Everquest II's lore just doesn't make any sense.

Morgander · 03-15-2008, 04:01 PM

There was once this idea of good versus evil within the realm of EQII. The entirety of the story centered around the infighting between the major cities of Qeynos and Freeport, though the onslaught of destruction reigned upon Norrath with the destruction of the moon Luclin left the cities as bitter rivals not fully engaged in self-sacrificing war.

In Everquest II's current incarnation it seems the realm of white and black has been skewed with some form of interrelationship gray. I noted to myself as I began to play through the quest line story driven content of the newest expansion, Rise of Kunark--that much of the story takes such serious strains between realism in both a moral and fictitious "realism" light.

Let me explain myself by issuing a few self-concept examples.

First off, let's contemplate the major racial influx of Kunark, the Sarnaks and Iksars, both evil races in all Norrathian lore spanning across several games and many years of adaptation.

The quests given by these races are often stereotypical, cookie-cutter quests in which for some un-benign reason, everybody needs help and you're "just the adventurer to count on!" Aside from that initial shortcoming in itself, my major gripe comes in the form of the very ethical endeavors in which these quests result. Some quests strike me as simply self-defeating of EQII's ravenous initial play on good versus evil as an Iksar might offer you some coin to assassinate a random person in the middle of the jungle in which you have no information about what so ever. In other words, your goodly high elf paladin wanders into an Iksar camp full of evil lizard folk ready to tear you limb from limb, but the quest giver himself not only will not engage you in combat, but if you didn't hesitate to slay the entire encampment in either self defense or in the acquisition of the defense of goodness by slaying creatures of evil, that very npc won't even lift a finger to defend his comrades, nor will he hesitate to offer you his quest to "kill 10 lions for pelts so we can make gloves that don't itch", or some other such nonsense quest I shouldn't even be doing at level 77 in the first place; what am I, an errand boy?

Anyway, so now you've gotten a quest! What's it entail? Well, you, being the good paladin you are, go out and find a gnome sitting in the jungle, and your job is without question, to assassinate the little bugger. Of course in a lore standpoint, the idea is ludicrous; of course I'm not going to besiege my divine ethics by taking a quest from an evil race in order to kill somebody that for all I know could be a helpless bystander. Unfortunately the development hasn't been creative enough to ensure enough viable alternatives to such quests as questing results in good rewards, great cash, and more experience than any other form of advancement. Not only that but it's just down right easier, less time consuming, and practically detrimental in some instances if you want certain rewards or long term-paths to open up such as your class's epic quest.

This is a gripe I have because it simply doesn't make sense. I'm sure many of you out there don't care about lore or reality in the realm of the fictitious, but for those of you who do; this is a warning to anyone who hasn't played this game yet, or who has, and hasn't reached this point. There are no longer any viable reasons to do anything within the realm of the game. There's nothing "epic", nothing mysterious, and nothing heroic about the world. I no longer contemplate feelings of heroism or adventure when I log in to play--feelings now replaced by an intuition that all I'm really doing is logging in an imaginary being into a computer game where monsters are replaced by statistics, class concepts replaced by spell and ability effects, and equipment lore (such as the Qeynos Claymore quest line) replaced by the item's statistics.

It used to mean something to be within an online world such as EQII. I used to feel as if I was experiencing something more, something greater than just a pixilated fantasy computer game, but alas, all good things come to an end.

My second gripe comes in the equipment creation in this new Kunark expansion. I recall a time when the Qeynos Claymore, one of the sister swords of Destiny for those familiar with the lore, was captured and I was asked to single handedly face all powerful dragons of yore, uncover secret mysteries of ages past, and fight my way through an ancient and dark draconic vault guarded by the mighty dragon Tarinax the Destroyer, a beast of undead and demonic proportions, just to uncover the mere mystery of a weapon so powerful that the very gods themselves had taken interest in their well being.

My reward of course for these acts of heroism, adventure, might, and mystery was a wondrous artifact of flowing runes and glowing light that would thrash my enemies with every punch, and lay waste to my adversaries by empowering my fists with ancient and mystical nether energies...

Only to be replaced by an item that some quest npc somewhere in Kunark happened to have lying in a box someplace after you fetched him 4 gorilla hides, 2 sarnak skins, and a bottle of ale.

Funny how all that glory and conquest came to a crashing defeat as the lunacy that is EQII lore kicked itself in the face with a gargantuan spiked boot of complete and utter stupidity.

What's happening to online worlds? Is this the future of mmorpg's? I hope not. I can only look on in dread at the idea of EQII being a fundamental development focus for ANY game in the even far future.

I look on in horror... and disgust.

Phrozen · 03-15-2008, 04:06 PM

The whole game is a shambles, just quit and let the rollplaying SoE Fanboi's continue to play, eventually it'll just die out then!

LFG · 03-15-2008, 04:06 PM

I'm actually thrilled to see an intelligent lore flame. We are not merely raiders, we are people with a keen grasp of what doesn't make sense.

Niber · 03-15-2008, 04:11 PM

Wow, awesome post. You put my many of my frustrations into words, beautifully.

Xanoth · 03-15-2008, 04:17 PM

EQ2 has been like this since launch and has gotten worse, I still find it the most enjoyable MMO out there at the moment and I had no choice but to blank out all the lore and click through quests as fast as possible without reading them. Not because I'm not interested in that sort of thing, just because reading it would make my gaming less enjoyable.

I used to care, but that part of me died a long time ago. R.I.P.

Morgander · 03-15-2008, 04:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LFG

I'm actually thrilled to see an intelligent lore flame. We are not merely raiders, we are people with a keen grasp of what doesn't make sense.

Thank you and I appreciate that.

A lot of people seem to think that if you raid, you must be some kind of 16 year old pot smoker with too much time on their hands who cares nothing about anything but "phat lewts".

I've got news for those people; I'm a 27 year old going for a degree in game design/animation. I've been "raiding" in mmo's since the release of Everquest in 1999, and I've been on top of my game ever since then, harboring characters so well equipped that I'm easily ranked in the upper 99 percentile in nearly every game I play extensively (as I once did EQII).

I read the quests, I know the lore, I try and experience the world. I've finished every Heritage Quest, completed every "prismatic" line, learned every language, uncovered every secret, discovered every local, and experienced every epic encounter. I know what makes sense and what does not.

I'm just waiting for the next series of events. What's next in line for SoE? Will we start to see the very names and titles themselves to begin to deteriorate from the fictional fantasy driven world in which we may or may not continue to delve into each day? Will npc names like Akorna Vendil and Delonie Fayflutter be replaced by Rikky Coolunch and Flyfly Muffinmunch who issue a quest to defeat the mighty dragon Bigface Firesauce in which you are rewarded with a giant pink sword that twinkles with fluttering daisies, "appropriately" entitled: the great sword of super coolness (and flower power)?

When does it stop? The naming policy that once extended throughout Everquest is already destroyed. Weather or not anyone here enjoyed or believes in the idea that players should be at their own liberty and viability to make silly names irreversibly DOES have an impact on the world, just as silly npc names, mob names, spell descriptions, or item names can.

Many of you probably never even think about it, let alone consider it--but what if you didn't cast Fireflash Master I? What if instead the spell where called: Coolnesscool Firefirepower doomness rank: SWEET!, which was enhanced by your "robe of sweet red coloredness of doom".

It all makes me feel like a 7 year old boy designed the game, and it's all disgusting, player and developer alike.

------
I'm not a role-player, and I'm not a "newbie". I'm a lifelong video gamer who's accomplished a great deal in the online worlds in which he's experienced. I'm elite in what I've accomplished, I'm professional in my play style, and I'm "hardcore" in my availability, but that doesn't make things such as lore something pointless or mundane. I need more of a reason for why I'm experiencing norrath than the next fabled upgrade I'm going to mindlessly acquire the next time our guild "figures" out what the next raid encounter does so we can defeat it over and over again every week until the next expansion.

You think that's epic? Trakenon isn't epic. The only thing "epic" in an online world... is why you're in it in the first place.

(Edited for a spelling error)

LFG · 03-15-2008, 04:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Morgander

Many of you probably never even think about it, let alone consider it--but what if you didn't cast Fireflash Master I? What if instead the spell where called: Coolnesscool Firefirepower doomness rank: SWEET!, which was enhanced by your "robe of sweet red coloredness of doom".

That's funny as hell.

Rizam · 03-15-2008, 04:35 PM

I think that we need to get game designers like this one hired at places like SOE. For example, if we put Morg. with an elite team of other programmers, developers, testers, etc.. of people not only on this site but in other games as well they could be hired to save games like EQII. Or at least keep companies like SOE from continuing on their blind path to ruination and money-whoring ways...

Odii · 03-15-2008, 04:44 PM

The whole point of an MMO is a world that has no start and has no end. The is time before you existed and time after you leave.

Its a shame to see the lore get used and abused.

The OP has very succinctly expressed a lot of the frustration the more in-depth player feels.

I started playing EQ1 about 6 months after it came out, a RL friend of mine would sit with me and tell me stories of the Lore in eq2. He would tell me about the epic life-long struggles the world of Norrath faced and how things actually progressed and changed. EQ1 was my first MMORPG, and if it wasn't for all that lore and the depth of the content, i would never have started playing.

I remember looking on the back of the Jewel Case and thinking, "God damn, that Elephant has some fucking sharp-ass corners on its face..."

I hear a lot of the old EQ1 peeps saying that EQ2 is just lacking that magical spark. I honestly think it is to do with the progress, the lore, and the complete ass about face progress we see xpac to xpac.

From a design, artistic and business standpoint, i for the life of me, can not understand why you would not continue to build on what you already have? There is so much here we can build on, but they send us into outerspace or into Forsaken City.

We want to feel like we are part of something greater than someone sitting behind their computer. We want to feel like we are part of the reason and the cause.

Dangle a carrot in our face... not a cock.

Niber · 03-15-2008, 04:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rizam

I think that we need to get game designers like this one hired at places like SOE. For example, if we put Morg. with an elite team of other programmers, developers, testers, etc.. of people not only on this site but in other games as well they could be hired to save games like EQII. Or at least keep companies like SOE from continuing on their blind path to ruination and money-whoring ways...

Unfortunately it's not that easy.

Releasing a game of the magnitude we're talking about would take a a lot of development time and a considerable sized staff. Vanguard attempted to do it and look what happened. I doubt many studios (outside of Blizzard) are willing to put up the capital for such a project.