• What’s wrong with DDO.

    I have been playing in the Dungeons & Dragons Online head start for the last couple of days, and I’ve got enough time in under my belt to be able to comment on it. For the attention deficit in the crowd, the capsule summary is: It’s a fun game, but it’s a generation behind in UI design.

    I can’t stress enough how important the UI design issue is though. After WoW, players expect a certain set of capabilities. They just expect that the engine won’t get in the way. Are you listening, Turbine? These things have to get fixed or you haven’t got a prayer:

    • Make a sound when you take damage from falling. I actually couldn’t figure out why my hit points kept randomly going down, until I realized that jumping off a stack of boxes can hurt you. And honestly, if you’re going to make it that easy to kill yourself by jumping off of something, why not make it a little harder for me to accidentally do the action that causes it, eh?
    • On a related note: Make all feedback more obvious. In a game where you actually require some skill/coordination to drive the UI, you have to make it more obvious when you are doing the right thing.
    • Of course, that would have made combat training easier, but even given that, you need a better combat training tutorial. I went through the battles with the three golumns about five times before I even started to understand the mechanics — I don’t actually think I’ve got it yet.
    • Don’t allow me to select my character by clicking on him. I have died several times because I wanted to select a particular enemy target that happened to just be standing directly in front of me. If you do think that selecting yourself on screen is important, at least make it option. I’ve played games that have it, and games that don’t. The ones that don’t work better. Trust me.
    • Don’t invent new keybindings when the entire MMO community knows the existing vernacular. You want to know what my first grouping experience was like in DDO? Someone sent me a tell that said “Do you want to join up?”, so (of course) I hit the “R” key to reply “yes”, but instead I (auto-)ran off the doc I was standing on and killed myself. “nm”, said the person who asked to group.
    • The inventory screen! Bah! It’s horrible. No auto-sorting, things disappear out of slots and get filled in with other stuff so you can never find the item you just picked up (because the icons are the size of pinheads even when playing at (only) 1280×1024). You can’t even figure out whether an item is worth using unless you select it, then expand the focus gem (normally hidden because it takes up too much screen real-estate), then click on the magnifying glass. Did it not occur to you to put this on a hover? If you want to see what you should have done, take a look at the auction interface in WoW.
    • You know all those NPCs that take random loot drops and give you something in return (like the mushroom collectors)? Did you really think making me click through every option and have them say “You’re making me angry” was a useful UI? It’s slow and it breaks immersion badly. How about just only giving me the options that I actually have the items for? Wouldn’t that have made more sense?
    • For God’s sake, give me a macro capability. I’m not asking for much, I just want to be able to /sit by hitting the X key. (Actually, I’m still hoping that this capability is in the game, and I just missed it — If this game doesn’t come with a decent manual, I’m going to be really pissed.)
    • And, please please please, allow me to make all the on screen windows semi-transparent (and allow me to drag them partially off screen). I spend half my time with about 1/3 of the entire screen covered with windows. I feel like I’m looking through a key hole.

    Anyway, that’s enough of a rant for now. I’m sure I’ll think of other things as time goes on. Stay tuned.

    Update: Can someone explain to me where in “real” Dungeons & Dragons they have that unbelievably outdated game mechanic: Smashing Barrels. As a lawful good paladin, why would I smash every barrel in some poor guys house? Can you tell? Why?

    Update 2: Any of you have this experience yet: get attacked by two creatures; randomly tumble around attempting to not get hit; get wedged on the geometry; try to get unstuck by jumping; not notice for a couple of seconds you are no longer attacking because jumping blew away your target; die. Turbine: On the list of absolutely must do items, please add “option to auto-target something that is attacking me”.

    Note: Despite everything I said above, I’m actually enjoying this game so far, at least in part because it isn’t anything like WoW. If you want to chat with me, look for Gimlit on the Mabar server. Good hunting!

  • AMD versus Intel

    I’m looking at putting together a new gaming machine. In an effort to cut costs, I’m going to probably just put my venerable 6800 Ultra OC in the machine, at least until I can save up some money for something better (Mmmm… X1900 XTX). I can live with that for now; what I really want is a CPU upgrade.

    I have been looking at the best AMD and Intel dual core chips, which are the FX-60 and the P4 D EE respectively. Both of these are worth a ludicrous amount of money: somewhere in the $1300 to $1400 range. Holy sizzling money-sinks Batman! You could buy a whole machine for that price. It also looks like the socket form factors they are using are both approaching the end of their lifespans, so next upgrade would also have to include a mo-bo.

    The thing is, I’m already running a P4 3.2GHz HT (800MHz FSB). This honestly isn’t that slow a machine, so it will take something serious to see an obvious performance win. I’m currently thinking the FX-60 is the way to go, but I’m open to anybody’s suggestions.

    I am also going for a better case/cooling system + a 10K RPM Raptor HD. Unfortunately, RAID 0 will have to wait until I can afford a second one.

    The good news is that I’ll have quite a strong upgrade path based on this system: up to 2 high end graphics cards plus a second drive in RAID 0 will almost certainly provide yet another performance boost next year.

  • Why the Intel iMac is fast

    We got an Intel iMac at work, and I have to say it is fast. Apps start quickly (one dock icon bounce to get Safari running) and are joyously responsive. Eclipse looks great on it!

    Of course, the reason why the apps appear fast is that they were slow before. That’s the joy of developing software on a slow platform: If it’s usable on the G4, it will scream on the new boxes. (Anybody remember the transition from 68K to Power?)

    Unfortunately, the downside of this is that developers will now start writing applications that are just “usable” on an Intel Mac, meaning that they will be brutally slow on my G4 laptop. Oh well. Enjoy it while it lasts.

  • Two more successful concerts

    Both nights went well for Divertimento. Personally, I thought Friday night was a little tighter over all, but I had people come up to me both nights and say that they thought the orchestra sounded the best ever. This included one person who said they’d been coming for 19 years.

    Now we have to start seriously working on the program for the next concert, which is definitely harder material.

    Thanks to all who attended, and I hope you had fun.

  • Divertimento Concerts Friday and Saturday

    Just a reminder that the spring Divertimento “pops” concerts are tomorrow and Saturday at 8pm. The program is:

    Sullivan, Overture to “Iolanthe”
    Rodgers, Medley from “The King and I”
    Ricketts, Satchmo!
    Leigh, “Man of La Mancha” Selections
    Rossini, Overture to “William Tell”
    Leopold Mozart, The Sleigh Ride
    Anderson, Jazz Pizzicato
    Loesser, Highlights from “Guys and Dolls”
    Wilson, Beach Boys Hits
    Rodgers, Selections from “Oklahoma”

    The Friday concert is at Rideau Park United Church, 2203 Alta Vista Drive. The Saturday concert is at L’Église St-Thomas-d’Aquin, 1244 Kilborn Ave. I haven’t got any tickets to sell, but they will be available at the door:

    Adults: $10.00
    Students/Seniors: $8.00
    Children under 13: $5.00

  • I’m home.

    I was up at 5am this morning to get to the airport in time to get through airport security before my flight left. Somehow in the process of taking everything you own and putting it in little grey boxes to go through the scanner, I missed the PDA in my pocket, so when it set off the security station they were (of course) inordinately interested in why I had tried to get through without getting it scanned (doh!). At which point, they told me to take off my belt, shoes, etc. — anybody who travels to the US now, knows the drill.

    I did finally get through the checkpoint, but my Bluetooth GPS unit fell out of my coat when I was taking it off and smashed on the cement floor. I put it back together, and it appeared to be communicating with my PDA, but it couldn’t see any satelites (even standing at a window) which leads me to believe it’s busted. More testing required.

    The flight was cramped but uneventful, which is about the best you can hope for now. I went directly from the airport to work, but didn’t stay for very long. I needed to come home and nap long enough to be awake at the orchestra dress rehearsal tonight.

    I got about an hour of sleep in before Dennis called home to say that his wallet had been lost, and just under 5 more minutes before he called again to say it had been found. At that point, I gave up on the napping idea.

    The good news is that I’m back at home again, but man, I hate travelling!

  • Day 2

    One day finished, one left to go. Yesterday’s sessions varied a bit, but there were some good ones. The lecture by the guy from the Harvard Business School was actually pretty good. No answers, but he did give you something to think about.

    We’ve got formal sessions until 15h00 today, but my team is getting together this evening too. Then it’s one more night in the hotel room and I get to head home.

    See you tomorrow. 🙂

  • Day 1

    We got in last night around 20h00. The plane ride was fine — a bit bumpy and it took about 25min longer than it should have, but it worked. The hotel room is reasonably nice:

    Nothing interesting is supposed to happen until 10h00, but we’re meeting for breakfast in a few minutes, so I’m going to head out.

  • Travelling tomorrow

    I’m packed and as ready to go as I’ll ever be. Dennis came down with a cold today, so I’ve been trying to avoid catching it from him. I guess I’ll find out whether I was successful just about the time the plane lands. *sigh*.

    You know, I really hate travelling.

  • PDAs are dead.

    It happened last week. As of today, no PDAs appear in either the Future Shop, Best Buy, or The Source fliers that came with our local newspaper. There aren’t even any non-phone PDAs on the Future Shop website.

    Weird. I knew it was coming, but I just didn’t notice how fast.