VGOEmulator Updates

[Bisonzabi]

There are tons and tons of games with better animation from the early 2000's. This wasn't the 90's when 3D was becoming a thing and it got ragged on hard for it. EQ2 had better animation. The game had some really solid gameplay, but it was covered in a lot of rushed out poorly thought out ideas. And yes, performance was a problem with this due to improper optimization. Even for a computer that was light years beyond what the recommended specs were.

Anyways, there's a reason why the game was dumped by a vast majority of those that tried it out during the open-beta and first two months.

And the comment you made about Pantheon...well I do remember playing on the 1st EQ progression server in 2006 and someone said the exact same thing while on the server despite being part of the closed-beta. Brad has no backing for his newest creation anyways, and his reputation will be a turn off for major investors.

[Fael]

Originally Posted by snergle [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

you should get started on emulating pantheon. smed can't bail out brad this time so the code needs to be salvaged immediately.

lol

[R Flair]

Originally Posted by AzzarTheGod [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I never crashed once. Played from launch for about 1 year until Ebonlore moved on.

VG gameplay, the immersion, the world size, was one of a kind. So many "damn this is fucking epic" areas. I am glad I was there and didn't have the "issues" the vocal minority of people had.

Pantheon will absolutely not hold a candle to it, and that's one reason I will not be checking Pantheon out. I played a better version of Pantheon called Vanguard. I prefer Vanguard combat any day over EQ1 inspired combat. VG had the right balance of WoW and EQ.

"Animation". lol, the game was designed in early 2000, released in 2006-2007ish. It was amazing for its time.

The vocal minority? Vanguard was a mess. I felt the same way, that the game was truly epic because I spent 2k+ on my PC before I bought the game, but that was not what most players experienced. McQuaid himself has admitted that a large portion of the people who bought the game could not run it, and never even made it past level 1. Not because the game wasn't fun, but because they were incapable of actually playing it. It wasn't just the vocal minority.

[AzzarTheGod]

Originally Posted by R Flair [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

The vocal minority? Vanguard was a mess. I felt the same way, that the game was truly epic because I spent 2k+ on my PC before I bought the game, but that was not what most players experienced. McQuaid himself has admitted that a large portion of the people who bought the game could not run it, and never even made it past level 1. Not because the game wasn't fun, but because they were incapable of actually playing it. It wasn't just the vocal minority.

We can agree strongly that Vanguard deserves full emulation, and a second life.

I hope somehow this can be accomplished. Pantheon can't hold up to an MMO like Vanguard, if we had Pantheon to look forward to I wouldn't care so much about VG emulation seeing the light of day. I loved the power of the classes and how it was technically group centric, but had great soloability and incredible combat.

To many who were able to experience it-- Vanguard was the pinnacle of MMO design. Despite lack of content and development, it had enough that absolutely nailed it.

[AenorVZ]

Originally Posted by AzzarTheGod [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

To many who were able to experience it-- Vanguard was the pinnacle of MMO design. Despite lack of content and development, it had enough that absolutely nailed it.

This. There's so much hatred out there for Vanguard but the only thing I ever hated was that it failed to sustain an audience. I'd still be playing.

[AzzarTheGod]

Originally Posted by AenorVZ [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

This. There's so much hatred out there for Vanguard but the only thing I ever hated was that it failed to sustain an audience. I'd still be playing.

The most polarizing MMO ever, to be certain.

It really deserved to still be around. Really a shame all that design just went down the tubes.

[k2summit]

Originally Posted by R Flair [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

The vocal minority? Vanguard was a mess. I felt the same way, that the game was truly epic because I spent 2k+ on my PC before I bought the game, but that was not what most players experienced. McQuaid himself has admitted that a large portion of the people who bought the game could not run it, and never even made it past level 1. Not because the game wasn't fun, but because they were incapable of actually playing it. It wasn't just the vocal minority.

This is why i personally didn't get past lvl 30 at launch. The spell mechanics and shit were unique and very well done. I made a vulmane ranger, and the abilty to switch stances from ranged to the dps/parry was pretty god Damn cool. My machine simply could not handle the game in any real playable way. Mabye like a year before sunset I picked it up again. I enjoyed it and did weekly clears of APW and open world bosses. That's the end tho. That's all the endgame content there is. Tis a shame. Could have been a lot more. Ive been following you guys at vgoe, and log in to the server from time to time. It definately deserves a second chance and I'm glad there are people out there that do these things. Good luck xinux and crew.

[R Flair]

Originally Posted by AenorVZ [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

This. There's so much hatred out there for Vanguard but the only thing I ever hated was that it failed to sustain an audience. I'd still be playing.

Vanguard could have been the pinnacle, but wasn't in my eyes. There is no comparing it to EQ simply because they had to compromise, release early and change the nature of the game into something it should of never been.

In the beta, you could see the potential for it to be a bigger better EQ, but that is definitely not what came out the other end. For all its glorious parts, it had equal measures of shit to bring it down. Huge inspired world, vast unpopulated wastelands. Amazing classes, horrible spammy combat lacking resource management. Great itemization, shitty quest progression. Then all the convenience crap they added like fast travel, weak death penalties, caravans and easy soloing.

Even without the money they had to make Vanguard, Pantheon could be a much better game by simply staying closer to the EQ design. Shit EQ only had a budget of a few million. With modern tools and an engine like Unity, they could produce much more with even less money.

Not that I wouldn't want to play some Vanguard again on an emu, but I don't think it should ever be compared to EQ. It can't stand beside it. It can't even sit in the same room. Theres a reason why EQ was 20x as popular and why there isn't nearly as much interest in emulating it.

[AzzarTheGod]

Originally Posted by R Flair [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Vanguard could have been the pinnacle, but wasn't in my eyes. There is no comparing it to EQ simply because they had to compromise, release early and change the nature of the game into something it should of never been.

In the beta, you could see the potential for it to be a bigger better EQ, but that is definitely not what came out the other end. For all its glorious parts, it had equal measures of shit to bring it down. Huge inspired world, vast unpopulated wastelands. Amazing classes, horrible spammy combat lacking resource management. Great itemization, shitty quest progression. Then all the convenience crap they added like fast travel, weak death penalties, caravans and easy soloing.

Even without the money they had to make Vanguard, Pantheon could be a much better game by simply staying closer to the EQ design. Shit EQ only had a budget of a few million. With modern tools and an engine like Unity, they could produce much more with even less money.

Not that I wouldn't want to play some Vanguard again on an emu, but I don't think it should ever be compared to EQ. It can't stand beside it. It can't even sit in the same room. Theres a reason why EQ was 20x as popular and why there isn't nearly as much interest in emulating it.

IDK about that.

I'd say it just released at a bad time, when WoW as at its peak and most had moved on and were fully addicted to WoW during the WOTLK era with a monster hit success expansion pack.

VG beat EQ in many ways for all its flaws if you stuck it out. Copying EQ would have been a bad idea commercially, I don't like it THAT much where I'd like to see it redone and replay it. Just not enough emergent gameplay.

The wastelands were not really wastelands, they added serious depth to the world and traveling. Especially on Qalia, I loved the landscape and running south it was epic. That continent was the most well-done and immersive even with it being largely unfinished. Other areas I stayed away from.

The market for EQ1 isn't there and I don't think they intended for VG to be a spiritual successor to EQ. I was merely comparing it on "MMO essentials" basis, pound for pound. The commercial success of VG is largely irrelevant and subject to forces outside of these factors.

For example another Modern MMO, The Elder Scrolls Online, held 1 million subs and was overall a worse game than Vanguard was at launch. Comparing modern MMO's is the only comparisons to be made, and TESO doesn't have shit on Vanguard in any way shape or form.

Instances are disgusting, and that's where Vanguard truly was the EQ1 experience modernized and done right.

As far as your combat comment, I have never heard spammy before. The class you played probably was on my no list. If you stuck to the big classes you didn't encounter any of that.

The itemization kicked the shit out of TESO, despite how unfinished Vanguard was and its content. Great design for limited resources. Too bad SOE fucked up the budget instead of giving it the "long-term" matrix treatment. We could have got a few more years out of it. For this reason again, I don't care about Pantheon. I like the modern itemization when its done correctly (WoW, VG). Not the ultra basic +1 STR ring.

[R Flair]

Man, you certainly look at vanguard thru a jaded fanboy lens. I loved the game for what it was worth, but there is just so much off about that post I don't even know where to begin.

There was just nothing about Vanguard except its newer graphics and bigger world that in any way beat EQ. It was much more cautiously made, and in no way had more "emergent gameplay". It was played exactly the way it was designed tbh.

Of course it was a spiritual successor. No one that played the beta or early rendition could possibly think otherwise. And of course EQ had a fanbase, were talking about a game that tens of millions of people played. EQ alone caused Vanguard to sell over a quarter of a million copies, but never did even a fraction of that number play the game concurrently.

I certainly never compared VG to TESO. TESO is a DAOC/WoW clone, and felt totally uninspired to me. Still, at least it played well on the avg PC.

Yes, the combat was ultra spammy. I played half a dozen classes over the years. You could mash megamacros too most of your skills piled into 2 or 3 of them.

The game was just changed in all the wrong ways post beta. SOE was to blame for sure, but it is what it is. Not going to pretend it was something it wasn't. All the cool factors that managed to not get removed could not change the fact that it was just another WoW clone in the end with a tiny bit more sand in the park.