That Fan Faire thing is currently going on in that den of inequity and filth that is Las Vegas. From there SOE are holding various panels on the state of the various SOE MMOs.
All standard stuff on the upcoming stuff for EQ2 and SOEs other MMOs, apart from the EQNext Panel. EQNext is just the name SOE are giving to the follow up to EQ2, the EQNext name is only being used for the time being, and it probably won’t be called EverQuest 3. From what I’ve read over on EQ2Wire (here, here, here, here and here!) it seems they’re going for somewhere between EQ1 (less classes etc.) and EQ2 (ease of travel, streamlining of content etc.). Of the images I have seen, the game is looking very nice indeed, seem to have managed to inject some much needed atmosphere (the joys of shader model 3), I found that EQ2 was always a little flat looking.
There wasn’t much info on gameplay, but I guess it will be similar to EQ1 and 2, no Vindictus style realtime hack and slashery. Pretty much a graphical update with some tweaking then, which is exactly what the EQ fanbase wants.
Who knows if those EQ devs had a gander at the Symposiums very own EQNext(ish) and pilfered/borrowed some ideas from there?
Related posts:
MMOYeti:
mmosymposium:
WodgeFTW:
MMOSres:
Nice spot Wodge.
It does look like they are finally realising some people want more of a challenge than EQ2 provides. It's SOE though so who knows what we can believe.
I would like to think that someone has read our Everquest 3 post comments but I'm not sure they bother with the community that much.
As I've said on the neXus site, I hope it's a PC MMO and not a console game. Nothing against consoles but I want a game that can have a long life and be improved to take advantage of new hardware as PC tech progresses.
We'll have to keep updates coming on our blog for people to read.
To be honest, the lifespan of an mmo nowadays is the same as a console, and being on console means an extra source of players. All current consoles have USB ports, so they can have keyboards and the like.
I don't think they'll be making it more challenging to be honest, SOE do seem intent on following WoW to try and grab a bit of their success, which I think is the wrong way to go about things, Rift is still very much the game to look forward to if you want a more EQ1 experience.
You can't upgrade graphics and the like on a console though to take advantage of things such as new DX versions like LOTRO did.
I'm afraid I'll be sticking to PC's for my gaming.