The EQL/EQ2 riftFollow

As long as the ratio of cost to profit is in SOE's favor, they will continue to support EQL. I don't mean that as a "Gaming companies greed" rant, it's acctually a good thing for EQL's fanbase. If they were thinking of stopping EQL you wouldn't see releases of new expansions, like the one released last month.

I have seen similar statements and rifts with EQ1 players. The most die-hards come from the people at the highest levels of the game. They don't want to abandon the power and prestige they enjoy as a level 70 whatever to start over in a new world full of the unknown. They also feel they've put too much time and energy to get where they are in EQ1 to just close up shop and leave. I was no different at first, having played EQ1 for 5 1/2 years and knowing things like the back of my hand. However, after I got accepted into beta and when I actually went through the newbie experience and everything, I found myself enjoying EQ2 much more than EQ1 and was much more willing to abandon it to try EQ2. Hell, I'm sitting here chatting on message boards and playing Civ instead of dinking around with EQ1.

At any rate, expect many end-game players to be set in their ways for awhile and talk about how EQ1 is better or that EQ2 sucks or whatever. Most feel they've come too far or still enjoy EQ1 too much to care about EQ2 or any other games. The problem die-hards in EQ1 are eventually going to face is that EQ1 is going to attract less and less new players as time progresses. This means as older players quit, they'll be less people coming in to replace them. It'll be a slow process, perhaps years in the making, but many will leave EQ1 in time for one reason or another and choose another outlet, be it EQ2 or something else.

As far as how EQ1 players treat people leaving for another game, it never ceases to amaze me how worked up some people can get. When I decided to retire in EQ1 recently, I had one person (for the record, NOT in my guild) send me a tell saying how my leaving was totally inconvienant to them and that a true friend wouldn't just up and leave. To that, I gave them the finger and said that EQ1 is a game that I play for fun, not a chore I do to for other people's benefit. Most were nice otherwise, just surprising how seriously some people treat this crap.

Yeah true dat on the profit thing. SOE will take their sweet time letting EQ1 die off. They're getting too damn rich.

Oh well. I look forward to making a new set of friends playing EQ2. Its like the first day of school again.
/sigh

See you then. If UPS ever gets here.

Yeah exactly.

I found myself remembering all the good times I had in EQ1 and then I realized they were all Newb experiences when I fist got the game.

-Riding boats to the new continents, (pre-Luclin)
-Pwning the throne room in Crushbone for the first time
-Diving deep into the mansion in Unrest only to get my **** handed to me

That's what I hope EQ2 will provide. And I'm sure it will, at least to some degree. That's what makes a game fun for me: discovery. Not the endless treadmill of AAs and tweaking your gear all day long. I shudder to think of it.

Oh yeah.

I can only hope that there are enough of us left to enjoy EQ2 in the same way, without all the power gamers drowing us out.

/Shrug Ah, but what can you do?

I played EQLive for 41/2 years, got my druid to max level, raided, AA's etc...I just got really disenchanted with it a few weeks back. I think PoP expansion really killed it for me. A whole new mentality was formed it was no longer about "lets go adventure" like the good ole days, now its just "ok need to get buff from PoK then Ill take stone to "X" hunting ground. People miss all the fun in it. I feel really bad for the new players of EQlive especially, they just dont get to really experience what us "old timers" had when the game was new and fresh (and harder to instantly get somewhere). I loved EQlive dont get me wrong and yes I am totally going into EQ2 alone b/c all my friends say "there is still too much to do in EQlive". IMO I think eventually even the hardcore EQlive people will eventually succumb to boredom or something similar and migrate to EQ2 (especially true if EQ2 ends up to be as fantastic as the begining of EQlive) Im just real glad no ports are avilable at all, I just love adventures with friends!! hope to see some of you in game..have fun

I'm a few kills from Time in EverquestLive, and couldn't be happier switching.

Everquest holds nothing for me anymore, after 5 years, it's dead.

The only thing that kept in in EQ1 for the last two years was my friends. None of us were hardcore power gamers, so we levelled tons of different characters together, going to out-of-the-way hunting spots that no one would use even for PLing. The game itself lost most of it's magic for me around the time my old guild on EMarr had a nasty split, and I moved servers to join one of my RL friends and got accepted into his little circle.

FFXI was an impulse buy for me. I had no friends who were going to play it, but I gave it a shot anyways. I liked what I saw on the main site, and I never regretted my purchase. So if I can get some of my old friends on EQ2, I will gladly split time between games to hang out with them, but I won't be quitting FFXI anytime soon, with so much left unseen/undone.

I'm sorry, Its been quite a while since I played the original EQ, and I haven't exactly keep up on recent events...

That being said, just what the hell exactly is EQLIVE?

I don't remember ever hearing the game refered to as such back when I used to play, yet I see people here saying that they played it for 4-5 years?
Is it just a newer name for EQ or something?

Thanks, it was starting to bug me. Don't ask me why, just was.