starting out helpFollow

I haven't seen the shots you're talking about, but the "look" of the game varies a lot depending on a lot of things. For instance, what expansion area you're in (the "old world" looks cruder than the newest zones), the amount of detail you have EQ set to show, whether or not you have spell effects on, etc. No doubt the screenshots were made with the maximum eye candy possible, but you may want to tone some of it down for performance reasons.

Pick whatever sounds fun. If it seems too hard, consider trying another class. You have eight character slots per server (unless you play on some special rules servers, namely Firona Vie and Sullon Zek) so don't be afraid to experiment. If you have specific race/class questions, ask away but there's not "best" class or race.

The first ten levels are basically made just to learn the game. You suffer no xp loss for deaths, don't have to corpse run to reclaim equipment, you get accelerated mana regeneration, etc. "Easy" is in the eye of the beholder, but the learning curve is definately smoothed from when EQ was a younger game.

Morden Rasp and Stromm are the two newest servers and are considered the "newbie" servers, in that Sony encourages new players to try them out due to their higher population of "lowbies" to group and adventure with. Aside from Stormhammer, a premium server (with a $50/mth pricetag), you have free access to all the SOE servers so if you don't like Morden Rasp, try another.

Never played SW:G, but from reports I've heard on it, no.

I believe there's presently 45+ servers. Most are just basic servers, but a few have special rulesets, namely Player vs. Player.

Should be peachy. I don't know what kind of GeForce4 you have, but regardless it should be more than sufficent to start playing the game.

Again, I've never played DAoC.

Edited, Sat Apr 17 20:26:46 2004 by Jophiel

There's been multiple expansions to the game. Each one has added new zones and content and raised the bar on the graphics. So if you're in Runnyeye Citadel (from the basic game) the graphics are much less impressive than they are in Dulak Harbor (from Legacy of Ykesha, the 5th expansion). It's all "Everquest" and you can run from Runnyeye to Dulak in a single gaming session, but you can tell newer content when you see it.

It's not quite as bad as I make it sound though. They retextured all the original game zones with the 3rd expansion release and they're currently working on new graphics in general here and there.

The only tutorial I've seen came with the basic game and is a fairly poor representation of the game though a decent way to become familar with the controls. I haven't seen it in forever and, if it's how I remember it, even the user interface has changed dramatically.