Champions Online

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devlin1
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Champions Online

Post by devlin1 »


Cryptic, makers of City of Heroes/Villains, have purchased the rights to the Champions Universe -- y'know, of HERO Games/Champions fame -- for the purposes of making an MMORPG out of it. NCSoft bought out Cryptic on CoH not too long ago; Cryptic [i]had [/i]been working on an MMO for Marvel, but Marvel pulled out, so now... Champions. It's certainly great news for DoJ, makers of HERO (for one thing, they'll get Cryptic's art resources, which may put an end to the HERO tradition of awful art), and could very well make the upcoming 6th edition of HERO a significantly big deal when it comes out next year.



(Oh, also, there's a 6th edition of HERO coming out next year, although I doubt that'll be of too much interest to most people around here. Champions Online, however, may be another story.)



As reported in Game Informer:
[quote]# The game has classes, but every class has access to every power. Class defines how many points each power costs for your character.



# Graphics are a 3D/cell shading hybrid that Cryptic calls "comic shading".



# The underground arena circuit allows PvP.



# Only heroes at launch. Dark Champions as an expansion later.



# Fully customizable characters AND powers AND movement types(floating,running on four legs).



# Secret identities.



# Customizable arch-nemesis. If you ever decide to kill off or incarcerate your AN, you get to create a new one.



# The game will take place world wide, not in just one city.



# Planned zones: underground cities, dinosaur-infested island, secret desert military base.



# The game has been created with Cryptic's proprietary game engine called "Game Tech".



# The game will also include voice dialogue and cutscenes.



# Scheduled for a 2009 release.[/quote]

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Post by Cthulhu »

Cool. I wonder how much of Hero's complexity they'll keep in the game.
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Count Zero
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Post by Count Zero »

Well, it can be really complex, mainly because you have a computer doing all the calculations. The system could involve all sorts of math, the player will just never see it.

Most video game systems have very complex calculations going on.
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Post by Cthulhu »

True. I guess I meant complexity as far as character generation goes. I wonder how much customization the game will offer.
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Post by Drew »

This sounds like the coolest on-line game ever, if it is a true to the system as it seems.

Too bad it will still be filled with idiots and twelve year old boys who are just out to see how much of other gamers fun they can ruin. I wish all these cool on-line games would have a single player option... or something like unlimited servers where anyone can set up a private server and only let in people they want. But no... all these games seem to be all or nothing. Well, most of them anyway...


Sorry, rant over now. :)
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Post by Cthulhu »

That's my biggest problem with online games in general. It rewards hours spent on the game rather than reflexes or tactical skill. This means that the anti-social 12 year olds are in the position to mess with everyones good time. This isn't as big a problem as it used to be, a lot of the newer games are designed around preventing this kind of problem.
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Post by cczernia »


[quote="Count Zero"]
Most video game systems have very complex calculations going on.[/quote]


What would you know about it :mrgreen:

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Count Zero
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Post by Count Zero »


[quote="Cthulhu"]That's my biggest problem with online games in general. It rewards hours spent on the game rather than reflexes or tactical skill. This means that the anti-social 12 year olds are in the position to mess with everyones good time. This isn't as big a problem as it used to be, a lot of the newer games are designed around preventing this kind of problem.[/quote]

Outside of the crap that happens on a PVP server, I have had a very good experience playing MMO's. Back in the good old days of Everquest, what you are stating is very true, but the game companies have realized that asshole players make you loose customers, so they get rid of them pretty quickly. I only wish game stores would do the same sort of thing.

Whenever I get confused about D&D alignment morality, I just imagine Abraham Lincoln and Mahatma Ghandi arm wrestling shirtless on the back of a killer whale.

In other words, I remember that it doesn't really make a whole lot of sense and deal with it best I can.
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Post by devlin1 »


[url=http://www.champions-online.com/]It's official[/url] as of today.



And a bit from Jack Emmert on the implementation of the HERO System in the game:
[quote]What about the rules system? We are using the ultra flexible HERO System as an inspiration rather than a strict guideline. One of our mottos for Champions Online is “total customization” and you’ll see that in many of the elements we adopt from the Champions pen-and-paper game. We don’t want to shoehorn a system that isn’t made for video games into a MMORPG, but we also know how great the HERO System can be.[/quote]

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Post by BlanchPrez »

What's funny about that list of features, is that it's almost exactly the same list of features they promised on City of Heroes way back in the day.

Don't get me wrong, I'm excited about this (I was a fan of Champions in the 80's, when it had it's own crappy comic series out), and I seriouslly hope they get these features implimented. It could stand to be a very cool game if they do.

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