcraft [worldofwacraft.com], you can use CosmosUI [cosmosui.org] to customize your GUI in game. It's very handy and can be overwhelming!

    Can EQ2 do this modifications? I would love to check out the game without subscribing. I am hoping Sony will do a free trial, without credit card requirement, like SW:G trial.
  • My name is Matt and I'm an evercrack addict. Yeah well thats pretty much what it came down to when one day I realized I had had 4 hours of sleep in the last two days and ate the last 6 meals in front of the computer. Then looking around the room at old pizza boxes and fast food wrappers my own odor bagan to bother me. This was the point where I decided I should probably stop playing everquest.

    Now Everquest2 is out and I have to resist the urge, and not slip into my old habits.
  • WoW = Bass Avenger (Score:2, Interesting)

    by slaker ( 53818 )
    I played techie-guru for a LAN party over the weekend, where five or six of the players were playing WoW (as a group, in the same room, which should have been really cool).

    On the one hand it looked pretty OK graphically, but then I heard someone explain crafting, and how many X-random-pieces-of-crap he needed to find to make some baseline piece of armor. And the whole group was wandering around killing IIRC rabbits (like rats in every other MMO, I guess. Maybe they were Monty Python Vorpal Bunnies or somet
    • by NaugaHunter ( 639364 ) on Monday November 15, 2004 @05:09PM (#10824326)
      I've been in since April, and I can't think of anything the rabbits would drop that crafting requires. And if you weren't catching any fish, I'm guessing you were fishing in to high of an area for your skill level. It levels pretty smoothly in the right area. Though there are NO crafts that require fishing to level up with, so I have no idea why everyone felt they had to fish instead of trying to buy it from the auction house and didn't just go out and kill things.

      I don't know what kind of person WANTS to wander all over Dwarf-Land looking for +2 Balls of Twine but from talking to the Diablo and Warcraft fans I met at that LAN party, it doesn't seem like much of Blizzard's fan base is going to appreciate the final WoW product.

      Firstly, all crafting is voluntary and for fun. If you don't enjoy it, don't do it - there isn't anything crafting gets you that is required to progress that you couldn't buy off someone willing to spend the time. Secondly, the servers being overloaded from 500,000 trying to constantly play suggest you may have a very small sampling of Blizzard's fan base that doesn't scale to do projections very well.

      The fact remains that MMORPG's are not for everyone, including some fans of previous Blizzard games. The general rule of thumb is if you wouldn't want to play a regular paper & pencil RPG, you probably won't like a Massive Online version either. It definitely sounds like the group you were watching is not the target audience, and the is nothing wrong with that on either side.
    • by Edgewize ( 262271 )
      Um, yeah. No quests are required, you don't have to learn fishing (let alone use it exclusively for long periods of time), and there is no quest that I know of that asks you to kill rabbits.

      If you're not trolling, then the guys who were playing were either messing with you - or just total idiots. If some guy gives you a quest to fetch a ball of twine, nobody says you have to accept it. You can go on killing monsters and just do your own thing.

      Crafting and non-combat skills are entirely optional, period
    • by Pugio ( 816116 )
      I have to disagree with you on all counts. Blizzard has a huge sense of humor and put fishing in the game for FUN!!! I have a friend who spends all his time fishing, not because you have to, but because it's cool. Fishing, by the way, is NOT just for fish, but for cool items as well. My friend just fished out a nice pair of boots worth good money on the auctions.

      Another point is the crafting - it's fun and is a great way to break up the monotony of most MMO's; in which one spends the whole time camping a

    • Fishing can be done as a diversion, a gag/joke/etc, but I have also found it to be useful for feeding "pets". Feeding your pet improves its morale/loyalty and this significantly increases its fighting abilities. It originally took about 10-15 minutes to get the fishing skill to the point where I can reliably catch fish anywhere I have tried.

      Your post is simply an example of the blind leading the blind, assuming it is not a troll. Now there is nothing wrong with not being an expert in the game and your ap
  • I played WoW from the beginning of fileplanet's most recent stress test and I finally gave it up two days ago. Everything in the game is designed to slow you down, to the point where you spend more time travelling over the same areas again and again than actually achieving anything. In fact I found no sense of achievement after probably 60 hours of gameplay. This might be a small amount of time for a MMOG, but it's a huge amount of time to burn in a few weeks if you already have a full-time job.
    • It is slow if you are walking everywhere and don't plan things a little. There are various forms of transport available in the game which will help you get around all those quests a little faster and with a bit of scouting when you enter each new town you can usually find two or three quests that are after components/materials/monsters from the same area.

      WoW is not an intensely complicated system. Blizzard has kept it simple which is perfect for the casual to moderately addicted MMORG player.

      The most

      • There aren't enough choices for race, class and skills. Just when you think you've put together an interesting troll shaman with skinning and leatherworking, one of your friends rocks up with a better troll shaman with skinning and leatherworking. The character development is so linear that I am frequently reminded that I'm one of many people all mindlessly doing basically the same thing. There's no way I've found to do anything truly unique and interesting. This basically just turns the game into a rac
        • Slow is relative. (Score:3, Insightful)

          by MachDelta ( 704883 )
          Trying to powerlevel is missing the point of WoW, IMO. I know I got stuck in the "this sucks, im just doing what everyone else is doing" mood too, with my first character. So I started a second one, determined NOT to do what everyone else was doing. So instead of going to random caves in search of random quest items, I just go wherever the hell I want to. If that means wandering 10 miles off into the distance because I saw a really cool looking cliff, then i'll do it. I'll temporarilly abandon a quest in mi
          • The problem with wandering off is that if you get attacked (particularly if something spawns behind you) you're dead. No matter how picturesque an area is, if it has level ?? monsters, don't even bother walking through it, unless you're curious as to how it looks in black and white.
  • In the open beta, liking it quite a lot so far.

    I'll be honest and say I've avoided MMORPGs until now. Frankly, I don't WANT to spend all weekend staring at a computer screen waiting for some bit of loot to drop.

    Probably... Oh, 18, 20 hours of play in. Maybe less. And I'm at level 13, and haven't noticed the grind effect, and am making progress in the game without having to give up things like "girls" and "job" and "bathing".

    It's just fun, and I don't have to make a second job out of it, or start dati
  • My Article [eqii.com] on EQII.com goes over a few points I would like to discuss further about the MyGuyGames article - I know I may be a little biased towards EQII, but I think I give a fair bit of merit to WoW, which is a great game in its own right.

    I'd love to see the same type of article from a WoW enthusiast if there are issues I misstated or the article misstated. I think these types of articles are pretty interesting, even if they're ultimately just excersizes in preaching to the choir... Its easy to get lo

  • I am a MMORPG vet, having been a MUD vet way before that. I have beta tested almost all of the current mainstream offerings and played a few of them after they went retail.

    Now before I begin, let me say I absolutely love Blizzard, and have nothing but good things to say about them, and had pinned all my MMORPG hopes on them for WoW. I had become jaded from the "skinner box" gameplay of pretty much EVERY SINGLE MMORPG out there.

    What did I discover? That WoW was that same skinner box model, with gameplay r

  • "My Guy Games has an interesting EverQuest II vs. World of Warcraft series that includes an interview with a level 50 EQII player and a level 60 WoW character..."

    Interesting indeed...

  • If you're expecting WoW to be radically new and different, don't bother. It's not.

    WoW takes parts from many established games and incorporates them into this one. You can read other reviews for the details, but just two minor examples are FFXI's auction house and object links in chat like AO.

    One more subtle item that distinguishes WoW. though, is more complete characters. Most games make it a point to cripple their classes so they almost have to group together to progress. In WoW, most classes fill a

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