Koldriana
09-03-2004, 04:05 PM
Taken from Planet EQ:
Check out the screenshots at:
http://www.planeteq.com/features/omensofwar/tour.htm
Return to Fantasy: Kwill’s Tour of the Omens of War Expansion
Imagine yourself in a place in Norrath where high fantasy rules. As you explore a new land, lured there by the promise of adventure by the mysterious Priests of Discord, you encounter strange creatures: grotesque, beautiful, frightening, and absurd – but in the mythical tradition of dragons, demons and magic wielders.
They live in colorful caverns filled with bright blue crystals and sweeping orange staircases, leading to strange arcane lizard creatures worshiping huge pillars of energy that erupt in crackling bursts of orange, reaching high above them into the darkness.
They live in murky sewers and moss covered caverns. Winged female demons with wings and tails burn, cruel monsters search for prey, and dragon-like creatures called dragorns inhabit dazzling caves where only the most intrepid adventurers dare to go.
The monsters flap and walk and run toward you like visions from a nightmare.
When they die they don’t disappear, but fade out slowly, disintegrating into particles, then nothingness before your eyes.
Spells are visible as complex effects, designs and colors intermingling to create elaborate light shows.
In cold zones, you can see the breath of NPCs and player characters.
When you gain an experience level, arcane effects surround your character.
Welcome to the Omens of War expansion.
Have the art and design team surpassed themselves again? Yes, in the Omens of War expansion they have. I truly enjoy taking press tours of expansions because I get to see the vision that the artists and the designers imagined and then created in the newest EQ zones (without worrying about dying, even though I did die when Brenlo said, “go ahead and attack something!” This is fun…. Uh oh, here ’s more ...gaah… Loading, please wait…). Despite experiencing the good and bad of EQ all at once, my overall impression was that this expansion again pushes the envelope of design, graphics, technology, and creativity for EQ players to explore, as well as adding new design and adventure elements for all kinds of players: hard core, casual and anything in between.
The guild summit opened a line of communication between the players and the designers that has changed the game forever. As a result of the guild summit and player feedback, the designers went back and retooled the Omens expansion to reflect the desires of the player base. No more aliens – this is a fantasy realm. The expansion’s elements reflect what players told the designers were the most important in a playable game. And with the addition of realistic elements as a result of improving graphics technology, the game comes more alive than it ever has before. An amazing realistic addition is shadows that move with characters and NPCs, reflecting light sources that change with the environment, and in the case of the sun, with the time of day.
Characters live in the environment now, not just inhabit it as cardboard figures. The shadow effects will carry over into the old world zones as well, adding a realistic dimension the familiar lands have never had in the past. There are new water effects again reflecting the sophistication of the tools the artists have to work with. The Omens NPCs show off the new detailed modeling employed by the artists and animators, who stretched skin tighter, showing more detail, and implemented more realistic animations. This is a imagined world with depth and character brought to life by the artists and designers. The skies change with the weather. The day turns to night, the sun sets and stars come out. The vicious mobs really do look nasty and the elegant ones are impressive. The flames really crackle, the bats fly erratically like they should, and the bad guys run just as fast as always, but look better doing it.
Are there experiences for the casual player? Yes. The task system, which will start in the old world and carry over to Omens, will give any player something to do for 30-90 minutes. Even better, there is no time limit on the task system, so you can start a task and then go on to do something else and come back to it (although you can only do one task at a time). The task system starts at level 5 and goes all the way up to 70, so anyone can participate. If you are a casual player, there is something for you to do when you log on for 30 minutes. If you are a serious player but are waiting for a group, there is something for you to do for 30 minutes while you wait. And if you are a role player, you have an opportunity to use the task system as part of role playing adventures.
There is only one flagged zone in Omens (Anguish), so for the majority of the expansion players can go anywhere to solo, find pickup groups, or do guild events. There are new epic weapons to achieve. There are involved quests to go on. There is good gear to be won. There are new spells to get. You can work on more alternative advancement skills. You can get to level 70. And from the looks of the zones I visited, which included Dranek’s Scar, Riftseeker’s Sanctum, and Harbringer’s Spire, there are plenty of boss mobs and difficult areas to test a guild’s skill. The spire with worshipping dragon-like monsters around it, the room with many mobs where I managed to die a graceful death under about 10 monsters, and other areas appear to be both a challenge and an enjoyable place to fight (I didn’t last long enough to really experience the fighting part, but I think it would be fun if the mage wasn’t trying to be a solo tank). The scenery certainly wasn’t boring! The colors are bright, the designs of the natural features are complex, and the architecture is sophisticated in the zones I visited.
People have been asking about instanced zones, and there are some in the expansion, but no solo instances. The reason for not including them in this expansion, Brenlo explained, was that when you go in a solo instanced zone, you are cut off from all social interaction, and that is not what they are aiming for in the overall game design. EQ is a social game by its very nature of being online. They are hoping the task system will fill in the gap for people who like to solo and want finite things to do for limited game time, or just something to do by themselves to get experience and items.
When we started an instanced zone in the expansion, this box came up:
The testing, too, has come a long way since Gates. Brenlo assured me this testing plan has been more solid, as they invited whole guilds from various servers to test content and didn’t try to introduce a new graphics engine in the middle of the beta test, which is one of the problems Gates experienced. They are trying to make this expansion as bug free as they can make it before it’s released.
And when will that be? September 14, I am told, just around the corner! You will enter the expansion zones through a Priest of Discord (remember him?) because the Priests of Discord are creating portals in major cities to create chaos and discord in this new world by porting Norrathians over to disrupt it. (Finally, the priests have a role in the story instead of just being fun to dress in hand me down robes, anyone remember that?) To find out more of the story, you will have to check the story pages in the game and learn for yourselves what the history is of this strange new land. The Wayfarers story line is coming to a close and a new one is starting …. Omens of War.
I will be visiting Omens again next week with the promise of a glimpse at the new Epics and the flagged zone. More to come!
Check out the screenshots at:
http://www.planeteq.com/features/omensofwar/tour.htm
Return to Fantasy: Kwill’s Tour of the Omens of War Expansion
Imagine yourself in a place in Norrath where high fantasy rules. As you explore a new land, lured there by the promise of adventure by the mysterious Priests of Discord, you encounter strange creatures: grotesque, beautiful, frightening, and absurd – but in the mythical tradition of dragons, demons and magic wielders.
They live in colorful caverns filled with bright blue crystals and sweeping orange staircases, leading to strange arcane lizard creatures worshiping huge pillars of energy that erupt in crackling bursts of orange, reaching high above them into the darkness.
They live in murky sewers and moss covered caverns. Winged female demons with wings and tails burn, cruel monsters search for prey, and dragon-like creatures called dragorns inhabit dazzling caves where only the most intrepid adventurers dare to go.
The monsters flap and walk and run toward you like visions from a nightmare.
When they die they don’t disappear, but fade out slowly, disintegrating into particles, then nothingness before your eyes.
Spells are visible as complex effects, designs and colors intermingling to create elaborate light shows.
In cold zones, you can see the breath of NPCs and player characters.
When you gain an experience level, arcane effects surround your character.
Welcome to the Omens of War expansion.
Have the art and design team surpassed themselves again? Yes, in the Omens of War expansion they have. I truly enjoy taking press tours of expansions because I get to see the vision that the artists and the designers imagined and then created in the newest EQ zones (without worrying about dying, even though I did die when Brenlo said, “go ahead and attack something!” This is fun…. Uh oh, here ’s more ...gaah… Loading, please wait…). Despite experiencing the good and bad of EQ all at once, my overall impression was that this expansion again pushes the envelope of design, graphics, technology, and creativity for EQ players to explore, as well as adding new design and adventure elements for all kinds of players: hard core, casual and anything in between.
The guild summit opened a line of communication between the players and the designers that has changed the game forever. As a result of the guild summit and player feedback, the designers went back and retooled the Omens expansion to reflect the desires of the player base. No more aliens – this is a fantasy realm. The expansion’s elements reflect what players told the designers were the most important in a playable game. And with the addition of realistic elements as a result of improving graphics technology, the game comes more alive than it ever has before. An amazing realistic addition is shadows that move with characters and NPCs, reflecting light sources that change with the environment, and in the case of the sun, with the time of day.
Characters live in the environment now, not just inhabit it as cardboard figures. The shadow effects will carry over into the old world zones as well, adding a realistic dimension the familiar lands have never had in the past. There are new water effects again reflecting the sophistication of the tools the artists have to work with. The Omens NPCs show off the new detailed modeling employed by the artists and animators, who stretched skin tighter, showing more detail, and implemented more realistic animations. This is a imagined world with depth and character brought to life by the artists and designers. The skies change with the weather. The day turns to night, the sun sets and stars come out. The vicious mobs really do look nasty and the elegant ones are impressive. The flames really crackle, the bats fly erratically like they should, and the bad guys run just as fast as always, but look better doing it.
Are there experiences for the casual player? Yes. The task system, which will start in the old world and carry over to Omens, will give any player something to do for 30-90 minutes. Even better, there is no time limit on the task system, so you can start a task and then go on to do something else and come back to it (although you can only do one task at a time). The task system starts at level 5 and goes all the way up to 70, so anyone can participate. If you are a casual player, there is something for you to do when you log on for 30 minutes. If you are a serious player but are waiting for a group, there is something for you to do for 30 minutes while you wait. And if you are a role player, you have an opportunity to use the task system as part of role playing adventures.
There is only one flagged zone in Omens (Anguish), so for the majority of the expansion players can go anywhere to solo, find pickup groups, or do guild events. There are new epic weapons to achieve. There are involved quests to go on. There is good gear to be won. There are new spells to get. You can work on more alternative advancement skills. You can get to level 70. And from the looks of the zones I visited, which included Dranek’s Scar, Riftseeker’s Sanctum, and Harbringer’s Spire, there are plenty of boss mobs and difficult areas to test a guild’s skill. The spire with worshipping dragon-like monsters around it, the room with many mobs where I managed to die a graceful death under about 10 monsters, and other areas appear to be both a challenge and an enjoyable place to fight (I didn’t last long enough to really experience the fighting part, but I think it would be fun if the mage wasn’t trying to be a solo tank). The scenery certainly wasn’t boring! The colors are bright, the designs of the natural features are complex, and the architecture is sophisticated in the zones I visited.
People have been asking about instanced zones, and there are some in the expansion, but no solo instances. The reason for not including them in this expansion, Brenlo explained, was that when you go in a solo instanced zone, you are cut off from all social interaction, and that is not what they are aiming for in the overall game design. EQ is a social game by its very nature of being online. They are hoping the task system will fill in the gap for people who like to solo and want finite things to do for limited game time, or just something to do by themselves to get experience and items.
When we started an instanced zone in the expansion, this box came up:
The testing, too, has come a long way since Gates. Brenlo assured me this testing plan has been more solid, as they invited whole guilds from various servers to test content and didn’t try to introduce a new graphics engine in the middle of the beta test, which is one of the problems Gates experienced. They are trying to make this expansion as bug free as they can make it before it’s released.
And when will that be? September 14, I am told, just around the corner! You will enter the expansion zones through a Priest of Discord (remember him?) because the Priests of Discord are creating portals in major cities to create chaos and discord in this new world by porting Norrathians over to disrupt it. (Finally, the priests have a role in the story instead of just being fun to dress in hand me down robes, anyone remember that?) To find out more of the story, you will have to check the story pages in the game and learn for yourselves what the history is of this strange new land. The Wayfarers story line is coming to a close and a new one is starting …. Omens of War.
I will be visiting Omens again next week with the promise of a glimpse at the new Epics and the flagged zone. More to come!