Dungeons & Dragons Online: Stormreach (review)

 (Surely this text is much older than 2014???)

We got preorder copies of DDO back in 2006 and started playing. I've never been much into gaming, so I reluctantly agreed to play. To my surprise, it was great fun! I enjoyed creating different characters of different stats and classes and see how they compared.

We played for about 6 months before cancelling, because the group of friends we were playing with had dwindled and we didn't like the thought of pick up groups, and it was getting trickier duoing the higher level our charcters got. We were both sad about cancelling, as we had really enjoyed the game.

When we heard of the free week's play in spring 2007 we came back to play, and we still really enjoyed ourselves (it's hard not to!), and it was fun to see some changes from last time. In the autumn, it was a free weekend, which also had us coming back for a bit, and still enjoying it. In February 2008, we decided to resubscribe, and we have not looked back since. We're in a big guild, so there's always people to play with.

The Initial teething problems described in reviews here are well out of date, as they have been fixed a long time ago.

With a good enough build, you can solo your way up the levels fairly well. A lot of dungeons now have a "Solo" option, which makes most of them pretty easy. You get more of a challenge doing something on "Normal" (not to mention "Hard" or "Elite").

The combat system is very involving, in that mobs move around, so you can't just hit auto-attack and go get a cup of tea. You have to be there and join in, which is great. Beating a really hard boss makes you feel as if you have accomplished something. Also, it makes being ambushed a lot more exciting!

All mods have been free so far, and mod 6 introduced item crafting, which is quite fun, but can be a bit confusing to begin with. There are plenty of wilderness areas of different levels - the higher ones give REALLY good XP.

The highest level to date is 16, but this will be raised to 20 with mod 7 out later this year. Every level has 4 ranks (each time you gain a rank, you get an action point which you can use to enhance your character), so you could say it's 64 levels.

The community is good and people are generally friendly and helpful, and feels a lot more mature than some other MMOs. Some are in DDO because they like to do the quests as roleplaying campaigns, others do it because of the fun of an MMO. You can have the cake and eat it. Highly recommended!

You can get a 10 day trial on the website http://www.ddo-europe.com/trial , so why not try it and see what you think of it for yourself?