First Impressions: Everquest 2 Extended

First Impressions: Everquest 2 Extended
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First Impressions - Everquest 2 Extended

Everquest 2 Extended is Sony’s latest entry into the growing Western F2P market. For those who do not know, Everquest 2 has been around for 6 years. There is a wealth a content available to keep you occupied for quite awhile. Before we start, Everquest 2 Extended is still in beta and the finish product could be quite different than what you see now. My first impressions of Everquest 2 Extended are based on playing the game from the bronze membership perspective.

Performance

Everquest 2 Extended is a game heavily dependant on your CPU. It is also not optimized for multi-core systems. You will see the best performance from a system boasting a single 4ghz processor as opposed to a system with a 3ghz quad-core. You will still need a decent video card though as some of the processing is still done on the GPU. Everquest 2 Extended also uses a streaming client so you can start playing the game while it downloads although on some internet connections this could cause some lag during gameplay or missing items from the game world.

Creating your Character

You are limited to four classes and eight races unless you upgrade your account to Gold or Platinum membership level. The game allows you to choose skin and hair color, body type, eyes and other details to make your character unique. You also get to choose your home city which determines if you will be good or evil. You can also select an alternate appearance for your character.

First Impressions

One of my first impressions: Everquest 2 Extended bronze members will notice the lack of chat. Bronze members can do /say, /tell, /group and /guild and can not talk nor see any of the other chats. The starting zones are well designed and the quests make sure you get enough starting equipment, money, experience and crafting items to get you ready for the later areas.

Quest Reward

You are also limited to what level you can learn your spells\skills to. There is also a restriction on the highest level items you can use. Although if you find a guild to join, they can usually help you get the best items you can wear at your character and membership level. Once you make it to your home city, you have access to your own house that you can use for storage and also decorate it. Unless you upgrade your account, you can not make use of the bulletin board to post items for sell or access the broker in the city. Having a house is a nice way to relax and you can obtain crafting stations so you can craft in the quiet of your home.

Final Thoughts

A few final thoughts. The graphics are still quite good for a 6 year old game. One fault I see is that there is no true full screen mode. It simple uses a full size window. Also, if you play in the full screen mode, alt-tabbing just drops it out of full screen and into a window mode. All in all, my First impressions-Everquest 2 Extended is mainly good and I see it as being a well polished entry into the F2P market.

This post is part of the series: Everquest 2 Reviews

A collection of reviews for basic and extended versions of Everquest 2.

  1. Everquest 2 Extended: First Impressions
  2. Everquest II Extended Review: Is This Free-to-Play MMO Worth Playing?
  3. Review: EQ2 - The Shadow Odyssey
  4. Everquest 2 Guild Hall Details Released