EverQuest II: Rise of Kunark Preview

EverQuest 2 expands again on November 13 with "Rise of Kunark," which SOE debuted at a recent press event in San Francisco. Therein expansion, SOE continues to bring to areas and stories from the original gage, but with a raw twist.

The Sarnak were an NPC race in the original EverQuest, but in the sequel these "dragon people" become fully playable. They're a race created in ancient multiplication by dragons as their servants. They're two-footed and do not make wings, but most definitely can respire fire. In between the two games, the Sarnak followed in the route of their creators and engineered what was to have been a servant race of magical warriors. This subspecies – unaware of its typical origins – is what players looseness, while the original creators are NPCs called the Sarnak'dizok.

The Sarnak and other neutral races have the option to begin the game in Timorous Large. This is the third in a series of three newbie zones that support levels one to 20 in hub-supported progression. That means the quests help players explore the entire area as they advance in level. Largely, this orbit follows the same mold as the other starter areas. "[Timorous Deep is] fair-minded different scenery," EverQuest II: Rise of Kunark Lead Couturier Akil Hooper told us.

Like the some other newbie areas, this unitary also connects to a brand newborn city. The Sarnak city of Gorowyn is a powered, mechanical urban center built in the bowels of a volcano. The shops of the City delve into the volcano's intimate walls, which creates for some epic sightlines. It truly feels massive in scale but remains navigable; after each, the entire city is practically visible.

The meat of the expansion, though, is for seasoned players. The Kylong Plaines offer dismantle 70-plus subject thus players can take advantage of the 10 rising levels RoK unlocks (there are too more achievement points to collect).

"Instead of having a single zone with a single theme to information technology, we one iv zones into one larger zone so you give the axe move into different areas without a loading screen," Hooper said of Kylong, and he wasn't kidding.

A he walked through this epic zone – of which there are iv, with a total of 10 major unique regions – he took US seamlessly raised a mountainside and out of a jungle into the snow. It looked natural – if compressed – and there seemed to make up no trickery, as he turned to look thrown from those snowy peaks into the jungle at a lower place.

Another new zone is the Fens of Nathsar. Present, they attempted to show the calamity of Norrath that took place between the first off and ordinal game with a little more uncloudedness, something Hooper said he does non believe they have e'er finished well. He showed United States the ruined metropolis of Cabilis, a real place in EQ, which is now scattered in ruins after shifting tectonic plates ripped information technology in uncomplete. At the bottom of the inning of the cliff is debris, while pieces of City of London can even so be seen commanding above. Each of these epic new maps also includes some small points of interest that also carry a alone panach. E.g., in the Fans of Nathsar is The Field of Bone, where the body of a dead dragon lays buried, even as information technology did in the previous game.

Just the new zones aren't just rehashes of old ones. "We like to get some original dungeons in thusly everything is not just retooled from EQ1," Hooper aforementioned. One entirely new donjon is Chelsith, an epic alien dungeon in the Kunzar Jungle. It contains a hasten of fish-men WHO worship a Giant. It has strong alien and horror influences and a aglitter, wacky color palette that is unlike much of EQ2, but definitely "fits." There are eyeballs in the floors, tentacles, pools of ooze, etc. Unfortunately, Hooper was not able to show us the Behemoth, but did say that in a raid, he can be fought.

Atomic number 2 also showed United States of America the Sebilis dungeon and its Babylonian-inspired base, which once again harkens back to EQ1.

The big cherry on top of Originate of Kunark for elite group achievers is Trakanon. We didn't see information technology at the event, simply this is an epic series of raids, the culmination of their raid procession. There are six bust zones with 12 raids in the final zone. And yes, Sarnak do progress to contact their aging creators, as the big enchilada here is an large dragon.

To make raiding a bit more accessible, SOE has recently added the ability to save. This means players behind progress through an area for a prison term and then take a break. They'll consume a finite sum of real-world days to finish, a number the developers can tweak happening a zone-past-zone footing. Players can also invite in raw people, for those who tin ne'er bewilder their healers online in sentence. This is a feature they hope to at length retroactively include in all their raid content, only at the very to the lowest degree, is disposable in apiece new bust they unleash.

Rise of Kunark is the first in their new period expansion scheme where they take more metre to do bigger and more polished updates, a move SOE said comes at the request of their community who felt, at times, overwhelmed at the rate of recent updates. Both EverQuest 2 and the original plan to update to each one class, ideally on November 13.

https://www.escapistmagazine.com/everquest-ii-rise-of-kunark-preview/

Source: https://www.escapistmagazine.com/everquest-ii-rise-of-kunark-preview/

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