The Best an MMO has to Offer. Norrathian Edition. Part II

This is a reprint from my MMO blog on guildportal.com.

In Part I, I told a story of Iari. It was my way of detailing what I loved in that game. EQ2 however, will be described with a list of what makes it stand out in the MMO world.

During the Christmas of 2004, I took what I thought would be a small break from Star Wars Galaxies. Many of my friends were no longer playing, which wasn't a big deal since I soloed mostly anyway. But their absence spoke of greater problems with the game.

In the new year, I bought EverQuest II on a whim. I installed it and entered the world and was blown away, quite in the same way I'd been blown away when I first entered Star Wars Galaxies a year and a half before. The first time, it was all "new" for me, and I was amazed that the game and everything in it was even possible.

With EQ2 my amazement was from a more "experienced" perspective. There were things I'd come to accept and expect from an MMO, and EQ2 met and exceeded my expectations in many ways. I'll list a few of them.

*Player characters and npc's looking at each other, whether it be to the side, up or down. Excellent touch of realism.

*Voices. No, not the ones in my head.. npc voices (and later player character voices).

*Relatively good character and npc animation, like pointing, motions made during battle, walking and running (not so much for the females, but the run for them has definitely improved).

*Character creation. This is a big one. Slider bars rather than pre-selected faces. Slider bars that do not go to an extreme like in Vanguard.

*While I think they are ugly as hell, I appreciate the idea behind SOGA, or the alternative models.

*Crafting. EQ2 has had many forms of crafting and they have all had merit, even back in the day of interdependency (community).

All of these things and more that I won't mention here boil down to the one thing that sets EQ2 apart from all other games past and present: realism. Sure, sometimes EQ2 takes its commitment to realism too far, as is the case with its drab armor models. But the realism for the most part lends itself to one of the things necessary for keeping people playing (aside from community, risk and reward, and an escape from real life): immersion.

The graphics potential in EQ2 is immense, and the better the graphics, the more realistic the game, the more immersive the experience. That is what, in my opinion, sets EQ2 apart from every other game on the market.

In Part III, I will attempt to combine my favorite elements from SWG and EQ2 into a recipe for the Perfect (imho) MMORPG