Cheap EverQuest: Planes of Power (Software) (Windows Me, Windows 2000, Windows NT, Windows 98) Price

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Customer Reviews of EverQuest: Planes of Power

Something for everyone
Lots of people regard this expansion as only for high level characters. I am not one of them, however this expansion is not for those new to EQ. You CAN install this stand-alone, but you should start off with the original version (can be downloaded free from Sony), learn gameplay, and then consider this expansion. For those familiar with the game this expansion adds some very useful things indeed. The pedestals you have seen appear in the zones lead to the Plane of Knowledge. This leads to almost every city or zone in the game. No more begging Wizzies or Druids for a port :) There is also a Soulbinder and a bank in PoK. Getting the idea here? I bind my characters here to make corpse looting safer and quicker. If you're capable of binding yourself this is trivial, but to those of us that can't bind, it's pretty nice. All the other Planes in this expansion require your character to be level 46+, but the PoK makes it nice for lower levels, and is one of the best additions to the game.

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EQ: Planes of Power: Where do we go from here?
Note: This review is ONLY about the "Planes of Power" add-on to Everquest, and not the game itself.

In many ways, "Planes of Power" (PoP) is one of the best of the Everquest expansions, raising the level limit, bringing in more planes (extradimensional homes of the gods) than in the rest of the game, spectacular new enemies to fight and a single overarching storyline that spans 19 levels and puts the most powerful characters in a battle against the forces of creation, freeing Norrath's equivalent of Prometheus, the god who gave magic to mortals and who was imprisoned by the others for his crime in a place no one would ever be able to find him ...

This all sounds pretty good, but for an expansion not designed to be the finale for the most successful American MMORPG, it has painted the rest of the game into something of a corner.

For starters, where does the game go once players have gotten more power than other (enough that some players are now soloing dragons that normally up to 30 people to kill) and have defeated almost all of the gods? Fighting a really, really, REALLY tough orc who happens to be as tough as the God of War strains credulity -- more than that, it's just plain silly.

Secondly, the expansion also includes the Plane of Knowledge, a plane every level 1 character can reach by clicking on the bookstand outside starting cities. And because all such cities are included (along with a few other locations in Kunark, Velious and Luclin), travel distances in the game are all but a memory. Instead of evil characters having to suffer the consequences of their evil, all characters may now use the factionless Plane of Knowledge as a home base without consequences, and may skip past barriers to go anywhere they want, almost at will. While this is inarguably a convenience, part of the appeal of Everquest was its wealth of content. PoP turns EQ into a Readers Digest version of Norrath, with players able to skip between the highlights, and now any zone more than two zonelines away from Knowledge is a back water where many players simply will not go. The game has been forever changed, and this is one genie unlikely to ever be put back in the bottle.

As for the content itself, it's good. It uses existing lore, draws us into the ongoing story of the game, and the planes are often real eye-poppers (the Plane of Innovation, with its magical clockwork robots run amok and the fleshscape of the Plane of Disease are two of the show-stoppers).

None of it other than Knowledge can be accessed by characters under level 46, and the other planes require further levels, characters to succeed in certain quests, characters to have beaten certain raid bosses (in events involving dozens of other characters) or all of the above. The vast majority of the player base will never see at least six of the zones in PoP. While most of the previous expansions had zones similar to this, they were usually a mere one or two per expansion (Veeshan's Peak in Kunark, Sleeper's Tomb and the Plane of Mischief in Velious, Vex Thal in Luclin), and six zones are an awful lot of content for players to pay for and never use -- essentially subsidizing the content for the most powerful guilds.

For what it is, PoP is enjoyable, and a lot of fun. But much of it feels like well-meant mistakes. Game balance is changed forever, much of the older content is sinking into obscurity, and Everquest's great system of faction that made player characters part of a world where actions matter is more or less irrelevant now.

"Everquest: Planes of Power" is a lot of fun (especially if you enjoy raiding), but it's hard to see how the game can continue on much longer in any recognizable form after this.

Recommended for the great deal of utility Everquest players will get from the expansion, especially players with characters level 46+.

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Probably the worst thought out Expansion to date
This is quite possibly the worst thought out expansion to the game to date. The addition of character flags has effectively cut off 80 percent of the players from even accessing the upper planes. Come play our game with your friends! Oh wait you can't because you can't get into the same zone with them..so sorry!
This addition and the relative decimating of older zones in the game by the additions of higher levels, overbalanced players and spells, and bad experience modifiers has cause this game to become even more elitist than it previously was. Add to that the rediculous twinking and destruction of game balance in general through overpowered drops useable by anyone, and rampant exploits/powerleveling and you have a wonderful game to be enjoyed by any 10 year old haxxor who has no regard for others.