How To Distinguish Ourselves?

City of Heroes is a wonderful MMO; the best out there, in my opinion. It's got it's bugs and different things that need to be worked out here and there, but it's definitely my best pick of the litter.

When Champions Online came out (this isn't a comparison thread!) I bought it with high hopes to find that it just wasn't what I wanted... Not in the least. It was as is someone had taken a turd, polished it, and put glitter dust all over it; it just wasn't what I was looking for in many ways.

But now, every last person that hasn't intimately played both CoX and CO is adamantly stating that it's just 'CoX2'. At first, it was something to laugh at, and now it's just something that's downright annoying.
I can easily see how one would confuse the two, however; both have an iconic Hero and Villain, along with the Hero/Villain Groups, both are centered around metropolitan cities, and they... Both deal with Superheroes. While this is all well and good, it leaves me with the question of 'just HOW do we distinguish ourselves as something other than the precursor to the game with polished graphics and more bloom than a rosebush in spring?

To me, it strikes me as Villains, and Going Rogue being what can make the distinguishing factor; we have something that can border on a monopoly of Villains. Champions doesn't have them, Marvel has not mentioned anything... and is DC Universe still in production?

Of course, that's just a small idea, but really, should City of Heroes be concerned with distinguishing ourselves, or should we simply rely on Going Rogue to be THE factor that separates us from everyone else? Is it even an issue? I'm looking forward to the feedback.

I don't think it's an issue to worry about. CHV will always distinguish itself by being the first one.

Time will tell if it remains the only worthwhile one.

I'm content to leave such matters to the professionals.

Let me first state that I am a loyal player and feel COX is the best MMO of its type. That being said, I hope the developers are concerned about distinguishing themselves and that feel the heat from the competition. I feel the competition will ultimately bring on new ideas and improvements that no one has thought of before. We as the gaming community will benefit. Even though I hope COX will win this battle, I think it is one that is healthy and necessary.

I just wanted to step in to say...


lolVillains


That is all.

(Full Disclosure: My primary project this weekend is to level up my now level 35 villain to 50 to unlock VEATS)

I'd say that the key point of difference NCSoft/Paragon Studios is marketing Co* on at the moment is the Mission Architect. It's unique to the Superhero MMO niche, yes? Maybe to the whole MMO genre, yes? It was the subject of the latest boxed release, yes?

I think that the MA system is the primary marketing / unique point of difference feature that NCSoft are pushing. I think they've chosen right.

There is also of course Going Rogue, another box set, massive expansion, and new feature. Do other Superhero MMO's let you go from being a hero to villain, or back again?

I don't think the OP has anything to be concerned about, Ross and the Marketing Team know how to spin. There are numerous articles on popular gaming sites with the developers about the latest in the game, contests, conventions...the list goes on.

I'm confident the game's in good hands. Can't say I'm so sure about the competition.

Isn't CoX already distinguished?

If the newer superhero MMO's are being compared to CoX, doesn't that indicate that the dev team has set the standard that must be met or surpassed for the others to be considered a success?

Since CO is being referred to as "CoX2", it seems to me that they didn't meet or exceed that standard enough to step out from the shadow of CoX. Are other fantasy MMO's often referred to as "WOW2" or "UO2"? Are other sci-fi MMO's referred to as "SWG2" or "EVE2"? I haven't heard so (but I don't know everything!).

I thought we distinguished ourselves by not looking like we were made out of play dough.

Here is my speculation. I think the developers were a little worried at first upon hearing all the features being implemented in CO, but I bet as soon as they played the game it dawned on them, CoX was not in any danger.

Honestly, I bet the Devs are a bit pleased with having CO on the market. It gives them another source of finding new features, player likes/dislikes, etc.

If villains are going to be the distinguishing feature, you'd be better served by not having most of the content be "Invade this other villain group's hideout and beat up their leader and 'steal' the same treasure you'd be 'saving' as a hero".

Oh, and wandering citizens shouldn't smart-mouth me ("My, you're looking villainous tonight") as they walk by. Or at least let me hit 'em with my axe when they get sassy

I've only played up to 20 in CoV so far so maybe there's awesome villainous content ahead. If so, it shouldn't take 20 levels to start reaching it.

I think the OP has a valid concern. CoX is a niche game; fantasy and, secondly, sci-fi MMORPGs are the more visible games and genres. A lot of the MMORPG player base has not even tried our game here, much less played for any length of time. They see a new (OOOOOO Shiney!!) CO game that came out, has the same developer name as ours (Cryptic), and people being dumb and gullible as they are, immediately assume that it is the successor to us. And because it is new, it just HAS to be better, right?

Uninformed perception is one of humanities worst failings, IMO. People will often take the path of least resistance in whatever they do, if it involves less of our time or trouble. Don't believe me? Just read through the forums here, especially a thread that is more than a couple of pages long. You will inevitably see somebody commenting or replying that admits they haven't read all the previous posts, but are more than willing to add their two cents on the topic.

My point (after a lot of rambling): the general gaming populace will NOT (again, my opinion) take the time to research or try out both games for a decent amount of time to determine which is the turd and which is the gem. Most will opt for the new "shiney" that is perceived to be a sequel that HAS to be better than the original. Now I'm not talking about old customers that played CoX before, but brand new customers, people that we need to be bringing here. The Architect edition helped with that, but I think NCSoft had better come up with a good plan to place it foremost in the face of every new potential MMORPG player that is in the market for a new game to play. Our dev team is one of the best out there, but if the general gaming populace is unaware of our virtues and "win", we will continue to struggle and lose new potential customers to those other games.

Last night I jumped on CoH for my SG-night activities, we meet once a week on Thursday nights, and after that played a bit of CO with my buddy. Both games are excellent in my opinion, despite their flaws, and provide me with a good "diet" of Superhero co-op/MMO playtime. Both games are already distinguished as they are, providing different gameplay styles, and different concepts despite their similarities.

If the question is, what should Paragon Studios do to make CoH/V interesting and relevant in a world where more Superhero MMO's exist. The answer is very easy actually. Just keep providing the best narration you can, from your point of view of the Superhero experience.

As an example, consider that both CoH/V and CO provide user-created content. CoH/V does this with AE, and CO does this with the Nemesis system. In all honesty, at first, I thought that the AE was superior to what CO would offer with the Nemesis system. However I recently changed my mind and delightedly (although grudgingly) gave points to CO because their Nemesis system has direction that to me feels better than AE.

What could CoH/V do with AE to make it surpass CO's Nemesis system? Very simply, provide more tools for catering for mission-content rather than pure and simple mission-combat, and also increase the immersion factor by integrating AE missions and story-arcs in the "normal" game environment.

Numerous examples exist for this, so both games are already distinguishing themselves by developing original concepts that may stem from the same ideas.

Disclaimer: This post is naturally my personal opinion. It may be contradicting to other people's opinions, including the Mods who may decide to delete/lock/ban or whatever. Just keep in mind that compare/contrast threads can teach us a lot about what players are looking for as long as the posts are done constructively.