While I was looking for the the playable demo download location for a game called "Ascension to the Throne" I stumbled across the latest seven day free trial for 'EverQuest Two'.
I was so intrigued I decided to download this and have a go.
Haveing had brought a copy of 'Everquest : Ruins of Kunark' ( I still have the cloth Map of Norrath stuck up on the wall above my computer.) at about this time ten years ago I;m not a newcomer to online RPGS. I had some idea of the game and how to play it without delving through volumes of instruction manual nad tutoriols. Though, since I have stopped working. I no longer play any game that requires me to spend money every month on it to continue.
Incidently, I had played 'Everquest Two : The Island' early last year when it was offered as a free trial as well. So this time around wasn't really my first venture into the shattered lands of Everquest Two, either. ( Need I tell that the main continent of Antonica had suffered a sever beating that left it shattered into four to five separate smaller islands since the arrival of Everquest two.) The improvement to the graphics quality was pretty phenonemal. To give a idea of how advanced the graphics, sound and other effects are:-at even with my reasonably modern computer andh a fairly reputable 3D accelarated graphics card. It still had huge perfomrance problems with all the bells and whistles turned up to the max. I had to switch them all off again just to play the game, which still looked and sounded very impressive, by the way.
Anyway, alot of stuff has been added since 'Ruins of Kunark' which I had been very excited about at the time. But the improvement in polygons, just admireing the textures on the bark of trees, the swaying grass, the wood grain and the adobe surfaces of the buildings and the sun and moon moving across the sky as day becomes night. Not to mention the other characters as well as your own walking around, some of them controlled by the game.
So, after a hours download, installation. I
start up the game and then forced to wait another eight hours of downloading the living breathing world of Norrath bringing me up to speed.
The newest expansion for 'Everquest Two' as it's been hinted at. Introduces the Fairy as the newest playable race. I chose one. A male character, and then a female. Not that I'm big on the fae. It's just that they are much smaller in a novel way. They move much faster then that other races, have wings and perhaps a natural applitude for magic and magic resistance. Plus they come in sorts of colours with a wides vareity of gossamer wings. As I said, that I'm not one to fantacise about mincing around in this fashion. It's just that I have already had ago at playing every other race since 'Ruins of Kunark'. (My Froglok ( Frogman.) Swashbuckler from playing 'The Island' expansion last year was a favorite of mine and would be a worth while character to continue with.) The flying ability suposedly possesed by this new race sounds very lucrative. Although once the female fae Necromancer character appaered in a small village located in Faydark near the entrance to main Dark Elf underground city of Neriak. I was given a strange sence of returning to a place I have known before upon entering the Dark Elf city of Neriak. (It just so happens that I played a Dark-Elf necromancer in this area in the first game.) Though the Faydark area I had to travell through appaered fairly unrecognisable. It was walking the streets, dark laneways and alcoves of the very much similer if upgraded and expanded Dark Elven city giving me a sence of De-Sha-Vuu. Just about everything seemed to be in the same place here.
On the subject of the Fae, again. They don't really fly, except that their wings flap and there's about a foot's distance between their feet and ground while they are moveing. I guess they can jump higher also. I never took any real notice of the advantages of being of the Fae in this game. As I used the Fae character to explore the Faydark area as much as I could before without fighting or trying to otherwise level up before getting bored with it and decided make few other characters. A Male Dark-Elf Assasin who explored Neriak and a Female Dwarven Furey. My Dwarven furey being a good aligned character appears in a place called Kelefin on one of the other scatter islands close by. It's supposed to be the Wood Elf capital, a tree city. Though this place, which I have also recalled from the first game did not appaer to be anywhere close by. This place, supposedly close to Kelefin, perhaps in a secluded valley looks suspicously like my character had been shrunk to the size of a ant and put into somebodies garden. The only building, a hollowed out gourd nearby, surrounded by a garden of sorts with overgrown leaves,( That you can walk across or use as ramp for getting onto the higher levels of the tree roots.) towering mushrooms a high way system of roots and lower brances all coming from the same tree which dominated the area. There was puddle that is a pond and a pond that looked like a inland sea. The mushroom men are a sight to see.
Knowing that Dwarves were meant to be short folk with uneven musculer or fat proportions and yet this my dwarven female character seemed more fae-like. Just look at the picture below. ( Her being topless, is just a glitch I noticed when I removed her leather cuiress at one time to replace it with better armour. Usaulley, she would be always wearing a whirt shirt as modesty permits.) Her proportions here are of a
two thirds of the height of a human with very large thighs. Her proportions seemd remarkbly human other wise. Perhaps characters created in this expansion are all given a measure of fae blood to improve their looks. Whatever it is, I have a very sexy looking Dwarven female character who would give a female wood-elve a run for their money in the looks department. There is a completly different graphics set for creating characters in this expandsion. There is also a option for using the graphics set from the expansion from last year. ( The Island ) so comparing my dwarve and other character races with the earlier versions have shown how far the graphics have been refined and female dwarves are now no longer given the option to have facial hair.
Walking through Neriak I do recall seeing Ogress ( Femal Ogre) standing around looking much prettier than her comtempary's. So this alone makes the expansion more interesting to play.
Enough waffling from me. Just play the game and look around for a DarkElven character by the name of Drissit on the Permafrost server. Yes, I am
playing out my R.A. Savatore fantacies of very well known Dark Elven Ranger from the Forgotten Realms universe.
http://img503.imageshack.us/img503/9029/eq2000006vh6.jpg">
I was so intrigued I decided to download this and have a go.
Haveing had brought a copy of 'Everquest : Ruins of Kunark' ( I still have the cloth Map of Norrath stuck up on the wall above my computer.) at about this time ten years ago I;m not a newcomer to online RPGS. I had some idea of the game and how to play it without delving through volumes of instruction manual nad tutoriols. Though, since I have stopped working. I no longer play any game that requires me to spend money every month on it to continue.
Incidently, I had played 'Everquest Two : The Island' early last year when it was offered as a free trial as well. So this time around wasn't really my first venture into the shattered lands of Everquest Two, either. ( Need I tell that the main continent of Antonica had suffered a sever beating that left it shattered into four to five separate smaller islands since the arrival of Everquest two.) The improvement to the graphics quality was pretty phenonemal. To give a idea of how advanced the graphics, sound and other effects are:-at even with my reasonably modern computer andh a fairly reputable 3D accelarated graphics card. It still had huge perfomrance problems with all the bells and whistles turned up to the max. I had to switch them all off again just to play the game, which still looked and sounded very impressive, by the way.
Anyway, alot of stuff has been added since 'Ruins of Kunark' which I had been very excited about at the time. But the improvement in polygons, just admireing the textures on the bark of trees, the swaying grass, the wood grain and the adobe surfaces of the buildings and the sun and moon moving across the sky as day becomes night. Not to mention the other characters as well as your own walking around, some of them controlled by the game.
So, after a hours download, installation. I
start up the game and then forced to wait another eight hours of downloading the living breathing world of Norrath bringing me up to speed.
The newest expansion for 'Everquest Two' as it's been hinted at. Introduces the Fairy as the newest playable race. I chose one. A male character, and then a female. Not that I'm big on the fae. It's just that they are much smaller in a novel way. They move much faster then that other races, have wings and perhaps a natural applitude for magic and magic resistance. Plus they come in sorts of colours with a wides vareity of gossamer wings. As I said, that I'm not one to fantacise about mincing around in this fashion. It's just that I have already had ago at playing every other race since 'Ruins of Kunark'. (My Froglok ( Frogman.) Swashbuckler from playing 'The Island' expansion last year was a favorite of mine and would be a worth while character to continue with.) The flying ability suposedly possesed by this new race sounds very lucrative. Although once the female fae Necromancer character appaered in a small village located in Faydark near the entrance to main Dark Elf underground city of Neriak. I was given a strange sence of returning to a place I have known before upon entering the Dark Elf city of Neriak. (It just so happens that I played a Dark-Elf necromancer in this area in the first game.) Though the Faydark area I had to travell through appaered fairly unrecognisable. It was walking the streets, dark laneways and alcoves of the very much similer if upgraded and expanded Dark Elven city giving me a sence of De-Sha-Vuu. Just about everything seemed to be in the same place here.
On the subject of the Fae, again. They don't really fly, except that their wings flap and there's about a foot's distance between their feet and ground while they are moveing. I guess they can jump higher also. I never took any real notice of the advantages of being of the Fae in this game. As I used the Fae character to explore the Faydark area as much as I could before without fighting or trying to otherwise level up before getting bored with it and decided make few other characters. A Male Dark-Elf Assasin who explored Neriak and a Female Dwarven Furey. My Dwarven furey being a good aligned character appears in a place called Kelefin on one of the other scatter islands close by. It's supposed to be the Wood Elf capital, a tree city. Though this place, which I have also recalled from the first game did not appaer to be anywhere close by. This place, supposedly close to Kelefin, perhaps in a secluded valley looks suspicously like my character had been shrunk to the size of a ant and put into somebodies garden. The only building, a hollowed out gourd nearby, surrounded by a garden of sorts with overgrown leaves,( That you can walk across or use as ramp for getting onto the higher levels of the tree roots.) towering mushrooms a high way system of roots and lower brances all coming from the same tree which dominated the area. There was puddle that is a pond and a pond that looked like a inland sea. The mushroom men are a sight to see.
Knowing that Dwarves were meant to be short folk with uneven musculer or fat proportions and yet this my dwarven female character seemed more fae-like. Just look at the picture below. ( Her being topless, is just a glitch I noticed when I removed her leather cuiress at one time to replace it with better armour. Usaulley, she would be always wearing a whirt shirt as modesty permits.) Her proportions here are of a
two thirds of the height of a human with very large thighs. Her proportions seemd remarkbly human other wise. Perhaps characters created in this expansion are all given a measure of fae blood to improve their looks. Whatever it is, I have a very sexy looking Dwarven female character who would give a female wood-elve a run for their money in the looks department. There is a completly different graphics set for creating characters in this expandsion. There is also a option for using the graphics set from the expansion from last year. ( The Island ) so comparing my dwarve and other character races with the earlier versions have shown how far the graphics have been refined and female dwarves are now no longer given the option to have facial hair.
Walking through Neriak I do recall seeing Ogress ( Femal Ogre) standing around looking much prettier than her comtempary's. So this alone makes the expansion more interesting to play.
Enough waffling from me. Just play the game and look around for a DarkElven character by the name of Drissit on the Permafrost server. Yes, I am
playing out my R.A. Savatore fantacies of very well known Dark Elven Ranger from the Forgotten Realms universe.
Link: http://everquest2.station.sony.com/promotions/playthefae/" target="_blank">If you beleive in Faries, just click on this.