Playable Villains Possibly in Champions Online's Future

[vansau]

Playable Villains Possibly in Champions Online's Future

Cryptic Studios is considering playable villains for Champions Online, letting players get in touch with their dark sides.

You have to hand it to Cryptic Studios, the developer seems devoted to keeping its community informed about what it's working on. In the latest issue of "Ask Cryptic" (the company's official Q&A column), the developer addressed a number of questions from the community about possible future content for Champions Online. While some hopes &mdash such as four-armed characters &mdash were shot down, Cryptic did reveal that players might get to play as villains somewhere down the line.

When asked if the game would receive a villainous expansion (similar to City of Villains), Cryptic confirmed that it was a possibility.

"In the short-term," said the developer, "we're still working on providing more hero-based content. From past experience in the genre, players mainly want to play the heroes, so that was always our focus for Champions Online. However, villain play is something we have always discussed as a possible gameplay expansion. All our prototype designs for villain play involve a different dynamic which deals with less directed gameplay and more sandbox-style gameplay: stealing the parts and kidnapping scientist to construct a death ray, rampaging through the city on a destructive spree, etc. A lot of the plots outlined in our Nemesis content provide good outlines for villain-based gameplay."

Being a bad guy in Champions Online would be pretty cool, but that's not the only upcoming improvement to the MMOG. I was always a much bigger fan of City of Villains than I was of City of Heroes. Cryptic also confirmed that it is working on further character appearance customization, creating new in-game special effects, and is considering adding new power types to the game.

Source: Massively

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[Timbydude]

I love the idea of playing a villain, but if it's as horrifically unbalanced as the original Champions Online and contains as many unnecessary time sinks (Why are superheroes gathering materials and crafting items?), then count me out.

 

[Dr. wonderful]

...I love the game, bought it and...didn't know it was Pay2play.

FUUUUUUUUU-

 

[deathyepl]

Oh, yeah, this idea is bloody brilliant... the thing that cost the original City of Heroes a massive chunk of their user base is EXACTLY what Champions needs, yeah!

Doc Wonderful - It mentions it on the box. Honestly, to expect an American MMORPG to NOT be subscription based is a bit naive... the only MMORPGs that get released here as free-to-play are from games that have flopped and they're trying to save their bacon. In general, the free-to-play games are imported from Asia.

 

[GrinningManiac]

Champions Online was the only MMORPG that ever interested me. It was the only one I ever brought and ever paid subs for and ever played. I enjoyed it, but the grinding was new to me, and it got stale

This might make me go back

 

[Mr. Grey]

When are we going to get the Anti-Hero... the smarmy asshole that does what he thinks is best at the time?

Not saying I don't appreciate the villainous endeavors though... I just hope I can honestly dip people into acid this time around. Although I really wanted to do that in the anti-hero mode where I would get rid of the problem at hand and just kick the antagonist's butt.

"Oh, you mean to distract me with a citizen in order to escape?"
I then proceed to push the button dumping the helpless civilian in the acid.
"What citizen is that, by chance?"

 

[Jared]

Well, they are offering a choice at least, which, I think could be pretty cool and both good and evil play off eah other rather well

 

[chstens]

Champions Online is a fantastic idea badly executed. This could take it a few steps in the right direction.

 

[Thealchemistofwhite]

I imagine villians becoming the new "Horde"...

 

[The Amazing Tea Alligator]

I got Champions Online, but haven't renewed my subscription since my initial one was finished. My hope is that one day they'll jump on the free to play with microtransaction bandwagon. Then again, the game already had microtransactions...

 

[Fearzone]

Glad to hear they are still working on it. I hope a PS3 version is still under consideration.

I enjoyed it, it's just too bad there wasn't very much content by MMO standards. Wouldn't mind playing again if content improvements were substantial. The core of the game has always had a lot of potential.

Broken PvP didn't help so I think that would have to be fixed before a villianous side would be a plausible enhancement, unless they are just thinking of different quest-lines for villians.

 

[ark123]

Pay to play is doomed. WoW gets away with it because it's blizzard and they were the first, but eventually they're all going to be either free to play+microtransactions, pay for software+free online (ala guild wars) or "pay to play until you pay 50 bucks, then free", which doesn't exist yet but seems like a logical way to go.

 

[asinann]

Pay to play is doomed. WoW gets away with it because it's blizzard and they were the first, but eventually they're all going to be either free to play+microtransactions, pay for software+free online (ala guild wars) or "pay to play until you pay 50 bucks, then free", which doesn't exist yet but seems like a logical way to go.

Wow, someone hasn't read their MMO history. Neverwinter Nights wasn't always the Bioware smash. Back in the 90's there was a version with graphics that looked like the Gold Box series games and was pay to play. After that there were many others like: Ultima Online (this one proved that the pay to play model works,) Everquest (without this one, WoW would never have been made) and Asharon's Call 1 AND 2 all before WoW came out.

Back on topic though, I'm not surprised in the slightest. They did it with CoH/CoV, and I knew the day Champions was released they would some day release a Villain version that ends up being better in every game play aspect.

 

[ark123]

Pay to play is doomed. WoW gets away with it because it's blizzard and they were the first, but eventually they're all going to be either free to play+microtransactions, pay for software+free online (ala guild wars) or "pay to play until you pay 50 bucks, then free", which doesn't exist yet but seems like a logical way to go.

Wow, someone hasn't read their MMO history. Neverwinter Nights wasn't always the Bioware smash. Back in the 90's there was a version with graphics that looked like the Gold Box series games and was pay to play. After that there were many others like: Ultima Online (this one proved that the pay to play model works,) Everquest (without this one, WoW would never have been made) and Asharon's Call 1 AND 2 all before WoW came out.

Back on topic though, I'm not surprised in the slightest. They did it with CoH/CoV, and I knew the day Champions was released they would some day release a Villain version that ends up being better in every game play aspect.

...correct, I didn't read up on MMO history. I read your post with the Simpsons Comic Book Guy voice in my head.

 

[erbkaiser]

@vansau: please properly close your HTML entities: &mdash displays as-is in standards-compliant browsers, you should use — to get an —.

 

[Aurgelmir]

...I love the game, bought it and...didn't know it was Pay2play.

FUUUUUUUUU-

Most western MMOs are...


Now over to the horrendous pile of pixels that is Champions Online.

Adding villains to the game post release is a bad idea. The game is not made to handle it, and it will most likely just feel like it is stuck on with a piece of tape. City of Villains had next to nothing to do with City of Heroes, it was just a bunch of new classes in a bunch of new areas.

Imagine if Blizzard would add the Horde to the game 2 years after they released a Vanilla Wow with only alliance as the playable faction. Then try and figure out how that would work

Now imagine a poor games developer like Cryptic trying to implement it, instead of Blizzard.

Do you really think it would work out well?


My biggest gripe with Cryptic is that they are throwing every good idea they have into the game, without knowing how to make a game. Champions is what Yahtzee would call a big toy box.
Champions have a lot of things it does great, or at least could do great. The character creator rocks, letting you pick your own powers is good in theory. But in the end the game ends up being a poor idea of what superheroes are on a graphic engine that is so bugged that you just don't feel like playing. Not to mention that the content you play is as run of the mill as anything you have seen.

And now they want to add playable villains to that? pfft

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Champions Online is a fantastic idea badly executed. This could take it a few steps in the right direction.

Or a few steps backwards. City of ... suffered badly from the inevitable PvP as the game was based around PvE - and then Players were re-directed to build purely for PvP.

MMOs simply aren't suited to PvP because the work involved with "balancing" the characters destroys them in PvE. City of ... took a huge hit when the PvP element was added as they're fundamentally against RPG - for reasons I'm yet to fathom - but the PvP element are the ones who demand and are more vocal.

If they do look at proper sandbox gaming, like in Oblivion/GTA/LotRo then there's a chance it could work; but the reliance on uber-NPCs simply causes frustration and dropped spaces. Something an MMO collapses under.

Guitar Hero did the same when it added competitive play. What you have there is player fighting player with no thought to character vs. character. And at that point, you would be better off with something like Counterstrike.

The idea is nice, but when the Antagonist becomes the Hero, then you've an entirely different genre to the Protagonist - and having them in the same area means that one is going to lose badly. And that's the one that will go to the forums screaming for buffs and nerfs.

Champions Online was tested by the CoX players when it was in Beta, and the biggest condemnation was that it's disjointed, grindtastic and falls on the same sword that SW:G, Guild Wars and to an extent, WoW does. You're not playing towards the advancement of your character or the world, rather the advancement of your player.

And that's only good for ganking and e-peen.

Unfortunately, SWTOR have already said that's the way they're going as well.