EQ2 BETA

[Martrae]

Let me know if you feel the same when you get to higher levels and are grouping more.

[Donnel]

Okay, the Heroic opportunities that they harp on the preview sites are worth the praise.

Fun, powerful, mostly intuitive, they really provide that extra edge that Melee Balance 2.0 could have been.

[Donnel]

PRetty sure I can say this, no NDA breach at all.

There are tons of quests. The quests give non trivial XP.

I dinged 9 last night, from experience I gained "exploring" the city. I have not fought a single mob since I dinged 9 and am at 60% xp already.

[Lyion]

I'm interested to play this. I'd love to do a non biased comparison of WOW and EQ2.

[mofish]

Now in beta. Dont want to break the NDA I guess, but I must say. This game is friggin awesome. I chose brawler as my class in Freeport at 10th level. The class quest I had to go through to become a brawler was awesome! I actually laughed out loud (tm).

Combat: Fast-paced. Lots of things to do. Heroic Opportunity wheel is a great addition. Got almost a skill a level and they are all useful. Im liking Taunt. It has a bit of a farther range, can be used to short-range pull some. The mob actually turns red, makes an angry face and shakes his fists at you when you taunt it. Downtime is mostly gone. If Im near death, takes me no more than 2 mins to regen to full health and power. Combat locking system works well. Good idea. And easily unlocked if youre in trouble and need to run to guards.

Graphics of course, are outstanding. Get some stutter in a couple of places when there are lots of mobs on the screen, or in the city, but I can live with it. For a game as demanding as this one is, it runs well. Also further optimization goes in with every patch. And they patch a lot. Spell effects incredible.

Freeport looks a bit more homogenous than Qeynos, but thats fine with me. Youre living under an evil, iron-fisted dictator, and everything reflects that. Racial areas of the city are run-down and ruined looking. I like it.

Quest xp is totally viable, in fact, better than grinding, up to level 10. Ive not gotten past that so I dont know whether grinding mobs takes over or not. But I do know up until now lots of my xp has come from quests. Well over half my total xp. The quest journal is great, keeps all your quests and quest details organized for you. Also quest titles are colored to reflect their difficulty in relation to your level. If its an easier quest, green. Harder quest yellow, etc.

Some of the voice acting is lame. But some of it is hilarious too. Walk by an Ogre, he says 'Make war NOT love!' Walk by a merchant 'My prices are so low, only a traitor would pass them up. You aren't a traitor, are you?' Hehe. Just a couple of examples.

Death system good. I know its 6 of one half a dozen of the other, but I like the xp debt system better than losing already-earned xp. Dying still has a sting to it, which is a relief. I was afraid they were going to trivialize the death penatly in EQ2. They didn't. You die twice in a row and youll curse. Just like old times =)

OK gotta run, that's all I got right now. Overall, 8 out of 10 from me. The UI looks a bit dated, but Im sure either player mods will remedy that, or maybe they will update the UI into something slicker for release. Even if it stays like it is, it is totally functional, works just fine.

[xKALECx]

I swear my beta luck has been shit lately. I just can't seem to get invites anywhere!

[Drem]

lyion i don't know if you're paying attention or not but Herko's offered to trade an EQ2 beta for a WoW beta to you twice now