CoH: A review (sort of)

[kingandy]

Now that I'm back at work and should be working (as opposed to in work at the weekend so actually working), I thought I'd post a few general opinions on City of Heroes. Just so people know.

It's a good game. Very pretty, nicely thought out. I love the character generator; it's very easy to make heroes that look immensely cool (though annoyingly impossible to change later). I like the whole team-up aspect and sidekicks and supergroups - especially the Team Colours part, where you get to exchange any or all of the colours in your costume for those set by the team, though you keep the actual design. It makes for a cool uniform feel while maintaining your individuality.

My main niggle with the game is that, having got used to Knights of the Old Republic, it's annoying that you can't see yourself from the front. In KotOR you can rotate the camera and your character doesn't move until he/she needs to move, while in CoH your avatar just magically spins on a point. Most annoying, in an entirely trivial cosmetic way. And the control system is just different enough to be annoying - I keep forgetting where the "turn" keys are and press "sidestep" instead. Force of habit. Oh, I think the one other thing I don't enjoy is that there's no "select nearest enemy" button - it just seems to "select random enemy that you can see". One more thing: I'd love to be able to pull up Info on people via the console - just the basic details (Known Powers and Bio) that you can get by rightclicking on them, only without having to actually find them. Other than that, all good stuff.

Plus, having no movement powers, I am having to walk everywhere, which sucks. But Danny Wraith will be teleporting himself around by Level 14 (by entering THE WORLD OF THE DEAD), you see if he's not.

As, I suspect, with many MORG*s, there was a certain amount of blurring between IC and OOC - at least there was in the "SuperGroup" I got recruited into by mrssshhh and arwel, I know there's others out there that just treat it as a big third-person shooter and entirely ignore the RPG aspect. The blurring happened because we kept talking in our IC idioms but often discussed blatantly OOC elements. Lots of fun was had by all.

In summary - it's not quite as immediately gripping as KotOR, because the plot isn't quite so personal and progression isn't as fast, but I suspect it'll have much more staying power. Text-based interaction with other actual players (truly the cheapest form of AI) makes for more fulfilling roleplay, even if the responses aren't played out in glorious audio by trained acTORRs. And there's a lot more freedom about what tasks you perform, and when. And stuff. Also I kick ass.

I did eventually create that robot spaceship guy I mentioned - called him The Indefatigable, because it works a little better than The Council. Also people will have trouble spelling it. Hee hee hee. I've only played him through the tutorial, but he should be cool to play with. So now I've got a Mutant Tanker, a Technology Blaster and a Magic Defender ... I have a plan for a Science Controller, so I guess I need to do a Natural Scrapper too. Just to balance things out. Yeah.

* I can't pronounce MMORPG, so I'm not going to type it either.

Comments

[arwel.livejournal.com]

You can move the camera. I think holding down the right or middle button on the mouse lets you change the angle and look at your character from the front.

Everybody needs a robot character, they're just cool. Dark defenders are excellent, they have a nice mix of abilities, debuffs, blasts and heals. I created one when I did Prototype X, but I'll give him a rest for a while given Danny Wraith and Dark Tarot have the exact same powers. He looks so cool though.

Playing a blaster makes you realise just haw hard tankers are. You can't really keep up in the damage stakes with scrappers and blasters, but you can sit there and take damage for your team for ages. Seriously think about getting provoke from the presence power pool for Therm, I'm finding it exceptionally usefull for keeping the attention on Titan Alpha especially since it doesn't seem to cost any endurance to activate.

[kingandy]

I had come to this conclusion after playing Danny. It's mostly the lack of ranged damage that cripples Tankers - by the time you get to the enemy they've been blasted to bits by the Blasters already.

ps, you remember Danny was going all semitransparent? He can do that to other nearby teammates too, now. It's an entirely different power (from Dark Defence instead of the Concealment pool) but fit nicely with the idiom... I DRAW YOU ALL DOWN TO HELL

(ultimately I plan to purchase the mass teleport power. And the intangibility one too. This will take some time.)

[arwel.livejournal.com]

I was worried about Titan being a little under powered at around level 10-12, partly because of the problem you mentioned. I then realised that my job was to take damage and keep the rest of the team alive. You can't avoid massive clusterfucks though, especially at higher level when the mobs don't seem to die quite so easily, and that's when tankers come into their own. Titan can easily leap into over half a dozen yellows (as long as they're not all doing fire or cold damage, can't resist that yet) provoke them all and start softening them up whilst the scrappers and blasters pick them off.

[kingandy]

My main plan with Therm is to amp up damage resistance and that power that sets enemies on fire when they're nearby. Then it doesn't matter that I can only punch one person at once, they're all on fire!

I don't see myself branching out on the Flaming Melee list, that's all flaming swords and shit which doesn't quite fit Therm's intended powerset. It would be cool, but it's not Therm...

Now if only I could recolour the graphics of my flame animations.

[kingandy]

ps, Right mouse just rotates the camera as though you were pressing the "turn" keys. Haven't tried the middle (wheel), it might work ...

Ohh, the onlime manual (as opposed to the one that came on the game disk) lists "rotate camera" as PgUp or middle mouse. So I'll give that a try next time I'm online. Probably Saturday dammit.

[wulfboy.livejournal.com]

I pronounce it "ummmmmm - PORG" even though it isn't spelt like that.

I am being lured. If any job pans out i may have to break it to My Beloved that we're getting CoH.

[kingandy]

Just be prepared for the 13 year old gamers who think it's cool to call themselves "Wolverine666" or "Professr_X" or "poopiepants". And the endless parade of Tickalikes.

[arwel.livejournal.com]

They're easily ignored\taken the piss out of, and it's fun when you get to stand by and watch them die.

[wulfboy.livejournal.com]

Gah, man. I'm not an Ummmmm-PORG virgin. The fantasy games I've played have had "Wolverine666" and "X_MEN_ALLIANCE_13" characters in 'em. I ignore them and turn into a bear, usually. I suspect I'm the only actual role-player on the entire Shadowbane server, mind.

The blending of IC and OOC reminds me of LRP. In fact, online-gaming as a whole reminds me of LRP.

[kingandy]

Yes! Only without physrep constraints. And you have to stop to type.

Wow, Wolverines in fantasy games? I am in awe. At least the ones in Paragon City are in genre...

[mrssshhh.livejournal.com]

You've missed such gems as "Lukke_Skywalker6647" in EQ.

At least 80%+ of CoH names are at least superhero-ish. To be honest, I turned off the "Broadcast" & "Request" channels, so the only time I get to interact with people outside Project Twilight are when we get nobbers following us around, or speak to one of the few people trying to roleplay.

As far as I'm concerned Project Twilight are the only organised superheroes in Paragon City, and the few others I notice are bit players in the background of our story.

As for viewing your character from the front, hold down the centre button / click the mouse wheel, and move the mouse or use the left/right keys. I've taken a couple of decent screenshots of the Riot Kids so far, but now i've upped my graphic quality I ought to take a few better ones.

[Wolverine] lvl5scrp LFT

[kingandy]

You have to photoshop them together so Riot Boy and Riot Grrl are teaming up! Or making out. Or whatever.

Hmm, must work out how to turn off broadcast and request. I don't ever respond to them and I don't think I ever will.

Re: [Wolverine] lvl5scrp LFT

[arwel.livejournal.com]

All I see on thge broadcast channel is:

[Stupid_Twunt] Were r teh circel in kings row?
*A few seconds passes*
[Stupid_Twunt] Were r teh circel in kings row?

Re: [Wolverine] lvl5scrp LFT

[kingandy]

I can empathise; I gave up looking for the Circle in Kings Row after I found it impossible to get onto rooftops. I got on one by way of a fire escape, but most of those only seem to go halfway up and the only visible enemies were right across the street. Went to Perez Park instead, with the help of Dark Tarot. But I never asked about it on the broadcast channel...