Compared to other MMOs, in what ways does DDO look and feel dated?

[Missing_Minds]

But how many MORE Drizzt Do'Urden, Drizzt Do'Urrden, Drizzt Do'Urdden, and so on ad naseum do you want to see?

Honestly, I want to see stronger naming rules. Nothing more immersion killing then seeing the WIZ join your group with a name like XxXNecrokillerXxX followed up by the inevitable *ding* that follows.

If I see a Drizzt in full armor bearded dwarf playing a loot, I frankly say let the dwarf play.

As for the guild tags, I never knew about those till F2P when people started to really show up with them. *shrugs* If they think it makes them special, let them think they are special. They suck light damage all the same if not better.

If you think about it, it is amazing just how much power people place into names. Such that it can keep a person around or just utterly demoralize them to lose it. This is one of those small things that end up really meaning a lot to players.

[Hendrik]

If I see a Drizzt in full armor bearded dwarf playing a loot, I frankly say let the dwarf play.

As for the guild tags, I never knew about those till F2P when people started to really show up with them. *shrugs* If they think it makes them special, let them think they are special. They suck light damage all the same if not better.

If you think about it, it is amazing just how much power people place into names. Such that it can keep a person around or just utterly demoralize them to lose it. This is one of those small things that end up really meaning a lot to players.

Wholeheartedly agree!

Just hope that the player with the name Leighsbein is actually attached to it and HE is just not trying to be clever and sidestep naming rules.

[Galeria]

I love the way DDO looks and think the recent additions to "update" the UI have taken a step backwards in usability, trying to look like other MMO's. Which is really unfortunate. I hate it when people take something simple. straightforward and useful, then try to make it pretty, making people work harder to do the same functions.

In any case, I just boosted my graphics again and now I can see that say, the bushes in the Red Fens are like 3 intersecting planes of flat sections of leaves... stuff that I couldn't really tell at lower graphic levels.

But I still love the artwork, the settings and all the details. Swarms of flies in the Fens... if you get close up... actually look like flies. Dragonflies swarm around the entry rocks at the Twelve. There's so many little things done so well.

[Missing_Minds]

Wholeheartedly agree!

Just hope that the player with the name Leighsbein is actually attached to it and HE is just not trying to be clever and sidestep naming rules.

*shrug* don't care, not my job to decide if a name is offencive in game or if it IP in game. Report and forget.

I play the game for fun, not for preenage humor.

[Hendrik]

*shrug* don't care, not my job to decide if a name is offencive in game or if it IP in game. Report and forget.

I play the game for fun, not for preenage humor.

Don't care all that much either MM, just making conversation as I try to find my pants.

I just shake my head at said preenage humor, or attempt at humor.

Screw it, I give up on pants.

[Lleren]

From my perspectives DDO really does not play to its own strengths enough; build diversity, raid replayability, bound to account, altoholics, ease in PuGing most high end content.

It really feels to me that DDO has been steadily abandoning those areas, and chasing any other MMO. Epic destinies; rewarding concentrating on one character. The high damage potential in several raids encouraging the players to push those hit point totals even higher. The melee vs caster divide seems much worse then I remember it being.

[Meretrix]

I think DDO is already ahead of many other current MMOs as far as visuals and customization goes. I love the UI options, in game chat ect. Many other games I have tried recently felt clunky and restrictive.

If there is an area I feel DDO is lacking in it's the very dated character sheet. (We have 3d models on our pet's character sheet but a red oval silhouette for our characters)

Also the character creation options could use an overhaul.

[GrampaBill]

The one thing that really would embarass me if I were an art designer at Turbine is some of the older splash screens. Every time I see the Dwarven Banker figure on the splash screen I just cringe; it looks like a picture of a stuffed doll with those hands. The House K splash screen is bad as are some of the Elven ones.

Someone just needs to take a couple days and go over all of the splash screens and update those that need a work over.

[Tiamas]

For me its mostly gear visualisation. 99% of the armors look boring, idealess or just ****** (including armor kits). There are other games where heavy armors look like they weigh 300kg alone. Might be a bit over the top but here what we got in DDO (very often):

Heavy armor: Leather full body condom with a single part of a FULL plate straped on (like shoulder part) or metal full body condom.

Medium armor: basically the same

Light armor: Leather full body condom, sometimes with a single part of a FULL plate straped on (check out goristros hide, its such a joke)

Robes: Probably the most decent ones, they look like .. well robes

Outfits: Full body condoms made of cloth (Mainly the armorkits) or some crazy fur stuff for voodoo monks (but at least here those arent condoms).

Important: Full body condom = the armor looks like a body painting no sticking out parts, worst for any fullplate. Theres hardly any massive metal plate, just a bit of metal color on your skin.

So if something is called a full plate, I expect my toon to be fully surrounded by more or less massive metal, and not a single part and the rest of the armor looks like some super stealthy assassin outfit.

And for all the non-massive metal armors: Super tight leg clothing might be a nice choice sometimes, but its not for every frickin armor!!
How it can be done right? Check out marilith chain. Thats a real nice model, you can really see all the armor parts.

Uh well, yeah so this is the most dated part for me (not sure if its really a dated problem though, but we can do way better today)

[Galeria]

Agree. The tight bodysuit cosmetic armors are bizarre, especially on WF. It's like they all need to be aerodynamic super heroes... with a swirl of silver on their chest.

[MasterHephaestus]

I'm fairly happy with the audio/visuals of DDO but would like to see a couple of things:

1. I'd like to have more randomized ambient/quest sounds. When you get to the point that you can play with your eyes closed because you can tell by the sounds what stage of the quest you are in, or the sound samples put you in a semi-hypnotic trance because the same loop has been playing for an hour without change, well.. perhaps it's time for a few more random sounds. I realize there are specific environmental and programmatic triggers for each sound but is it really that hard to add random sounds by category? In a rocky environment? Perhaps a sliding rock/rolling pebble/shifting sand random sound would add spice. In a freaking HUGE cavern? Would it be that hard to add a slight echo to all noises?

2. This might push some systems a little but I'd like to see a shift in the graphic direction in which DDO appears to be heading. It's starting to get very candy-like and bright, following the pattern of other MMO's, and I'd actually prefer a shift to more realism and less glitter. This would probably not be helpful to Turbine as a business but it's something I'D like to see. Heck, give us cinematic-quality avatars that can be subtly and cosmetically changed. I've done it with photoshop and I'm not a graphic artist.

Just my two cents..

[Dhalgren]

The UI just feels antiquated, to be honest. The inability to scale things, the lack of configurable alpha, the extremely restricted command set on the command line (sorry, I'm an old Doom/Quake player), the fact that the map doesn't reflect the targeted character or highlight currently speaking characters, the clumsy dialog box conversations/interactions . . . and so on.

(Aside/tangentially related gripe: I always want to mention the almost entirely useless mapping in this context, but that's not really a matter of it being "dated" so much as "broken by design". In PnP my DM would have killed me on principle if I had kept maps like this game does, and it's not a function of the age of the game, either. Look at games like Descent, or Quake, and so on. Good 3D mapping has been around since the mid '90s.)

Honestly, the first thing I noticed when I started playing was the clunky old UI. I love the game but almost everything about the interface just makes me think "Really? In 2006, this is the best that they could come up with?"

[Alabore]

OH MY THE HELVES...

* Twitches *

[TrinityTurtle]

The color palette. It's very pastel and low-key, there is not a lot of vivid color. It just looks kind of old and washed out ot me, especially after playing games like Armalur and Skyrim with vivid, beautifully colored worlds.

The lack of customization: Everyone really, really looks the same. I don't know if adding more options would increase lag (more things for the computer to render) or not, but there must be some way to balance performance and individualization.

Too many strait dungeon quests. They are a LOT of enter and kill everything in the map quests. They are capable of clever and creative ones. Impossible demands, the one that's name escapes me with Yalthoun, Delirium, etc. etc.

Lack of individual housing that players can customize. They've even done it before as a company on LOTRO. And it was done well, and a lot of fun for those that enjoyed it, and ignorable by those that don't. I doubt having already done it that it would be that difficult to do for DDO.

[Alrik_Fassbauer]

The problem I think is that the avatars look dated compared to newer games out there.

Yes, and they and NPCs are low-polygon. They look more "blocky" than other NPCs in other games, imho ...

The color palette. It's very pastel and low-key, there is not a lot of vivid color. It just looks kind of old and washed out ot me, especially after playing games like Armalur and Skyrim with vivid, beautifully colored worlds.

There are people who desire such a non-colourful palette. It is called "D&G" nowadays, standing for "dark & gritty".
In an RPG forum I've made myself a name already as being the only one who wants colourful games ...
(But I'm also the only one wanting real social interaction in role-playing games ...)

Too many strait dungeon quests. They are a LOT of enter and kill everything in the map quests.

DDO currently feels rather like an (A)D&D-based Action-RPG clone ...

And that's one of the reasons why I want some REAL social interaction in it ... Because that's something which Blizzard-based Action-RPGs generally lack ...
(Social interaction -> Partycrashers)

Light armor: Leather full body condom, sometimes with a single part of a FULL plate straped on

ROFL !

Yes ! It's EXACTLY the way the "Duelist Leathers" look like ! *laugh*

(But it is still an good item apart from that.

[TrinityTurtle]

There are people who desire such a non-colourful palette. It is called "D&G" nowadays, standing for "dark & gritty".
In an RPG forum I've made myself a name already as being the only one who wants colourful games ...
(But I'm also the only one wanting real social interaction in role-playing games ...)

I agree that there are, but to me it just looked dated and 256 colors schemy.

[Alabore]

Yes, and they and NPCs are low-polygon.

Admittedly, I find that a plus.
I don't care much for upgrading/replacing my rig just to play against higher poly foes.
I'd actually ask for even lower, better optimised, gfx options, so I can play the game on low-performance notebooks.
But that's me; I realise to most players stunning graphics are part of the immersion value.
And they'll happily buy alienware just to enjoy the richer textures.
Heavens, nowadays even facebook gamelets require a multicore CPU...

...

To me, immersion is about being able to customise my character's appearance to a greater degree.
I really dislike armour kits; they felt more like a cunning way to squeeze out money from customers.
And I'm Premium, with three p2p accounts, so I'm not trying to get away playing the game without paying a dime for it.

...

I'm liking what they've done with armour tiers.
Chainmail as light armour was an interesting way to breathe new life to character appearance, without creating new models.
If only new armours showed some diversity...

And we had the option to mix and match textures and meshes, the way we could in LOTRO.

...

[Ivan_Milic]

The only thing about ddo that is dated is that you cant exchange 100 things for 1 or get 100 things with 1 click,like you have to click thousand times to convert essences,same with cove and other events.