"I'm really surprised an MMO would take the route of such super high system requirements. How in the world are they going to pull in large numbers of people with those kinds of requirements?"
AC2 dosn't really have that high of requirments if you look at the current systems coming out. My 1.1 ghz, 256, GF2 MX 64mb system runs the game well at mid graphics settings, and it still looks VERY nice. The game is very scalable (Geforce 1 is still very much playable) and with the monthly storyline and updates it's got the gameplay stuff down pretty good.
E&B is fun, I played the beta for over 1 year... only reason i'm playing retail at all is because of all the people I met ingame and like to play with. Although it looks like EVE will be able to kill this one.
The Game just looks breathtaking on a 2 Ghz, 1 gig ram, readon 9700 machine.