Only 2 years

[BluePaladin24]

The folloing is and excerpt from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeon...ne:_Stormreach .


Dungeons & Dragons Online: Stormreach was developed by Turbine, Inc. over the course of approximately two years of development. The initial prototyping and concepting was done by Jason Booth, Dan Ogles, Cardell Kerr, Ken Troop, and Michael Sheidow, in coordination with Wizards of the Coast, the current publisher of the Dungeons and Dragons pen and paper game. Later this initial team was moved to work on Turbine's other title in development Lord of the Rings Online, or left the company. Development was then led by James Jones, and DDO was released on February 28, 2006. It is published by Atari.

I love this game. I defend turbine as much as possible. With everything that is in the game I think it is good work. (LOTD may be an exception, have not played a lot of it, but I put that in the same category as some bad PnP DM's I have had, as well as it could be one gigantic build up for what could be the best raid yet.) I like the current enhancement system, class systems, races, feats, character creation, and much more. I think that the game stayed very true to actual D & D. Yes it's not perfect. Yes we are all overpowered for our level if we are going by true D & D rules, but a lot of things are still a challenge. Think about this, an all lvl 14 party can still get wiped on a dragon scale run. Not only that it has been almost two years, and for the most part they do not nerf the players, the quests get harder. In fact they are making spell casters evern more powerful in Mod 5.

The bottom line is this game was rushed through production for reasons that I do not know. That is why the quality is good, but the content is low. The Dev's were rushed to make the game, and now they are being rushed to add new content. You have a population of players that is constantly complaining about how we don't have (insert whatever). In short give them a break.

Yes I am disapointed that the game was only developed for two years. Yes I am not happy that we do not have all core classes and races. Yes I am not satisfied with the fact that since the Dev's have to catch up with the core, they do not have time to put in the extras.

Lets look at what we have. This is a game that is as close to true D & D as you can get in an MMO. We have a development team that is actualy listening to the players (for the most part). Not only that, but we have a game that already has hundreds of books to pick from for expanssions, spells, equipment, races, and classes, they just have to be programed.

[hannika]

i <3 ddo. even with all the changes, even with all the things that bother me, even with all the guild drama. i <3 ddo and that's not going to change anytime soon. thanks guys.

[JUMPMASTER]

Ditto

Proud officer of the Saviors of Stormreach
Wruntbro
Wruntdro

[negative]

Honestly, this is all very typical for MMO's. I'm not saying it's a good thing, but it is very typical.

[barecm]

As much as this game excells at a lot of things, it will never gain any steam until they seriously beef up the content. I am not talking about the trickle we have seen, I am talking about a huge flood of content to put it on the same par as a lot of other MMOs. This game has so much potential.

And by the way, the people who complain about the game and Turbine would probably be the first to defend it against someone talking smack about how their game is better. We complain because we want this game to be the greatest. It could be, but....

[Taur]

As much as this game excells at a lot of things, it will never gain any steam until they seriously beef up the content. I am not talking about the trickle we have seen, I am talking about a huge flood of content to put it on the same par as a lot of other MMOs. This game has so much potential.

And by the way, the people who complain about the game and Turbine would probably be the first to defend it against someone talking smack about how their game is better. We complain because we want this game to be the greatest. It could be, but....

Agreed. The OP has a point in regard to why we are where we are, but the fact still remains that we are where we are. At this point in time, we are at a point in this game that within a month or less of release of any new content to date, it has been completely raped of XP and loot by which time, we're all sitting around trying to come up with stuff to do in game to bide our time while we're waiting for the next update and/or level cap increase.

There is really not much left to strive for in this game. only the most casual of the player base doesn't have 75% of the items he/she wants in order to tweak his or her character just right. And those that play a lot have five or six different toons that are to this level if not farther along.

This game needs a flood of content. Bottom line. We need the rest of the core races and classes, prestige classes, dungeons that can't be memorized in two runs, and just more content, more content, more content. Otherwise, this game we all love, which should be the 8000 lb gorilla in the MMO market based on the sheer amount of books and campaigns based around Eberron, will go the way of the dodo bird.

[blakbyrd]

Well, Atari does not have the best record with MMOs. Actually they don't really have alot to do with MMO's but their record is pretty poor in the ones they have had a hand in. I expect part of the possible rush to release may have been on their part.

Also, MMOs require an enormous amount of money up front to develop from, and the companies doing it have to be able to be out that money for several years until the game gets released (if it makes it) and then at least 1-2 years later before a profit begins to be made.

So the possible rush to release probably fell a little on all 3 players. WotC might have wanted it out quickly to help promote the newer 3.5 and Eberron setting. Atari may have wanted it out quickly for monetary value or to meet production time lines. Turbine may have wanted it out to begin to recoup some initial costs already spent on the project, in order to better facilitate a quicker release and quicker potential income on LotR.

Who really knows, but it is what it is now.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Overall Turbine has done a great job and made the best most fun game I have ever played.
That being said, I do want a lot more!
And I am worried that this game will have fewer and fewer subscribers, forcing them to one day end my favorite game.
I also would like to see things better to someday get my old D&D frineds really interested in this game.......for some reason I've had alot of trouble getting them to try it, and the one who did quit for lag reasons.

Still good job overall Turbine and don't let all of the nay sayers get you down.

Druids Plz!!!!!!!
And don't you dare nerf firewall before we get them!

[OKCRandy1]

/agree and applaud the sentiment

[flowmaster]

We complain because we want this game to be the greatest. It could be, but....

It already is the greatest. There are no yardsticks to measure it by because of the awesomely incredible combat system. But, in order to REMAIN the greatest, improvements must be continual.

[VirieSquichie]

This game has fantastic structural integrity - the combat system works very well, the dungeons look and play nice, the UI is clean and powerful. It can weather just about anything (other than Welcome Back weekends, apparently) and has the potential for years and years of enjoyable play - much like the pencil and paper game it's loosely based on.

It's also fairly hollow after a while...it only takes a few months of steady play (not rabid 20-hours-a-day, just evenings after work...) to go through almost all the quests and see everything at least a couple times. At this point it starts becoming a bit stale for many people.

I know I'm about to get flamed for this post by people who say "make new characters, try different tactics, try 2-manning everything" etc. Let's face it, those are all workarounds for the underlying problem - the content isn't, and probably can't, keep up with the consumption rate. It would take several development teams the size of Turbine's DDO team (and I don't know what size theirs is) to keep up with the ravenous rate that the players play at. It just isn't going to happen.

The best thing they could do is make it so third-party companies could also develop content, subject to oversight by Turbine for balance purposes. Give these companies toolkits to make dungeons, monsters, items and spells. Give them guidelines to adhere to. The items and spells would be usable by any character, whether they had the expansion or not. New monsters would be available to any content maker.

Each company would have separate towns across the continent - some visible way of delineating between content providers. Turbine can host the content on their server farms still, actually they'd almost have to in order to retain control of the game and prevent a myriad of exploits. Release these new areas as paid add-ons, so you can only go to Town X if you have the appropriate expansion pack. As long as the new items and spells are balanced with the existing stuff, people with expansion packs won't be more "uber" than people without - they'll just have more options for places to go. The third parties make money off the sales of their expansion packs, and Turbine gets to keep subscriptions up - AND they get new monsters/items/spells/textures/object templates without having to develop them themselves! They'd even make money selling the toolkits to the content companies.

There are tons and tons of AD&D resources to draw from, dozens of unimplemented low and medium level spells for instance. I'm not talking about letting third-parties raise the level cap, I'm talking about fleshing out the existing levels with so much new content that players wouldn't feel deja vu *every time* they open up the LFM panel.

Grinding for a particular named item you want is one thing, grinding because there's nothing else to do anymore just sucks. You want a way to keep DDO relevant? Make it the most vibrant world out there. If people are constantly having new, interesting experiences they'll stick around without grinding unless they *feel* like grinding.

[tekn0mage]

I know I'm about to get flamed for this post by people who say "make new characters, try different tactics, try 2-manning everything" etc.

Umm isn't this what we tried, but they keep taking steps to prevent?

This is the major issue with the game, is that for those of us who are trying to get more enjoyment out of it by challenging ourselves just keep meeting resistance.

The developers spend more time curbing our efforts than creating new content.

Yes, they may just have to let some things go in order to make progress. Someone (most likely the forum fans who persist in fixing every tiny little "exploit" in the game) keeps pressing to get things fixed that are of little consequence when compared to the big picture.

It just doesn't seem to get any better.

[Impaqt]

Do you believe everything you read in Wikipedia?

While DDO:Online stormreach May have taken only 2 years to develope, Turbine had the core engine already..... , The RUles are based on an exstablish PnP system..... and the graphics, While Very Good, are not revolutionary......

[tekn0mage]

Do you believe everything you read in Wikipedia?

While DDO:Online stormreach May have taken only 2 years to develope, Turbine had the core engine already..... , The RUles are based on an exstablish PnP system..... and the graphics, While Very Good, are not revolutionary......

What part of that is untrue?

[mgoldb2]

I never had a doubt this game was rushed to production. Never stopped me from enjoying it or having fun playing.

You know why I never had a doubt because about 50 people told me the game was rushed to production that I played with pre mod 1. Could they of been wrong sure but it sorter a sign when you cant find anyone that did not thing it was rush to released that I played with in april 2006. At least that was my experience maybe it was different for other people that been playing since near the start.

But it came a long way since back then and hopefully it got a long way to go.

[wundernewb]

We complain because we want this game to be the greatest. It could be, but....

IMO, it already is. If you're talking playerbase size, though, it doesn't have a chance.

The fact that it is an instance-based game with vast complexity in character development, precisely the things that endear it to me, (and others) are the things which permanently consign it to being a niche game (although AFAIK, it is one of, if not the most populated niche game out there)

There are just too many more people out there who want to wander through an uncharted wilderness for hours on end, want simple "point-n-click" combat, and just hit the "Level Up" button to advance their characters for this game ever to be the greatest in terms of subscriber numbers.

[negative]

I never had a doubt this game was rushed to production. Never stopped me from enjoying it or having fun playing.

You know why I never had a doubt because about 50 people told me the game was rushed to production that I played with pre mod 1. Could they of been wrong sure but it sorter a sign when you cant find anyone that did not thing it was rush to released that I played with in april 2006. At least that was my experience maybe it was different for other people that been playing since near the start.

But it came a long way since back then and hopefully it got a long way to go.

Of course people said that about this game when it came out. Because it was true, and it showed. BUT, this is true about ALL MMO's. Even WoW. I played WoW for about the first 6 months it was out and people were always speaking about how the game seemed like it was still in Beta and they should have waiting another 6-12 months to release it. And it was just as true for WoW as it was for DDO.

I said it earlier, this isn't surprising at all. This is just how the MMO bussiness works.

[negative]

What part of that is untrue?

His point is the meaning of "two years" varies greatly depending on where you are starting. Some MMO's build their game engine from scratch. Include all that time (plus the other stuff the poster mentioned) into DDO's production and the two years suddenly becomes 3-4 years.

[Klattuu]

The bottom line is this game was rushed through production for reasons that I do not know. That is why the quality is good, but the content is low. The Dev's were rushed to make the game, and now they are being rushed to add new content. You have a population of players that is constantly complaining about how we don't have (insert whatever). In short give them a break.

Yes I am disapointed that the game was only developed for two years. Yes I am not happy that we do not have all core classes and races. Yes I am not satisfied with the fact that since the Dev's have to catch up with the core, they do not have time to put in the extras.

To be honest though, a huge portion of the technical development is not being counted in the development time as that mostly came from development from AC2. Also, the thing that really separates out DDO from every other MMO is the fact that it has an existing rule base. The trick for DDO was to figure out how to fit that rule base into a real-time computer simulation as many parts are vague and sometimes contradictory.

DDO probably had limited investment capital from the start, especially after the financial collapse of AC2, so the game needed to start making capital as soon as practically possible and become a viable commercial product. Consider what a staff of developers and IT folks costs alone per year. In my experience, computer wizs often are paid $50k to $120 a year. This means that costs to produce DDO could easily approach $1 million per year and that money has to come from somewhere.

DDO was released about halfway before what some would consider was considered a "finished" product. The problem with that thinking is that a persistant MMO is never a finished product. Even if DDO was released with 20 levels, 500 high quality adventures, 20 classes and 15 races, players today would be whining that there is nothing left to do and still demand more.

The upside is by the time level 12 was introduced, Turbine has tons of play data which showed trends and game perceptions which showed flaws in some original design concepts which have allowed the developers to rechart new courses on the road to level 20 and beyond.

[Hambo]

There are tons and tons of AD&D resources to draw from, dozens of unimplemented low and medium level spells for instance. I'm not talking about letting third-parties raise the level cap, I'm talking about fleshing out the existing levels with so much new content that players wouldn't feel deja vu *every time* they open up the LFM panel.

For the umpteenth time, there are not "tons and tons" of resources to draw from. Turbine doesn't "own" DDO; They are only licensing the electronic rights for D&D ver. 3.5, and apparently have them until 2017. Other entities license the rights to older content, and "Turbine" would most likely be sued if they infringed on those rights.

With today's announcement of ver. 4.0 of D&D, who knows what the future holds? DDO2? Hopefully. It all depends on licensing costs, percieved profit and the ease of applying existing game mechanics to the new ruleset (or vice versa).

On the other hand, I would definitely applaud any effort for more "randomness" to be implemented into the questing system, enough so that non-Tanking characters become highly desired, if not essential members of the average party.