Man I hope Mythic got a royalty check for thisFollow

I didn't say anything when LoY added dyes to the game for the first time, which was long overdue. And when items were given a recommended level to scale down their stats for twinked young newbs, I silently thanked the gods, but said not a word to mortal man. I kept my mouth shut when all of a sudden, melee players gained a whole run of new Combat Abilities, it was good for them. All the while I was silent I thought, "Wow, SOE's taking the best player aspects of DAoC and adding them to EQ.

DAoC has always had the better game mechanics in my opinion, just never the numbers of EQ. Had DAoC come first I doubt anyone would have heard of EQ, but again this is my opinion. Though now it would seem that SOE devs agree with me. They've decided against making a sequel to their vastly popular, yet wholly item-based and thin-lored game Everquest, and instead made a sequel to DAoC.

But wait, that new game is called EVERQUEST II, not Dark Age of Camelot 2, and it's set on Norrath with all our old races. Ok, you got me there, maybe the new game should be called Dark Age of Norrath. Because after playing for 10 minutes you realize that this ain't the EQ we all got hooked on 5 years ago. And those of us who once extended our play beyond the dreaded Evercrack to Dark Age of Camelot, might find themselves more comfortable in this game than our hard-core EQ fanbois that flame anything that speaks of another MMORPG like it's worthwhile.

True, there are new innovations that are truly unique to EQII, but the mark of DAoC is there. It's like SOE and Mythic accidently brought home the wrong babies from some horrible delivery room mix up. Honestly, I just think that since VI left this massive golden-goose that is EQ in the hands of SOE, SOE has ripped off anything they could get their grubby little paws on to keep it going. And now, they've decided, rather than continue taking bits and pieces from the next best game, they'll just grab it all in one fell swoop.

For those of you that have read this far and are still scratching your heads trying to figure out what the hell I'm talking about, I'll point it out to you. Anyone wants to add to this, please do. But here's a list of the amazing similarities between EQII and DAoC:

1)Death...No more popping up naked or leaving a corpse for 2 hours to get someone to rez it later. Now you die, you get a brief chance to be rezzed, while safely scouting the area, and if you get no rez, you reappear, fully clothed at a place of your choosing. No corpse runs??? Wrong! Now, just like DAoC, you leave behind something that you have the option to return to in order to restore a measure of lost xp. But wait! In EQII you lose stats temporarily until you recover your shard. Yes, and in DAoC you lose stats until you pay off your local healer.

2)Quest Journal...Finally we have a coherent, step by step log of where we are and what we need to do next in our quest. Mythic's had that going since release.

3)Combat Abilities...Anyone remember introducing a friend to EQ and telling them, "Better make a melee class, all you have to do is target something and hit attack, it's an easy class to learn." I know I did. But recently EQ decided to take a page from the DAoC playbook and give those fighting classes something to liven up the playing. And now the plagerism is complete with EQ2, heck, the new hotbar at the bottom of the screen is almost a straight UI copy from DAoC(we'll give that eerie coincidence to SOE for free). No longer do fighting classes have a pathetically simple job that a trained orangatan could perform, now they actually have to work for their kill.

4)Sprint...Remember hitting that spacebar as fast as you could hoping you could jump to those guards before that orc pawn tore you apart? Well, the days of jumping are over. Yes you can still jump in EQ2, but guess what, it no longer eats stamina(or power as it is in EQ2). But it also no longer speeds you up. Now, we have a new ability called sprint, which speeds us up at the expense of our power, another direct copy from the launch of DAoC.

5)Spells...remember dying as a lowbie caster and taking 5 minutes to mem spells? Remember buying spells? Well, now spells are just sitting there on your hotbar, waiting to be used even right after you die. And buying spells, well SOE decided to halfway rip off DAoC there, now you get your spells when you level, but you have to buy improvements to those spells as time passes. Good to see SOE didn't completely sell out to the boys at Mythic on that one, I mean free spells? That's nuts.

6)Maps...I was thrilled when I heard EQ was introducing a mapping system. Then this retarded, Etch-a-Sketch crap showed up that almost no one could use until people started downloading ready-made maps from the nearest web-site, showed up. But, EQII has a crisp, clean mapping system that, once fully revealed, looks remarkably like a map of the frontiers in DAoC...

7)Classes...Remember having that big choice between all those classes when making your character in EQ? The choice that defined your life. And most people had to make it pretty blindly in the begining too. No longer! Now, you merely choose one of 4 basic classes, fighter, mage, scout, or healer, and play. You get used to your vague role in the game until you hit that magic level and have to specialize. I swear ro Innoruuk I actually told the guy next to me when my mage hit lvl 10 I was gonna have a nice Void Eldritch...whoops wrong game, guess I got confused.


Now look, there is more to EQII than these 7 little details, right? But as time progresses and I get further and further into the game I have to wonder where DAoC stops and EQ begins. I'm not bashing the game itself. As I said before I firmly believe that Mythic always had the better game, but got beaten to the MMORPG punch. And to see so many of the things that made DAoC superior to EQ put into a game with SOE's vast resources and player base makes me happy. But I have to wonder at the end of the day, if Mythic just got completely jacked, or if in fact, they netted themslves a nice royalty check.

Enjoy the game all...
Welcome to Dark Age of Everquest
Where DAoC comes alive.

Damerr Flinn

Greetings,

As someone on the outside looking in, I am excited to gleam any information I can find. I had been waiting for a long time for Ultima X Oddessy (sp) and was very upset at it's demise. I had been excited about the 'private rooms' that allowed multiple groups to do the same quest at one time, invisible to each other, that seems to have been implemented in EQ2 under the name 'instancing'. Great addition.

(I do not see this thread as a slam of any kind, its seems wise to immitate what works and trash what does not. The comparison of similar systems in other games is only for stroking understanding in how the systems work before I can get my hands on experience)

While I agree with many similarities to DAoC, I kept thinking Horizons as I read the EQ2 mechanics. Especially the group buffing/limited buffs at one time, the crafting/foraging, and Asherons Call for the apartment style housing and guild requirments for mansions.

It seems that SOE is shooting for the best of what works in all worlds, instead of the best of what is different, and I will admit this is promissing to my expectations.

And what? DAoC did not copy *anything* from EQ or others? Jeeze. Just because you like DAoC (I played for a couple of years, on and off) does not mean EQ2 cannot be good. So what if EQ2 expands to include some features that DAoC (and other MMORPG) have? I would like to point out that DAoC, in its initial offering was really nothing like the DAoC that is running today. I know, I was there on day one. Even today, the crafting, skills, and abilities in DAoC are pretty simplistic. So, if you like your current MMORPG, well, stay there. DAoC has always been the 'small-pond' compared to the Ocean of EQ. And, I imagine a Big Fish in the Small Pond is quite happy to stay there.

For me? I like new challenges, new places to explore, new ways of doing things, new folks to meet. And I am tired of DAoC.

Ok, so let's say I create a widget. My widget becomes extremely popular, and I sell a lot of them. They are so popular that competiton arises, and they try and improve on my widget. Many different companies, many different impovement.

By your logic, if I improve my widget, but someone that copied my widget already made an improvement, I stole their idea and should be paying a royalty check to them.

1- Did mythic pay royalty to SOE for copying EQ1?

2- Aren't most of those concepts present in many other games, not all online?

3- In any case, aren't those improvements extremely logical and a natural succession to the initial concept?

Bonus - Are you as stupid as you make yourself out to be?

First off, I want to say thank you for not being a total idiot in the way you wrote your post. Others might not have handled that quite as well and I have read much worse posts in my day. Now, to get to the correcting...

First off, I should explain that I have played a little bit of just about everything. I have played EQ, DAoC, SWG, AC, AC2, Horizons, CoH, Lineage, Lineage II, and a long lists of other that I can't even think of at the moment. In my experience with both DAoC and EQ I will agree with you on similarities on both. But the point that I must correct is that while EQ may "copy" some things from DAoC it would seem that Mythic entertainment has also copied some things for EQ.

If you look at DAoC as it is now there are many dynamics that did not exist uppon the release of the game, as is the case with many MMO games. I remember nothing in DAoC that resembled any (non-pvp related) aspects of advancement after reaching level 50. EQ was one of the orriginal games to really push the idea that although your character may have reached the max level, it didn't mean that he/she was done progressing. Now DAoC seems to have a system call MLs, while not being anything like the AA system in EQ this is still a type of advancement that occurs after reaching the max level in the game (although I know that you can work on MLs before reaching level 50).

Another good point might be DAoCs newest releasing expantion. This new expansion is introducting instancing into the game. This is a concept that LDoN (an expantion for EQ) came up with first. This is a great idea and I belive that it should be given to ALL MMO games.

I don't mean to bash DAoC in any way what so ever. I still have an active acount in the game in fact and I cannot say the same for EQ. I only want to point out that progressing is a part of all MMO games. EQ may "steal" ideals from many other MMO games but it is unfair to say that DAoC is totally innocent when it comes to this same concept. I have no problem with any game doing this but if you are going to accuse SOE of stealing then you cannot claim that any other MMO game (or any game for that matter) is only an innocent bystander

-Pythius Out

EQ didn't invent LoY type dungeons, Anarchy online did, years ago. They also were the first to use links ingame to show an items stats, nothing wrong with that, happens in Business all the time. The Person that invented the Delay windshield wiper for cars, had to fight like hell to get credit for it after Detroit figured out it was a good thing....

If you guys dont like the fact ideas have been taken, added upon and re-hashed you dont have to play the game.
As far as ideas being taken, hmmm UO was the first MMORPG with graphics soo all games copied Ultima?? or maybe they copied the text based MUDs. point is, who cares..

If people didn't copy one another for ideas we would still be in the dark ages.

I was aware of this game but also remember how crap-tastically-horrible that thing was and never wanted to mention any knowledge of it.. but of course this is a personal opinion and I know that only 99% of people who played it will agree with me..

Well said for a first post.




diddo

Shadowrelm, you couldn't be more wrong about EQ having more people multiboxing than DAoC. Do you have any idea how many "bots" there are that high level people have? You can't be successful in RvR unless you have a buffbot. Ask any higher level character in DAoC and they will say a buffbot is essential. So EQ has had a lot more subscribers than DAoC

Um... the reason so many ideas from DAoC, like archetypes, trade quests, etc have shown up in EQII is that some of the DAoC developers came from EQII and took those iteas with them(EQII has been in development longer than DAoC). I'm sure the ideas have roots elsewhere, but I've heard DAoC devs say as much (i.e. look we took all these great ideas that EQII was working on and developed em in 2 years when EQII is still working on them).

Ideas like these are usualy covered under patent law which would give the rights to the inventor (SOE) rather than the one to publish them first (Mythic). Copyright law which would give rights to the one who published them first can't cover things like game concepts, only implementation.