Perfect Dragons? Dungeons World?

I've been examining two games closely for the past week or so. Dungeons and Dragons Online, and Perfect World International. As is my wont, I shall now examine the pros and cons of each, and everyone will pretend to be interested in what I have to say. I know this is a boring topic, but such are my passions, so strap in. We're rolling.

DDO first. I'll hit Perfect World in tomorrow's post.

This game doesn't collect much in terms of the global subscriber base for these types of games. There is a reason: It's pretty hardcore. Dungeons and Dragons is, in its fundamental heart and soul, a game meant to be played with your friends. That's how the table top game works (you know, the one with all the dice?), and since they have kept as unswervingly true to that ruleset as they could ever hope to, the video game is every bit as group-minded as the board game.

What this means is, if you want to accomplish much past the early levels, you're going to need friends. Group up. This rubs the online gaming market the wrong way. The ability to solo in an MMO is, for reasons that were once unclear to me but now make perfect sense, very important to most of the current gaming population. The knowledge of why escaped me for so long but this morning broke in upon me like an enlightening light that... enlightens. Here it is:

People can be really stupid online! People can be even more stupid in an online game! People want the ability to play the games without being subjected to one another's idiocy!

Such a clear and sublime knowledge that has washed over me...!

Anyway...

Graphically the game environment is beautiful. It makes use of all the latest bells and whistles that DirectX has to offer to great effect, making for soft, realistic-looking environments to have your adventures in. Creature models are true and accurate to the monster manual. Music adds backdrop without being intrusive, and the DM (Dungeon Master, the disembodied voice meant to add color to the adventures and fill in details you can't experience for yourself, such as how something smells or how the air feels) is a unique proposition to the genre. They used a deep, booming, confident voice for him. My opinion? It would have been far more entertaining to have a nerd do the voice-over. Preferably someone with a lisp of some kind.

I like the way the game feels and plays, with the climbing over things, ducking under things, flipping switches, climbing ladders, swimming along and praying you don't drown, taking extra care on ice-coated narrow ledges and being ever-wary about traps and obstacles while finding keys and solving puzzles. This is very different from, say, WoW, where the focus in a dungeon is all about killing and looting. Player versus Environment actually means what it says in DDO. It plays much more like a real game than any other MMO I have ever touched, and that's important to me.

I know my wife will whine if I don't point out the game's downfalls, and there are some. The character models themselves kinda suck, for one thing. Everyone looks to be roughly middle-aged, the developers neglecting to give us the ability to alter the base skin on the model. In combat, everyone stands like they're struggling with back pain, or a hernia. The female character models look about like you'd expect: Designed by some geek who has never actually seen a woman naked. Vaguely female-shaped, they're narrow in the wrong places and curvaceous in the wrong ways. Combine that with the aforementioned animation troubles and you wind up with some truly troubled visuals.

Some of the game sounds are problematic as well. The sound that happens with a spell is cast, Magic Missile for instance... I'm not sure what they were thinking. Did they believe we wanted to sound like ring wraiths every time we cast something? It just doesn't gel well with the rest of the game, at least not in my opinion. Even something like the random, meaningless incantations from Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter Nights would have been more acceptable.

I always like to end on a positive note, and here's mine: The price. The core game now costs as much as a month's worth of play. Remember, you get your first 30 days included in the purchase of the core game. Therefore, the core game is now free. You just pay for the monthly access. There's also a 14-day free trial, so you can try before you buy. They've gone out of their way to put the software in your hands, in other words.

Of ten stars, I give this one seven and a half. Definitely worth checking out.

Tune in tomorrow!