Our very own Roaming Elf, Sobe, has grabbed a few screenshots for us to drool over from the upcoming sequel to Everquest. He's still tight lipped about the beta since the NDA is still in place, but he was able to get Moorgard to approve letting these screenies sneak out.

Have a look for <a href="http://thedruidsgrove.org/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=lastup">yourself!</a>

Reminds me of StarWars Galaxies somewhat. Great use of lighting and texture.

Sobe always did have a preference for playing fruity elves...

....GIMME!....

Nice pics :)

You have to see alot of this stuff first hand to fully appreciate it though.

I just want to know if the game is friendly for time-limited players and how the terrain geometry is handled. I absolutely hated SWG's terrain engine. The way the terrain would flicker and fluctuate as you traveled across the gameworld. It was damned annoying. GuildWars terrain is great, but it, like NWN, lacks z-axis movement. Maybe if we could get GuildWars terrain with CoH freedom of movement and fast paced gameplay with the rich history and lore of Norrath... slap in some flying air/space-ships and we could go explore the Ruins of Luclin.

Anyway... *sighs* Not too much longer to wait for EQ2. I just hope SOE ignores the vocal majority. They're not the ones that support the game financially.

Aly your bound to be disapointed by EQ2.

Perhaps. I just don't understand the SOE devs idiotic fetish/fascination with forcing players to play for long sessions. I want short, sweet sessions that I can play whenever I want to. Whenver I have the time free. I don't want to be forced into camping in the same spot for hours upon hours for some rare drop item from a rare spawn mob. That has to be the stupidest form of game design I've ever seen. At least CoH got the gameplay/timesinks right on the nose. I love it. I can play when I want to for however long I want to and still feel like I'm getting something done in the game and keeping up with even the end game addicts.

Greater than 95% of the game absolutely should be accessible to everyone, regardless of how long they can play. Why is that so hard for the devs to understand? I like the screenshots for EQ2, though the characters look plastic. I like the class structure. I just don't want to deal with the stupid timesinks all over again.

Perhaps. I just don't understand the SOE devs idiotic fetish/fascination with forcing players to play for long sessions.I heard somewhere it was a group effort on the part of the EQ devs to get at some player named Aly... but maybe I heard wrong. You know how rumors are :D

I wouldn't be surprised!! I used the /feedback option quite liberally. Unfortunately I think /feeback just leads to /dev.null or however you type it. :p

Ah, Arienne, we can only hope.

You can vaguely tell from those screenshots that the image of the exploded moon is amazing. It's a very spooky image seeing it burn like an evil milky way in the night sky. another thing that would be nice to show people is the looks of the "special visions" Infra vision, Ultra vision and, Sonic vision all give a unique way to look at the world that is pretty amazing. I hope that I haven't said too much.

1.Screenshots look great! Im pretty excited about this game.
2. If I had a quarter for every time ALy said the Word COH, Id be a Millionaire :whistle: .
3. EQ2 will have options for players with a little time to play, But it will not be the majority of the game, EQ2 will be like every other long term succesful MMORPG with long quests and timesinks which sink u into the game. I like these timesinks makes me feel special when I complete a long quest or finally spawn a rare MOB.
4. Im on Aly's ignore list, so can someone plz relay this message "Aly please do not play EQ2, I really hope you stay away, I really dont want to hear your annoying posts on the subject of EQ2, the game is not for you, you are meant to be playing other games that only have a lifespan of 1yr of less, games that you can accomplish alot in a little time".
CHubbs

Thank you Sobe for sharing those :).

It would be interesting to hear Sobe's thoughts of both EQ2 and WoW now that he's had some play time in each. However, I know he can say nothing about EQ2 at least for the moment.

I'm glad you were able to get the ok to show these, thanks again.

Shame I never get into any of these beta tests. *sighs* Course I usually don't sign up anyway since I'm on dial up and they don't ship CD's out anymore for beta testers. =/

Beta test wasn't a CD it was a download. Mine took 3 hours.

I know Fen. Companies usually don't ship CD's or DVD's out to beta testers these days. I signed up for beta's all the time way back in the day... and they would ship the software to you. Now they expect everyone to have broadband and that's just wrong. The cable company stops a quarter mile from my house and I'm too far away for DSL service.

Moving isn't an option either. :(

My friends download was going to take 176 hours.

Ooh, pwetty.

Looks like DAoC? With slightly better graphics :D Especially #11.

I hope they brighten it up a bit - I'm not keen on dark, medieval dingy depressing type stuff... I want to see some lush landscapes and bright skies even if they are pulling out of the "dark ages" or whatever between EQ1 and EQ2.

I got my EQ 2 Charater creation kit last night.

Pretty cool, I messed around doing diffrent looks on alot of charaters.

Loving the Iksar look as well as the wood elf. To me , High Elfs males, look like girls though.

I hope they brighten it up a bit - I'm not keen on dark, medieval dingy depressing type stuff... I want to see some lush landscapes and bright skies even if they are pulling out of the "dark ages" or whatever between EQ1 and EQ2.

I kinda want to see a truly dark world where evil holds sway and the ambience of most of the game reflects that. Or a world where things have just kinda run down and the PC's are a new force on the scene to turn things around. A new age of exploration so to speak.

With cities that look like this:
http://www.city-of-doors.com/modules/coppermine/albums/userpics/10003/NWN0002g.jpg