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City of Villains: CoV Re-Review
Stradden
Managing EditorMember CommonPosts: 6,696
Lisa Krebs takes a look at the darker side of City of Heroes with this review of City of Villains.
When I re-entered the world of Villains, I did bring along a teammate, a villain who would partner with me, but after the third mission, said teammate abandoned me for another shinier MMO. Wandering around, I ran into few people, and while it may be the server, my belief is that the population of Villains exists at the higher levels and has little use for creating newer characters. It's not a game that attracts new entrants, and so while it's user-friendly, once a new player gets in, they may not stay.
This is where I think Villains does itself a disservice. While a player's goal tends to be to reach higher levels, and the goal of MMOs is not to have groups of players linger below level 20, it's too easy to get bored by the 'sameness' of the content in the lower levels. A little bit more variety here or there in the stories, or the missions, and I'm convinced my teammate would have stayed with me, and there would be more alts running around... because there's just something fun about leveling new characters, just not in City.
)
Read the CoV Review
Cheers,
Jon Wood
Managing Editor
MMORPG.com
Comments
*snigger* go rogue....nice use of today's headlines :P
I completely agree with the issues regarding the lower levels. I couldn't stomach another regurgitated mission involving the exact same goal with different character names after a while. I was looking forward to involving myself in a bustling game, but instead found a near-abandoned one that gave me little incentive to carry on playing. The thought of creating a new character actually makes me sick to my stomach with boredom.
well you could level though mission architect theirs some great content there....heck ive got a 2 part (5 mission each) arc up there with more parts to come now that i can buy more architech slots
Unfortunately I played it a little while before the mission architect was implemented. To be honest, I don't think it's worth my while resubbing on the chance that I will enjoy the game with the mission architect included. When it comes to custom content...Ryzom has been doing it since 2004 so I can get my fix there for a much lower price too.
It really is a pity as I loved the game before the monotiny kicked in!
Not good for Solo? That is so Wrong! I solo 90 percent of the time with no problem what so ever. Also, if you want to, you can visit NPC and adjust game difficulty by choosing one of the five levels ranging from easy to most difficult. So if your having a hard time just go to NPC and lower difficulty level. I took a few years off of cox playing every other mmo that came out. TR closed and they gave 3 months free play along with free aion beta and game plus Dungeon Runners which I didnt like. Reinstalled COX and forgot what a great game it was. Then again, its not for everyone but obviously enough like it to keep a decent population going. Hell the market is so active you can watch the prices fluctuate while shopping. Anyway, it IS very solo friendly.
This post is intentionally written as to not make any sense what so ever. Thank You Very Much.
I guess it depends on your tolerance for tedious and repetitive content that is usually labeled as ambrosia de solo, puke.
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
What mmo isnt repititious, Please? I have tried just about every one out there. I mean combat, exploration and just fun to play. The economics and making money in a game to me is mindless numbing since its just like running a business only kindergarden grade. In other words its work without challenge. If you have any suggestions for something none repititious I am interested please. Thanks.
This post is intentionally written as to not make any sense what so ever. Thank You Very Much.
Pointing out an error in the article. For Day Job badges, it's 21 days, not 30. The time logged out does not need to be consecutive to earn the badge. Even just spending 1 day logged out will net you a temporary bonus when you log back in; continuing to log out in that same location (or type of location--any Black Helicopter will do, for instance) after you've earned the badge will net you a LARGER bonus (say, +25% to earned Infamy instead of +15%). But anyway...yeah. 21 days, not 30. The contact that tells you all about Day Jobs (and villain-side, you can't miss the bastard) informs you of this.
Also--no difficulty soloing here, either. Masterminds are, I think, the best for soloing. Brutes are a close second. The game's literature recommends Stalkers for soloing and/or first-time players, but I think they're insane. My first lvl 50 character was a Mastermind--Robotics/Force Field, as it happens. Soloed probably 95% or better.
Crafting is optional. You're not building items for other players (though I s'pose you could...), you're creating Enhancements for yourself. Purchased Enhancements fade away and eventually stop providing any benefit. Crafted Enhancements never fade away; the bonus you get when you first build the thing is the bonus you'll get as long as you leave the thing slotted in there.
I could continue on, but I won't bother. The author is correct about one thing, though--teams on CoV are hard to find. Much less so on blueside (aka hero-side). Of course, most of the teams I encounter blueside are farm teams, so...blechh. Also, no roleplayers redside. Very sad.
Why is 'not great for solo play' listed twice in the 'cons'? We all like a bit of solo play but that is not what you play a online game for, did he run out of cons or something?
Guild Wars, for starters.
And I'm sorry, but CoH/V takes repetition to a WHOLE new level. I've played the majority of AAA MMO's out there and I can easily say that this one is the most repetitive of them all. Here, you do the same mission over and again, just with different names of victims etc. to cover that fact up. In other MMO's at least the story somewhat changes as you go along...
This is a major problem with all themepark MMO's. As they grow everyone gets to the end and usually start on whatever end game treadmill the developers come up with and the servers grow stagnant. New players might as well play a single player repetitive MMO for 100's of hours just to experience a lackluster end game.
FFXI's job system helped to alleviate this greatly, and most Sandbox style games have players of all levels around all towns usually. Devs need to start looking at longer term retention, or something like EVE's single server model.
Try Virtue
Sall i'm gonna say
Jack Emmert ( Cryptic talking head), recently admitted that CoV was a rush job that basically just reskinned CoH. He said if Champions has a villian( Nemesis) version, he would make it a totally different mechanic this time. Hard to feel villanous when you're just a reskinned Hero with slightly tweaked missions.
I don't see this. The horde has more in common with the alliance in wow than villains and heroes in CoH/V. For one thing, the classes available to heroes are different from the ones available to villains. Some similarities, sure, but no actual copy-cat classes, compared to wow where you can be a undead mage or a gnome mage, and they both play the exact same.
Also, not solo-friendly? This is, bar none, the most solo friendly MMO in existance. The whole game is built around making alts, so there are always lots of lower level characters working their way up. Form a team and put out an LFM, I guarantee you're team will fill quickly.
I've recently rediscovered CoX myself. I was playing when it first came out for a few months but utter boredom with the repititious nature of the missions and the bone-numbingly slow grind wore me down. The themepark design also didn't do much for me as I tend to favor sandbox MMOs like SWG and Eve Online. This is a game that just screams "don't take me seriously - this isn't a real place and you're not playing someone that really is part of it."
Instead you'd just grind through mission after missions, arc after arc, until you get bored. What seemed to keep some people around, back then, was the variety in visual character design and a love of superhero roleplaying (though many different themes can fit into this from Vampire stuff to medieval/fantasy). PvP really doesn't seem as big a deal as the author of the rereview makes it sound. I haven't run into anyone that seems interested in it yet but I could be moving in the wrong circles.
What I've discovered upon returning is a much quicker level progression, more variation in content (mainly due to Architect but also new foes and places to discover like the Oroborous on the Hero side) and some wonderful functionality as well as decorative potential in Super Group or Villain Group bases. There's also one central melting pot for roleplayers that's usually so popular on some nights, mainly weekends, that it actually fills up and other instances spawn to accomodate the stragglers: Pocket D.
The invention system allows even deeper mechanical customization before as special "sets" of enhancements can offer stacking bonuses or special procs in any kind of combination one can dream up. Before an offline character builder wasn't remotely necessary as power enhancements were pretty straightforward but now? There are so many factors to consider it's really important, more than ever, to plan ahead. Every bit as complicated, and rewarding, as shipbuilding in Eve Online if not moreso. And beyond Enhancements (IO = Invention Origin Enhancements, the good stuff that includes IO Sets) you have Accolades (achievements that can grant powers or improved abilities), Patron/EpicPower Pools (powers that offer functionality a particular powerset might not normally have) and Veteran Reward Powers. There's quite a bit one can do when customizing a persona in CoV!
And even though I know I'll burnout and get bored eventually, I have to concur with the author that there's something powerfully addictive about the bitesized missions one can get from the newspaper or radio. The mayhem/bank missions do a nice job of mixing things up. And there are also the soloable storyarcs one can get from NPCs (in addition to the big 'raid' style Task Force missions that require very dedicated teams with players who've alot of time on hand) which can mix things up a little but are often just rehashes of the same limited mission types you get from the newspaper/radio.
That is one downside of Mission Architect. It too basically regurgitates the same basic mission types as you find everywhere else in the game. Players can customize text and even foes but the settings and the things a player does in them tends to be the same as you'd find elsewhere. More exotic maps and foes can be unlocked with tickets but I'm not sure how much real variation that offers. I much prefer the "live storyteller" approach of SWG's Storyteller tools which allows a player to moderate a session much like a player GM in a tabletop game. They can improvise and add or remove elements as needed and as they interact with the party. These aren't instanced either. They're set up in the great, wide, vast territories of the game. Props and NPCs can be used for Storyteller missions or, even more often, incidental decoration for events or just fun.
Architect's instanced/published content approach, and more user friendly toolset, certainly means more adventures and the potential to reach a vaster audience. However it greatly limits the creative input of the designer. The fact that players are bribed with rewards for playing means more players but it also means more abuse of the system and lots of missions that are utter crap. Luckily there's a ratings system and they are improving the functionality of the search tools.
When I look at CoH/CoV and then look ahead to Star Trek Online I do wonder how Cryptic's going to do. In theory Star Fleet's a fairly uniform military and people who uniformly wear, well, uniforms. How will the penchant for wild customization help maintain this conceit? Conversely the universe is an extiting and mysterious place full of unexpected encounters and situations not, hopefully, some Q designed hell of eternally repeating warehouse corridors and chambers. I think Cryptic's aware of the latter and they've retained a guy with some strategy game experience to help design the Exploration content which is said to be procedurally generated and promised not to be "talk to the NPC with the ? over his head" typical MMO fodder.
It's an odd fit here but I look forward to see what comes of it.
Always notice what you notice.
Try Virtue
Sall i'm gonna say
That's the truth. In CoX it's Virtue. In SWG it's Starsider. Oddly enough, both are their game's unofficial RP servers and have been since launch. I don't think this is a coincidence when you take into account other servers like Wiccana or Landroval in other games.
Always notice what you notice.
Horrible review. I've never had a problem soloing in either Villains or Heroes, even with Dominators who are the squishier of the bunch. As a Brute, the most adapted Villain tank class and also the one with the highest potential DP, there is absolutely no reason why you shouldn't be able to solo.
Beginning levels feel slow, I'll grant you, because your powerset is limited. However, by level 14 you should have enough to keep to satisfied and level 14 takes only a few hours. My gripe with CoX became that leveling was WAY too easy. They had numerous exp boosts, double exp weekends, etc., all making my last 3 characters level 50 within a week or 2. My Fortunata got to 50 in 2 days, thanks to all the teams that were available at the time.
Either the author did not give the game more than a moment's chance, despite what is claimed, or they went in with preconceptions that wouldn't allow them to enjoy the game no matter what it was.
CoX is an old game, but a good one. If they got rid of Mission Architect, or at least made it so it couldn't be used for farming, I'd go back in a heartbeat.
"Forums aren't for intelligent discussion; they're for blow-hards with unwavering opinions."
I think it does really depend on which server you're on. Some are pretty sparse while a couple, Virtue and Freedom, tend to be packed. It also depends what kind of character you create for PUGs to be interested. Make any character with Kinetics and you'll be invited to teams even when you aren't looking for example. Getting into a good regular group helps too as with any MMO.
I suppose my biggest gameplay gripe in CoH/CoV, besides repetition - which while not so bad as originally is still definitely an issue, is the feeling that until you've a character in his 20's you're just buying powers you have to have. Stamina, travel powers and their prereqs are things almost every character needs and it's no fun buying them. You've done it for every character you have, you know what they do, and it's dishwater dull going through it again. I think most of my characters are below level 10 or with a couple over 30 and one over 40 with nothing in between. Because very few characters are so much fun to play you're going to want to grind through the levels to get the boring stuff again.
Always notice what you notice.
Guild Wars, for starters.
And I'm sorry, but CoH/V takes repetition to a WHOLE new level. I've played the majority of AAA MMO's out there and I can easily say that this one is the most repetitive of them all. Here, you do the same mission over and again, just with different names of victims etc. to cover that fact up. In other MMO's at least the story somewhat changes as you go along...
I can not disagree with you before Architect came out. but now they have AE and in my opinion the people have created missions far better than even the game itself. Also, did you take your coh/v char to cap level and do the pvp areas? Not until I did those things did I really see some mind blowing stuff. Of course as soon as I capped my 1 character after years of play (taking so much time away to try everything new), I started another. Now I tthink I will go back and grab some missions with it because Not till after the high levels Did I get to areas with graphics and mobs that blew my mind compared to anything else. I wish they put those areas in the lower lvl missions sporatically to keep interest. Also, I see so many lvl 50's running around in that game all the time. What are they doing? PVP? I capped a mastermind which is worste PVP so my mistake there. Anyway, Is there a game out there thats not repititious? I always like to check these out and have just about everyone out now. I would really like to try something completely different. Oh, red light district? thats one I havent tried yet
.
This post is intentionally written as to not make any sense what so ever. Thank You Very Much.
Try Virtue
Sall i'm gonna say
That's the truth. In CoX it's Virtue. In SWG it's Starsider. Oddly enough, both are their game's unofficial RP servers and have been since launch. I don't think this is a coincidence when you take into account other servers like Wiccana or Landroval in other games.
Or Freedom? before I was going to get back in game fromt he free 3 months nc gave for shutting down TR I watched servers and Virtue and Freedom were the ones. I transfered my char to Freedom because it seemed more likely in my time zone. But even the server I was on (forgot name) had a surprising amount of people on it for being tagged as low at sign in. coh/v is a game where I actually have to hide from team invites (at work, afk too much) there is so much activity. The markets actually fluctuate in front of your eyes a lot. coh/v is a hold over till Aion and champions come out soon. Then on to APB, Jumpgate and Startrek when that comes out, anything else lookin good too. Aion Beta today (another gift for shutting down TR). I really wished they copied the leveling properties of Coh/v, the skill one level and enhancing that skill the next. Thats nice. Maybe in champions.
This post is intentionally written as to not make any sense what so ever. Thank You Very Much.
Check out their recent announcement about Issue 16. You'll see almost all MA farming gone.
the review was good except for the "not good for solo play". this game is very solo friendly, if not one of the most friendly... because there are only 1 or 2 archtypes that can't solo well. The only one i can think of off the top of my head are Dominators, they have the weakest overall dps, thus them being able to solo early on is diffecult, but later on in the game they are soloable. just not nearly as good as Brutes are for instance. but for the most part i've played this game solo, with the occasional friend that jumps on to play with me. I've gotten 3 characters to level 50 mostly by solo play. only 1 or 2 levels where made with groups.
This game is very repetitious but the story elements are sometimes really funny and interesting. There are a lot of different types creatures to fight, especially now with the architect system, people can make an endless amount of content for the game.
Its been a very fun game for me aside from Guild Wars. To each is their own of course...
I just read that same article today (if you're talking where he said if he could re-do Villain's he'd do it a completely different way) and I'm pretty sure that the plan (guessing) is if Champions does well to role out a nemesis version that would reflect Villains could have/should have been. I imagine the vision for villains went something like this: lets take the hero's world, and use the same formula, only reverse everything so you kidnap rather than rescue, destroy rather than save.' It just feels too much the same game. And I think the fact there are so few lower levels or alts or anyone really, running around is a case being made for how hard it is to get through those first levels.
Saying that, it'll be interesting to see if a nemesis game rolls out, and it does correct many of Villains' missteps, what that will do for villains.
LrK
This game is atleast my favorite MMO. Yes it can be boring and if your new with no guidance then you'll be bored I believe. But I brought my friend in and showed him around and he is having fun. Been playing this game sense '04 so I know my way around (CoH '04 and believe CoV '05).
With the new AE missiosn there is no reason to be slow lvling. Join freedom server and get to like lvl 6ish and go do some AE. I created a team for AE at lvl 6 and got to lvl 12ish in matter of like 1hr or so. If your lucky and have a friend like me can get your other friends in some higher lvl AE boss farming and get from 1-30 in like 3-4hrs all depends on your team really.
In long run this game kind of died because of age and now they use the ascuse of AE killing it (it was dead before AE because of it being out so long, AE just made it alive again but in different way).
Villain: Will of Lightning
Guild Wars, for starters.
And I'm sorry, but CoH/V takes repetition to a WHOLE new level. I've played the majority of AAA MMO's out there and I can easily say that this one is the most repetitive of them all. Here, you do the same mission over and again, just with different names of victims etc. to cover that fact up. In other MMO's at least the story somewhat changes as you go along...
I agree, most mmo's have some level of repitition but, yes, CoH?V DOES take it to a whole new level. I couldn't stay interested and found myself treating missions like a chore... must...do...this... must... do.... it's very hard to stick with a game like that. But it is about preference, and enough players still enjoy the game to be staying, I just think the population is aging (as in higher levels, not actual age) and has little interest in starting all over. This makes sense, but it still does the game a disservice, because new players, or even veteran players who quit and are considering coming back, without any sense of story in the lower levels, or any population... probably won't stay. I've decided to stick it out, I pulled a veteran player back in -- but it's like we're playing in a world where the zombies won and ate everyone else... it's just the two of us and some snakes.
LrK