A little bird told me....

The intro is pretty good for getting you acquainted with the controls. The island where all newbs go is pretty full of quests in itself. By the time you get to the island (if you do the tutorial) you'll be level 3. The quests are varied - you could collect items, kill so many mobs, deliver something, etc. But the key thing is they aren't super lame things like some of the EQLive quests. In order to progress through the game (like becoming a citizen of your city...you can't reach level 7 til you do), a certain amount of questing is necessary but it does provide rewards such as gear, money, and exp.

Leveling hasn't been too hard. I've been soloing most of the time simply due to lack of decent groups or not being high enough level. Soloing is indeed possible, but not necessarily preferred. When targetting a mob, you'll get a box that will show you the con, the amount of health, and the word "solo" or "group". Also, the mob will have a target ring and if you target a mob that will bring friends, it will show target rings on all of his friends too.

One cool feature is that there are multiple instances of newbie zones. (I'm not sure about higher level zones cause I haven't been yet.) There are multiple islands and multiple newbie yards, but there are also ways to select which instance you want to zone into as long as that instance is not full.

How to explain the UI....

OK, imagine if your spell and hotkey bars were combined into one....we'll call it an activity bar. You can have multiple activity bars showing in your UI at one time. The slots of the bar will show you what keys on your keyboard they are mapped to (1, 2, F1, F2, etc.). You can create hotkeys for spells, abilities, other UI windows (like the map or your inventory), emotes (like sit or hail), and other things. You create a hotkey by dragging an icon onto a blank slot on your activity bar.

There is a part of the options screen that allows you to create macros. I haven't really played with that one, so I can't give much info on how it works.

You will have a window showing your health and power (the equivalenth of mana or stamina in EQ1). You also have a long window that will show the health and power of groupmates. There's an experience bar and a compass as well.

There are 2 spell windows - one for the spell effects you have on you, and one for the spells you are maintaining (such as group buffs or offensive spells that have a duration).

You start out with one chat window and can add multiple windows as well as change what text goes to what window.

In the corner of the screen is a quest window showing you the next step in your current quest. If you need to go talk to someone, it will show that. If you have to kill so many of a certain mob, it will show that and the progress you have made so far.

There is also a quest journal which has 2 sections: a listing of quests accepted and a window with expanded text on a selected quest. The quest listing is divided by originating zone. As you complete steps in a quest, it will show you the next step. When a quest is completed, it will be removed from the journal.

You will have a button that reads "EQII" which is very similar to the start button in Windows. When you click on it, you will have a menu come up with a series of options each having an icon you can drag to your activity bar. The menu includes options such as inventory, quest journal, map, game options, skills, knowledge (a book for all spells & abilities), emotes, and others. There are keyboard hotkeys for many of these, so it's merely a matter of preference on how you want to open them.

Your avatar is hot.

Did it ever date Ssoulz?