Everquest II or WoW?

[SViper]

Ok, I'm deciding between playing Everquest II or WoW. I've played a little bit of both. Nothing too in-depth though. I played and EQ2 character to lvl 20 and a WoW character to lvl 10.

Coming from playing EQ1 for 4+ years, the best thing I like about both games is that you don't have to have a full specialized group to do things like you had to in EQ1, so you can jump in for a few hours and play. You don't have to play all damn day to do interesting stuff.

I guess what I'm really asking about is the mid- and end-game. Which MMO better supports the idea of getting a couple people in a group to go do some questing or something, as opposed to spending an hour to get a full specialized group and be stuck for the next 5 hours or so in that group.

I'm kind of partial to EQ2's look and questing system, but I don't know too much about the mid- and end-games for both EQ2 and WoW. So which one would be better?


Cliffs (for the lazy)
-which one to get? EQ2 or WoW


*update* 2/15/06

I saw that Eve online had a free 14 day trial and I signed up for it. Let me just say that this is an awesome MMO. I space themed, but that's fine with me. I really enjoy how open-ended it is. You all should give it a shot. www.eve-online.com Thanks again for all of the opinions/suggestions.


*update* 2/16/06


You do have a very valid point. I'm enjoying Eve Online right now because I'm doing nothing but kill missions, but I'm starting to see how it will get old really fast. I still have 1 more week left on my free 14-day account, but I'm not really sure if I want to continue playing. I guess it hooked me initially, but I'm starting to realize the "real" game. That, and it isn't too much fun playing by yourself.

Damn, I thought I had a really good find here too, but I can see it will end up like all other MMO's I've played: Play for a few months doing the same thing over and over again, get bored, uninstall, and find some other MMO to play.

 

[AdamSnow]

I say WoW

 

[Schadenfroh]

I like them both, trying out the new changes in EQ2, have not really played it since LU12.

 

[JSK06]

I vote for WoW as well. I was not impressed with EQ2.

 

[AbAbber2k]

Save your money and wait for something with decent PvP.

 

[pontifex]

both have free trials, download both and play the one you like best.

 

[Chaotic42]

I picked up World of Warcraft because it was only like $30.

It's my first massively multiplayer game, and I really don't like the idea of paying per month to play it. It's an okay game, though I don't get the whole addiction thing. It's certainly not that entertaining.

 

[cKGunslinger]

WoW = Fun
EQ2 = Work

 

[Noema]

Neither!

Run for your life while you still can!!!

 

[CKent]

I voted for WoW.. but not very enthusiastically.

 

[Dumac]

I am not impressed with either MMO, however, I would suggest to download the free trial as pontifex did and see which one you like more.

If I was forced to choose between the two for you, I would choose WoW because of the grahpics are easy to handle and it has a bigger fanbase. If i had to choose for myself, I would choose EQ2.

Still disappointed in both though.

 

[Hadsus]

Originally posted by: cKGunslinger
WoW = Fun
EQ2 = Work

QFT

 

[Mr Smiley]

Cocaine... I mean WoW

 

[9748904947]

If you MUST play one of those, make it Wow. SOE doesn't deserve your $$$

See this:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/12/20/tech/gamecore/main1146894_page5.shtml

 

[Cooler]

Originally posted by: Mr Smiley
Cocaine... I mean WoW

i whould have to agree same effect.

 

[ubercaffeinated]

Crack cocaine... I mean WoW. If you don't get why it's addicting, get to 60 and get purpled out. or oranged out as people are doing now.

 

[imported_sling]

I'd say WoW if you really want something that you can jump on for an hour and actually accomplish something worth while.

EQ2 if you like the fantasy feel, though leveling and such will be at a slower rate than WoW.

WoW = Easy, unless you roll on a PvP server in which case it can be difficult at times to get things done due to the dirty alliance gankers ouside Grom'Gol. You know who you are!

If you already got to 20 in EQ2 then you should have a decent feel for it. WoW at level 10 probably hasn't shown you what the game is like. Get to a level where you can group some for instances and see how you like it.

I've been playing WoW for a little while now, and although I have fun playing it, it's more like getting a group of guys together for an FPS game in a private server than it is an MMO where players constantly have to interact. Instancing nearly every important zone causes this. I played DAOC for a long time, and having a mob you need camped by another group of players for days on end sucks, but having EVERYTHING instanced hurts the community too. There needs to be some balance. Blizzard did this for the casual gamers and such, and it does work, but it makes things incredibly easy compared to EQ1/DAOC.

I understand that EQ2 has quite a bit of instanced dungeons and such. Just take those things into consideration. If you hated the work that went into EQ then WoW would probably be your game, because it's the complete opposite. Anytime someone can get to the maximum level in 5 days /played you know that it can be extremely easy. The whole game is simplified in terms of item/player stats and abilities. There aren't really that many different ways to build a particular class and race differences won't really kill you in the long run like it will in some games (I.E. Avalonian Armsman in DAOC) Basically if your race can be a particular class then go for it, because in the end, the specific racial differences will make only marginal differences.

Personally, I'm playing WoW until Vanguard:SOH comes out, then I'll give it a shot and probably quit WoW if it's as good as it looks. I'm more into the hardcore MMO stuff and ease of play isn't an issue for me. That said, Vanguard is supposed to implement some things that make it feasable to be a player active and contributing on a limited amount of play time. Just don't expect to max out your level in 10 days.

 

[SViper]

Thanks for the input sling. Does it really take a very small amount of time to get max lvl in WoW? Unlike some people, I enjoy the journey more than the destination. I would rather it take a little longer to get levels in a game than grind to get max level. I think it kills the experience. From what I've played of EQ2, I see it would take quite a while to get that.

 

[Genx87]

To me those choices are like picking brown poop or yellow poop to have for dinner.
Just better off not even having dinner.

 

[Malladine]

EQ2 does take LONGER to reach max level, but IMO the journey is not at all enjoyable. In WoW you can have fun adventuring a few different characters (at least two, 1 horde 1 alliance with quite different environments/quest backgrounds) up to lvl 60, soon to be 70. I highly highly highly recommend WoW over EQ2.

Did you mention if you enjoyed PvP at all? If you do then WoW is the only way to go.

 

[FlasHBurN]

If you haven't tried out EQ2 in the last 6 months, you really can't comment on it. They have changed it drastically.

 

[Malladine]

Played it 3 months or so ago. It's a moderately stinky turd - we played to lvl 20.

 

[Zbox]

Originally posted by: cKGunslinger
WoW = Fun
EQ2 = Work

not in the least. both have their grind, and I'd argue WoW's is more repeating and dull.

I have 3 lvl 60s in WoW and the end game is poop. Only reason I stopped playing EQ2 was because my server was so abandoned there was not much you could do. The community is what ruins WoW and lack of it in EQ2 causes problems as well. WoW misses a lot of the "epic feel' that you had with itemization in EQ1 (played since alpha).

 

[SViper]

Originally posted by: FlasHBurN
If you haven't tried out EQ2 in the last 6 months, you really can't comment on it. They have changed it drastically.

Well, I haven't played in the last 6 months, so I don't know how it is now. Has it been changed for the better?

And about PvP: PvP is nice, but I haven't found any PvP system yet that rivals Shadowbane. The idea of fighting over territory and resources is what made Shadowbane's PvP really good. Now if they fixed their server architecture, it would be a great PvP game.

I would probably do PvP in WoW or EQ2 (saw that it's coming out w/ the expansion), but the quality of PvP in these games won't make or break my decision. I would just try it out because it's one of the added features.

 

[Dumac]

WoW seems way to easy to reach max level. It is way to easy IMHO. It really doesn't seem to make you feel like you accomplished anything. Maybe i am just used to the time it took to get to max level in EQ.

EQ2 seems way to empty. I never really ran into more than a handful of people during my time playing. It seemed way to empty. Also, I believe they made the graphics a little to good for a MMO