What do you really think of Champions Online?

[Enforcer84]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

Well having logged in for a few hours after getting my new rig to work...

 

"It's pretty."

Some of the character models don't do it for me and some of the vehicles look really clunky. Effects are fabulous.

 

All i did was fly around and bust up some mobs but then I came across a burning building and with the help of a fire extinguisher and my super-strength, rescued 4 people...it was really kind of cool.

 

I'll probably keep trying. I do believe my name is @Enforcer84...but I'm pretty sporadic.

[Guest Celt]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

I log in sporadically myself still. @FenianB, friend invite sent, Enforcer.

[baronspam]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

I tried the free to play version. Honestly, the most interesting element of the game seems to be the character creation system, which you don't have access to unless you are paying the monthly subscription. I tried all the free archtypes, and often found myself wanting to redesign some element of them. I settled on a punch-em-in-da-face flying brick character name Paragon.

 

Pros: Picking up a car and taking out a minion with it is priceless. There are several differnt adventure paths. You can stay in the city and do mostly (so far) door missions, or you can go off to Canada for more of a Hazard zone (to use the CoX term) experience.

 

Cons: Some minor gameplay elements bug me. On a door misson you have to find/run back to an exit once you finish it. It should just have an "exit mission" button. I spent half a hour or more running around an empty map after killing all the badguys trying to find the breifcase I was supposed to locate. It didn't appear untill I was right on top of it. Some of the Supervillian fights are very hard. I don't expect the game to be World of Warcraft easy, but I tried to take on Kevin Poe with a level 9 character (its a level 9 mission) and just flat cound not take him out. I just couldn't survive the damage he was putting out, even with my best efforts to block his heavy attacks and use good tactics. I jumped the superjet to canada and did missions there for a couple of levels and then came back and beat him, but that kind of things annoys me.

 

Personally, I find the city has less personality than much of CoX did. This game does have the advantage that it has non-city zones you can get to very early, but running around Atlas Park and Kings Row was a more immersive experience than fighting super-gangs on the West Side.

[Certified]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

A couple of things to Baronspam's post. I would really like to see an Exit Mission button as well but I'm guessing there might be some legal issues behind that since well Cryptic developed CoH as well.

 

Fighting super villains, this is a trickier subject. While a well put together build can solo most super villains, good luck with Dr. Destroyer's lab, the Archetypes are meant to be solid fun builds but they lack a bit of the punch and finesse the free form characters can have. While I wouldn't be surprised if an Archetype character could take out Kevin Poe I don't think it will be easy.

 

Now, city stuff CoH broke Paragon City into distinct zones using the back story to explain why. As far as the layout of Millennium City goes, they don't have zones in a game sense it's one large map. However, there are very different feels from the Westside Docks to China Town much less the Renaissance Center, City Center and all parts East. While it would be nice to get a little more diversity in feel on the East side overall Millennium City has a more natural feel. Unfortunately this also means a blander feel since well most cities are fairly bland. Since Millennium City is built on the ashes of Detroit I'd like to see a Manufacturing District and some burned out suburbs. Although, the latter may be a bit to dark for the Silver Aged feel of the game.

[Certified]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

So I put some of the ideas about Millennium City together here.

[Enforcer84]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

I log in sporadically myself still. @FenianB' date=' friend invite sent, Enforcer.[/quote']

 

Thanks!

That was you!?!

[BobGreenwade]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

Maybe it has to do with the fact that this is my first-ever experience with an MMO, but I've been playing for the last couple of weeks and I'm finding it quite enjoyable.

 

I'm not saying it's without flaws. Some of it has to do with the system I'm using, which is just a low-end netbook; I have a lot of lag, especially if there's a lot of activity going on nearby, and it accumulates. Graphics limitations also mean that I can only turn in increments of 45, 60, or 90 degrees, depending on the location (at least, I believe the limitation is at my end; I've seen videos with smoother turns). That's especially bad when trying to move long distances, as neither of the characters I have can fly and much of the landscape tends to twist, turn, and be filled with obstacles. Thus, most of the time I have to leave my Travel Power off.

 

As to content complaints, I see little benefit in using an Archetype rather than a Freeform (higher starting Characteristics is about it). I'd really like to be able to go into more parts of Millennium City, and will probably feel the same about Vibora Bay when I get there. In some areas I've been finding it harder to go from the Contact to the Mission than to carry out the Mission itself. And I'm not the only person who's experienced key commands going into the chat box, or vice versa, with disastrous results.

 

But still, it's fun enough to me that I'm seriously considering becoming a subscriber once I'm able to get a computer upgrade, and for now the best birthday present I can think of (I'm turning 50 next month) is Atari tokens.

[dmjalund]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

I would like to be able to export the characters to Poser or similar - or at least to a higher res image.

[Kraven Kor]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

Fun, if a bit 'shallow' - I'm trying to get to 40 before passing full judgement. I love the character creation and advancement so far, but am wondering if level 40 is just doing the same thing over and over again.

[BobGreenwade]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

Fun' date=' if a bit 'shallow' - I'm trying to get to 40 before passing full judgement. I love the character creation and advancement so far, but am wondering if level 40 is just doing the same thing over and over again.[/quote']Perusing the Wiki, I've seen that there are a lot of Level 40 only Missions, by care of UNITY. There are also ways to continue to advance the character by way of Devices and other equipment, and you can create some of your own variety by having multiple Nemeses.

 

(I've also seen hints of people asking for more content, mainly via more Millennium City neighborhoods, though the Moon has also been mentioned and China and England are a couple of other good possibilities. So hopefully the developers will get some of that together. Also there's been some talk from Cryptic about expanding and improving the Nemesis system.)

[BLBlake]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

I've been having a lot of fun with Champions Online. I don't play many video games, and even though I'm a big Champions fan I resisted trying the MMORPG until just recently when they went F2P. I liked it enough to subscribe. Between work, and family I have a tight schedule so, I appreciate that CO allows me the freedom to jump in, play, and then log off when I want. Many of the missions seem to be scaled for solo or team play which I like. Since I can't play as regularly or for long at a time as I would like, it's nice to play solo. Maybe when my workload lightens I can try joining a team.

 

One thing I absolutely love is the character creation part. I spent a longtime tweaking my character's look. This is something I longed for ever since the old Champions vaporware from the early 1990's was announced. I enjoy creating, and designing heroes and this feature hits the spot.

 

[Nolgroth]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

RISE THREAD RISE!

 

Recently downloaded and started playing the Champions Online Free For All through Steam. Keep in mind that this is my very first MMO that I have played for longer than it took to grimace and exit.

 

Character Creation

Hands down, my favorite part of the game. The obvious reason is being able to visualize the character. There is another, more subtle reason that has to do with game play. Anyway, my first character channeled all of the Dark Avenger look (though I played him as a Behemoth). I have since deleted him (and man does only having two character slots suck eggs) and built many other characters. Along the way came a techo looking martial artist named Emerald something-or-other. She didn't last long. She was soon replaced by my Inferno character, which essentially used the same design with an altered color scheme. Fun character. Then came my second Behemoth; a Warhammer 40K Space Marine looking fellow. Nice, but something was missing so he got replaced by She-Hulk. She in turn got replaced by a Grimoire character that I tried to make look like a stage magician. He in turn was replaced by yet another character. The cycle ended with the return of She-Hulk (as a Behemoth of course). Sadly I could not name her She-Hulk, but the visual is about as dead on as I could make it.

 

The Tutorial

Okay, we now start the game only to find that an insectoid alien species called the Qulaar have invaded Millennium City. Nice and epic. So you get to learn the basics of movement, combat, inventory, interaction and the whole enchilada while fighting space aliens trying to steal our chicks. Well maybe not. It was great with just about every character I played. The notable exception was the Grimoire character. Hated him. Probably the most fun I had was with the Inferno character (named Firelight because Firebrand was forbidden for some reason).

 

Getting used to the control scheme was tough. I am a PC gamer, so the mouse buttons are the obvious choice for bringing the smackdown to the baddies. Not so here. The default control scheme is "MMO" so I am guessing that other MMO games follow the same unusual scheme of using the number buttons to attack and activate powers and all that rot.

 

So I am not going to spoiler any of the specific quests, but eventually I get through the final segment of the tutorial and on to the freshly repainted Millennium City.

 

It's A Big World Out There

First mission? Power up of course. And here we get our super movement power. Let me tell you, Flight was worth the price of admission (which being a free game is admittedly not much). I especially loved just flying around Renaissance Center (sort of the safe zone of the game). Kudos to Cryptic for that.

 

Then it's off to do the post tutorial tutorial missions. Fun, but only distracting for a minute. Taking a tour? Sure, you want the players oriented but that was sort of tedious. The crafting thing was okay. Fallout New Vegas did it better.

 

Then I start my first "real" mission. It goes okay, leading me further into one of the big sub-plots of the game. After finishing a series of related missions, Defender no longer seems to like me and dumps me off on some guy in a monster truck. He gives me a mission which I do with little problems.

 

It is the subsequent mission where things start to go wrong. I wander down an alley where the primary antagonistic group awaits. All of a sudden (and for no apparent reason beyond "screw you player") a member of a whole other faction jumps out of a side alley. Despite blasting him with literally everything I had, the dude took me down with barely a scratch on his health bar. I even tried to fly away and to no avail. The bad guys have really long range attacks, superleap and your own super movement powers slow to a crawl when you are in combat. I came back and killed the guy, but that is besides the point. Why is a superhero getting owned by a frickin' common thug? It seriously felt like I was playing a street level hero (and a low point one at that) rather than a character worthy enough to stand next to the Champions.

 

Since then, I have (with my son and best friend or alone) taken several missions. They tend to be repetitive, but I liken the game play to Diablo II. One of the idiosyncrasies of the game that takes me out of the world is the presence of super powered characters everywhere. The abilities that the bad guys show, the sheer number of players, and the fact that my contact for missions can one shot guys that I have to wear down all lead to a little bit of a disconnect.

 

I was worried, at first, that all Behemoths (Bricks), Minds (Mentalists), etc would look the same at a given level. After I got to level 11, I realized that the customization truly begins. There will obviously be similar builds with a leveling class system, but at least you can tailor the character a little bit.

 

I was disappointed with the fact that I couldn't just build my character. I understand why class and level was used, but I really wish a Champions game would include a point buy system.

 

Thoughts and Review

This game is the first MMO that I honestly enjoyed playing. Character creation is fantastic, reminiscent of my favorite games like Mass Effect and Oblivion. My son and I (sometimes with the help of my best friend) have really taken Millennium City by storm. The graphics are pretty and there is shine of epic scale.

 

When you scratch the surface, the shine proves to be just glamor. Sure, your character can fly, but he also gets thumped on routinely by common thugs. It is a recipe much better suited to fantasy or science fiction genres than mighty superheroes.

 

While I like the buffet pricing for the add-ons, I don't necessarily agree with the rate at which some of the things are priced at. Additional character slots cost somewhere around $15? No thanks. I realize Cryptic and their publisher are trying to make money and I totally support that. As the discriminating consumer, I vote no. How about a single slot for $5. I would pay for that. And while I am on the subject, no matter what you call them, Atari Tokens, Bioware Points, Microsoft Points, I hate the concept. Give me a hard dollar amount, not this fooling around crap so that I always end up buying more points/tokens/whatever than I need.

 

Honestly, I would like this game a whole lot better if they developed and packaged it like Diablo II; something that I can start a server and take off with my close associations. I would actually pay the current video game rate ($50-60) for that. Heck, make those adventure packs an extra charge ($5-10 seems reasonable) and I'd buy those too. I know that I am not anywhere near being in majority. I can dig that. I will spend my hard earned bucks elsewhere, but I totally understand Cryptic's/Atari's need to cater to the majority crowd and their own business model.

 

Finally, I want to thank Cryptic and/or Atari for making Champions Online available for free. While I have some complaints about the pricing issues and some game play snark, I think it is incredibly kind of them to allow us to play for free. I hope this tactic garners them much business in the future.

[Certified]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

I was worried, at first, that all Behemoths (Bricks), Minds (Mentalists), etc would look the same at a given level. After I got to level 11, I realized that the customization truly begins. There will obviously be similar builds with a leveling class system, but at least you can tailor the character a little bit.

 

I was disappointed with the fact that I couldn't just build my character. I understand why class and level was used, but I really wish a Champions game would include a point buy system.

 

Thought I would comment on this point. Several people have commented that the Free To Play experience is like an extended tutorial. Not because you are limited in game play content, they give you virtually everything except 3 adventures, but because character creation is hamstrung.

 

As a Gold player you are not limited to archetypes and can freely choose your powers as the character advances. The do stagger power levels so you can't just start the game with a mega blast type power but this flows fairly naturally. Characters start with generally basic, straight forward, powers picking up more nuanced abilities along the way.

 

It seems that you're a fan of bricks so I will say that as a Gold member depending on your power selection you are able to make a tank in every power framework from fire to mentalist. Even more appealing is each of these characters will have their own feels as to how their defenses work and what powers interact with them.

 

Also, while this is readily available on the website I may as well include the following. (As it seems I'm the official Gold pusher.) Gold players have multiple character slots (8 to start). When you reach level 40 you get a free character slot so you never have to delete a level capped character. Lastly, Gold members also pick up 400 Cryptic points with their subscription each month.

[Nolgroth]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

Thanks for the information. I do not think that it will change my overall opinion, but extra information is always useful.

[Jagged]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

While I like the buffet pricing for the add-ons' date=' I don't necessarily agree with the rate at which some of the things are priced at.[/quote']

 

Interesting to read your thoughts. I've been thinking about trying this again now its free, but I am wary. I used to play City of Heroes and one of the things that helped push me away was the rise of macro transactions. It wasn't too bad because CoH started off with a very high degree of availability for things like costumes and such. And part of you has to accept that if they were not charging for new costume options then you probably wouldn't be getting any! But still, it slowly started to annoy. I am interested to note that City of Heroes is going to a free model as well, so I guess macro transactions are here to stay.

[Nolgroth]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

Interesting to read your thoughts. I've been thinking about trying this again now its free' date=' but I am wary. I used to play City of Heroes and one of the things that helped push me away was the rise of macro transactions. It wasn't too bad because CoH started off with a very high degree of availability for things like costumes and such. And part of you has to accept that if they were not charging for new costume options then you probably wouldn't be getting any! But still, it slowly started to annoy. I am interested to note that City of Heroes is going to a free model as well, so I guess macro transactions are here to stay. [/quote']I don't mind the concept really. For instance, I loved the official DLC from both Oblivion and Fallout 3. Yeah, it was like buying a whole new game when it was all said and done, but the extra content was welcome. Assuming it was handled right, I could actually see myself paying for extra content from CO:FFA. It's just that I am not particularly fond of the whole purchased character slot model. I totally understand why Cryptic/Atari chose to go that route but, personally, I love to create characters and the CO creator is one of the best I've seen so far. It is probably unfair to compare a standard PC game to an MMO, but I have created literally hundreds of characters for Oblivion. Sometimes just to make one. Similarly, I've made at least a couple of dozen Fallout 3 characters (character design not so fun with that one) and maybe a hundred with the Mass Effect series of games. I think that I just illustrated the reason for the limited slot thing, but this is the deal breaker for me.*

 

Still, the experiences I have had with Champions Online FFA have been pretty good. It certainly has held my attention for a lot longer than all of the MMOs (combined) that I have tried. It deserves some kudos for that at least.

 

* Not actually the only one. The other big deal breaker is the respawn thing. Yes, it totally needs to be there. It is just disconnecting to see the quest you just went through "reset" for the next group or character. I tend to buy games to immerse myself in a story. While there is a story there, I can see that everybody else is experiencing the same "assembly line" plot. It is jarring for me. Sure Oblivion and other single player games have the same story for every player, but I don't have to watch them do the story in real time either just before me or just after me. Sheesh. I tend to be long-winded don't I?

[Jagged]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

If your favourite part is creating characters then you should definitely try City of Heroes when that goes free-to-pay. Perhaps I should whisper it, but some think CoH has better character(appearance) creation than its newer sister, which is strange considering its the same dev team. But true or not, worth a try for free.

[Nolgroth]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

Well, I may try out City of Heroes: Freedom just for kicks but I definitely will NOT be dumping money into Champions Online: Free For All. If the pricing scheme is similar for CoH: Freedom, then they will not get money for that either.

 

I was going to purchase one new "class" and one new character slot for CO: FFA. The problem is that the points add up to 2040. Just a little more than the $25, 2000 point mark. Really? From where I come from, that is what we called a hustle. Even $25 seemed awfully steep, but I was willing to toss some scratch towards Cryptic/Atari as a thank you/incentive. The pricing scheme is, IMO, outright crooked. I also noticed that almost every combination of additional upgrades tend to leave you with a few extra points. That pretty much settles the question in my mind. A la carte pricing is fine, just make each thing a specific dollar amount or forget it. I got caught in that whole scheme for Mass Effect 2 and it will never happen again.

[Certified]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

This may be stating the obvious but all the archetypes are included with a Gold Membership along with 8 starting character slots.

 

When Champions Online went live me and a few friends did the Lifetime subscription. at this point or very soon, Cryptic will be paying me to play.

[Nolgroth]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

This may be stating the obvious but all the archetypes are included with a Gold Membership along with 8 starting character slots.

No offense, but not really the point. My main beef is with the way they (Atari) decided to price the a la carte add-ons. I am not opposed to paying them money, I'm just asking Atari (and Bioware, Microsoft and any other company that participates in this kind of scam) to stop it. Give us rounded whole dollar prices instead of using points that are deliberately priced to leave a few points extra. That model forces us to pay more than strictly needed for the upgrades that we want. If they didn't want to release the game for free, they didn't have to. In that case, because I never bought into the monthly subscription thing, I would not have even bothered to try it.

 

As to the Gold Membership, I just think $15 a month (or $180 a year) is about three times what I would pay for a new, non-subscription game. With Steam deals and less expensive games that could become as many as five or six games. So 3-5 games versus one per year and being as the shine of Champions Online has already severely started to fade, no thanks. Not to say that it isn't a game that isn't fun or worth paying Atari/Cryptic for. I just don't buy into the concept of monthly subscription to play a game. Maybe if there was something like Netflix, where I could log into a variety of sufficiently different games and play, then I might reconsider the idea.

[Enforcer84]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

yeah but most of the free-to-play games run it this way do they not? Ah. Nevermind I see your beef. Well you could just play crippled for a long time. you do earn Atari Points for playing. And it's not an insignificant amount.

 

I noticed that my $15 a month sub game which I play all the damn time comes out to far less than a few cents an hour.

[Certified]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

yeah but most of the free-to-play games run it this way do they not? Ah. Nevermind I see your beef. Well you could just play crippled for a long time. you do earn Atari Points for playing. And it's not an insignificant amount.

 

I noticed that my $15 a month sub game which I play all the damn time comes out to far less than a few cents an hour.

 

Lifetime Subs All the way baby!!! ... or something like that.

 

Anyway, aside from the first time completing the Tutorial where else can you score Cryptic Points in game? A friend of mine just started playing as a Silver Member and asked me if he could I didn't think there was any other way than that first Tutorial run.

[Nolgroth]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

I noticed that my $15 a month sub game which I play all the damn time comes out to far less than a few cents an hour.

That's good if you think you are getting your money's worth. I realize my argument regarding monthly subscription is entirely subjective. If YOU are having fun and think it is a good value, then it is. Period. For me it wouldn't be. So yeah, I get that.

 

And my beef with Atari goes with any and all game publishers that charge you for more points than you need to buy something and you always seem to have wasted money. It's not just Atari. And I will now stop flogging that dead horse. I think everybody gets where I am coming from.

[Enforcer84]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

That's good if you think you are getting your money's worth. I realize my argument regarding monthly subscription is entirely subjective. If YOU are having fun and think it is a good value, then it is. Period. For me it wouldn't be. So yeah, I get that.

 

And my beef with Atari goes with any and all game publishers that charge you for more points than you need to buy something and you always seem to have wasted money. It's not just Atari. And I will now stop flogging that dead horse. I think everybody gets where I am coming from.

 

Totally

If it ever becomes unfun, I'm throwing money away. And not even getting fat like when I was a fast food addict. *cough*is*cough*

[Nolgroth]

Re: What do you really think of Champions Online?

 

Anyway' date=' aside from the first time completing the Tutorial where else can you score Cryptic Points in game?[/quote']I have not been able to find anywhere to earn them. On the other hand, there are power-ups that unlock costume pieces. That is sort of nice. An example is the Qulaar pistol from the tutorial opens up the Organic Alien Pistol (or similar) for the shooter archetype.