There are few institutions in gaming like Dungeons & Dragons. From humble beginnings as a pen-and-paper RPG, D&D has proven to be one of gaming's most enduring franchises. There was a time when you simply couldn't get your geek papers without playing it. Not only has it been directly adapted into countless video games, but it could be considered the mother of all RPGs, so it's not surprising that a MMORPG based on this dearly loved classic has raised a lot of interest. Dungeons & Dragons Online (DDO) stays acceptably close to D&D 3.5 rules for a real-time game. D&D fans will be in familiar territory, but even if you're new to RPGs it's not difficult to adapt to, and the community is usually helpful. The DM has been replaced with bits of audible "DM text" and the computer handles all the dice, so the pace of gameplay is brisk.

The graphics in the game are excellent and they've managed to capture the essense of D&D in a believeable way. We've come to expect these games to look terrific, and DDO lives up to this expectation with a complete array of visual bells and whistles. The engine allows your character to jump, fall, and climb, giving you more freedom of movement than some games of this kind. Because of the instancing system and the fact that Stormreach is itself broken into numerous zones, loading screens are a way of life. During quests the game runs smoothly, but running across city zones can still cause extreme lag and irritating crashes to the desktop.

They've used the city of Stormreach from the Eberron campaign as a setting. Subsequently, there is a playable race called Warforged that are a combination of machine and magic, which is something a lot of people don't expect to find in a D&D game. They are a central part of campaign's lore, and while they are a bit peculiar, many games have far stranger playable races. The current level cap is 10. These are broken into 5 ranks each to bring progress more into line with what people expect from a MMORPG, and I suspect that the cap will be bumped up to 20 in conjunction with future content releases.

As I mentioned in my beta impressions, there are no large persistent areas in DDO. Taverns and city zones serve as meeting areas, from which parties of up to 6, or raids of up to 12, depart on instanced dungeon crawls. There are advantages to the heavy use of instancing. Different parties doing the same quest cannot interfere with each other, and there are no line-ups to kill boss monsters. Puzzles, traps, and dynamic environments can be offered that would be impossible for everyone to experience in a persistent world. Image 2006 D. Spohn licensed to About.com, Inc.The downside to instanced content is that being in your own private copy of a zone is a long way from "massively multiplayer."

When you get sent into the sewers to rescue someone, you can bet that the Kobolds aren't going to be happy about it. DDO follows most RPG combat conventions, with a few notable exceptions. The shift key lets you block, and your right mouse button lets you perform a single swing of your weapon, although you have an auto-attack toggle as well. I'm still not convinced the single swing is really useful for anything aside from breaking barrels. In keeping with the original D&D, your health does not automatically regenerate. You can recover only in taverns or at the single-use rest shrines found in some dungeons, making healing classes highly valued. This also forces players to give some thought to their strategy, as they can find themselves without enough health or spell points to complete a quest.

DDO has some of the most imaginative traps, puzzles, and side quests I've seen in a game of this kind. It brings to light the biggest problem with traps and puzzles in MMORPGs; word gets around very quickly, making secret doors anything but secret. If you're playing DDO with a random group, odds are at least one person in the group knows exactly where the traps are and how the puzzles are solved. Naturally, the best way to enjoy content like this unspoiled is with a group of friends at a similar level. To gain experience you must complete these instanced quests; you can't progress simply by sitting in one spot and grinding mobs. Apart from a few early dungeons, soloing is not a viable option in DDO, and there are no NPC henchmen for hire.

Traditional D&D didn't have crafting, so it won't come as a shock that there is no crafting in DDO either. While you can trade with other players, they've made an effort to avoid a player-driven economy. You can exchange items through NPCs at fixed rates, but there is nothing akin to the auction houses some other games offer. The chat system in DDO does not even have a trade channel. Many people have mixed feelings about player-driven economies because they can be unpredictable. They invite real-money trade and they're not immune to such things as inflation, however, in my view they're far more interesting than static economies controlled by NPCs.

The graphics in Lineage 2 have aged extremely well and the game still looks great. Some of the environmental effects, such as water, aren't quite up to what the latest games have to offer, but for a seamless world it certainly holds its own. The player and creature models are remarkably detailed. Lineage 2 has earned a bit of a reputation for its female character models, which often look more like they belong in a beauty pageant than a war with ferocious beasts, especially given how scant their "armor" is. I don't doubt for a second that it appeals to hormone drenched teenage boys, but would a warrior of any gender go into battle with their underwear showing? Yeah, it's a fantasy game, and I guess this criticism could be levied against the industry as a whole.

Lineage 2 is almost 2 years old now and players are currently working their way through Chronicle 4: Scions of Destiny, the game's latest free content addition. If you're not familiar with the Lineage series, they are leading MMORPGs in Korea where they were developed, and they have subscribers that number in the millions overseas. They haven't been a huge success in North America, but Lineage 2 is making an effort to break into this market. Online games of this kind are constantly changing, and Lineage 2 is no exception. Along with a steady stream of bug fixes and content updates, adjustments have been made to lessen the "grind" that is often associated with this series. Chronicle 4 is the largest update the game has seen so far. Lineage 2 remains one of only a few games that feature large-scale PvP guild battles for territorial control of the game world.

To start out, Lineage gives you a choice of 5 races: Human, Elf, Dark Elf, Orc and Dwarf. Dwarves differ significantly from the other races in that they only have one initial class option, and they are the only race with crafting skills. Once you've settled on a race and gender, you decide between 2 starting classes: Fighter and Mystic. As you would expect, Fighters use weapons and Mystics use spells. This may not seem like much of a choice, but you do get to pick additional classes as you advance. It's worth having a look at the class structure before you get started to ensure you're on the right path.