Dark Age of Camelot: Catacombs interview

The Dark Age of Camelot MMORPG series has been around a long time, and in that time it has managed a lot of firsts for the genre. It was the first MMORPG to be localised in Britain, France, Italy, Germany and Spain, and the first game to take direct influences from Celtic and Norman legend. It also pioneered the symbiotic relationship between PvP and PvE combat with its Realm Versus Realm combat.

But firsts aren't enough for Mythic, the development team behind DAoC. That's why Catacombs has been released, a new expansion pack that adds a number of unique and fresh features to the game.

Catacombs main function is to open up the game more to beginner and low-level players by offering more effective character customisation, instanced dungeons, and better player support. High level players don't lose out, though. New rewards and powerful items are available in the deep underground dungeons, and a new tough-as-nails dungeon called The Dark Spire should prove the ultimate challenge.

We chatted with Iain Compton, the community manager forDAoC, to unearth the dark truths hidden in the depths of Dark Age of Camelot: Catacombs.


What are the main things you've added with the Catacombs expansion?

There are two main thrusts behind the expansion. First is the overhaul of the graphics engine and a vast improvement in the technical detail as a whole. The new visuals benefit the whole game, not just the new environments. Wherever you go you'll see the benefit.

Second is offering the player lots of new things to do. That especially means that we're galvanizing the lower part of the game for those players who aren't at a high level already. In the last expansion pack we offer high level players lots of new content, but with Catacombs we want to offer everyone more stuff to enjoy. So there's more stuff across the board. That also closes up the ranks between the lower and higher level players, the casual and the hardcore. We found that people who could only fit in an hour here and there were falling too far behind players who were dedicating several hours a day. Those dedicated players will still achieve more in the game than casual players, but Catacombs will allow players who spend less time in the game the chance to keep playing with their friends, who might be at a much higher level.

Also, Catacombs makes it much easier to get into the game as a new user. Within minutes you can have logged in and can be battling in an instanced dungeon created especially for you alone, or your party. No more searching for a suitable party that wants to do the same thing as you. You can get straight into the action.

We wanted to pick up the pace, and that's just as important for high level players, so we've made sure that you can see exactly where the instanced dungeons are and exactly where the high level content is, and go straight there. No fuss, no waiting.

Is the focus more on PvE?

Yes, Catacombs is pretty much an exclusive PvE expansion. The rewards and bonuses you receive in Catacombs won't really help you out in Realm Vs Realm combat, but they will make you much stronger against NPC characters. Of course, the experience you gain in Catacombs will make you much stronger against other players, but the focus here is really PvE. The RvR experience in DAoC won't really change, although the new graphics engine will mean they'll be rendered more efficiently.

You've mentioned the casual player. The industry seems to be aiming at this market. Is that good?

I think that any MMO game that doesn't make itself accessible is shooting itself in the foot. There is only a limited number of truly hardcore players who will devote huge chunks of time to a game, but there is a huge amount of players out there who'd love to play more but can't because of time constraints. That can be very discouraging for players, especially when they see other people reaching high levels quickly because they can pour a lot of time in. We've found that the casual players are actually the majority in the game, but because they are only there for a limited time they become quite invisible to the hardcore players. The problem is, casual players are paying the same subs as hardcore players, and just because they are only playing and hour or two a week doesn't mean they don't deserve the same level of service, enjoyment and new content. If you don't reward them they leave, the subs drop, the servers close and your game is dead.

Do you see MMOs moving towards the casual end of the market?

Well, yes and no. By their very nature MMOs are more complicated and time consuming than other types of games. For new players that can be very intimidating, and there's not really any way to prevent that from happening unless you make your game very basic, which obviously affects its long-term or high level appeal.

At the same time, however, there are some really big MMOs popping up from big publishers, and that means that more people than ever are willing to give an MMO a try. If that experience doesn't grab them in the first couple of hours then it's unlikely they're going to keep playing - and keep paying their subs.

DAoC has a very large user base already - is there any worry that offering new content primarily for lower level characters could alienate the higher level users?

No, because there are two types of high level characters. The first kind is the person who is only interested in the RvR stuff, and views PvE stuff as the necessary grind to max out their level and compete in the RvR sphere. The second type of high level user may value PvE stuff higher than RvR content, or may be the kind of person who wants to explore everything and find out the full story behind DAoC. These people see RvR as part of the game, rather than the game.

For the first type of player Catacombs is only going to make the RvR experience better thanks to the improved graphics engine and the ability to create a new character quicker. That means if an RvR player wants a new RvR character they won't have to go through the same long grind to level up, and can do different things to get there.

For the second type of player Catacombs is great because it adds so many new challenges, new areas to explore, new things to see, new story aspects to discover, and new objects to find. So I can't really see anyone being alienated, unless it's someone with very preconceived ideas about the gameworld and the status of newcomers.

You've really added to the character customisation side of things?

Sure. The characters haven't been touched since the game was developed in 2001, and to be honest they're looking very last generation at the moment. Everything else has been improved visually, but the character models haven't changed. This is the first major upgrade to the character side of things, which is arguably the most important aspect. After all, your character is the centre of your gaming experience, and how it looks is very important. Plus, when you start a new MMO the first thing you see, before you experience the gameplay or meet the community, is the character creation graphics. So it was important for us to harness all the new bells and whistles afforded by new technology to really up the ante and provide some pretty eye candy for players.

That applies to the environment too?

Yes, we've got far more ambient sound effects to improve the atmosphere, better lighting, better reflections, better water visuals and greater graphical efficiency. Players will find the game loads faster and they can up the detail without harming performance. The new areas in particular have been designed to take advantage of the improved visuals. They look particularly stunning.

You mentioned that there was a striking lack of variety in the character models until now...

In the past there were about six to eight character models for each race split between male and female and all you could really customise was height and hair colour. Now there's a whole raft of things you can change on your character. It's extremely easy to make them very much unique.

What about existing players who have characters?

The first time existing players log in they'll be taken to the character create screen where they can edit their appearance as much or as little as they wish. They don't have to change anything at all if they don't want to, and I'm sure there'll be some people who are so attached to their current player model they'll be more than happy to stick with it.

Tell us about the new underground dungeons.

The whole underground area is a 'classic' dungeon if you wish. It's a static environment area that you can go into on your own or with other characters and battle NPCs. In addition to that we have added instanced dungeons. These are accessed through portals. Once you're in that dungeon is all yours - or you and your party's - and that quest is all yours to complete. That gives a great sense of completion rather than just wandering around.

You've also added something called the Dark Spire. What's that?

The Dark Spire is a new environment we've added. Anyone can go to it whenever they want, but we've designed primarily with high level characters in mind. If you're not level 50 yet you'll probably find it a little bit too much of a challenge, and anything below level 35 will pretty much get obliterated. The Dark Spire is at the centre of everything so there are some really powerful rewards to find, but you'll have to work hard for them.

What do you see as the most exciting new additions for fans of the series?

Two things: the new character models, because they add so much variety and they affect everyone in the game to some degree; and also the new depth we've added. DAoC has always been a very deep RPG experience, but we've really managed to round that experience out better than ever before with Catacombs.

What plans do you have for the future of the DAoC series?

Well, Mythic has stated that it wants to support the game into the future. At the moment there are no solid plans for future expansions, but I think the next expansion will be free. I can't say too much about details, but we definitely want to enhance character customisation even further.

The Catacombs expansion pack for Dark Age of Camelot is available now for PC. You'll need a copy of the original game complete with both previous expansions (Shrouded Isles and Trials of Atlantis) to play Catacombs, but you can buy a special edition that bundles everything together.

Graeme Boyd