Norrathian Races & Building Collaboration

Though the female looks like the prince of persia with boobs its a nice art style. I've never been a fan of cartoon graphics. The more drawings I see showing plate armor they just look like layered kegs with faces added so you know its a humanoid race. The dwarf even looks like a cyborg keg operated by alcohol.

But seriously though how much are you going to stop and watch someones face enough for SoEmote anyway enough to make it a crowning feature needed for such an art style anyway? Possibly while chilling in town or roleplaying or sexual gestures but thats about it. I cant imagine anyone being like "Jimmy bro your face looks to cool emoting while we are supposed to be raiding these orcs stop your parkour so I cant see what your mouth is emoting cause im not seeing all those elaborate facial gestures your making".

You can still get decent frame rates with a little more realism too tho if that was the reason as well. Its all in the amount of primes in the end. No matter if its cell shaded or not.

I love the EQ franchise. I hope the WoW borish cartoon look gets 86-ed so I can enjoy another stunning experience from the original king of MM games. The way they rushed to commercialize WoW to beat out the graphically pleasing but interface lacking WarHammer game was a real letdown to the RPG community. My brother came in to it with WoW as the running champ of MMORP-ing, he thinks EQ and EQ2 were jokes. I keep telling him, the joke was the sellout corporate lemmon he bought, and now the mass leaving of that game is due primarily to the return to pleasing graphics packages like we see in Skyrim or a few other noted games that don't cater to under 13 players. And the fact that the elite armors once prized as quest locked trophies became buyable and geared towards a Wal-Mart-like takover of the game. The market is in 20-30 something gamers who like a good visual. And who dislike an elite in a game brought about by the love of money verses authentic gaming rewards.

Kids are too big on I-Pod apps playing Jewel Witch and Angry Birds to be serious gammers. lol

Sell this game to the grown folx who like a rad fantasy setting to escape the 9-5 life! And keep it free-to-play with very limited buy-in bonuses! Trust!

PS:

The keggy looking armor is a cop-out in my book to save time by allowing more than one race to wear a standard cheap variation of the same thing. The developers are too focused on the new constructs and sytemic concepts to realize they are sacrificing the most endearing quality of this franchise. I don't mean to offend with that, just my opinion as a fan of the original models. Blizzard, can have the corny anime look, and EQ should remain in the realm of super cool.

Does anyone else recall when Warcraft came out on PS1? Before Shadow of the Horned Rat? And made me and every other dweeb mad about the corn-ball spinoff rushed to shelves just to beat, GamesWorkshop, to market! lol

I remember, and I don't want to see EQN go out the same way.

PEACE!

Here is my worry about much of this:

SOE has already re-started the EQN development twice because they didn't like the direction. I don't think they are in any position to backpeddle and rethink things.

These forums are showing that the player base has concerns. The Kerran style and architecture was a huge discussion point, yet they are plodding along mostly with what they have (its too late to substantially change it). The Kerra models look like Tony The Tiger. The player models. The animations.

Several of these things are so far along I don't think SOE can make them "right". I think they have to cross their fingers and hope the players embrace it.

The emotes are silly and not meaningful to gameplay. The player models are 1) ugly and 2) cartoonish.

EQN and LM need to feel more like EQ1 than EQ2 and WoW.

This is what happens what you say its a collaboration and it turns out to be a dictatorship disguised as a democracy. If they had came out before they ever started wasting money developing and said hey community we want to know what you want the next EQ title to be they would not be in the predicament they are now.

Right now they already had a set Game Design Document and plans for what EQN was to become. And having restarted 2 two times as Fazool has pointed out they are being hardpressed by their investors to stop wasting money and slap out a game already. And most likely have changed some of their core designs to what they are now due to the restarts.

If they had created the round table before they ever started wasting money then they would not be in this position.As it stands the round table is a joke. There is no real change or discussion. There hasnt been one in weeks ever since the workshop came along, and they sure as hell arent listening to the community. They already have plans and the polls only serve to validate those plans. Ok they will be 25% less/more pissed when we roll out this mechanic. Its too late to change but what the hell see how its going to be recieved by the community.

Not to mention its impossible to read all the tidbits and follow all the social media posts spread over like 10+ mediums. The Round Table was supposed to be the place where the design as to take place. And yet even the round table is broken up over 3 forums and its hard to tell where the actual conversations are taking place for development.

And I highly doubt that even half of the community is even fully behind this project yet. Sure they are building things for next now but it hardly even resembled what the races were or are now. The direction they are headed now is troubling to me and only increases with the silence except for the workshop models being built. Their initial system proposals are lack luster and just as RNG dependant as any other titles out there.

For instance the Relics needed to upgrade your grades are like aions fluxes. They say that they are removing RNG and making crafting easier by allowing you to make greens every time. And yet you have Relics split into armor, weapons, and accessories. Then you have tier versions of each. And it gets rarer and rare each tier. And now crafters and adventurers have to compete over them for upgrades. which does not also take into account the individual coding of each of their drop rates on a mob (wep relics dropping more then accessory ones) or that specific sought after relics or specific armors arent inherently harder per grade as well.

This is what people wanted in a crafting system like 4-8 years ago from the asian supergrinders that were frought with RNG gods smiling upon you. When now I wish that games were based on your actual skill with 0 RNG.

So until I actually see concrete facts I have to be skeptical of all I see and hear because if their reasons for making it this way is for stupid reasons like "JJ Abrams did this and that so we thought"... Then it may make or break my decision when this title goes live to play. Because they dont seem to be listening to what their customers who have stood by since the conception of the 3d mmo are telling them they want. Having been a loyal fan of eq even when people were lulled by wow for so long I can just as easily Re-Imagine my loyalty to another game company that is innovative and is actually making next gen games the push the genre forward.

Its not to say that SoE hasnt aquired great technology from leasing it for this title by other innovative companies (such as storybricks, and the voxel engine) But the choices they are making neither sound like they are doing anything they design themselves but are out of origional ideas and are borrowing from the genre instead of reinventing what they themselves invented in the first place. Though lots of the minds that first made the game are no longer with EQ. Ever since SoE took it over from Verant.

I imagined more from games 15+ years since EQ1. But with current FTP<>PTW models take away from everything that a game can be. And as people from LM are finding out that "Rare" Quintessential props are being held against their wallets. A porticullis is required for any sort of castle defense. It should be in the game. And it also caters to Casual players more then the dedicated and often times will hold the game itself against you unless you play using your wallet. I would much rather have servers dedicated to subscriptions over pay as you go.

But its the casuals who have ruined the genre. It used to be that you know it would take 100's if not more hours to complete something depending on your play time to recieve an epic reward. Now game companies are expected to cater to them to play for a minimal amount of time for that same epic reward. Its silly if you ask me. It should be based on your level of dedication instead of the most minimal time spent for maximum rewards. As they said in fight club "you choose your own level of involvement". It should be like that in MMOs too. If you want to play for a short amount of time so be it but the best rewards are for those most didicated to the game. And if you think you are entitled to those rewars then you better play the game. Or shell out cash to make up for that time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Route_58

OK, the link here, is kind of a shadow of my expectations for game server live cycles?

SOE only really needs to set limits inside, SOE cities? Player cities will be another story? The maps we play on are server controlled? I remember the map system from other SOE game productions?

EverQuest NEXT is not: very much a building game like Ever Quest Next Landmark?

You need to build an individually suited Player Housing System to import approved models in map spaces from EQNL to EQN? ASK for a FEE to import player models from EQNL to EQN for game play?

SOE is going to build cities to SOE needs and the player community is going to build cities to community needs; in EQN and EQNL?

I do not seem to understand if their is going to be player cities in both games; EQN and EQNL?

ART is very objective, the server map system has finite points?

Nice look on the Dwarf. Their is quite a bit more " reality " base to this version. I like it personally. Growing tired of cartoonish characters, would like to see the advent of adjustable features though. Each would be more unique that way.

Well said RedAngel!