Discussion: New Interview with City of Heroes Design Lead Melissa Bianco!

More info or pictures please?

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^ Very interesting!

I think you should perhaps change that to "a couple of months"

"In July," I think, which could be at the end of July. So two to six weeks.

Personally I was intrigued when Melissa say they had added their "doppelganger technology" to the AE.

If you look at the Prelude to Going Rogue video starting at 2:55 there's an enemy group that has a "disgruntled band of ruthless soldiers" look to them. Get the feeling those are the Destroyers.

I hope that she is being 'humble' about how many mission map sets/tilesets there is in GR. I don't want some sets, I want LOTS OF new map sets/tilesets

Indeed A nice little tidbit.
I am curious... what is the difference between morality missions and "tip" missions? Perhaps I am forgetting, but I don't recall this term being used before... It seems like she's using it as something different than "morality" missions, but I'm wondering if that is reading too much into it.

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It already has been used outside of AE.

There were two new arcs added to the blueside with I17 and two new arcs added to the redside with I17.

Both arcs introduce us to the doppleganger tech and it pretty much used throughout the arcs.

I really hope they still make the "In July" that is mentioned here and seems to have been the goal for some time now, but with the San Diego ComiCon Dev Panel happening on July 22nd to discuss the "impending" release of GR, I am starting to have my doubts.

and Ocho needs to change his name to Slowmo...I had a link to this posted yesterday in the San Diego announcement discussion...people crave the info Slowmo...let's stay on the ball.





*much love to Ocho....just having a little fun.

Can't wait to see what these are, and I'm especially happy to see whatever it is mentioned as it was, with the whole pain of dismemberment thing!
I don't really like dry, carefully-worded industry babble.

It's also used in the new Posi TF, isn't it?

from http://goingrogue.na.cityofheroes.co...-info/faq.html


What is the release date for City of Heroes Going Rogue?

City of Heroes Going Rogue will be released in Summer 2010, although it is available for prepurchase now.




My prediction Sept 14th 2010


Also, is it a seamless world? No war walls but a sonic fence, does it serve the same purpose?

Hehe, perhaps that "Mirror Effect" option in the AE NPC creator will have a good use now

Ah, and that's also some pretty new info on there being two mission types, but the names seem fairly self explanatory.

Tip missions are missions where Contacts or possibly Clues (dropped by street mobs or possibly provided by a radio-like medium) provide information on a situation, and you can handle it as necessary. They're just providing tips for you to go on, no specific instructions or detailed stories really. These missions will probably be radio-mission-esque and have no real effect on your character's moral standing.

Moral missions will be deeper and more character/story focused with real repercussions for your actions. These will probably handle more like actual arcs and have an effect on your moral standing.

But that's just my speculation, it could be something radically different. I look forward to more info

Per request:
E3 2010 Interview: We chat with the lead designer of City of Heroes: Going Rogue

First there was the City of Heroes. Then came the City of Villains. There wasn't much confusion about this set up. One was all good and the other was all evil. Yet the super hero MMO titles from developer Paragon Studios (taking over from the game's original creators Cryptic Studios) have continued to expand, thanks to free content updates and more recently the launch of the player-based Mission Architect.

Now the studio and publisher NCsoft are close to releasing City of Heroes: Going Rogue. This new commercial expansion puts in some shades of gray in our heroes and villains as we explore a new parallel universe. Big Download got the game's lead designer Melissa Bianco to answer our questions about Going Rogue which is due out this July.

First, how has City of Heroes held up in terms of player subscriptions in the light of the release last year of Champions Online?

I'm excited about how successful we are today. Even with new MMO's on the market, our players still choose us for their online adventures. There's a reason we're still the world's most popular super powered hero MMO and it essentially boils down to commitment to the franchise, respect and interaction with a loyal and dedicated player base, and a pledge to keep a game that we love fresh, innovative, and fun.

Competition is a good thing because it forces us to continually be on our toes and reinvent the game both for veteran players and new ones. We have more than six years worth of game content, lessons learned, and ideas. We've had the time to iterate, expand, and realize many of those cool features that you see in-game today, everything from Super-Sidekicking to Mission Architect to our next expansion, City of Heroes Going Rogue. There are things we've done in Going Rogue that people never thought we could ever do and that is very satisfying.

The release of the Mission Architect editor has made the game one of the very few that allows players to craft their own missions. How has this changed how the developers make their own new content for the game?

We are constantly giving our players an amazing amount of materials to fuel their imagination as they create and publish their own stories with the Mission Architect system. In fact, seeing this kind of creativity and fantastic story-telling has given us a shot in the arm to raise the bar on our missions even more with Going Rogue and beyond.

As developers, we have access to some pretty sweet and powerful tools, a lore bible and we have an entire Design, Art, and Code team to create and implement these stories. That said, our players still manage to impress us by creating truly innovative story arcs with only a fraction of the tools that we have. In fact, we were so impressed by one of our player's creativity and skill that we hired him to work on the Mission Architect system and he's working alongside a very talented Mission Writing team, creating and implementing many of the storyarcs you'll see in Going Rogue.

How did the idea of the Going Rogue expansion come about?

One of the discussions that the leads and directors had when NCsoft purchased the IP for City of Heroes back in 2007, was their desire to put out an expansion now that NCsoft had 100% control over the franchise. We wanted introduce ourselves as Paragon Studios, with a goal of excellence and innovation and we finally had the full support and resources from NCsoft to create an expansion that could exceed veteran player expectations in terms of graphics and game-play. Suddenly we had the freedom to truly push the boundaries of what we knew we wanted to provide our players. That's why we've been introducing technological innovations like Ultra Mode, Powers Customization, and of course Mission Architect. Going Rogue is simply the latest product of our newfound drive.

We wanted to create an expansion on our own merits as a studio and I believe that we have succeeded. Going Rogue is, both visually and in terms of game-play, above and beyond anything that City of Heroes has ever done.

How does the mirror universe of Praetoria differ from the lands in City of Heroes?

Well, you would think that since Tyrant (aka Praetorian version of Marcus Cole) is a "bad guy," that he'd play the part of tyrant with a dark world and a depressing landscape. But here's the thing: Emperor Cole doesn't see himself as a tyrant, he's the man who saved the world. He didn't ask for his situation, but he made sure he used it to his advantage and Emperor Cole is nothing if not smart and resourceful with a taste for aesthetics. Everything you see in Praetoria is homage to him, from the Cole-approved advertisements to the tiles of gold on the sidewalks in the Magisterium.

Do we have a mirror version of Atlas Park? I'd probably suggest that Nova Praetoria is it, but only in the sense that it is the heartbeat of Praetoria as Atlas Park is the pulse of Paragon City. Both cities are where the decisions are made and the important players gather, but that is where the similarities end. One thing that you will not see in Praetoria is a war wall, but sonic fencing to keep the citizens safe from all harm, perceived or otherwise.

We essentially built Praetoria from the ground up, using as many new assets and technology as possible and with the Ultra Mode (live in Issue 17) upgrade in mind. Stylistically, everything from the skyline to the buildings to newspaper boxes on the city streets are as different as they could be, and this is by design. Praetoria is its own universe, it deserves that kind of treatment.



Can you describe how the new alignments will affect characters and character creation in the game?

We have had two alignments in the past: Hero and Villain. Now we have Hero, Vigilante, Villain, and Rogue. The fall from grace takes you from Hero, to Vigilante, to Villain. The road to redemption transitions you from Villain, to Rogue, to Hero. The circular path provides a few perks for the morally gray areas such as Vigilante and Rogue because they are now allowed to meander over to the other side and get a taste of how the other half lives. As for characters and character creation, you can still create your favorite Hero or Villain with all of the power sets that apply to that alignment, but the benefit is that you can take your Mastermind (previously relegated to Rogue Isles only) to Paragon City and typically Hero-aligned characters such as Defenders and Blasters can now morally 'unencumber' themselves and see what's what in the Rogue Isles. Some players may decide to create a brand new character, expressly to role-play the experience of falling from grace or path to redemption just so that they can enjoy the entire progression the moment they reach level 20.

What sorts of new missions can we expect to see in Going Rogue?

There are plenty of missions centering on Praetoria as a new land to explore and all of its citizens and figures, some new and others that players will recognize, as well as missions that support the new Going Rogue system in the form of tip missions and morality missions. We're also introducing dialogue trees in missions as a form of information distribution, in-zone objectives, and moral choices that affect a player's moral character progression. We've included hundreds of new missions for this expansion so there will be plenty of things for players to experience both in Praetoria and Paragon City or the Rogue Isles. And, of course, we have the odd trick up our sleeves when it comes to bells and whistles, too.

What new enemies and enemy groups will be put into the expansion?

We have introduced several new villain groups in Going Rogue, such as: The Destroyers, a disgruntled band of ruthless soldiers abandoned after the Hamidon Wars; the Praetoria Police Department, a peacekeeping force utterly loyal to Emperor Cole who enforce the peace using any means necessary; The Resistance, a rag-tag group of misfits whose only common objective is taking down Cole any way they can; The Syndicate, a group of highly modern mobs who have taken organized crime to the next level; Ghouls, a group of zombie-like creatures with high-tech arm and leg bands that indicate that they are no accident; and The Seers, a division of the PPD whose psychic abilities have been finely honed to ensure that the people of Praetoria are thinking appropriate thoughts.

A familiar villain group, the Clockwork has received a make-over as Praetorian Clockwork and their presence in Praetoria is signified by a sleek and futuristic appearance as "helper" droids built for menial tasks, programmed to be 100% loyal to Emperor Cole, and outfitted with attack powers to help "keep the peace" as necessary.


What other new features will be put into Going Rogue?

Under the guidance of Matt "Positron" Miller, we're adding a teaser of the Incarnate System which is an end game content system for level 50s so that they can experience a whole new level of challenging game-play. We have four new zones that take place in Praetoria and with this new universe we're introducing some new mission map sets as well. We added four new power sets (Electric Control, Kinetic Melee, Demon Summoning, and Dual Pistols) which adds a new power set for each of the basic archetypes and we've done some serious upgrades to the Mission Architect system in the form of new maps, new mobs and a special new feature we introduced in Issue 17 in the form of doppelganger technology. The new alignment system and all the creativity and access that will provide is pretty exciting. Did I mention we are throwing in new costume sets, auras, and plenty of emotes? There is an even longer list of game-play features that will make the new missions more advanced and fun than you've ever seen in City of Heroes. That's just a taste of it, there's plenty more I'm probably forgetting.

After the expansion is released what plans are there for further free content updates?

We have big plans for our free updates, actually. We intend to expand on the Going Rogue system in the form of additional missions (tip and morality), add more End Game zones and events, unlock more Incarnate Slots (though you will need to have the Expansion to play them), and continue to add content, costumes, power sets, and a few little things I have up my sleeve, which I will not tell you, even on pain of dismemberment.


Finally is there anything else you wish to say about Going Rogue and the future of City of Heroes?

I've been working on City of Heroes since before it launched (I started way back in 2002) and I have been around for every issue, the CoV expansion, and every little booster pack we've ever done, but I have to say that I couldn't be more proud of the work that we have done on the Going Rogue expansion. Visually speaking, the alternate world of Praetoria will impress existing players and absolutely stun new or returning players with the graphical update and all of the features and systems we've added since we launched in 2004. I do want to thank all of our incredible players who've been enjoying our game for the past six years. Thank you for helping us to make the world's best super powered MMO. The next few months are going to blow your mind away.

[Edit: Seriously? Someone red repped me for posting this as a service to those who were not able to read the original article? Pardon me for empathizing a bit, I have had that same problem on a few seperate occassions and appreciate the gesture when others do it; I returned the favor.]

I have a feeling that the "sonic fence" is just another way of justifying the engine mechanics. You will most likely still have to "zone" between areas.... just a guess

Am I the only one who isn't really seeing much of anything new here?
(as in, nothing we haven't really been told already)

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