How does coming from a monster title like EQ affect the development of a new project? Do the overwhelming expectations help or hinder the creative process? (I.e.) How does a legendary development team handle the pressure of coming from something so huge?

Many of the Vanguard: SOH fans are ex EQ players. Most of us have played the said game for more than two years. If you ask any of us, we'll tell you that EQ was the best game ever -- even though we complained incessantly about camping, corpse runs, bottlenecked epics, pointless crafting and overcrowded servers. We exalted in the game. I recall sitting at the E3 2004 Sigil dinner and stating quite boldly to the people around me that I hated EQ with a passion.