Dungeon design lazyness

FezzikVizzini

I thought dungeons were samey then I saw this. Says it all really

roflcopter

Yeah, I was disappointed when I first noticed that as well. They should have spent a little more time on the dungeon designs.

demendred

I personally like the Ondil dungeon.

nerevarine1138

I'm deeply upset by this, and rest assured, I will be writing a strongly worded e-mail to ZO just as soon as I can.

They are, of course, ignoring all the group dungeons, but who's actually counting, right?

Shimond

the hell, Tom's Hardware?

tengri

Agreed, I get that strange feeling of deja vu a lot in dungeons, too.

Landscapes and outside scenery are done rather nicely but the caves/dungeons/mines (and houses!) are a real lazy butcher job.

Elsonso

If ESO uses tools that are similar in nature to the ones used for Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim, where the designer has to align unwieldy three dimensional objects, then yeah, I can certainly see why cloning dungeons would be happening. It takes a lot of patience to make a new structure, like a dungeon, in this manner.

reggielee

sometimes I get confused and think I have already done a dungeon due to this

Lord_Hev

Wow... it's even worse then TES Oblivion. With Oblivion, they at least varied the pathways a little.

But ESO looks like, literal duplicates, with just changes in architecture. /facepalm

Thunder

The mobs inside them change! neener neener!

christopherktomb14_ESO

I feel that all of the dungeons that I've explored are relatively the same in shape, color scheme, encounters, and mobs. There are no levels, multiple floors or ledges. This is a huge disappointment coming from the single-player game of Elder Scrolls in which the dungeons all felt unique and had unique obstacles; I was truly disappointed by the Dwarf's dungeons which looked nothing like the original game. I hope that this is due to the overall size of the game and that they intend to revisit each dungeon to make it unique.

nerevarine1138

christopherktomb14_ESO wrote: »

I feel that all of the dungeons that I've explored are relatively the same in shape, color scheme, encounters, and mobs. There are no levels, multiple floors or ledges. This is a huge disappointment coming from the single-player game of Elder Scrolls in which the dungeons all felt unique and had unique obstacles; I was truly disappointed by the Dwarf's dungeons which looked nothing like the original game. I hope that this is due to the overall size of the game and that they intend to revisit each dungeon to make it unique.

I really don't feel too strongly one way or the other, but stop using Skyrim as the only barometer of what an Elder Scrolls game is. Oblivion was notorious for copy/paste dungeons.

Lalai

I honestly don't really care about this. Then again I don't spend a whole lot of time in them and never really paid any attention to the layout. I wouldn't have cared if they were different and it wouldn't have added any additional enjoyment to that aspect of the game for me. Though I suppose if you care that much about the design of some side stuff, it may increase your enjoyment.

The title would also be misleading for someone who hasn't played ESO, or who thinks that dungeons in eso are the same as dungeons in other games. The things posted above are actually delves. Public dungeons are the ones tuned for groups, and those rarely look similar, maybe they look similar across factions.. I wouldn't know yet. Group dungeons, the actual instanced 4-man things, all feel extremely different from each other. Those don't even look like they're listed.

jambam817_ESO

@Lalai‌ correct, these are the Public Dungeons that are scattered all over and contain one unique boss, usually at the "end". No groups are normally required. I can see the reasoning behind this, but yes, it is a bit disappointing that the delves are rather plain and similar. Nothing better then spending an hour in previous Elder Scroll game dungeons :P

Lalai

jambam817_ESO wrote: »

@Lalai‌ correct, these are the Public Dungeons that are scattered all over and contain one unique boss, usually at the "end". No groups are normally required. I can see the reasoning behind this, but yes, it is a bit disappointing that the delves are rather plain and similar. Nothing better then spending an hour in previous Elder Scroll game dungeons :P

Those are delves.. the official "Public Dungeons" that are in the game are those you also get achievements for killing multiple bosses in, or solving a puzzle.. group achievement type stuff. If you hit J, go to achievements, then go to dungeons, you can see them there. None of them are listed above (at least none I've been in). They're things like Bad Man's Hollow, Obsidian Scar.. the ones that look pretty different going from one to the next and usually contain huge groups of mobs and bosses that take more than one player to kill.

Delves are the smaller version. You can go through them solo, but also see other players in them. They have a skyshard and a boss at the end that's tuned to single player even though you can see other players in the group. The majority of players refer to both the delves and the actual public dungeons as.. public dungeons, so a lot of times they get mixed up. So this is more akin to saying "the caves in ESO are all repeated designs" instead of dungeons.. as delves are more similar to caves than they are dungeons in other games.

The things listed though, are definitely delves.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Delves

Also, sorry about the rant.. I just wish people would start using the correct terms to avoid confusion.

Either way though, like I said.. I don't mind. If they made them different, cool.. but since it's only one minor aspect that I don't spend a whole lot of time in, I don't care that they're the same. Same as I don't care when house designs are reused.

buffbcub17_ESO

Put me in the group that really doesn't think it matters much. Would I want completely different dungeons for each? Sure...but think on the incredible amount of work to do that.

Also, I like that I can go into a dungeon and have a decent idea of where to go and what to do. It isn't like these dungeons are a big part of the game anyway.

Thechemicals

They did this so they can put more focus and energy into the real things like.....like....(place answer here)

Armitas

Given that most dungeons are short, and intended to exit at the entrance how many different ways can you make them. How many ways can you draw a square? I applaud them for finding 31 different ways to draw a square.

Korusus

Delves are a huge disappointment. Not sure why they even bothered, they're pretty much just guaranteed skyshards and boss-farming points. Maybe if they had tried to make them a little more complex...a little more Elder Scrolls. Meh.

Danarchist

Delves are allot of fun if you play off hours =P The main issue with them at he moment is general over-crowding. Meaning the empty halls you are running down aren't normally empty, they have just been cleared out by the 100 or so people that ran through them within the 10 minutes before you entered. I usually only go into them after hours now so I actually get to fight through stuff.

Kichu

They also do it with a lot of the big buildings too, something that also annoys me. I think they should have made the dungeons modular, and put them together like legos! Would still repeat the rooms, but at least they'd be laid out differently.

Kiash

I honestly don't get the big deal. All the caves in World of Warcraft were copy paste. All the caves for the most part in Rift were copy paste. Even Everquest was guilty of this at one point.

It's not like this is something new, but I can't blame people for wanting variety. At least the actual dungeons are all different and unique. Oblivion was far worse about copy paste dungeons than ESO is imo.

Korusus

Kiash wrote: »

I honestly don't get the big deal. All the caves in World of Warcraft were copy paste. All the caves for the most part in Rift were copy paste. Even Everquest was guilty of this at one point.

It's not like this is something new, but I can't blame people for wanting variety. At least the actual dungeons are all different and unique. Oblivion was far worse about copy paste dungeons than ESO is imo.

At least Oblivion used the modular designs every other numbered Elder Scrolls title used so even though they all looked the same they at least had length and varied layouts. ESO's dungeons are Dragon Age 2 bad.

Kiash

Korusus wrote: »

Kiash wrote: »

I honestly don't get the big deal. All the caves in World of Warcraft were copy paste. All the caves for the most part in Rift were copy paste. Even Everquest was guilty of this at one point.

It's not like this is something new, but I can't blame people for wanting variety. At least the actual dungeons are all different and unique. Oblivion was far worse about copy paste dungeons than ESO is imo.

At least Oblivion used the modular designs every other numbered Elder Scrolls title used so even though they all looked the same they at least had length and varied layouts. ESO's dungeons are Dragon Age 2 bad.

Haha that gave me a chuckle. Fair point about the modular design. But nothing can be as bad as Dragon Age 2 was good sir!

madfeldoreb17_ESO

Thechemicals wrote: »

They did this so they can put more focus and energy into the real things like.....like....(place answer here)

I don't actually mind the dungeon details that much but as you asked:

The world as a whole, looks great and has a feeling of being there. Can disagree (like with many other things, people have opinions) but in my opinion the world looks great.

The quests, well I actually like them and see there is a lot there to enjoy.

Music, just great.

Community, well this cannot be said to be a design feature but, somehow it is there. Have nothing but great people what I've seen. So easy to get help if needing.

Crafting, well I probably should NOT mention this as some negative reviews have already mentioned this being, good eh?

PVP - well interesting enough this part seems to be great even for a person like me, who doesn't normally play MMOs for this kind of things. I have never liked "open PVP", starting from Diablo... well actually on that game it actually worked. And I'm talking the second part.

The Lore. If you have time, you enjoy it. If you don't have time or interest in these kind of things, well... then you don't enjoy it.

etc.

Plus as an extra (but we will need to see of course), the Road Ahead looks promising. I'm not worried in any way, if some are, they probably have to (if not already) unsub or not even start to play. There are games for everybody nowadays. This one, is for me (included).

Take care,

Cheers...

Gohlar

The world isn't much better.

vyndral13preub18_ESO

If they mattered at all id care. As someone said they are basically a skyshard and a boss and out. If you are doing it at level, the longest step is waiting for the boss to spawn so you can get the achievement. All told like 10 minutes.

Really my biggest disappointment with them is really the lack of integration. They are just there. Most have no quest pointing you there, no reason for going outside a piece of blue loot and a skyshard. A simple quest for them would be swell. Hi, we are afraid our kids playing at the dwarven ruin will get hurt, can you clean it up for is? Hi, some bandits robed the bank and are holed up in there. Hi, some evil looking wizard scares me, can you go stab him?

Even the very simple quest chain that lead to 2-3 of them before going to the dungeon in the area was fantastic.

Tyr

Kiash wrote: »

Korusus wrote: »

Kiash wrote: »

I honestly don't get the big deal. All the caves in World of Warcraft were copy paste. All the caves for the most part in Rift were copy paste. Even Everquest was guilty of this at one point.

It's not like this is something new, but I can't blame people for wanting variety. At least the actual dungeons are all different and unique. Oblivion was far worse about copy paste dungeons than ESO is imo.

At least Oblivion used the modular designs every other numbered Elder Scrolls title used so even though they all looked the same they at least had length and varied layouts. ESO's dungeons are Dragon Age 2 bad.

Haha that gave me a chuckle. Fair point about the modular design. But nothing can be as bad as Dragon Age 2 was good sir!

He just regurgitated the DA2 line from the Tom's article.
Even the chuckle you got out of it was contrived BS.

Tyr

Double post sorry.

PBpsy

I really like how there isn't really any dungeon In that image. I wish I could also troll so nicely

Gunsang

PBpsy wrote: »

I really like how there isn't really any dungeon In that image. I wish I could also troll so nicely

It'd be funny if it wasn't so genuinely stupid.