Introducing: DCUO Relaxation Video Series

Welcome to my EQ 1 and 2, DCUO, Vanguard SOH, SWG Relaxation video series.

Greetings everyone,

I am known as Sturmlocke accross the universe. Huge fan of DCUO, EQ1, EQ2, VGSOH and SWG. Played them all, love them all. Now that I am back on PC, after playing on Playstation for many years, I thought it might be a good idea to give something back to these magnificent and highly underrated virtual mmo worlds. You're never going to see me do World of Warcraft or the likes, because I plan on focusing my entire effort on the games created by former SOE alias DBG / DPG. Basically just following my gut instincts here.

I played DCUO for many, many years, supporting it where I can both officially and unofficially. Started playing on PS3, then PC, then PS4, and now back on PC again. Began from scratch in DCUO after the last transition back to PC from console - did the same for EQ2 too btw. Not doing consoles anymore, maybe only for my kids as they get older. That said, I do enjoy the fact that DCUO still has good controller support as I play via a PS4 controller on PC. Back in the old days, my wife and I had our very own league in DCUO, which at one point in time had over a hundred active EU players. We're thinking of resurrecting what was once lost, after resurrecting and upgrading our old league website that is.

Anyway, long story short. Love these games and the time has come to give something back. This is for the engineers and the company that created these worlds, basically for everyone involved in its creation, and for our community of players too ofc. It is my sincere wish and hope that these relaxation videos will help us all take a deep breath and relax a bit, while also serving as a way to showcase our beautiful virtual home worlds to new and returning players alike. Been through countless of mmo worlds of the years, and I feel like a lot of virtual worlds have gotten a bit toxic in recent times. Back in the old days, over two decades ago, we would come together to help our devs achieve greatness, because in the end, everyone wins by motivating the powers that be to go the distance for us.

@DBG / DPG / DC: Keep up the great work and never give up!

Alrighty then, without further ado, this is my very first Relaxation video post for DCUO. I plan to do more as time goes on, covering all of our major cities, most of the vast amount of playable dungeons and much, much more. Housing videos are also on my to-do list btw. Please take a deep breath for this one and make sure to turn your sound up before hitting play. Relax and enjoy!

Last but not least: EQ2 dev "Ratalthor" confirmed that DBG / DPG is going to be fixing a long standing graphical glitch in EQ2 with its next expac. I promised that I'd put a bit more effort into future videos as a way of showing the powers that be that I appreciate the effort, and I'll be doing just that with my first DCUOR Atlantis video. Please note: My videos will contain music purchased via Indie Music Box and by Christopherlloydclarke. I just literally spent over 150 bucks for relaxing and stress relieving music, which I plan on using exclusively in some of my videos featuring all of the games mentioned in my introductory post further above. See here for more infos.

Powered by (Hard- and Software used for the creation and gameplay of my series):


Software:

• Elementary OS
• OBS
• Shotcut
• G i m p
• Trimmer
• Handbrake
• Steam + Proton
• All apps installed in a sandboxed environment via Flatpak
• Free and Open Source Software

Optiplex 3040 SFF:

• Core i7 6700
• 16 GB DDR3
• Nvidia Lenovo T600 4 GB GDDR6
• 1 TB SSD
• 1080p @ 60 fps

Thanks and happy relaxing,
Sturmlocke

Ok, seems that there is a time limit for post editing. Didn't know, as there is no such limitation on the EQ2 boards. Asked Mepps to edit my intro post above so that I can add more info and the YT links via a separate post - this one in fact.

Here it goes, enjoy everyone:



Atlantis is such a beautiful and underrated zone. I remember how some folks were highly sceptical and how it was deemed and argued that an underwater zone of this magnitude couldn't be done with the current engine that DCUO uses, Unreal Engine 3, yet here it is - in all of its awesome glory. This video is ideal after a long day of stress, work or gaming.

Alrighty then, next video is up, two more in the pipe.

SMALLVILLE Relaxation Session V1.0, extended 2h+ edition:

4k version WIP, Youtube is working on it rn, should be ready by tomorrow night. In addition, I might also upload a shorter version without the music and only with the ambience and nature sound effects.

A few words: First, this video was inspired by the view outside of my window in my home town. I was watching out of the window and just relaxing to the rain a bit the other day, trying to free my mind, and then a double rainbow literally hit me. No joke, a double rainbow appeared right before my very eyes. Might share a picture soon, gotta check for stuff to blend out first though. Anyway, after living in the city for the longest time, we now enjoy life on the land, and it's actually really peaceful. The view from the hill we live on reminds me of Smallville a lot, we even have a few barns around here. I hope that I can share a bit of this peace with ya'll via this relaxing showcase of Smallville.

Second, filming this location I not only realized just how beautiful Smallville was crafted, but how utterly underrated this zone is and how it has potential for much more. My wishlist @devs:

• Make this region a full blown and explorable zone like Gotham or Metropolis
• Or at least make this instance or dungeon bigger and wider
• Make it much bigger; I want to be able to reach the barns in the far distance
• Add housing elements to said enhanced or increased zone, would like to live there
• Add day and night cycles and random weather effects like rain, thunderstorms and more to the game
• Increase high quality detail range even further in order to reduce popups in the distance
• Add Antialiasing, Anistropic Filtering and AMD FSR options to the game menu (can"t seem to force it on for dcuo via Nvidia's CP)
• Enhance the water shaders and add more realistic waves and water refraction when swimming through it etc. Make it possible to dive under water in zones like Metropolis and Gotham and add a bit of underwater exploration and sea life if possible

Last but not least, my wife joined me for this quick walkthrough in Smallville, and after being absent from the game for a while, we still enjoy it just like we did when it first launched on PS3. Much has changed, some things to our liking, a few minor things to our disliking, but we still love and respect you DCUO.

Enjoy!

Ahh this is very cool and calming, great idea! Always nice to see creators coming up with new things. You earned my sub

Hmm, this gives me an idea for a Mepps ASMR video...BRB

so, what? like, three hours of listening to Mepps go "meow" while staring at a disconnect screen?

I usually just hiss at the disconnect screen, oh well, I guess every cat is different lol. Also, is that the little guy’s mum who took him out for a pint? Lol. That is too funny & cute all at the same time! It made my day

Apologies to Sturmlocke. I just meant to make a little throwaway joke, not to derail your thread...

It's all good mate, was laughing manically and also wondering if you were being serious or not. Was actually looking forward to a close up of Mepps doing a few interesting sounds or talking gently into the mic.

UUuhhh:



(no kidding, I actually enjoy watching videos like that to fall asleep at night)

Don't mind jokes, in fact, it's nice to see some ppl around here take it easy and with a sense of humor after all. No need to be so serious all of the time, eh?



Anyway, thanks for all the positive feedback guys / gals! Makes me super happy seeing ppl enjoy the content. I like to use some of my own vids to help my kids fall asleep at night, they love DC and Superman, and will be doing much more.

Thank you for your kind words! Subbed to your YT channel too. Super interesting videos you got there, will take some time to browse through all the content you have created so far. Glad to see we have so many ppl streaming and producing videos for this world, seems like we are very much alive and healthy in this regard There is something for everyone - awesome.

Cheers

Howdy folks, just wanted to let ya'll know that I am still working on more relaxing content for all of the titles mentioned in my opening post, and DCUO is the one getting some love currently:

Sightseeing in Metropolis

Check out the playlists on my channel hub for more videos, and feel free to let me know which type of video you would like to see next. Things have been slowing down a bit lately, mainly due to the summer time break that I enjoy spending with my family, but I expect things to kick up back to full speed during the colder days of the year.

Quoting my own comment in the video above:

If there ever was a game that made my teen self believe that a man can fly, then it is most certainly DCUO. Another game from the ppl in charge of the likes of Everquest and more. You guys just don't get enough credit for the beautiful worlds you have been giving us over all these years.

Cheers

Make New Genesis please! Also tittle screen selection characters.

I'm the type of player that has my own soundtrack playlist that I listen to periodically and if there's something I can point out is that I generally prefer the type of video that doesn't have a channel intro but that already starts with the music, I watched a video its about the atlantis environment and i saw that the intro was 1:25. I thought that was pretty long.

I also believe that it would improve if, instead of an image of the game and the character lying down, you put an ambient image that has to do with the theme, for example in the atlantis video you put videos of marine life for example. Real pictures, it adds a lot to the relaxing environment.

There is this channel that I listen to a lot more than I would admit, you could be inspired by some ideas:

https://youtube.com/@Geytkeypur?si=5Y6u3CHJmLrF8LT0


Also: GOOD LUCK!

It's not Mepps..... but...
Would you settle with MulltiBob??

My hats off to you....


This is pretty cool and original.

Kudos!

Damn you for making me get emotional some of these made me think of the ones we lost but these are beautiful bless you man .

These are truly wonderous and truly breathtaking I am in Zen mode and tea and crackers are right here thank you for these treats.

Your wish is my command!

New Genesis

Also a few more:

Hive Moon Base

Infernal Kahndaq

Washington D.C.

Smallville sounds of nature with rainfall

FOS1 ambience (working on FOS2 right now)

More in this playlist.

I'll continue to record more in order to make this list much longer in the future. In addition, I have started work on two interesting projects for DCUO. I'll post an update here when the content is done, spared no expense, which might take a couple of weeks. Not sure if ya'll know, but I'm a fulltime dad with two kids and work on the side, so these things will be taking some time to produce, but I will get them done eventually - slowly but steadily. I won't forget to give DCUO its fair share of love and shine, because we have invested many years of real life time into this game and our kids are already starting to play it on the Switch and my wife on her brand new Steam Deck (it runs beautifully on the Deck btw!). I've also managed to upgrade my hardware many times now, so ALL videos will be in pure 4k with 60 fps from now on, which you can see in the links that I posted above. Enjoy!

Hey there, I haven't had the time to check out the forums until now. I just read your feedback. Thank you! I'll try to take your advice and incorporate it into current and future projects. In fact, I have already started doing just that, see my previous post. New Genesis thumbnail has real life elements combined with the in-game graphics (tree, nature, rocks, animals = real life pictures + waterflow texture in the background = dcuo screenshot taken in-game). Same with Kahndaq, real life pyramids + game background sunset. I'll try to combine both as often as I can because it seems to fit together very well and it combines the best of both worlds. I will also be cutting out the long intro that you mentioned for the more simple relaxation videos and will only be using it for very special videos or maybe even some gameplay related content, which I do plan to do in the future. In addition, as mentioned in my previous post, all videos in native 4k and 60 fps from now on. Rendering these longer high quality videos can take many hours to finish, up to half a day in some cases, but it's very much worth it in the long run. Keep the feedback coming if you see anything else that can be improved on for our community!

Also big thanks to everyone else for the kind words. I'll keep the content coming and will try to improve on it as we go! More to come very soon!