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Worth it for Some People

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 15 / 17
Date: December 02, 2002
Author: Amazon User

The Maps of Myrist is a colorful addition and is worth the buy for a true collector. Despite all the nay-saying reviews I read here at Amazon.com I purchased this book anyway and was pleasantly surprised to find the book to be of much better quality than I expected.

First of all, the book was a lot smaller in size than I had previously anticipated. I was expecting it to be the size of a large portfolio, but instead it turned out to be a much more compact size. This is incredibly convenient as it doesn't take up too much room of my already limited desk space. In addition to that, the book is spiral bound (as you can see from the picture), which helps to keep the pages open when you need a constant reference.

Now lets get down to the nitty gritty. The maps are arranged entirely in alphabetical order (except the Planes of Power, which is a seperate section in the back, which I will talk about in a minute). So far this has made the maps easy to locate as long as you know the name of the zone in which you are seaching for. Some people feel it would have been better if the maps had been grouped together by region, however nifty zone-connection maps in the back of the book give you a good indication of how all the maps connect together. With the maps alphabeticallized, you will not need to constantly refer to a table of content to see which order the maps are in.

Each map is hand drawn in a 3D isometric fashion, which gives them a very nice appearance that you won't find on any online reference. Each map is marked with points of interest (for the most part) and zone exits. Each section has some useful information, like Bestiary (or example monsters for zones with huge monster lists), Dangers, Benefits, Background (my personal favorite) and Notable NPCs. Each story opens up a whole new dimension to these places that have been reduced to nothing more than hunting grounds for most players.

So with all the praise, what are the downsides? Well, for starters, the Atlas is not the answer-all cheat guide that tells you the spawn locations for the hardcore campers. The guide is generally a book of lore that still tries to capture some of the mystery of the game. If you swear by the /loc command, than you will sorely be disappointed as this game does not have grids over the map. Also, the maps are generally vague in markings. You will not have a marker for every point of interest. In addition to that, not every zone has a complete list of monsters. You won't find monster spawn points or an references to NPCs on the map. In short, this map will severely disappoint any hardcore EQ junky that heavily depends on online guides to even play this game. This atlas was more geared towards the adventurer who likes to have a little mystery and yet know enough about their surroundings to appreciate them and to not get lost. Also the book is a good reference of what zones you should be in at what level. Lastly, the maps for the new Planes of Power are non existant, which is unfortunate.

Unfortunately, the book does have some errors. I've noticed some missing details or some wrongly place details in some locations, as well as the famous Dreadlands level typo (the book lists the level range as 1-10 which is far from the truth).

All in all I think this book is excellent addition for people who like to explorer, for people who like lore and for new players. Hardcore gamers should steer clear of this book.

A midget Coffee Table book.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 6 / 6
Date: October 18, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I spent the money to get a copy of the SoE EQ Atlas. It arrived last night. (I have not checked the bonuses on the CD yet, but the labelling made it look very promotional.) Here are my views on it.

Positive Points:
1. It has nice 3d colored pictures of each zone. The pictures show the positions of the entrances and exits.
2. Nice general write up on the zones including history.
3. General Identification of a few mobs in each zone.
4. Some indication of the Zone level Mobs.

Negative Points

1. The pictures/maps have no co ordinates on them.
2. The pictures/maps are to small to be useful in normal navigation. They might be useful in extreme cases for navigationn. But without coordinates or indication of north, I am not sure how useful.
3. No mob/key locations are showm on the few picture/maps, I checked.
4. No information concerning levels of identified mobs.
5. Nothing but very general information on mob drops.

Conclusions

It is no replacement for Eq Atlas Maps and Allakhazam. The exception would be the places where EQ Atlas has not done maps then a poor map is better than no map. In fact, there is less information about the zones than in the Prima guides.

I would call it a coffe-table book except that for the size. It is somewhere in the 4 x 6 or 5x7 range.

...

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: November 08, 2002
Author: Amazon User

If you want "The EQ Story Book", this is your product. However, very few people purchase this for the stories. People purchase this for excellent, detailed maps and they do not exist.

There is nothing in this book that cannot be pulled from a website... Owners of the other Sony authorized guides were probably aware this would be the problem.

This material is sold as if it contains in-depth information to help people find secrets in game, but like all other materials Sony has released on EQ, it is full of "roleplay" speak and void of detailed substance.

To buy or not to buy?

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 9 / 13
Date: September 26, 2002
Author: Amazon User

From the information i have available, this atlas will not have their maps layed out in a 'Grid' fashion. Most maps in real life have "grid coordinates" of longitude and latitude, so why not this atlas??

For the Advanced and Expert Everquest gamers, the maps will be more of a hinderance and makes the Atlas more or less useless imho, as most tend to use grid locations to find out were they are or were they want to go.

For the Beginer or Intermediate, this Atlas will contain much usefull information about zones/places they will travel.

Overview: the zone information in it will be helpful but if they had put in a little extra effort and did the maps in grid fashion, this would be a hot item. As it is, its more of a collectors/newbie item than anything else.

EverQuest Atlas, Don't Bother

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 6 / 7
Date: October 25, 2002
Author: Amazon User

If you are an avid EQ collector then buy the book. However, if you play the game, this book is worthless to you. There are no grid lines and North is not at the top. SOE could have done so much with this, but as usual they didn't even go half way.

If you just have to spend the money, donate it to the premier map site. At least there it will do some good.

This "atlas" will get you KILLED in EQ

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 6 / 7
Date: January 24, 2003
Author: Amazon User

I bought this for my wife for Christmas as we're both avid EQ players....

While the book does have some interesting reading material, as another reviewer has stated, this is certainly not why I bought it, and the writing is definitely not worth the price you pay.

Here are some of the major problems with these maps:

1) Map and adjacent zone information is simply wrong. Example: I believe the map says that "The Grey" is adjacent to "Marus Seru", when it is not - "Mons Letalis" is between The Grey and Marus Seru.

2) The maps are not at all detailed. If you have used the [online] maps you probably expect a certain level of detail (where certain mobs live, etc) and little of that detail is in these maps. Additionally, the maps are TINY, and they're shown at a strange angle, which makes them ever less useful. Again, [online] maps are at a directly overhead view and are decently sized.

3) Information about zones is incorrect. Each zone has page or two of info and background, including the range of mob levels. I can't remember the exact zone, but there was one listed in this book as level 10-25 that has 55+ monsters in it.

... I wish I had purchased it from [Amazon.com] rather than a mall so I wouldn't have to drive all over the world to return it, because I don't have the patience for that. So now we're stuck with a book with mediocre writing and useless maps. Way to go, Sony....

maps

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 8 / 12
Date: September 03, 2002
Author: Amazon User

So there are no Meridians or any other orienteering guides other than landmarks? I guess those of you that think that having a location grid would be a cheat guide have never read a REAL map. I'd rather spend my money on the ink and paper on that "other" site.

Lacking a few important items

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: October 23, 2002
Author: Amazon User

The Atlas offers some background and nice maps. It is however outdated. List level of mobs in Innothule Swamp as 1-26. The Black Ravagers were added in May of this year and are level 55.

No Planes of Power Maps. If this was the case, why not release it ahead of Planes of Power. Not even the mapes of the Plane of Tran. or Plane of Knowledge.

No Port locations to the Planes are listed, or even the port stones to Jaggged Pine from Surefall Glade or Black.

Buyer Beware

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: February 15, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Well, I guess Sony just couldn't stand the online entrepreneurs producing maps of this great game so they decided to publish a paper version and sell it.

Well, you would think that the company that owns the game would know the content of the game, but they evidently don't. If you are a novice gamer, please do not buy this book as a guide to the world of EQ. The maps are grossly incorrect in respect to locations of landmarks, camps, town, druid rings, you name it. The zone levels listed are most incorrect and the "dangers within" background stories are erroneous.

Ever since Sony shoved Verant Interactive out of the picture, there has a been a succession of poorly executed attempts to milk the EQ cash cow. This atlas is one of the worst.

Please don't make the mistake I made when I preordered this terrible boot and waste of money.

Too bad

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: January 17, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This book had the potential to be a "must have" on every avid EQ player's desk, but it falls painfully short. So short, in fact, that as a map resource, it is horribly inferior to most maps available on the internet. As a source of practical zone information, it is completely useless, in some cases (as have been mentioned in other reviews) the information is simply incorrect. As a bit of light reading including some EQ lore minutiae that may have been heretofore unknown, it might actually succeed. I can't tell, however, since I really don't care.
Things that are not included that should be, in my opinion:
The positions of Plane of Knowledge books.
A grid for finding locations.
Names for prominent map locations.
Descriptions and possibly level ranges for various monsters. found in the zone and information on where they can be found
Faction information in a more specific sense.

Almost all of these things can be found on maps provided by many of the various EQ cartography sites.

If you want hand drawn maps with colorful commentary about the various zone, but not much else, maybe this book is for you. If you want a legitimate EQ resource, look elsewhere.

One more thing, the book that I purchased (brand new) was missing roughly 30 pages. Zones starting with the letters "E", "F" and "G" had vanished from inside the shrinkwrap mysteriously.

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