Most of you who are following Everquest II news will have already heard about the expansion coming down the pipeline, and earlier today there was a live stream detailing that expansion. It is also available for preorder now, with the price tag varying greatly dependent on which edition you choose. If you do preorder, you’re supposed to get instant access to everything that’s currently out, including Altar of Malice and The Rum Cellar Campaign, as these are included in the purchase price of Terrors of Thalumbra. The expansion’s feature set includes:

• Subterranean Overland Zone – Overland zone deep beneath Norrath’s surface… underland zone?!
• Signature Quests – Special quests for both Adventure and Tradeskill players!
• New Level Agnostic Dungeons – Brand new dungeons that scale for players 20-95
• Upgrade Your Items – Through the new Infusion system!
• New and Updated Deity System
• New Best-in-Slot Relic Items
• Heroic & Advanced Solo Dungeons, Challenging Raid Zones and a New Contested Zone for level 100s!

So basically, there’s no AA cap increase, and no XP cap increase. There’s a big zone, new in depth quests, scaling dungeons, new solos/raids and a contested zone. There’s some new upgrades to the item system, a new slot Relic item, and a new Deity system that sort of doubles as this expansion’s AA tree, but that’s not clear by reading this. You should do what I did, and head over to EQ2Wire’s live blog of the dev stream, where they detail some stuff that isn’t on the pre-order page.

I had been thinking about pre-ordering this, but was unsure if I’d be able to play the older content without a sub. Then I was thinking I could just wait til it releases because then I would get the old stuff for free, and only have to pay when I got to the new area. Then I heard what’s going on with this expansion, and it’s not too exciting. I was thinking level cap increase or big boost to AA numbers. This doesn’t seem to be the case. Screen shots of the new stuff look well enough, but at the same time it’s not out yet, I’m not ready for new content yet, so I’m not going to bother at the moment.

Still, it’s good to see an old game still getting love. Especially from a developer who has moved onto different things over the years. I haven’t played in about a week myself, and am still quite a ways behind. I’ve had fun with the game recently, but at the same time I’m not playing it everyday either. Usually it’s spurts of two or three days in a row then nothing for a week, but hey, it’s not a competition and it’s progress nonetheless. It works for me. We’ll see how I feel when I get to the point that I’m nearly caught up. Maybe then I’ll spring for a sub and new stuff.

Are you picking up the new expansion?