Dual Gaming !
March 19, 2008
These days, it seems like I am moving more and more away from my usual patterns of behavior and doing things I don’t usually do, like maintaining two MMO subscriptions at the same time. That’s what I’m doing now and apart from the money hit, I kinda like it!
This month, I’m currently playing DDO AND Lotro, often switching from one to the other in the same play session, which is something I realise now that I should do more often. Initially, there were two reasons I started doing this : one is because my champion in Lotro was close to hitting the level cap and I wanted to top him off before moving on to another game and the other was that I was impatient to see how DDO had changed after a year away from the game. So I got subs to both.
DDO and Lotro being such different animals, the first being group-centric and action oriented while the second is more solo friendly and less action-oriented, when I grow tired of one game’s style of play, I just log onto the other. Also with Lotro, I get the added bonus of getting some PvP goodness going on with Monsterplay ( my Black Arrow just hit Rank 6 !!!).
So here’s to stepping out of one’s comfort zone and exploring new ways of enjoying MMO gaming!
DDO and voicechat
March 6, 2008
Voice-chat in MMOs is nothing new. For me on the other hand, it’s a week old phenomenon. I’ve been avoiding using voice-chat in my gaming, mostly for immersion reasons ( nothing like having an attractive dark elf sorceress ask you for a heal in a deep, manly southern drawl !).
But after playing Lotro and seeing the high usage that was made of the integrated voice-chat in that game, I decided to get with the programme in DDO and use that game’s voice-chat.
Overall I have to say that I find that voice-chat does indeed affect immersion a bit, but also allows for some quicker consultation and decision making within a group, which is a huge advantage in a fast paced game like DDO. It does indeed improve communication in many different situations, a good example being when guiding a lost player to the group in one of those crazy convoluted dungeons that DDO features. At a time like this, typing detailed directions is a royal pain, whereas using voice-chat makes it that much simpler.
So there it is, I am now a voice MMO gamer, for better or for worse!
It’s been about a year since I lay aside my level 10 barbarian in DDO and went looking for greener pastures elsewhere. Yesterday, I re-acquainted myself with this Turbine title and overall, I’m glad I did.
The first big adjustment this return entailed for me was regarding it’s group and instance-centric philosophy. Sure in DDO you can do so some stuff on your own, but if that’s really your thing, there are games out there that will better cater to this play-style than DDO. Loners and Dungeons and Dragons Online are not a good mix.
The second important adjustment I had to make was to DDO’s action oriented combat and world interaction model. In short, playing DDO often feels like playing Tomb Raider. Indeed in this game, your opponents run around you and jump on top of crates instead of standing still, which means that if you’re a melee class like my character, you often have to do the same to score some hits. To get through many of DDO’s instances, you also often have to exhibit a fair degree of manual dexterity and problem solving skills, for example to time your jumps to get past a stake-filled pit or to figure out which ledges to use to cross a yawning chasm. There is definitely a twitch-factor involved in playing DDO and to my surprise, I kinda enjoyed it!
These two elements give DDO a certain “vibe” that I find quite refreshing compared to other games. The feeling that my character is just one free agent among many in the city of Stormreach, an interchangeable cog in the mechanics of a typical adventuring group, gives this game an adventure atmosphere that I find no other title seems to have, at least not to the same degree.
So far, I feel that my coming back to DDO has been a good decision and it seems that I am not alone in this regard. Indeed, when I joined groups and mentioned that I was a returning player, a very common reply that I got was “Me too!”. A lot of people seem, like me, to be giving it another go, which augurs well for the future of the title.
So for now, I give Dungeons & Dragons Online a thumbs-up.
