Hello everyone first time to this forum with a few tricks for my 2nd gen 4runner.
Very soon I will be pulling the 3.0 to replace with the 3.4 first things first.
Looking into a lift/tires/wheels/spacers afterwards

My current question is what is required to achieve the "pre runner" look, for example the pics below. I would imagine a large offset wheel will get me a bit away so I checked out some -64 offset pro comp steel wheels. and I found some 2" wheel spacers. I'm new to this setup and could use some info.

 

Just my experience, stay away from large offset wheels combined with wheel spacers if it sees a lot of road use wheel bearings will be going bad every few months. when I 1st got my 4runner it had 2 1/2 inch wheel spacer with crazy dished out wheels and after my 3rd set of wheel bearings on the front in the 1st year I took them off.

 

ummm... instead of going for just looks you could do a Blazeland kit. Relatively cheap big upgrade over stock and then you will actually have longtravel instead of just looking like you do.

just my 2 cents

or you know you could check out my build. its a 1st gen but long travel and 3.4 swapped

 

The "look" you're seeing on all these prerunner trucks is due to increased front width of the long travel kits on them. If you want long travel the a-arms have to extended, usually this is outward due to frame and engine interference - hence the extra width. None of those trucks appear to have heavily dished wheels. There are several options for long travel kits, but Blazeland is the cheapest. it's a low-volume product that's not all commercialized like say a Total Chaos kit. Also remember that with the ~6" wider front end, what are you going to do for the rear? What about clearance of fenders and tire coverage? Many things to consider.

In general excessive leverage on the wheel bearings is not a great idea if you want to keep strength. your wheel bearings will hate you, your steering radius will increase, and higher chance of breaking something.

In regards to your engine swap, 3.4L is a better engine and a popular swap, but I'd personally lean more toward a 1uz v8 or a turbo'd 2rz/3rz.

 

The wide stance in all the trucks you pictured was accomplished with suspension.
Functional, not cosmetic.