What made you decide to try EQ back then

So, back then, I remember CDs and tons and tons and tons of games. The PC game section was littered with many many many good games.

What was the incentive, what drew you to get the game, or what got you into trying EQ.
Let me do some helping with your decision, so this EQ back then.





This EQ nowdays,



Question is, what drew you in back then.
Is EQ still like what drew you in back then. Is it still doing what it did to draw you and kept being EQ or do you think something changed? If what drew you in back then you think people looking for that when they think about EQ again?

Husbands fault I play, though he has been long gone. EQ lasted longer than he did!
And he started because of a friend at work.
Friends have kept me here.

EQ is still far more entertaining than the garbage on TV.

I first played on UK release, so Kunark in 1999 I think - a very long time before LDoN! Might be wrong on the year, but I think it was pre-2000.
Anyway, it was 640x480, tiny visible screen, most of the display taken up with inventory, spellgems etc. Medding meant staring at a book with no way to see the world.So no, it's nothing like what it was - some changes are for the better (PoK), but I see no real interest for me in recent expansions. But I still sub (x3 now) and 25 years later am still finding fun content I haven't done before. The biggest change is in attitude towards content - there's so little wonder in any new content anymore, we are all jaded a bit and the lure of just exploring isn't there for many.

Can't remember why I started, probably as there was some buzz about it and it was one of the first MMO's, so an interesting concept to check out.

What drew me in was I loved D&D. So when computer games became a thing i gravitated towards games like Baldurs Gate or Icewind Dale. The only thing I didnt like was you were basically just running a script. You had to play the game like they wanted you to. Even the characters responses were already scripted. ( Go for the eyes Boo!)
Eq was different, it was D and D and you decided what to do and where to go. It was live, characters everywhere doing whatever they wanted and still getting stuff done. Even boring things like tradeskills was new and great. You could make food that made you stronger or whatever. Just running around talking to people was great. (sure beats the old yahoo chat rooms).
So much to do I have not gotten bored enough to take a break since my ex wife introduced me to this game in 2003. I still love it and play it quite a bit.

Too long ago to remember clearly.

I suspect that I heard about it from friends either RL or on line.

I'd been playing text based MUD's and remember thinking EQ was just a MUD with graphics world.

First time I played EQ I gave up after a couple hours. My PC video was so bad I would get turned around and chain zone ( over a modem ... )

I ended up getting a couple folks to play and for several years we'd cart PC's around and do EQ LAN parties 2-3 times a month.

Watched my friend play Ultima online then after awhile he started playing eq. I didnt get into the game just watched him play on his two computers. Eventually i got into eq and the rest is history. Beofre eq i played Diablo 2 were i got my name from act 1 boss

It was basically the only MMO at the time with any real traction where I lived and a friend's dad is unironically who exposed me to it. I've been playing off and on since I was a young kid. In my 30s now and still occasionally feel the pull despite having MMOs now that I enjoy more.

I always played the major fantasy PC titles back in the day. Bard's Tale, Might and Magic and the like. A couple of buddies of mine bought EQ when Kunark was released and we're telling me about it. Not long later I was at Costco (maybe it was Price Club back then) and there EQ was sitting on the software table. I bought it and installed it on my then girlfriend now wife's PC and I stayed up all night playing it. We got in a huge fight about it but the hooks were in. I quit around 2005 to get a family started but came back in 2020 when one of those original friends that got me into it recovered his account and started playing again.

Long, long ago in a far off galaxy... or my bedroom when I was a kid, I played a game called Pool of Radiance on the Commodore 64. This was a pivotal game because it was the first I ever played that your efforts in the game would carry over to the next game that came out in the series. Up until this point, we played games like Pacman where you play as far as you can, die, and then play again. Your efforts did not accumulate over time.

Fast forward many years to around 2000. I was reading a gaming magazine, and it was talking about this new kind of game called Ultima Online. I was super intrigued because it reminded me of Pool of Radiance from my childhood. The idea of playing a game where I develop a character and it just continues to grow over time was what I loved about Pool of Radiance back in the day.

So, I bought a copy of Ultima Online, installed it, got scammed by someone in game right after creating my character, ran off in a random direction, died, and logged out. It was slow, buggy, and just didn't hold my interest.

I was in a game store a week or so later, and I saw this game on the shelf called Everquest. Reading the box, I realized it was another of these games like Ultima Online. I bought a copy to give the genre a second chance.

I installed EQ, created a dwarf paladin named Dunsquat (my old D&D character's name), ran around the rooms where it plopped me in the game, and thought to myself, "man this game doesn't look that good visually" lol. I couldn't figure out what to do, so after a while, I just logged out.

Right before my free month ran out, I figured I would give EQ one more chance. I logged in to Dunsquat, and proceeded to run around the rooms again, and then the game locked up. Back then, it wasn't uncommon for your computer to freeze and you have to do a hard reboot. I was just about to hit the power switch on my computer when the game started working again.... and, I was in a different area. I had no concept of zoning back then, so I had no idea that the freeze was just the game zoning me to another area.

I was like "OMG this game has more to it", and I proceeded to run around the new area I was in. After a while, I managed to zone again, and found myself outside. At that point, I was thinking hey there is a lot more to this game than I originally thought. So, I proceeded to get killed by a guard by accidentally hitting A while targeting him. That was the right of passage for any new EQ player back in the day.

I managed to figure out how to fight monsters, and I proceeded to do that for a long time. After a while, this NPC came up and was talking to me while I was killing mobs. I literally was thinking "holy crap this game has some good NPC code because this is like talking to a real human". Little did I know, I was talking to a real human. I had no concept of MMO at that point, so I had no idea I was playing with other people around the world.

The NPC told me that I can click on the mobs I kill to loot them. I tried that, and low and behold I had been leaving crap tons of loot all over the place for about the past hour or so killing mobs. I didn't know what looting was up that point because I had no concept of dropped items or anything MMO-related like that.

Then the NPC told me how to talk to merchants and sell the stuff I was picking up. This NPC was freaking amazing. I mean wow... what a leap forward in gaming technology.

And, then the NPC explained to me that he was a real player playing the game as well somewhere else in the world. *MIND BLOWN*

That was it. I was hooked. I got a copy for my brother, and we started our journey in the world of Norrath.

I can't believe I'm responding to an Uberkk thread lol, but here goes.

My first gaming addiction was pc hack. (I still boot up nethack occasionally) It was an old dos based randomized d&d dungeon crawler. I tried out Pools of Radiance but never got too far, hack scratched the itch better for me, and I used the old commodore for Pirates, I can't recall if it was Sid Meirs or a diff title. Then I got a demo cd for baldurs gate in a D&D combo box of old games, I don't even remember what it was called cause I never played any of them. Baldurs gate was it, hooked, ran all the expansions. Beat the game and waited patiently for a sequal that never came.

In college I was dating a girl who transferred to main campus a semester before I did. I worked 3rd shift 4 nights a week hit class friday morning and then lit out of there to spend the weekends with her. But she had to work to, so I would waste my weekend while she was waitressing. I needed something to do, and found EQ planes of power in the game bin at walmart. I was like cool this looks similar to BG/D&D in theme I'll try it.

I researched classes and since I liked to play a tanky DPS in BG settled on Ranger ( pause for laughter ). I stepped into Qeynos hills just as dawn broke and the giant skeletons depopped, found 2 corpses up and got a bow and a mask immediately. And then as night fell on my rat and snake slaughtering, they rose again. I ran without sow all the way to Qeynos, Surefall was too far to make it, Blackburrow offered no shelter. I missed the gate somehow in my panic and clicked on a strange object zoning to PoK for the first time. I saw red conned NPC's everywhere and quickly clicked back, thinking I had accidentally stepped into a hostile high level zone. It was weeks before I realized my error lol. Met friends, (shout out to Lekab, Pamthebee, Vamor, Azriel, Worgador, and many more who's names I forget) started a guild, joined NCG fought for a spot on the raid schedule, and just kept going. The AC Nerf for chain classes hit shortly after and I was now out tanked by monks and beastlords, squishy like rogue, thanks Holly. I continued to play the ranger as stubbornly as possible, refusing to stop trying to tank in groups, (sorry Fezagorn) but I did finally realize I should let the warriors hold aggro, (damn you Holly).

My relationship didn't survive my addiction. However, I met a plucky cleric who tolerated my attempted tanking antics (when she could be bothered to tab over to eq from whatever else she was doing long enough to keep my out of the grass) and that relationship bore fruit. We still play today. I'm still a stubborn , though now I play a Warrior and try to out dps Monks and other DPS melee's. So I guess that's growth?

I was playing The Realm Online and some people I knew were talking about it, the box art looked neat so I bought it. Then I cried (I was like 10) because my computer couldn't run it as I didn't have an actual GPU at that point. Mom bought me a Voodoo card and off we were.

Fezagorn.... was this on Luclin/Stromm?

im a little unique in the eq world as EQ is the only video game I have ever had interest in. I have never owned a video game system, or any other computer game. Sure I have played other video games at friends houses, but video games was just not anything I ever pursued as a hobby

I got turned on to EQ by a roomate. I started a character on his account, and played for the 3 or so years we lived together (whenever he wasnt playing). He suggested I start a shaman. This was luclin-GoD era. The fast foreword to after TBL release I saw EQ mentioned in a post on a forum as a joke and was like hey now I think I want to play that game again! I started a new shaman and here I am.

Yes, I'm Aurilius. Or i was then heh.

THIS PITA ranger always trying to out-DPS me on raids...

Trying? ;p

I succeeded at least some of the time! At least when i wasn't taunting!

My first EQ era was as a first-year college student in the dorms during the fall of 2000. My roommate was playing EQ and I had no idea that such a game was even possible. He let me make a character on his account and I was hooked. Maybe a little too hooked. I stopped playing by February of 2001.

My second EQ era was a couple years later when SOE was offering EQ and the first couple expansions for free and I wanted to experience more of the game. That's when I created the characters I have to this day.

During this later (permanent?) era of EQ, I had to leave for extended periods because work got too stressful, but it was the people I met during this era that brought me back both times. My emotional attachment to these people and their well-being is strong and if I had to leave again, I would come back for them.

I haven't played on Luclin in quite a while, but when I did, I was Vald (think that's the name).

I first heard about EQ back in '99 from a couple of my Army buddies. I swore I would never buy a game, and then pay monthly to be able to play it. Fast forward to 2001, I'm out of the Army, and pick up the Velious box for my birthday. I created a character (human in Freeport), but didn't know how to attack, talk to others, anything. I got killed by a_moss_snake and then couldn't figure out how to reequip my newbie gear. I fell into some water, couldn't get out, and drowned. I logged off and uninstalled.

A few months later, two of my real life buddies from D&D started playing, and got me back in. It's been off and on periodically since.

I left before Stromm merged with Luclin I think. We did come back and level new chars but couldn't catch up to live, and decided to run a TLP to refamiliarize, the next time the bug hit. Cornaiv, till it's almost death and Mangler since.