@@messitup pfft live is not considered real daoc by most. atm the eden freeshard is where most are at. freeshards have been outdoing live pop for a while.
I LOVED DAoC back in its first year of release. Running around Emain in an 8man group sending the Albion zerg back home every time it dared passed the mile gate. 8v8 fights with proper teams were so fun. This was the first and last actual proper PvP mmo. Nothing has come close to even scratching that itch
This game is underrated and mostly unknown to most mmorpg content creators, unfortunately and therefor lacks its deserved recognition in the genre imho. Thanks for the video.
My favorite game of all time. I appreciate the work that went into this. I thought I was pretty knowledgeable but i learned a lot about the history. Can't believe im still playing this game (Eden) most days in 2023.
@@thesetiredeyes3431 Link in the description to servers site (where you can also download the client). Im thinking of starting to play too....been waaay too long since I've played this game!
@@thesetiredeyes3431Eden Daoc, search it in google and come join the fun.. developers also have a “secret” project going to make DAOC in unreal engine so.. that’s exciting too.
So much good stuff about DAoC. I played it a LOT back in the day. I loved that the 3 factions were so culturally different, and at the time no matter which realm I played the others always seemed better..! It would have been easy for each ream to have the same classes. What strikes me about DAoC was how each realm had different styles. Minstrel/Bard/Skald. Paladin/Warden/Thane. Cleric/Druid/Healer. I played on Gaheris a lot in the end, and you could mix and match all classes. It was so fun!
I was one of the many CSRs that Mythic brought in for WAR, and was directly impacted by EA's dismantling of the studio. They had us meet off-site to do mass-layoffs in groups of 30+ at a time. Despite all of that, I still love DAoC and currently play on Eden. Have been playing different incarnations of the game off and on since 2001, and probably always will as long as somewhere has the population to make it worthwhile.
my first mmo and I consider it still one of the best and most epic mmo, The pvp and all it's system was fantastic for its time, and I would argue I would love the pvp system they had in any of the new mmo's.
I was in college and heard about it by word of mouth. Best time I have ever had playing a video game. going hard 15 hours a day like a fiend to be #1 Aug healer on my server
Played for the last 20 years. I’ve played since I was 7 years old. The game is what made me love gaming. My entire family played ! Blades of Unity-Guinevere ;Midgard!!!
The music was gorgeous. Makes me tear up hearing it again. Having 3 realms, as opposed to two, was also genius. And yes, my friends and I did quit it for WoW, but tried to come back for Warhammer online. The game was just too buggy.
Best MMO I played at it's peak. I played it from launch until 2004. I've played more UO and still play UO on Outlands. That said, I'd pay stupid money for an updated DAOC!
This game was such a huge part of my life - I met so many people who became friends IRL because of it. The game was simply amazing. But, and I'll die on this hill, Jacobs selling off to EA thinking about a cash grab after so many games EA had just bought and slowly killed, which would eventually be what happen to the Mythic team. We all knew it was over when Sanya left for another company. She was the best community manager there has ever been. She was engadged and we saw our feedback come to lfe. Her leaving was the sign. Then unfortunely giving us some hope when jacobs left and started CityState and began asking for the DAOC fanbse to gofundthem money to start on Camelot Unchained. That vaporware is such a joke for those of us who actually thought they were righting the wrong that was the EA sale. But all Jacobs does now is take our 10mil in donations and put out a trash update video every 6 months. Woulda coulda shoulda, had EA stayed out, I think this would have lived much longer. Broadsword is actually doing a decent job with it right now, ever with the ridicoulus sub fee if you want access to all, but a Free option that gives you plenty.
It's been over 2 decades, yet I remember my first guild on Midgard/Prydwen called Jorheim's People Front. GL was called Hoden. Some of the others were Gupster, Jols, Arth, Tricky, to name a few. Guild disbanded and the next one was The Salamanders. Nothing has ever scratched the itch since. Such good times!
Midgard Pellinor here. I don't really remember my guild too much, memories from early on that stuck the most.. grouping up killing tomte camps and then venturing into nisse's lair with a grp. Later weeping willows and then grouping up for werewolf camp, and eventually grouping up for spindlehalla. And of course remember seeing the first enemy a purple Firbolg, who wound up being the first 50 on our server I believe
@@chriso6042 Enjoyed that read. I'd forgotten about Myrkwood mobs and Spindy. Nisse's was one of favourites to take my BB and level up alts a bit or help newbies get going. Or do you mean the werewolf camps at Malmo or Vind (forget the exact dungeon name) for that last push to 50? Ha! I remember being in Awe of the first 50 I ran into...a Thane if I remember right. I'm sure the lingo for a purple was "grape con"
@NukSooKow-yp9py ya Askheim the fort by gna faste. I remember the later stuff a bit too, but mostly the original. Malmo was fun too. I think the other stuff sticks so much because I played hunter to 35ish, then switched and played skald, and back then leveling took forever.
I could genuinely watch retrospectives and video essays about DAoC until the end of time, just hearing the ambient music makes me so incredibly happy. I've not played a game since that's given me the same feeling as Camelot did back in the day, probably helped by being barely a teenager at the time, but the amount of time I spent on this and the friends I made, that I still speak to now, is amazing.
38:00 I think among the many things that set DAoC apart from contemporary MMOs to make it more accessible was no level loss and you kept your gear when you died. Other MMOs could let you lose so much XP on death that you actually leveled down, and made you run "naked" back to your corpse to get your items back. If dangerous monsters were between you and your body, you had to risk dying a lot and losing progress or begging for help. DAoC still made you lose xp, but with a floor of your current level. I think it was the most accessible and casual friendly for its time. Which is a big contrast to today's mindset, where original WoW was easily ten times more casual than this and is held in high regard as a brutal hardcore experience.
Well done video! Lots of history here I was unaware of. Played DAoC shortly after launch and pretty much exclusively until LoM came out. I was new to PC games and heard about this game through word of mouth. I still have it on my PC and visit from time to time. I was never into RvR due to my PC melting anytime more than 20 players were near in the Frontier. I think the best memories from Camelot come from leveling and hitting 50 on my first character. Also DRAGONS! I remember the call to arms across the lands anytime a relic was being attempted or a Dragon party was being formed. The world felt so alive and nothing felt like a grind. Every time I logged in truely felt like an adventure.
The two things that stood out to me in DAoC to me was the fun of the huge RVR battles with keep sieges, and the incredible variety of class skills. I mean I have never seen another game with a class like the theurgist who could send out dozen little elementals to chase you. I also liked the ability to have buffs that you didn't have to constantly renew. Of course, it did open the door for buff bots which were kind of cheesy, but I still liked it better than having to recast every 10 minutes.
Yep. All realms being unique in feel as well as different strengths was awesome. The 8v8 and 8vX combat was amazing. The fact that you could pvp in so many different ways was great.. solo, small groups, 8man, zerg, stealth solo, stealth groups etc I even enjoyed the grind nature of pve when the game released. Actually talking to other players, grouping up and chilling. I despise the current system of following quests and skipping through the dialog and cutscenes until max level.
I'm still at it after 22+ years, "I can't quit ya", lol. We have since moved to Eden which is free and they have done a wonderful job with it so far! Long Live DAoC, best game evah!
I still have my install disc with the CompUSA price tag on it. Only recently discovered that the game is still alive, and will definitely check it out!
Still playing DAoC (on Eden Freeshard). Not as much as back then in the 2000s where I had much more time, but still quite regularly. Still the best PvP oriented MMO ever.
I played SO much Rolemaster Magestorm back in the late 90's and early 2000's. I love that game so much. I wish there was a modern version of it. There's been a fan remake of Magestorm in the works for years, but I think it's by a solo dev, so it probably won't be coming out any time soon.
I loved DAOC and played on the US servers even though I was in the UK (Albion, Galahad) The lower level Battlegrounds were a great innovation, the RvR was wonderful, but the most important part of the game was the other players, whether they were allies or enemies! In what other game would you get 200 Albs, 200 Hibs and 300 Mids gathering in the Midgard frontier for a memorial service to a Midgard player who had passed away? Teletha's memorial was one of the most emotional events I have ever been involved in in ANY game.
Man, this was a trip down memory lane. I remember reading people debate the merits of switching from eq1 to DAoC in zone chat when playing eq1. Glad to see you're still making videos!
Still come back to it from time to time. One of the best mmorpgs ever made and the pvp aspect was not surpassed till today (no, ESO and WOW do not achieve the level of greatness of being sandwiched between 2 armies). I might just come back again and make another toon.
I learned quite a bit about world building and game development from mastering this game and reverse-engineering it to learn how to develop unique and dynamic character classes. I also learned a ton about team PVP while leading the largest guild on the Kay server then later while leading two guilds on PVP servers.
What a throwback! Starting a new journey today and this pops up reminding of times past, strange! Loved this game to its core and dare to think the amount of hours RVRing with mates. Thanks for this!
Nevermind, i read your description and you point toward Lithlet's channel. Very interesting video!!! My first MMO and still waiting for a new real 3 realms /PVE/RVR MMO...😢😢
Such a great game - me and some friends keep coming back to it when new private servers open. We had an amazing time on Phoenix and I'm sure we will be back at some point. I have such fond memories, the PvE (even though quite grindy) was amazing and the RvR as well as the Battlegrounds (Thidranki!) were so much fun. The servers did support 3000 (I believe it was increased at some point to 3500, but I might be mistaken), but remember that there were also regular crashes if big events happened. I still remember some events where people had to meet at zone-crossings to make sure half of the ~200 people sat in one zone and the other half in the other zone. It was also quite useful, as incoming lag always preceded large incoming enemy zergs. You don't have that feature anymore today ;)
Best game ever. I played at the release, and continued off and on for many years until life changed. I still watch DAoC videos on TH-cam today to get my fix.
Ha! Thanks for checking back in! I'm hoping to get a bit more consistent this year. You know how it goes...sometimes life comes up. But that's the goal!
20 plus years later (ALB Nimue) and I have never since found any MMO that I enjoyed more then Dark Age of Camelot. Hail to the King of MMO'S! Glad too see the Freeshard EDEN classic server is doing well. I will be returning!
my Infiltrator Noshot loved being the PvP villian! one thing about DAoC was that you could literally be the world boss, if you dedicated yourself and had the skills you could be that 1 player everyone wanted to kill as soon as you stepped into the RvR, you could be famous in your realm, the realm leader people would rally around you and follow your commands in RvR.. it was great
I loved DAOC. I logged in on day 1 and played for years. Sadly there is nothing quite like it. Crowfall came close but was shutdown a year ago. Fingers crossed for Camelot Unchained!
just discovered your channel - very in depth and satisfying breakdown and retrospective! Looking forward to seeing what else you've covered subscribed!
Thanks for this, I learned a lot! This is by far my most favorite game of all time and there was so much here I never knew! Crazy seeing that screenshot from Darkness Falls, and all those items that I've picked up in DAoC....I sure do wish this game would have aged well like Eve, which came out around the same time. I look at what Eve Online looked like back at its release and I look at it today, and I really wish DAoC would have gotten the same treatment.
DAoC was so good. So many good memories. Music underrated. Always wished it got a modern upgrade but that somehow would probably not equate very well, but perhaps it would. Design and class balance and pvp rvr was the draw. For me, I did enjoy Trials alot. Animist was my original character. At least I got to enjoy it when it was OP :)
I starting aging again. The music, the animation it all brings me back. That said I don't remember RvR being as hard as it is, then again I played on non-atlantus servers back in the day so maybe thats what feels.different. As it stands I have no idea what I'm doing anymore lol
Magestorm is still active. Main dev has the capability to do like Aliens and Splatterball and maybe Spellbinder, but wasn't enough interest. Darkness Falls: The Crusade has a remake called Olmran.
i was so addicted to that game, played it when it came out in france, i was like 13 or 14 y.o. played so much that i missed many school days. fortunatly i left the game because otherwise i wouldn't be able to study. now i want to come back to the old days but the game must have changed so much.
I loved DAOC back in the day. If it had kept expanding with more pve content I would have kept playing. I know a lot love just the rvr aspects, but my tastes go to a nice mix, as I play hardcore when I game (hours wise). I cannot believe how they could mess up Camelot Unchained - when they have/rather had a huge popular base looking for it to release - but instead of doing a basic successor to DAOC they decided to be stupid and never achieve anything.
If Mythic had kept committed to it, it could have ended up like EverQuest or Lord of the Rings Online - small but still active. But of course, the EA purchase made that impossible. EA wanted the next World of Warcraft.
The pve content that was added, in the form of expacs, quickly became irrelevant (catacombs being the most questionable addition) that only enhanced gear and bloat for rvr. ToA had loads of content, amazing content that was great for solo players and groups, especially on the much harder pvp servers. Overall though, each of the pve expansions were larger zones of empty filler with specific items players farmed for and abandoned.
As a kid around 13-14 I remember sitting in my Dad’s office until 5am on weekends, watching him & my Uncle play with their guild, fighting Grave Goblins & Wights in Stonehenge Barrows 😅 Damn man, good times…
Wonderful retrospective! I admit I skipped over this era of MMOs. I wish Freemium plans had existed back then because I would have been more willing to try them out but paying for a game and then paying a monthly sub really turned me off and, up to that point, I was primarily a single player game. It just wasn't for me at the time. I might look into one of the player- run servers though and give it a try!
Still to this day my favorite MMO of all time! You're right about WOW killing off this game, but I think also having to have 2 accounts (buff bots), to be competitive in RVR helped too.
@@bensminecraft2733 well if u think about it, Trials of Atlantis really was the first game that introduced raiding to MMOs, which is the main thing in WOW and Final Fantasy and other MMOs.
I played Neverwinter Night on AOL, I found it rather unforgiving. Rolemaster is one of my favorite RPGs, I started playing it in the early 90s. Its so crunchy that its hard to find players for it anymore
Takes me back. Thanks a ton for making this video, wish I had seen it sooner. I jumped into DAOC on a whim shortly before Thanksgiving weekend that year. I had been perusing the Ultima and Everquest titles at Wal-Mart for some time, and a friend I played M:TG with at the game store suggested DAOC as an alternative with better pvp. PVP had been a big thing I was looking for from my days spent playing MUDs and MUSEs. I never knew of the connection between Mythic, DAOC and those early online multiplayer games (other than the obvious online multiplayer facet), but it makes a lot of things make sense. How the point of view affected the desired outcome. However, DAOC had a lot of problems, that only continued to grow even before EA bought them. Myself and my friends from my guild were constantly discussing and on the lookout for something new to jump to. We tried things like Anarchy, SW:G, City of Heroes, Guild Wars, FF XI, Lineage 2 and eventually WoW. Even WoW was insufficient and we all left and went back to DAOC, for a while... but yea, following the release of Labyrinth of the Minotaur, a few months later, we were all off playing WoW and never went back again. Dissatisfaction with Mythic's customer support and frequent "Working as intended" mantra when players encountered problems were what killed the game. These were the main factors in driving sufficient subscribers elsewhere. Did a great number of them move to WoW? Absolutely, but like I said, we were constantly leaving. It wasn't until WoW that we found a game solid and robust enough to let the DAOC subscription die. And even still we held out hope, with Warhammer Age of Reckoning... our hopes took quite a hit when EA bought Mythic, but we still hoped, bought our copy, and jumped on. But where as Mythic without EA likely would have made different decisions regarding what to do when sub numbers slumped, it's also quite possible sub numbers would never have slumped like that, without EA's mismanagement of the teams at Mythic and Bioware. EA never properly understood what they were buying, and I don't believe they cared. And it showed, players could tell, and you can't afford too much of that when relying on a subscriber system.
Really miss the game. Was annoyed when WoW came out and people migrated. He said three sides kept one from dominating... but Midgard dominated big time in my day. I was Team Hibernia... we were the definite underdogs.
Excellent review. Being a veteran on this game ( 7 years ) and never found another one like this. It was my first MMO and would be forever the last one. Childish and too commercial, wow sadly killed it. But the problems for Mythic began way before wows launch : What it's not said in this video is that if daoc had not been weakened by a series of very bad expansions, it would have better resisted the onslaught of wow. The toa expansion particularly hurt DAoC and its player base. Alas we can't remake the past and bad choices. Ha, if mythic had launched DAoC 2 instead of the Warhammer fiasco, but did they still have the talent? But the wonderful DAoC still exists while so many other games have disappeared...
ToA was amazing but just too hard, they made it eaiser too late but last 2 expansions were just garbage tbh .. NF sucked balls, great concept and design just poorly excuted.
One of the best games of all time and had a shoestring budget and very little time. Just goes to show what you can do with creativity and a lack of diversity as the defining goal. You don't need tens of millions and cutting edge graphics.
@@BrandyGraf Yeah NF sucked :D Such a shame too, the intent was good. The RVR battles were amazing in the old frontiers. Teamwork was SO important, too. Your stealthers (assassins and archers) would sneak around unseen, share information about groups with friendly teams... you'd have your DPS casters, long-range casters, crowd-controllers, healers, heal-over-time healers, melee DPS, dual-wield DPS, tanks (that did amazing DPS, too), many different utility classes for debuffs and buffs. The concept of unseen low damage but ground-targeted AOE damage. Attacking keeps, capturing Realm Relics, late night raids to catch the enemy off-guard... I can still dream about dungeons and enemies like it was yesterday...
I started playing right after shrouded isles came out, stayed till the labyrinth of the minotaur, had several accounts for mains and others for buff bots, ran a few guilds, spent a lot of time playing DAOC. Greatest mmo ever !
Man, this video really puts Mark Jacobs' latest endeavor, Camelot Unchained, into perspective. Regardless of what you think of the guy, he is ambitious but also stubborn. It's like he's trying to capture lightning in a bottle twice- he has the concept/dream, but it's as if he's attempting to do another underdog push into the market via unconventional methods (many of which are the same ones he cut his teeth on throughout DAOC's development).
I have never met him, but his history makes me think Jacobs is quite stubborn and willing to pave his own path. Sometimes a great trait, sometimes not as much. On the plus side, maybe he will see Camelot Unchained through despite its very long development so far.
@@computergamingyesterday ya, I can see that and being burned by EA on Warhammer Online probably left him with an unhealthy dose of cautiousness. Hopefully he can pull off CU- I backed it, although I'm not holding my breath.
I played the hell out of this game. 12 hours a day sometimes. I've been through a lot of MMORPGs since originally trying The Realm, But DAOC always stands out as some of my most memorable gaming. I know there's several free shards available, but they are all too much of a departure from the classic feel I wanted. Currently waiting for Blackthorn to get up and running.
Greatest game ever made in my experience. The big issue is that PvE wasn't as good as WOW so when it came out many people left for that game and DAOC relied on population since the big draw was the RvR/PvP aspect of the game. The other issue was highly skilled players could dominate larger groups of lesser skilled players because of the games great game mechanics. Those players advanced in realm rank quicker which earned them extra abilities which further increased their advantage over the fodder which left lesser skilled players to zerg or camp keeps since they couldn't complete in solo/8 man fights.
I remember RvR battles with hundreds of people fighting in squads and zergs. At that point though, the netcode couldnt keep up and it became a slideshow. Was still fun though. The most addictive game i have ever played. I eventually had to sell my account and take my life back. I felt like a recovering addict.
Trials of Atlantis was definitely what ran off a lot of Players, it isn't a mystery. Only a minority of Players had enough time to grind up the Atlantean Artifacts to a competitive level.
My Fav MMO of all time though I only played much RvR on Uthgard as a Healer and mostly play casual with friends/family. Back in the 2000s my 50 friar on live hit RvR in time for Trials of Atlantis to be released and I couldn't put time into that to keep up!
God this game was amazing, played it almost as much as Ultima Online. I never got into World of Warcraft even though I really loved the Warcraft RTS and wanted to play it. I decided to play Guild Wars instead, and XBOX took a lot of my attention. Everyone always talks about RvR but I just loved Mordred, coming from UO I was so excited when that server launched and I got to fight and traverse all the realms and interact with all weapons/mobs/races and teams. I have video footage still of doing raids with everyone to slay the dragon and all that, one day I will upload them (on an old pc that was in storage).
Game is waaaaay ahead of its time. I still play it 20+ years later.
character selection and pvp are so complex every day feels like a new day
$14 a month tho.
@@messitup google Eden...
@@messitup pfft live is not considered real daoc by most. atm the eden freeshard is where most are at. freeshards have been outdoing live pop for a while.
i still play XD and just keep coming back as there is nothing like it
It was a pleasure being part of this development team. Thank you for the review!
Were you part of Mythic before DAoC?
@@JeremyB8419 yes, during the Magestorm era
Did you work on DAoC? Where are you now?
Tell them to shutdown live then. So people come play eden.
Thanks for helping to develope the best game ever!
Although i spent/wasted a good part of my life with it,... - it was a blast! 🙂
I LOVED DAoC back in its first year of release. Running around Emain in an 8man group sending the Albion zerg back home every time it dared passed the mile gate. 8v8 fights with proper teams were so fun.
This was the first and last actual proper PvP mmo. Nothing has come close to even scratching that itch
Well said.
No other game has managed to replicate those moments for me.
Running the Emain night watch with friends is some of my fondest memories
This game is underrated and mostly unknown to most mmorpg content creators, unfortunately and therefor lacks its deserved recognition in the genre imho. Thanks for the video.
My favorite game of all time. I appreciate the work that went into this. I thought I was pretty knowledgeable but i learned a lot about the history. Can't believe im still playing this game (Eden) most days in 2023.
I wanna play!!! Where can I ?
@@thesetiredeyes3431 Link in the description to servers site (where you can also download the client).
Im thinking of starting to play too....been waaay too long since I've played this game!
@@thesetiredeyes3431 If you're still looking google Eden-DAoC
@@thesetiredeyes3431Eden Daoc, search it in google and come join the fun.. developers also have a “secret” project going to make DAOC in unreal engine so.. that’s exciting too.
So much good stuff about DAoC. I played it a LOT back in the day.
I loved that the 3 factions were so culturally different, and at the time no matter which realm I played the others always seemed better..!
It would have been easy for each ream to have the same classes. What strikes me about DAoC was how each realm had different styles. Minstrel/Bard/Skald. Paladin/Warden/Thane. Cleric/Druid/Healer. I played on Gaheris a lot in the end, and you could mix and match all classes. It was so fun!
I was one of the many CSRs that Mythic brought in for WAR, and was directly impacted by EA's dismantling of the studio. They had us meet off-site to do mass-layoffs in groups of 30+ at a time. Despite all of that, I still love DAoC and currently play on Eden. Have been playing different incarnations of the game off and on since 2001, and probably always will as long as somewhere has the population to make it worthwhile.
Little floaty orbs of sorcery
I'm on Eden as well, Hib
What is CSR?
@@YavNe Customer Support Representative. The equivalent of a GM in other MMOs and DAoC freeshards.
God bless the CSRs that had to deal with my /appeals when I was 12 years old. LOL
my first mmo and I consider it still one of the best and most epic mmo, The pvp and all it's system was fantastic for its time, and I would argue I would love the pvp system they had in any of the new mmo's.
One of the best game history videos I have seen on DAoC. Your digging to find old interviews was impressive. I really enjoyed this!
I was in college and heard about it by word of mouth. Best time I have ever had playing a video game. going hard 15 hours a day like a fiend to be #1 Aug healer on my server
Played for the last 20 years. I’ve played since I was 7 years old. The game is what made me love gaming. My entire family played ! Blades of Unity-Guinevere ;Midgard!!!
The music was gorgeous. Makes me tear up hearing it again. Having 3 realms, as opposed to two, was also genius. And yes, my friends and I did quit it for WoW, but tried to come back for Warhammer online. The game was just too buggy.
Best MMO I played at it's peak. I played it from launch until 2004. I've played more UO and still play UO on Outlands. That said, I'd pay stupid money for an updated DAOC!
From a DAoC vet, ty for this, great job man. I definitely learned a ton. Appreciate it.
Hey, glad you enjoyed it.
This game was such a huge part of my life - I met so many people who became friends IRL because of it. The game was simply amazing. But, and I'll die on this hill, Jacobs selling off to EA thinking about a cash grab after so many games EA had just bought and slowly killed, which would eventually be what happen to the Mythic team. We all knew it was over when Sanya left for another company. She was the best community manager there has ever been. She was engadged and we saw our feedback come to lfe. Her leaving was the sign.
Then unfortunely giving us some hope when jacobs left and started CityState and began asking for the DAOC fanbse to gofundthem money to start on Camelot Unchained. That vaporware is such a joke for those of us who actually thought they were righting the wrong that was the EA sale. But all Jacobs does now is take our 10mil in donations and put out a trash update video every 6 months.
Woulda coulda shoulda, had EA stayed out, I think this would have lived much longer. Broadsword is actually doing a decent job with it right now, ever with the ridicoulus sub fee if you want access to all, but a Free option that gives you plenty.
You would sell out too for tens of millions, it was his retirement and game was already at the end of its life.
Agree from a consumer pov. EA was the killer. And should not be sub based anymore.
It's been over 2 decades, yet I remember my first guild on Midgard/Prydwen called Jorheim's People Front. GL was called Hoden. Some of the others were Gupster, Jols, Arth, Tricky, to name a few. Guild disbanded and the next one was The Salamanders. Nothing has ever scratched the itch since. Such good times!
Midgard Pellinor here. I don't really remember my guild too much, memories from early on that stuck the most.. grouping up killing tomte camps and then venturing into nisse's lair with a grp. Later weeping willows and then grouping up for werewolf camp, and eventually grouping up for spindlehalla. And of course remember seeing the first enemy a purple Firbolg, who wound up being the first 50 on our server I believe
@@chriso6042 Enjoyed that read. I'd forgotten about Myrkwood mobs and Spindy. Nisse's was one of favourites to take my BB and level up alts a bit or help newbies get going. Or do you mean the werewolf camps at Malmo or Vind (forget the exact dungeon name) for that last push to 50? Ha! I remember being in Awe of the first 50 I ran into...a Thane if I remember right. I'm sure the lingo for a purple was "grape con"
@NukSooKow-yp9py ya Askheim the fort by gna faste. I remember the later stuff a bit too, but mostly the original.
Malmo was fun too. I think the other stuff sticks so much because I played hunter to 35ish, then switched and played skald, and back then leveling took forever.
I could genuinely watch retrospectives and video essays about DAoC until the end of time, just hearing the ambient music makes me so incredibly happy. I've not played a game since that's given me the same feeling as Camelot did back in the day, probably helped by being barely a teenager at the time, but the amount of time I spent on this and the friends I made, that I still speak to now, is amazing.
38:00 I think among the many things that set DAoC apart from contemporary MMOs to make it more accessible was no level loss and you kept your gear when you died. Other MMOs could let you lose so much XP on death that you actually leveled down, and made you run "naked" back to your corpse to get your items back. If dangerous monsters were between you and your body, you had to risk dying a lot and losing progress or begging for help. DAoC still made you lose xp, but with a floor of your current level. I think it was the most accessible and casual friendly for its time. Which is a big contrast to today's mindset, where original WoW was easily ten times more casual than this and is held in high regard as a brutal hardcore experience.
Well done video! Lots of history here I was unaware of. Played DAoC shortly after launch and pretty much exclusively until LoM came out. I was new to PC games and heard about this game through word of mouth. I still have it on my PC and visit from time to time. I was never into RvR due to my PC melting anytime more than 20 players were near in the Frontier. I think the best memories from Camelot come from leveling and hitting 50 on my first character. Also DRAGONS! I remember the call to arms across the lands anytime a relic was being attempted or a Dragon party was being formed. The world felt so alive and nothing felt like a grind. Every time I logged in truely felt like an adventure.
The two things that stood out to me in DAoC to me was the fun of the huge RVR battles with keep sieges, and the incredible variety of class skills. I mean I have never seen another game with a class like the theurgist who could send out dozen little elementals to chase you. I also liked the ability to have buffs that you didn't have to constantly renew. Of course, it did open the door for buff bots which were kind of cheesy, but I still liked it better than having to recast every 10 minutes.
Yep. All realms being unique in feel as well as different strengths was awesome. The 8v8 and 8vX combat was amazing. The fact that you could pvp in so many different ways was great.. solo, small groups, 8man, zerg, stealth solo, stealth groups etc
I even enjoyed the grind nature of pve when the game released. Actually talking to other players, grouping up and chilling. I despise the current system of following quests and skipping through the dialog and cutscenes until max level.
I'm still at it after 22+ years, "I can't quit ya", lol. We have since moved to Eden which is free and they have done a wonderful job with it so far! Long Live DAoC, best game evah!
I still have my install disc with the CompUSA price tag on it. Only recently discovered that the game is still alive, and will definitely check it out!
DAOC remains the one MMORPG that has wide-scale PVP I actually really enjoy playing.
I love this game, I play on Eden also and the RvR combat is still ahead of it's time. The Graphics do show their age but oh well.
Still playing DAoC (on Eden Freeshard). Not as much as back then in the 2000s where I had much more time, but still quite regularly. Still the best PvP oriented MMO ever.
It's good to see the Eden shard has so many players on it.
I played SO much Rolemaster Magestorm back in the late 90's and early 2000's. I love that game so much. I wish there was a modern version of it. There's been a fan remake of Magestorm in the works for years, but I think it's by a solo dev, so it probably won't be coming out any time soon.
You can play the original. There's just only people on it like one day a week.
I loved DAOC and played on the US servers even though I was in the UK (Albion, Galahad) The lower level Battlegrounds were a great innovation, the RvR was wonderful, but the most important part of the game was the other players, whether they were allies or enemies! In what other game would you get 200 Albs, 200 Hibs and 300 Mids gathering in the Midgard frontier for a memorial service to a Midgard player who had passed away? Teletha's memorial was one of the most emotional events I have ever been involved in in ANY game.
Man, this was a trip down memory lane. I remember reading people debate the merits of switching from eq1 to DAoC in zone chat when playing eq1. Glad to see you're still making videos!
my nightshade climbing castle walls to ambush travelers. those were the good days! great video mate!
Still come back to it from time to time. One of the best mmorpgs ever made and the pvp aspect was not surpassed till today (no, ESO and WOW do not achieve the level of greatness of being sandwiched between 2 armies). I might just come back again and make another toon.
I learned quite a bit about world building and game development from mastering this game and reverse-engineering it to learn how to develop unique and dynamic character classes.
I also learned a ton about team PVP while leading the largest guild on the Kay server then later while leading two guilds on PVP servers.
What a throwback! Starting a new journey today and this pops up reminding of times past, strange! Loved this game to its core and dare to think the amount of hours RVRing with mates. Thanks for this!
Nevermind, i read your description and you point toward Lithlet's channel.
Very interesting video!!!
My first MMO and still waiting for a new real 3 realms /PVE/RVR MMO...😢😢
Such a great game - me and some friends keep coming back to it when new private servers open. We had an amazing time on Phoenix and I'm sure we will be back at some point.
I have such fond memories, the PvE (even though quite grindy) was amazing and the RvR as well as the Battlegrounds (Thidranki!) were so much fun.
The servers did support 3000 (I believe it was increased at some point to 3500, but I might be mistaken), but remember that there were also regular crashes if big events happened. I still remember some events where people had to meet at zone-crossings to make sure half of the ~200 people sat in one zone and the other half in the other zone. It was also quite useful, as incoming lag always preceded large incoming enemy zergs. You don't have that feature anymore today ;)
A joy to see you upload, especially enjoy your videos on MMOs because they passed me by but the idea of them fascinates me
Best game ever. I played at the release, and continued off and on for many years until life changed. I still watch DAoC videos on TH-cam today to get my fix.
I was just checking your channel yesterday to see if anything new came up. I should've waited a day. Happy new year and many subscribers.
Ha! Thanks for checking back in! I'm hoping to get a bit more consistent this year. You know how it goes...sometimes life comes up. But that's the goal!
Great documentary and thanks a lot - from a guy who spent tens of thousands of hours playing tihs game.
20 plus years later (ALB Nimue) and I have never since found any MMO that I enjoyed more then Dark Age of Camelot.
Hail to the King of MMO'S!
Glad too see the Freeshard EDEN classic server is doing well.
I will be returning!
Wish I still had my cloth map from this game. It was really nice.
Indeed. I miss so many cloth an paper maps from the good ole days of boxed copies.
my Infiltrator Noshot loved being the PvP villian! one thing about DAoC was that you could literally be the world boss, if you dedicated yourself and had the skills you could be that 1 player everyone wanted to kill as soon as you stepped into the RvR, you could be famous in your realm, the realm leader people would rally around you and follow your commands in RvR.. it was great
loved the game played it from the start, the concept of 3, the battlegrounds, and pvp were excellent.
That character selection music hits hard with nostalgia
I loved DAOC. I logged in on day 1 and played for years. Sadly there is nothing quite like it. Crowfall came close but was shutdown a year ago. Fingers crossed for Camelot Unchained!
just discovered your channel - very in depth and satisfying breakdown and retrospective! Looking forward to seeing what else you've covered subscribed!
Thanks for the mentionning :)
went back and played this off and on retail so much and then one a few different private servers up till like 2019 shit was so fun
Really good video really enjoyed it. You did miss Old Frontiers and mentioning the original Beta Test which got a lot of people on board including me.
Still play daily. Best PvP ever.
Glad to see another video from this channel pop up. Once again, a great video. Its a wonder you don't have a six digit sub count!
Grabs popcorn. Love anyone just talking about this game.
Thanks for this, I learned a lot! This is by far my most favorite game of all time and there was so much here I never knew! Crazy seeing that screenshot from Darkness Falls, and all those items that I've picked up in DAoC....I sure do wish this game would have aged well like Eve, which came out around the same time. I look at what Eve Online looked like back at its release and I look at it today, and I really wish DAoC would have gotten the same treatment.
Eden is alive and kicking! The DAOC we love lives on!
Oh man DAOC .. I still have my beta CD of DAOC and AC still in my game room.
Mark Jacobs, what a great guy! Man, I wonder what kind of magic he's up to now!
. . .
DAoC was so good. So many good memories. Music underrated. Always wished it got a modern upgrade but that somehow would probably not equate very well, but perhaps it would. Design and class balance and pvp rvr was the draw. For me, I did enjoy Trials alot. Animist was my original character. At least I got to enjoy it when it was OP :)
DAoC has some of the most unique classes of any game I've played.
Honestly best game to be a literal troll ever, as well. They took one look at EverQuest trolls and were like ah...no...we're gonna make them badass.
I starting aging again. The music, the animation it all brings me back.
That said I don't remember RvR being as hard as it is, then again I played on non-atlantus servers back in the day so maybe thats what feels.different.
As it stands I have no idea what I'm doing anymore lol
God I wish that someone would pop out of the woodwork with some source code of the old AOL Online games.
Magestorm is still active. Main dev has the capability to do like Aliens and Splatterball and maybe Spellbinder, but wasn't enough interest. Darkness Falls: The Crusade has a remake called Olmran.
i was so addicted to that game, played it when it came out in france, i was like 13 or 14 y.o. played so much that i missed many school days. fortunatly i left the game because otherwise i wouldn't be able to study. now i want to come back to the old days but the game must have changed so much.
there is a new freeshard "eden" .. try that one
I loved DAOC back in the day. If it had kept expanding with more pve content I would have kept playing. I know a lot love just the rvr aspects, but my tastes go to a nice mix, as I play hardcore when I game (hours wise).
I cannot believe how they could mess up Camelot Unchained - when they have/rather had a huge popular base looking for it to release - but instead of doing a basic successor to DAOC they decided to be stupid and never achieve anything.
If Mythic had kept committed to it, it could have ended up like EverQuest or Lord of the Rings Online - small but still active. But of course, the EA purchase made that impossible. EA wanted the next World of Warcraft.
The pve content that was added, in the form of expacs, quickly became irrelevant (catacombs being the most questionable addition) that only enhanced gear and bloat for rvr. ToA had loads of content, amazing content that was great for solo players and groups, especially on the much harder pvp servers. Overall though, each of the pve expansions were larger zones of empty filler with specific items players farmed for and abandoned.
As a kid around 13-14 I remember sitting in my Dad’s office until 5am on weekends, watching him & my Uncle play with their guild, fighting Grave Goblins & Wights in Stonehenge Barrows 😅 Damn man, good times…
Best money I ever spent, I will never unsubscribe - even with lower population count, nothing comes close to DAOC.
I was addicted to this game when I was a kid.
Wonderful retrospective! I admit I skipped over this era of MMOs. I wish Freemium plans had existed back then because I would have been more willing to try them out but paying for a game and then paying a monthly sub really turned me off and, up to that point, I was primarily a single player game. It just wasn't for me at the time.
I might look into one of the player- run servers though and give it a try!
Still to this day my favorite MMO of all time! You're right about WOW killing off this game, but I think also having to have 2 accounts (buff bots), to be competitive in RVR helped too.
For me it was Trials of Atlantis the thought of levelling items and obtaining scrolls n stuff was just to much for me.
@@bensminecraft2733 well if u think about it, Trials of Atlantis really was the first game that introduced raiding to MMOs, which is the main thing in WOW and Final Fantasy and other MMOs.
I loved the content of ToA I just hated the levelling items and scroll hunting lol 😂
The ToA environment was amazing!
This has quickly become my favorite channel with under 10k subs... or probably 100k subs
One of the greatest games ever made.
I feel sad for gamers that hadn't the chance to experience it.
You can play it today, calm down dude
I miss my 11L1 Warden. Those were some fun times.
I miss my rank 12l2 hero. I finally did it in the end. I got that title that like 20 other players had...
I played Neverwinter Night on AOL, I found it rather unforgiving. Rolemaster is one of my favorite RPGs, I started playing it in the early 90s. Its so crunchy that its hard to find players for it anymore
That was a game I played when it launched, did not have the time to really get into it, and I now remember with regret how I missed it's prime.
Rolemaster Magestorm .. oh my god, as I kid growing up I absolutely LOVED that game. Other than DAoC no game has gripped me like that
You can still play Magestorm
Takes me back. Thanks a ton for making this video, wish I had seen it sooner. I jumped into DAOC on a whim shortly before Thanksgiving weekend that year. I had been perusing the Ultima and Everquest titles at Wal-Mart for some time, and a friend I played M:TG with at the game store suggested DAOC as an alternative with better pvp. PVP had been a big thing I was looking for from my days spent playing MUDs and MUSEs. I never knew of the connection between Mythic, DAOC and those early online multiplayer games (other than the obvious online multiplayer facet), but it makes a lot of things make sense. How the point of view affected the desired outcome.
However, DAOC had a lot of problems, that only continued to grow even before EA bought them. Myself and my friends from my guild were constantly discussing and on the lookout for something new to jump to. We tried things like Anarchy, SW:G, City of Heroes, Guild Wars, FF XI, Lineage 2 and eventually WoW. Even WoW was insufficient and we all left and went back to DAOC, for a while... but yea, following the release of Labyrinth of the Minotaur, a few months later, we were all off playing WoW and never went back again. Dissatisfaction with Mythic's customer support and frequent "Working as intended" mantra when players encountered problems were what killed the game. These were the main factors in driving sufficient subscribers elsewhere. Did a great number of them move to WoW? Absolutely, but like I said, we were constantly leaving. It wasn't until WoW that we found a game solid and robust enough to let the DAOC subscription die. And even still we held out hope, with Warhammer Age of Reckoning... our hopes took quite a hit when EA bought Mythic, but we still hoped, bought our copy, and jumped on. But where as Mythic without EA likely would have made different decisions regarding what to do when sub numbers slumped, it's also quite possible sub numbers would never have slumped like that, without EA's mismanagement of the teams at Mythic and Bioware. EA never properly understood what they were buying, and I don't believe they cared. And it showed, players could tell, and you can't afford too much of that when relying on a subscriber system.
So you just never tried everquest?
DAOC is the ONLY thing i wish i was young again. Best game ever made and best life span i had with it
Been thinking about coming back to play my necro miss that game.
Really miss the game. Was annoyed when WoW came out and people migrated. He said three sides kept one from dominating... but Midgard dominated big time in my day. I was Team Hibernia... we were the definite underdogs.
Excellent review. Being a veteran on this game ( 7 years ) and never found another one like this. It was my first MMO and would be forever the last one. Childish and too commercial, wow sadly killed it. But the problems for Mythic began way before wows launch : What it's not said in this video is that if daoc had not been weakened by a series of very bad expansions, it would have better resisted the onslaught of wow. The toa expansion particularly hurt DAoC and its player base. Alas we can't remake the past and bad choices. Ha, if mythic had launched DAoC 2 instead of the Warhammer fiasco, but did they still have the talent?
But the wonderful DAoC still exists while so many other games have disappeared...
ToA was amazing but just too hard, they made it eaiser too late but last 2 expansions were just garbage tbh .. NF sucked balls, great concept and design just poorly excuted.
Hearing the theme song brings back memories
amazing.. I played this from the start and too much after, but i have learned so much from this.. a good job by yourself
Glad ya enjoyed it!
One of the best games of all time and had a shoestring budget and very little time. Just goes to show what you can do with creativity and a lack of diversity as the defining goal. You don't need tens of millions and cutting edge graphics.
DAOC was the best MMO ever, the gameplay was so good, you needed skill to get it right
I loved the attack chains and positioning. I miss DAoC. I wish it would get updated graphics and be re-released, minus new Frontiers.
@@BrandyGraf Yeah NF sucked :D Such a shame too, the intent was good. The RVR battles were amazing in the old frontiers. Teamwork was SO important, too. Your stealthers (assassins and archers) would sneak around unseen, share information about groups with friendly teams... you'd have your DPS casters, long-range casters, crowd-controllers, healers, heal-over-time healers, melee DPS, dual-wield DPS, tanks (that did amazing DPS, too), many different utility classes for debuffs and buffs. The concept of unseen low damage but ground-targeted AOE damage. Attacking keeps, capturing Realm Relics, late night raids to catch the enemy off-guard...
I can still dream about dungeons and enemies like it was yesterday...
Playing it today. XD Eden Freeshard made DAoC come to life again
I started playing right after shrouded isles came out, stayed till the labyrinth of the minotaur, had several accounts for mains and others for buff bots, ran a few guilds, spent a lot of time playing DAOC. Greatest mmo ever !
Man, this video really puts Mark Jacobs' latest endeavor, Camelot Unchained, into perspective. Regardless of what you think of the guy, he is ambitious but also stubborn. It's like he's trying to capture lightning in a bottle twice- he has the concept/dream, but it's as if he's attempting to do another underdog push into the market via unconventional methods (many of which are the same ones he cut his teeth on throughout DAOC's development).
I have never met him, but his history makes me think Jacobs is quite stubborn and willing to pave his own path. Sometimes a great trait, sometimes not as much. On the plus side, maybe he will see Camelot Unchained through despite its very long development so far.
@@computergamingyesterday ya, I can see that and being burned by EA on Warhammer Online probably left him with an unhealthy dose of cautiousness. Hopefully he can pull off CU- I backed it, although I'm not holding my breath.
I played the hell out of this game. 12 hours a day sometimes. I've been through a lot of MMORPGs since originally trying The Realm, But DAOC always stands out as some of my most memorable gaming.
I know there's several free shards available, but they are all too much of a departure from the classic feel I wanted. Currently waiting for Blackthorn to get up and running.
Greatest game ever made in my experience. The big issue is that PvE wasn't as good as WOW so when it came out many people left for that game and DAOC relied on population since the big draw was the RvR/PvP aspect of the game. The other issue was highly skilled players could dominate larger groups of lesser skilled players because of the games great game mechanics. Those players advanced in realm rank quicker which earned them extra abilities which further increased their advantage over the fodder which left lesser skilled players to zerg or camp keeps since they couldn't complete in solo/8 man fights.
DAoC was and is my fav pvp game ever!
Fantastic channel, important historical stuff given the general rise of social media and online interaction since these days
One of the most underrated MMOs out there
This game was childhood memories
I remember RvR battles with hundreds of people fighting in squads and zergs. At that point though, the netcode couldnt keep up and it became a slideshow. Was still fun though. The most addictive game i have ever played. I eventually had to sell my account and take my life back. I felt like a recovering addict.
My online gaming journey was the best. Multiplayer Battletech on AOL - Ultima Online - Asheron's call - DAOC. The good old days.
Still the best game nothing even comes close. It's as if you're playing 4d chess with x number of other people in real time.
I'll always remember the smooth launch of daoc.
Trials of Atlantis was definitely what ran off a lot of Players, it isn't a mystery. Only a minority of Players had enough time to grind up the Atlantean Artifacts to a competitive level.
the cloudsong freakout meme lol
My Fav MMO of all time though I only played much RvR on Uthgard as a Healer and mostly play casual with friends/family. Back in the 2000s my 50 friar on live hit RvR in time for Trials of Atlantis to be released and I couldn't put time into that to keep up!
Glad to see so many comments about how this game was|is so amazing, I agree with all of you! ❤
God this game was amazing, played it almost as much as Ultima Online. I never got into World of Warcraft even though I really loved the Warcraft RTS and wanted to play it. I decided to play Guild Wars instead, and XBOX took a lot of my attention. Everyone always talks about RvR but I just loved Mordred, coming from UO I was so excited when that server launched and I got to fight and traverse all the realms and interact with all weapons/mobs/races and teams. I have video footage still of doing raids with everyone to slay the dragon and all that, one day I will upload them (on an old pc that was in storage).
It really was a fun game. I remember when WoW came out, people kept trying to get me to leave and I wouldn't give it up. It was just too much fun
I still play DAOC on Ywain server (live).
I quit DAoC for WoW when it released, but came back later. Looking back I consider DAoC part of my childhood whereas WoW was just a game.