It's time for an honest conversation Devs - What are you doing?

The Watchmen tie-in was what I was looking forward to most.

Ball well & truly dropped on that one.

For me, the problem is the inconsistency in quality of the content. Here is how I would review this DLC:

After the tell on Perpetua's eyebeam 1shot attack was made more clear, the new raid has felt really fun. There's tons of stuff going on in that fight and it feels refreshing compared to other newer raids where you just stand still single targeting a boss. I don't even mind the reused Dark Knights bosses because the mechanics are fun. Elite is fun too. 9/10 raid.

The duo has some cool stuff: a new, good-looking level, and an interesting subplot. And yet, the first 2 bosses are pretty must just rehashed from previous raids? And now the 2nd boss has chances to overlap attacks so just screw you over for no reason. The last boss is mostly original but it's just lacking in terms of mechanics. 5/10.

The alert is a mess. Reused level and bosses. The fights and the mechanics on the last 2 bosses feel inconsistent/ignorable. It's genuinely better to just ignore the mechanics on those bosses and brainlessly DPS through everything. It doesn't feel polished or complete. Elite feels so similar to regular, but everything just has like double health? It's just so boring... 1/10.

As for the open world: it's alright. Reused area but redesigned assets are ok by me. The dailies are slightly more interesting than the last DLC's I suppose. I'm not sure why the weekly counter missions are thrown about the place. Very disappointed that the collections, briefs, and investigations don't give any style pieces or anything...just catalysts. Sad. Overall, the open world is largely inoffensive, but nothing really interesting is going on. At least the Jimmy missions are different. 6/10.

Styles: They are okay if you are into metal stuff, I guess. The Death Metal WW style looks really good on females, but not so good on males. Batman's style looks pretty good all-around. The OP back is cool. The lantern supply drops are appreciated for people who like lantern stuff (although they seem really out of place for this DLC). Robot sidekick skins are also very nice. 7/10.

You can see that, in my opinion, the content is all over the place in terms of quality. When a DLC feels so inconsistent, it makes for a mostly lukewarm experience. I do think it's better than the last DLC, if that helps. If the raid was anything less than it is, I would have been much more disappointed.

Your points and Proxy's original points are all true. But like I stated elsewhere, Ep 43 is a live training project for the new hires, as such with that in mind, I think they exceeded my expectations delivering to us an enjoyable DLC which I hope will keep us entertained until Ep 44 drops. Ep 44 will be the true test to show us the talents, capabilities, and direction of the new dev team.

I believe from the posts Charon has made that this is going to be a very good team that will deliver some really exciting products to us. I feel that Charon is engaging with us and engaging with his dev team to come up with ideas that will delight us.

Please don't judge Ep 43 against the previous DLCs with the same metrics as it is a live training project worked on by the new dev team who are still learning the ins & outs as well as the skills of each other. By the release of Ep 44 I believe they will give us a feel for their chemistry as the work together on creating new projects.

I see a lot of players stopping DCUO because they are fed up with having half a new DLC recycled and always facing the same thing and I'm also starting to think that DCUO is not worth the trouble anymore, yet I love this universe...

Also, we're increasingly faced with a game of uneven difficulty where some people demand a difficult game while most, I think, see it as a "mainstream" game because it's the DC comics universe

There's also the fact that the studio doesn't really listen to its community which is very often reported about DCUO in addition to being too much on the players' money and that I think really breaks everything that the game could be or could have been...

Pretty much sums it up. I think they listen too much though, hence the constant 180’s. If the game were always clamped like it is now, nobody would mind since there’d be nothing to compare it to. The fact that everything was one shot-able once you out leveled it and now you can not is an understandable blame for one of the many 180s that hurt population/potential for the game. Just never a clear vision.

They've listened on many, many, many, accounts.

I finally looked thru the vendor and those prices might as well be triple digits. Hot damn! Not cool. Not cool.

One aspect that hasn't been talked about much here that I'd like to bring up is that the recycled content is only just a piece of the sameness that has been detrimental to the game.

In the realm of dps powers, basically every ranged ST might loadout consists of heat vision + finisher + robot sidekick, and sometimes freezing breath. At least in my opinion this just makes watching rotations and fights boring. Watching these rotations its basically Red line -> blue cone channel -> power themed line with an occasional pi or dot application. Whats the point of having different powers if their rotations are just slight variations of the same iconic power rotation with a themed finisher and dot/pi applicator.

For melee its not as bad, but I would still argue powers could really use something to replace/be equivalent to whirling dervish/sonic cry/frost breath for their aoe rotations.

I'm not arguing that iconics should be nerfed into the ground as I know that people enjoy using them. I would argue however that non iconics need to be raised in strength so you that using your real powers is at least viable at the high end.

I'm not a prec player but they have a similar situation with the same two brawling/dw WM combos being best in slot. Again not arguing for a nerf of those, but for raising others up.

I am aware that its a cat and mouse game when aiming for balance between powers/weapons, but at least trying for diversity would be a great start.

Another major factor I'd like to bring up is the extreme reuse of music, although this has gotten better over time.
While we do occasionally get new tracks like in the some of the metal episodes, actually creating new music for content would go a long way to making zones and raids feel more different.
I'm not sure if dcuo has a full time music person on staff, but this would be a pretty great idea for improving future episodes.
As new tracks are created they could also be inserted into older relevant content that uses the same couple versions of boss battle/theme music.

One thing I've noticed more now since this episode dropped and kind of addresses how players like Proxystar don't care for the Death Metal storyline is I myself didn't really gel or like it either because it just feels oh so unnecessarily bleak, if that's the right emotion I'm trying to convey? I mean don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to say this is fundamentally wrong and I do think as story themes go DCUO has tried to balance whacky hi-jinks with darker more mature themes, maybe? Just like DC comics in general I guess? But yes we've fought threats like Brainiac, Darkseid and the Black Lanterns before but also before Death Metal it felt like the game had more hope and happiness in it, as we raced to save the Multiverse and the peoples in it? Now it just feels like treading water in a pool of bleakness. Sorry I'm not addressing other issues that players might have like game progression or mechanics or recycled assets but the overall theme and environment of the game itself that DM seems to have added to it overall. I don't know about you guys but I'm not down for playing a game that can potentially depress you, you know? Like in these recent episodes in the open world Washington we got BWL turning orphan children to Dark Robin zombies (if I understand that correctly?), Sinestro's UV Lanterns kidnapping people to harvest fear and now you got Perpetua experimenting on humans turning them into Martian hybrids the Apex Predators those Dragonball looking aliens (now Goku and Vegeta toons can feel authentic I guess) it's all so goulish and creepy really. Granted it's just my personal preferences for what type of content of games I play but I feel if I play something with the DC logo it doesn't necessarily have to be so bleak. We used to be able to un-transform or free citizens who were in trouble. That mechanic was oddly left out this DLC. I'm not trying to say we can't have "bad stuff" happen in a game obviously not trying to sound weaksauce here but as Proxy pointed out we've had three years of Death Metal edginess for awhile, it got kinda too much now I feel. I'm not saying DCUO should all be kiddie G rated oh boy let's be old school Batman and Robin from the 60's and defeat enemies with the Power of Love or anything but yeah I'm kinda clocking out on all this Metal stuff I'm feeling. Just my opinions on Death Metal as a whole. Not saying I still don't like DCUO but I do feel the themes of Metal have been really played out by now but yeah I do understand some fans really like BWL so I hope I'm not sounding too judgemental here.

The event it's based on was pretty bleak and hopeless. Actually, the DCUO version of events is considerably less dark.

Once they were locked into the Metal storyline, I imagine they had to finish it. It was a major event in the comics for 2 years, but I agree that it's been overstretched. Half-arseing it / cutting it off would have left things in limbo, though. It does have the advantage that DCUO can have a Joker surrogate without paying Mark Hammill, I suppose - but people are hungry for the OG Joker.

Having said that, it's been my least-favourite ongoing storyline. And it didn't have to be done all at once. I forget how long it was between AF2 and AF3, but over a year - and THAT story didn't suffer for the break. In fact it was refreshing to go back to Olympus-themed content.

I feel that spreading out related content has worked so well in the past that it's lunacy not to capitalise on that. But content always seems to revolve around three particular groups - Lanterns, Themyscirans and the Bat Family.

The last Superman-centric episode we had was Death Of. Out of the Big Three he gets the least love. Possibly because he's extremely boring (IMO).

And enough of the Multiverse / Alternate Versions. Is what there is to work with so poor that it can't be exciting? No.

Give JLD another spot? Maybe revolving around Twilight of the Superheroes (sorry, Alan) or including The Endless? Or insert your favourite ignored group here.

As far as the recycling is concerned, I agree. But that is, again, part of the storyline from the comics - and additionally a training wheels excercise for the new Devs.

But. Content shouldn't suffer just because you have new blood at the company. Git Gud, New Devs.

Previously (e.g. Atlantis) there was a completely committed Artist (you know who I mean) who could work fast and to an extremely high standard to sort out the textures required for new maps.

If the Black Adam / Shazam postulated DLC is just a rework of Kahndaq, and Black Adam doesn't do something new, other than shout "SHAZAM!" every 30 seconds for group wipe, I'm going to be incredibly disappointed.

Something I would REALLY like to see in this game is something we've never seen. Rather than "Hero/Villain X" standing in the middle of a zone, and having what is effectively a stand-still fight with us, and their usual Nemesis, I want to see a full-on brawl.

And by that I mean that we and they can throw the scenery at each other, effectively (it doing decent damage). I want Black Adam and Shazam to literally rip things out of the ground and beat each other with them. I want a rolling, running fight, where players are punched through walls. Where we follow them as they smash the ever-loving **** out of each other. Not following between phases - I want it to be go where the fight is. One long, brawling fight.

Too much to ask for?

DC does this every few years to reboot their continuity. It's necessarily Apocalyptic, and therefore grim. This is their preferred method for dealing with continuity errors - just say it's from another Universe in the Multiverse, and when it gets too much, reboot.

I wish they'd just pick the classic origins, and unify them once and for all. Retcons are slightly preferable to the Multiverse stuff. But not by much.

Out of the Big Three, the only one to have their Origin retconned is Wonder Woman. And unneccesarily, IMO.

Shazam (Captain Marvel) also has the Greek gods influence (the source of his power), so we could see them again.

One new theme we could see with Black Adam is the addition of the Egyptian god mythology (the source of his power). The chances of that increase with Dr Fate likely in play too (because he’s in the movie and also from ancient Egypt).

It’s hard to say what they’ll do, but I would rather see a full on Egypt open world (which could later be used as a foundation for a Mars open world in a Martian Manhunter episode).

You know that that could mean….? New Egyptian Lair style! YAY

With every passing day, I'm convinced this game will be absolutely shattered when the rest of the industry finds out about the triple-down microtransactions, the laughably bad glitches, the versions on next-gen consoles randomly shutting down the whole console and requiring a storage repair, and the frankly astonishing amount of bots. Content or not, Daybreak needs to completely shut down Time Capsules, bring everything in them to the ingame Daybreak Store for a flat purchase, and just take a long, long time to iron out the issues. The engine is now two versions behind. (while I am aware it is extremely difficult to upgrade engine, it's been two console generations now, it's time to at least try).

Nowadays I'm just convinced this whole game is a money laundering scheme. I talk to my friends who play many other MMORPG's, and they are absolutely appalled at the stuff this game gets away with. The voice acting feeling like it was taken from unpaid interns on their break time, age-old animations that are beginning to be even more awkward with the newer models, and new areas looking like they came out of the PS2/Gamecube era, coupled with the ridiculous amount of recycled content from other 'expansions'.

Are the scamcapsules a publisher issue? Is DC mandating all of this? Are you deliberately underselling in hope this game doesn't get mainstream success, because you're afraid WB will shut it down the moment it gets bad press from how much potentially illegal gambling and background dealing is going on?

In 11 years I have never fallen this far behind in terms of collecting feats. I am currently at 995 sp.

I have obsessed and obsessed with SP for a decade. But even I have reached my limit. I am not gonna bash but the constant repetitiveness has finally beaten me down. The making of mods, the same 50 kill bounty feat, the same "no death feats", the same grind of Elite Gear... its finally taking its toll on my desire to play like I used too. I am gonna hit the 1000 sp club soon. I think that is good enough.

I'm willing to give the devs something of a one-time pass on the current and previous two DLCs, and the current state of the game, because of the circumstances of a bunch of devs leaving and there being a bunch of new devs-in-training which explains why we have a DLC that looks as if it's been put together by people using training wheels.

The seams of that are showing clearly.

But we have no idea what the circumstances are of various key people leaving in a short period of time. The general sense is of a tiny dev staff having little ability to pick up the pieces and carry on with development-as-normally-intended until new devs are fully trained and experienced and the staff isn't working excessively shorthanded.

Thus my giving a one-time pass.

But the basis for real judgment will come, I think, as Tiffany pointed out, with the next DLC, and I'd suggest also the one after that. If we're-building-a-new-HQ and we-built-two-DLCs-using-training-wheels are just the results of temporary conditions, okay.

But the next couple of DLCs better be innovative and creative and pleasing or a lot of long-time players may be apt to just get bored and leave. Frankly, I've come close to doing that already. I've just pretty much stopped raiding for the past entire couple of years and mostly just solo stuff and don't give a crap about "progression" any more because, sorry, for me the clamp just 97% eliminated any sense of progression, however little it may have ever existed in the first place. But that's me and I don't want to generalize far from my own personal feelings. Nor do I want to pointlessly argue further about clamp/no-clamp/optional-clamp.

The best solution would be if the corporate owners threw a bunch more cash at Daybreak to permanently significantly enlarge the staff again and raise the budget for more ambitious projects than just-another-cookie-cutter-DLC, thus enabling the creation of, finally, actual new powersets-and-weapons, which at this point have been missing from the game for too many years, but I'm not gonna hold my breath waiting for that miracle.

But maintenance-only mode can't go on much longer or the player base will go into significant desertion mode. More than the usual churn.

I'm Just Saying: devs, you've had slack, but the next couple of DLCs better impress or at least some of us will lose patience and cease bothering with the game at all. There's never enough time for other games, and for movies/television/books/the-rest-of-life anyway. This Is A Warning: step up your game or risk suffering the consequences.

Feel free to paste this post out and tape it to every dev's cubicle, Mepps.

How are you at 995 SP when the max is around 736+?