Phew. I've done my share of DAoC posts in the past week or so. Here's another: The Gamer's Press posted a review on the Dark Ages of Camelot, which received a perfect ten. DAoC was equal to EverQuest in many people's opinions after release, and with each new patch, they appease that many more people... Ahhhhh…feels like home. I am reviewing an RPG for the first time in a looooong time. The game is Dark Age of Camelot an MMORPG. Some of you may remember some time ago that I wrote in one of my earlier Dungeons that I wasn’t going to fall prey to the MMORPG monster. Well I was wrong. But I am impressed that I held out as long as I did. So read on to get my full take on Dark Age of Camelot. Consult the Book of Armaments! Here are the minimum game specifications: Pentium II PII 450 256mb RAM 600mb free hard drive space 32mb 3D accelerated video card Pentium III/IV PIII 450 128mb RAM 600mb free hard drive space 16mb 3D accelerated video card The recommended system is: PIII 1ghz 256mb RAM or higher 32mb 3D accelerated video card Voodoo 1/2/3/5 cards are not supported, but Voodoo 3 and 5’s may work. Also it said that Win2K was also unsupported, but I had it working fine. I am also assuming that you have an Internet connection too. I would recommend DSL or cable to reduce the lag factor as much as you can. Camelot! Camelot! Camelot! It’s only a model. I am not going to stand here and tell you all that this is better than Everquest and Asherons Call, because I haven’t played either of them. But I will begin by telling you why I decided to delve into the MMORPG genre by playing DaoC. One of the main reasons was the different Realms that are in the game. All of them have a great appeal to me for one reason or another. The three Realms are Hibernia, Albion and Midgard. Hibernia is based on Celtic mythology, and being Irish myself this was a big selling point. I will go into more detail about each of the realms later. Albion is set in the Arthurian legend, with…Camelot as its biggest city. Pretty cool, huh? The last realm Midgard follows the Norse mythos. The Norse Gods are, IMHO, some of the coolest mythological Gods. And as I said before that I was drawn this game because I am Irish is only part of the reason. I am part Irish and Swedish, so I have Celtic and Viking blood in me. And people ask me where I got my temper. Another reason is I have spent a good deal of time playing Diablo 2 online in the Realms during the past year or so. I really liked playing co-op, with other players. But one of things that bugs me is when some punk 13 year-old decides it would be really cool to go hostile on you in the middle of taking on Big D. If I wanted to do some PvP I would, and I have on many occasions, I would. I have my fair share of people’s ears in my inventory. And the way the Realms are set up in DaoC is really great. You cannot go hostile on anyone in your Realm unless you are in the Frontier. But you can travel to the other Realms and attack anything that moves. Yessir you can hack, slash, nuke other players to your hearts content. We are now no longer the Knights who say Ni! Albion. Home to Camelot, the Knights who say Ni…I mean the Knight of the Round Table. This is the Realm that I have been logging the most time in. Mostly because that was the Realm I was told to go to by the Gamers’ Press staff (Which, other than Ms. Judi have been REALLY missing out). I could go on for hours telling you all of the different classes, skills, and styles for each of the Realms. But I would hasten to guess that everyone would give up reading after page 372. So I won’t go into such detail. I will however try to tell you all I can and still keep it interesting and to do the game justice. Each Realm has a unique set of character classes most of which have crossovers to each realm such as Albion’s main healer is called a Cleric, whereas in Hibernia it is a Druid. When selecting a character to play, you really need to take into consideration what you want the character to do. Also think about what you are good at, by this I mean if you are a hack and slash find of player running a spellcaster might not be for you - at least not initially. Since I tend to just attack blindly at times I wanted to make a character that would be a good tank. Every party needs a tank. A tank is basically a shield for you casters. So I created a Paladin. They are a cross between a true tank and a healer or buffer. A buffer casts spells on party members to raise their attributes and thus become more effective in combat. A Paladin can wear heavy armor, not as quickly as a Fighter (ArmsPerson in Albion), but ultimately can wear the heaviest plate mail. One thing that you will learn, is that partying with other characters to go in hunting parties is one of the best ways to level your character. All of the character classes have their pros and cons, strengths and weaknesses. There really isn’t a best class, just pick one you feel comfortable with and have at it. Leveling your character is not as easy as it was in Diablo 2 that is for sure. But you have several different ways to increase your levels. The most obvious is to kill as many bad guys as you can. Fairly straightforward right? Well think again. One thing that will be very important to learn is how to identify the monsters you should attack and the ones you should run like HELL from. Basically, when you target the monster the name will come up in a color. The color will tell you whether or not you should attack the monster or FLEEE!!! Green monsters you can take no problem. Purple, on the other hand…if the monster is already charging you try to make a mad dash for it. Another way to increase your level is by doing quests. You can get quests by talking to certain people throughout the Realm. Many quests will be restricted by your character’s level or class. But when you complete a quest you can bank on some serious XP and goodies. Tasks are like quests but a little different. Unlike quests which you can have multiple quests ongoing, only a single task can be active at one time. There are a few different types of tasks: fedex, kill and consignment. A fedex task is just what it sounds like take package “A” to point “B”. Kill tasks require you to kill a monster for a guard (a named guard BTW) and return to him after you have completed. Consignment tasks are only going to help you out if your character has taken up a crafting skill. Crafting skills are used so a character can make or “craft” weapons, clothing, armor, etc. A consignment task is given by a master, who will then have you craft a certain item and then deliver it to another NPC in the city. These can be very useful to increase your crafting levels as well. The best thing, at least for me, is playing with a bunch of friends. Teaming up to go hunting or go questing is a blast if you have a good core group of people to do this with. In DaoC, guilds allow you to put a group together and become a real team. There are numerous guilds on now and as the game grows I expect this continue to grow. Unlike some of the guilds that AD&D people are used to, the Thieves Guild and the like once a guild is created it is up to the guild masters and members to who can join the guild. Guilds can be identified by the name of the guild appearing underneath the characters name. Another way guild members can be distinguished, is by the use of guild emblems. Once a guild has been established, it can create an emblem to use to decorate cloaks and shields. But don’t expect to get an emblem right away. The emblem costs 300gp to create, and the characters have to be 20+ level to use. So you may be waiting a while to get that really spiffy cloak. Bring out yer dead! As I said earlier this is my first attempt at playing MMORPG games so I am really unable to say that “this game kicks EQ’s butt”. What I CAN say is that this game kicks serious ASS! I am absolutely addicted to this game. I haven’t been this hooked on any game EVER. I just want to play this damn game all the time. I now understand how this genre got to be so popular. I have been fortunate enough to play with some really AWESOME players and we have been on-line almost every night since I bought the game. I really could have gone into more detail about the combat and the spell casting, to navigating, but then this review would have been entitled War and Peace. So in conclusion, I am merely going to say “BUY THIS GAME” go to whatever software store you have nearest and plop down the cash. I also did not want to even attempt at making this a strategy guide. But I will leave you with these few words of wisdom… Never auto-follow someone who is prone to dropping. You will die horribly as they unknowingly drag you right through a large group of monsters. When someone in your party asks “think we can take all of them at once?” RUN! DO NOT piss off the healers. They will let you die. Shortcuts…BAAAAD. Stay on the road when you are traveling. You can’t have too many healers. Don’t forget to eat…not the character YOU. Last bit of advice, there is a definite language that you will need to learn. There are a boatload of terms that I had never heard. So…it pains me to say this, get the strategy guide. It is a huge help. BTW…BUY THIS GAME!!!! Until next time… Jaster Fetche lavache!!!