Post by Gilvan Blight on May 14, 2007 7:32:15 GMT -5
Quickly: a rather fun MMO, does a good job capturing the comic feel, amazing character creation.
Note: done at about Rank 10 (level 10), still lots I haven't seen or done.
Summary: The sequel/companion to City of Heroes from NCsoft, the guys that did Lineage, Guild Wars and one of my Favorites Auto Assault. This is the Super Villian MMO. You create a Villain and go out and do Villainous things. Start by Creating a hero in an incredibly details character generation system. Pick from a selection of different power types and then sources of that power. From there pick a few starting powers and move right into the action. You start off in the middle of a Jail Break and quickly get tossed into a tutorial that teaches you pretty much all you need to know to start playing. You find out you were saved by the mysterious Arachnos group and are given the option to join them as a lowly foot solder (with a destiny for greatness) or set off lone wolf style. Either way you chose you end up in the scummiest cities on Earth on the Rogue Isles. Here between running about beating up on rival gangs, cops, superheroes and just passer buys you will meet contacts that give you missions to complete. Each mission involves moving over the open ground to get to the right door (manhole, elevator, teleporter, bank, garage, etc) and then entering an instance were you and your Team complete the goals without interference from other players. Complete enough missions by a contact and your relationship grows, get friendly enough and they will introduce you to other contacts. In addition once unlocked by hitting the right level you get access to the local paper, which leads to a rather wide variety of missions as you read the news. There is definitely an overall plot to the game as well as a wide variety of 'side quests'. This edition also adds Arena' and other PvP areas to challenge players playing City of Heroes. Recently added was a black market (AH) and a crafting system. Combat is real time and typical of most MMOs, using the 1-0 keys to set off powers. There is an interesting inspiration system, where during a fight you get single use power ups, that you can save for later fights. It's often worth beating up some 'strangers' just to get inspired before a big battle. One last note, you don't buy stuff in this game like other games. You won't be saving up for the latest weapon or armor for your character. Instead you buy enhancements which you slot onto your powers to customize and improve them. For example adding accuracy drain to your eye beams, increasing the knock back on your force push, or increasing your jumping height on the run command.
Note: if you pick up the City of Heroes Vs City of Villains edition you get both games in one. This is actually what I tried out, but I have only tried the Villains part of the game, thus the stand alone review.
The Good: I can't say enough good things about Character Creation. You can pretty much make any Villain you can imagine as long as they are humanoid. The options for monstrous characters was somewhat limited but there were still enough options to keep creature fans happy. I spent over an hour tweaking my guy and then when I started playing, I was tempted to quit just to try to make another. I am still planning on making a Hero as well. The sheer number of different power types and then origins gives a ton of re-playability and I can see making quite a few characters to try out different types. The origin of your powers not only changes what powers you get, but also the graphics and what enhancements you can add to your powers. The things they added to make this feel like a comic are great. Cut scenes are reminiscent of comic panels, everyone talks in speech balloons, newspaper articles just remind you of The Planet or the Bugle. The whole start with a prison break is very traditional. It feels like a Superhero (villain) game as it should. The powers are varied and interesting, by adding the enhancements there is no reason two players ever need to alike. Other nice Comic book touches are the fact that groups are called Teams and Clans are called Super groups. Super groups can even build a headquarters with all the expected amenities. Once nice touch I found when I joined my first Super group was the ability for the members to update their costume colours to match the group, giving great unity to the team. The missions, at least thus far have been nice and short, nothing requiring more then about half an hour, this is good for the gamer on a short time budget. Flying and levitating is way too much fun and needs to be in more games. Thus far the mission system mixed with the newspaper has meant 0 grinding. Every bit of xp earned has been during some form of mission, or during a patrol (wandering about causing random crimes).
The Bad: I'm not a fan of the setting for City of Villains. I expected to be in Shiny Paragon city not some dilapidated Rogue Isles. Even though you are a baddie, you are a baddie in a baddie city. You just don't feel like much of a villain. Even the cops (called RIP, Rogue Isles Police) are all corrupt. It's like being a bad guy and beating on other weaker bad guys. This is all good and fun, but it would feel better to beat on good guys. Even the missions are taking out rival gangs, rival villains and guys saying bad things about you. Maybe late in the game you get to pound some Superheroes, but for the first 10-20 levels at least you will be battling your own. You kind of end up feeling more like a hero then villain though. I just think it was a bad style choice. I would love to see a power tree while making your character. It's a lot to choose from and as a new player, you don't really know where they described abilities will lead. For example for a secondary power I took force fields, for which I expected to be able to guard myself with fields while my Zombies did the dirty work (I am a Minion Master who uses Magic, Primary abilities are Necromancy, secondary Force Fields). The problem is at 10th level I still don't have a force filed I can cast on myself, so my character concept didn't work as well as expected. Instead I now use Levitation to float above the battlefield and let the 'boys' do their work. The major problem with CoV is that it's showing it's age. It doesn't have many of the newer developments in MMOs. The AH was just added this month, and isn't up to the level of other MMOs. The crafting system is just odd and somewhat unnecessary. There are no mounts or teleporting systems, meaning quite a bit of walking (which really isn't that bad as there is lots to do on the way everywhere), there is no voice chat system, There is no 'bank' without a headquarters, No voice acting, no FMV for cut scenes. It's still not horrible looking or running, but it's nothing compared to say Lord of the Rings or even Guild Wars.
The Ugly: graphical issues. This isn't a new game and it shows. There are some definite clipping issues. Unlike Star Wars Galaxies though they aren't game breaking. You won't have guys running at you through walls, but watching my character walk around with his long hair going through his cloak is driving me nuts. Watching my zombies walk through the fronts of cars and ignore what should be physical objects is also annoying. I find the backgrounds look pretty good, definitely passable, just the characters, while cool looking, don't look polished at all. A graphical update would be really really nice to bring this up to the level of more current games.
Overall: of the MMO's I have been trying out lately this shows a lot of promise. There is quite a bit of a fan base already so finding other players isn't an issues. The game play is still fresh enough and made interesting through the genre. The graphics are definitely not up to todays standards, but they don't get in the way of game play. The comic book feel is definitely there and appealing. I could definitely see subscribing to this one at least for a short term to see if I sill enjoy it. It's an excellent Supers game, the best I have played on a PC (more fun then Freedom Force for example). I recommend trying it out. Anyone and everyone can get a free 14 day trial from the City of Heroes website as I did.
Note: done at about Rank 10 (level 10), still lots I haven't seen or done.
Summary: The sequel/companion to City of Heroes from NCsoft, the guys that did Lineage, Guild Wars and one of my Favorites Auto Assault. This is the Super Villian MMO. You create a Villain and go out and do Villainous things. Start by Creating a hero in an incredibly details character generation system. Pick from a selection of different power types and then sources of that power. From there pick a few starting powers and move right into the action. You start off in the middle of a Jail Break and quickly get tossed into a tutorial that teaches you pretty much all you need to know to start playing. You find out you were saved by the mysterious Arachnos group and are given the option to join them as a lowly foot solder (with a destiny for greatness) or set off lone wolf style. Either way you chose you end up in the scummiest cities on Earth on the Rogue Isles. Here between running about beating up on rival gangs, cops, superheroes and just passer buys you will meet contacts that give you missions to complete. Each mission involves moving over the open ground to get to the right door (manhole, elevator, teleporter, bank, garage, etc) and then entering an instance were you and your Team complete the goals without interference from other players. Complete enough missions by a contact and your relationship grows, get friendly enough and they will introduce you to other contacts. In addition once unlocked by hitting the right level you get access to the local paper, which leads to a rather wide variety of missions as you read the news. There is definitely an overall plot to the game as well as a wide variety of 'side quests'. This edition also adds Arena' and other PvP areas to challenge players playing City of Heroes. Recently added was a black market (AH) and a crafting system. Combat is real time and typical of most MMOs, using the 1-0 keys to set off powers. There is an interesting inspiration system, where during a fight you get single use power ups, that you can save for later fights. It's often worth beating up some 'strangers' just to get inspired before a big battle. One last note, you don't buy stuff in this game like other games. You won't be saving up for the latest weapon or armor for your character. Instead you buy enhancements which you slot onto your powers to customize and improve them. For example adding accuracy drain to your eye beams, increasing the knock back on your force push, or increasing your jumping height on the run command.
Note: if you pick up the City of Heroes Vs City of Villains edition you get both games in one. This is actually what I tried out, but I have only tried the Villains part of the game, thus the stand alone review.
The Good: I can't say enough good things about Character Creation. You can pretty much make any Villain you can imagine as long as they are humanoid. The options for monstrous characters was somewhat limited but there were still enough options to keep creature fans happy. I spent over an hour tweaking my guy and then when I started playing, I was tempted to quit just to try to make another. I am still planning on making a Hero as well. The sheer number of different power types and then origins gives a ton of re-playability and I can see making quite a few characters to try out different types. The origin of your powers not only changes what powers you get, but also the graphics and what enhancements you can add to your powers. The things they added to make this feel like a comic are great. Cut scenes are reminiscent of comic panels, everyone talks in speech balloons, newspaper articles just remind you of The Planet or the Bugle. The whole start with a prison break is very traditional. It feels like a Superhero (villain) game as it should. The powers are varied and interesting, by adding the enhancements there is no reason two players ever need to alike. Other nice Comic book touches are the fact that groups are called Teams and Clans are called Super groups. Super groups can even build a headquarters with all the expected amenities. Once nice touch I found when I joined my first Super group was the ability for the members to update their costume colours to match the group, giving great unity to the team. The missions, at least thus far have been nice and short, nothing requiring more then about half an hour, this is good for the gamer on a short time budget. Flying and levitating is way too much fun and needs to be in more games. Thus far the mission system mixed with the newspaper has meant 0 grinding. Every bit of xp earned has been during some form of mission, or during a patrol (wandering about causing random crimes).
The Bad: I'm not a fan of the setting for City of Villains. I expected to be in Shiny Paragon city not some dilapidated Rogue Isles. Even though you are a baddie, you are a baddie in a baddie city. You just don't feel like much of a villain. Even the cops (called RIP, Rogue Isles Police) are all corrupt. It's like being a bad guy and beating on other weaker bad guys. This is all good and fun, but it would feel better to beat on good guys. Even the missions are taking out rival gangs, rival villains and guys saying bad things about you. Maybe late in the game you get to pound some Superheroes, but for the first 10-20 levels at least you will be battling your own. You kind of end up feeling more like a hero then villain though. I just think it was a bad style choice. I would love to see a power tree while making your character. It's a lot to choose from and as a new player, you don't really know where they described abilities will lead. For example for a secondary power I took force fields, for which I expected to be able to guard myself with fields while my Zombies did the dirty work (I am a Minion Master who uses Magic, Primary abilities are Necromancy, secondary Force Fields). The problem is at 10th level I still don't have a force filed I can cast on myself, so my character concept didn't work as well as expected. Instead I now use Levitation to float above the battlefield and let the 'boys' do their work. The major problem with CoV is that it's showing it's age. It doesn't have many of the newer developments in MMOs. The AH was just added this month, and isn't up to the level of other MMOs. The crafting system is just odd and somewhat unnecessary. There are no mounts or teleporting systems, meaning quite a bit of walking (which really isn't that bad as there is lots to do on the way everywhere), there is no voice chat system, There is no 'bank' without a headquarters, No voice acting, no FMV for cut scenes. It's still not horrible looking or running, but it's nothing compared to say Lord of the Rings or even Guild Wars.
The Ugly: graphical issues. This isn't a new game and it shows. There are some definite clipping issues. Unlike Star Wars Galaxies though they aren't game breaking. You won't have guys running at you through walls, but watching my character walk around with his long hair going through his cloak is driving me nuts. Watching my zombies walk through the fronts of cars and ignore what should be physical objects is also annoying. I find the backgrounds look pretty good, definitely passable, just the characters, while cool looking, don't look polished at all. A graphical update would be really really nice to bring this up to the level of more current games.
Overall: of the MMO's I have been trying out lately this shows a lot of promise. There is quite a bit of a fan base already so finding other players isn't an issues. The game play is still fresh enough and made interesting through the genre. The graphics are definitely not up to todays standards, but they don't get in the way of game play. The comic book feel is definitely there and appealing. I could definitely see subscribing to this one at least for a short term to see if I sill enjoy it. It's an excellent Supers game, the best I have played on a PC (more fun then Freedom Force for example). I recommend trying it out. Anyone and everyone can get a free 14 day trial from the City of Heroes website as I did.