That's BS, Ultima Online was extremely popular.EQ1's biggest draw was that it had no competition at the time.
And years later people would branch out to even shittier games like Asherons Call, DAOC etc
That being said, If EQ was launched today it would last about a week. People would have maxed leveled in like 3 days, and killed there pathetic end game at the time which was 2 dragons.
The planes didn't open up to monthes later.
EQ was qood for its time because it was a very social game with some very western RPG mud gameplay.
In todays world no one would give two shits about a game that moved that slow.