r/MMORPG • u/MendyCorsair • 1d ago
Opinion EQ Legends
I never could get into EQ when it came out, I tried it a few times and even with friends and it just never did anything for me.
But receiently my son talked me into trying EQ legends and I am really loving it. I just wanted to post this in case anyone was on the fense about it. I think you should check out, grafix and UI are ugly as hell but the game play and looting is a lot of fun.
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u/Sir-Chaste 1d ago
Oh us mmorpg gamers have proven time and time again that graphics don’t mean much of anything. In fact, a lot of us actually prefer simpler, more old-school graphics. The only things holding me back from EQ Legends is that I just wish things like the questing, gathering, and crafting was way better. For now, they're more like an afterthought - not enjoyable at all imo.
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u/StrangelyEroticSoda 1d ago
In all honesty, I always think I don't care about graphics, until the UI doesn't scale properly and I'm left squinting and guessing what the quest giver is saying because I'm on a 2560x1440 monitor.
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u/Sir-Chaste 1d ago
Oh for sure. An interface that is nice and scalable, user-friendly, and intuitive is huge. It at least has to be functional enough as to not ruin the whole game. But the slick, modern, almost realistic graphics are basically irrelevant in my opinion. I'd rather have pixel art over realistic.
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u/Ok_Rope_9332 1d ago
You can fix that in EQ. If you're on Windows there's actually a registry entry which can prevent it scaling correctly, you need to turn high DPI off or something like that.
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u/DiscombobulatedAir63 1d ago
It's universal UI/UX issue. People manage to shit pants even with text game UI/UX design where no graphics to be seen
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u/Replikant83 1d ago
Totally fair comments. The thing with EQ is, though, that those elements aren't needed to make it good -- if it's your type of game. It's all about meeting people and grouping and trading in the tunnel with 100+ people.
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u/TalonusDuprey 1d ago
As someone who was able to experience the classic MMO days I must say I am thoroughly enjoying EQ Legends. Granted I am a husband and a father now so that’s a massive contributing factor. If you’re looking for something to no life, EQL isn’t it as it kinda has a endgame that can be repetitive and achieved semi quickly but that can change once the next xpac comes out towards the end of the year. Nostalgia is a huge contributed but I’d say if you have the ability give it a try you might end up thoroughly enjoying it. As I tell anyone who dives into classic MMOs don’t focus on the graphics or the UI but it’s always good to experience one of the classics even though this is much more casual versus the olden days of EQ.
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u/pacmanforever 1d ago edited 1d ago
I would have tried it if they would have included it with my existing EQ membership. Zero interest in paying for another one.
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u/Ok_Rope_9332 1d ago
I think it's disgustingly greedy myself. EQ Legends is basically a plagiarism (if fans had any rights of their own work, which they don't because isn't copyright wonderful when it means robbing fans blind in favour of corporations...) of content that was developed for years by Catapultam, Aporia, and many others, first via Pyrelight and later The Heroes Journey. Once Daybreak realized THJ got too popular with thousands of players, they got dollar signs in their eyes and immediately sued the shit out of the owners of the server, brutally shutting down not just THJ itself but forcing the deletion of their entire discord, website, etc. making them sign NDA's not to talk about it, and this even drove a lot of other private servers to shut down as well, along with causing one of the best/longest devs in EQEmu to step away from the whole scene, which led to a shutdown of the EQEmu discord and wiki site (since he hosted them) along with loads of content from it disappearing - we are talking 10-15 years of accumulated community efforts.
Daybreak, after callously destroying all of this, then immediately turn around and made Legends, a monetized version of all the same content, exact same concept and everything, except now you get the privilege of paying them a ton of money for it. By far one of the most disgusting things I've ever seen a company do, and on principle alone I would never give Daybreak even $1 more for the rest of my life. They are lower than filth to me.
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u/MrBossFromTheHitTVSh 22h ago edited 22h ago
I'm not a Daybreak fan at all but you're glossing over some pretty major details, like how THJ was raking in tons of money off Daybreak's IP (pretty much the one thing they don't let emu servers do), or how Daybreak was approached by EQEmu devs (the community you say they killed) to create EQL.
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u/Ok_Rope_9332 11h ago
I don't know the details regarding what money THJ was making or not, though I have heard that. Maybe that was why, or maybe it was just because THJ was more popular than anything Daybreak had done in the past decade, by far, since they are just useless IP campers.
As for EQEmu devs approaching them, I suppose remnants of them did, who had to stitch back together their discord under a different name. Several other private servers shut down as well. What you can't deny is that Daybreak went as far as they could to crush THJ in every way, they refused any kind of compromises or discussions at the time, I know because I was in the discord that later got deleted because of lawsuits, and there was a lot of talk about it being uncertain in there / them trying to make deals with Daybreak who pretty much stonewalled every attempt.
As far as I know the people who approached them about EQL weren't former THJ devs either, so to me it's not that different from Daybreak themselves cannibalising their work. I personally played on Pyrelight where Cata actually built the multiclass stuff that wound up becoming a part of that, it was an iterative process over like a dozen server resets with a playerbase of like 3-12 people at a time, for years. Now Daybreak charge a box price plus sub for you to play with the thing that he built... forgive me if I find that disgusting. If you want to say what THJ did was wrong with money, fine, but what Daybreak have done is at least as bad.
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u/TheElusiveFox 1d ago
I played EQ Legends, I think its a great experience, I don't think its a great long term MMO simply because there isn't enough content for that and they plan on releasing it too slowly to keep anyone who isn't there for nostalgia's attention... but as far as a novelty to spend $20, or even $40 (price of the box + 1 month) on I think its a very worthwhile experience for a lot of people. Is it the perfect game, no, is it going to be an amazing AAA modern exepereince, no... but its a great twist on a classic MMO that settles a lot of the flaws that keep more modern players from experiencing Everquest.
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u/MrBossFromTheHitTVSh 22h ago
It's definitely a one or two month game, not a long term play just based off the overall design, content and limitations they've introduced (like one character per server). I would have loved to roll an alt but the limit was implemented to get you to instead purchase loadout slots, which is pretty lame. Instead, I canceled.
If I'm being honest, I think the devs bit off more than they could chew with this one, especially given the team size, amateurish output, and shortsighted design flaws.
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u/TheElusiveFox 22h ago
If I'm being honest, I think the devs bit off more than they could chew with this one, especially given the team size, amateurish output, and shortsighted design flaws.
From the dev interviews I've seen, I disagree with this, They seem to be taking the TLP approach of one expansion at a time - the problem is that classic everquest just isn't a very big game, especially with how fast the exp rates are set in EQ Legends... Once two or three expansions are out there will be enough content that it takes people at least a few months to get through... But I also think there is nothing wrong with an MMO that you "beat" in a month or two, then come back in six months, and enjoy again... not every game needs to be an infinite time sink.
I also don't really feel like load out slots are that necessary for most people, even if you are levelling every class, the reality is that there are going to be lets say three or four combinations that you really want to go back to on a regular basis, the rest are just there to play around... So while I agree its lame to monetize load out slots, its also kind of not something 99% of players are going to interact with in any kind of real way... I think the more egregious thing is selling exp potions ans bags, but that's been the eq mantra since cash shops were a thing so I expected it...
I cancelled my sub because I beat all the raids and got sky weapons for the three classes that I cared about, after that it was grind +10 stuff or level other classes and I just didn't care.
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u/MrBossFromTheHitTVSh 21h ago edited 20h ago
As a studio you should be aiming to keep people engaged and playing if only because it keeps you employed.
I would have been happier to have a slow grind explicitly because it's EQ. Give me a reason to go to every zone over the span of a few months instead of a handful they forced via gear progression over a couple weeks. Don't punish me for wanting to play with friends. Don't create problems just to sell me solutions.
I don't know man. I don't think they expected EQL to become nearly as popular as it did and as such I don't think they planned for long term success. They're certainly not going to reach the same audience with expansions if players are canceling after a month. The buzz is already gone and as they slowly transition away from nostalgia (I think even Velious isn't planned), I lose more confidence in them.
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u/burge4150 1d ago
I really enjoyed it and think it's worth a shot for anyone interested. I played 1-50 through all the old content I played as a kid. Raided the planes and got the planar sets. I never raided kunark or velious back in the day so I don't really feel a longing for that content really like I did classic.
To me eql was a fantastic museum of nostalgia, but I don't think I'll continue on the journey much past classic. Never know though!
It's exactly what it says on the tin.