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When I first played DS1, I was amazed by the graphics. My first journey into the Ehb swamp left me in awe at the eye candy and overall mood effects. It was clearly ground-breaking for the time (not just for the graphics either: no load screens, great gameplay / character development design, music, mods...).

Now, the DS1 graphics look dated... advancements in technology allow some amazing things. DS2's graphics weren't a huge step forward either. Shaders / shiny things are a nice addition, but I get the impression that they threw in far too many particle effects (swirling colours, clouds of light...) as a distraction to the dated graphics engine, and that's too bad. I find it a visual turn-off. The poly counts are low, and the texture detail could be better, but making combat nothing more than a colourful light show is unnecessary. IMO, it takes away from the fun gameplay. Always-on buff effects should be subtle, not hugely distracting visual obscurations.

As far as comparing things to other games, my basis for comparison is limited. Next to the Blizzard creations I've played (StarCraft, Diablo1/2, a Warcraft3 demo), the Siege engine graphics have always seemed to rock. Now, next to HL2 or TES4:Oblivion, the Siege engine graphics look lame. Yes, HL2 is an FPS, and therefore has less logical overhead for the gameplay stuff than an RPG, so I would absolutely expect that the graphics would be better... but I've recently been playing Oblivion, an RPG with 1st person / 3rd person perspective toggle. Sure, the hardware requirements are steep, especially if you want all the graphic settings turned up high, but if you can run it, the eye-candy is simply stunning. You can really feel a part of the world, because it looks so real. Add in the mod user-friendliness, with a community creating some amazing model and texture replacements, and you can really see what's possible now.

I have to say that looking at DS/DS2 in the light of more modern games (with higher system requirements...), the graphics look like only a marginal step up from the Diablo graphics. That's something I didn't think was possible a seemingly short time ago.

All that being said, DS/DS2 are still fun games. Graphics are not the end all or be all of a game. Gameplay is still the most important factor in how much I enjoy a game, and the Siege games are most certainly fun.