As a continuation of the City of Heroes' 7th Anniversary initiatives, a few of our developpers wanted to share a few things with our community.
Here is the fist part of the triptyque, prefaced by Brian Clayton, Paragon Studios General Manager and Executive Producer:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Brian Clayton
Fellow CoH Community Members and Friends,
It has been an amazing 7 years of super-powered experiences in City of Heroes. I feel honored and privileged to have led the CoH franchise from the early days in 2003 to today. Every moment, from our talented developers bringing many of the most progressive (and now most widely used) features to the MMO space, to amassing the most passionate and engaged MMO community Ive ever seen, has been truly a surreal experience.
Im looking forward to another incredible year ahead. The Paragon Studios development team has never been stronger and with the continued support of our online community, were committed to driving City of Heroes to new heights this year and beyond! I hope you enjoy the retrospective Q & A below, as our team shares some great insights as to what its like to create the worlds most popular super-powered MMO!
A huge thank you to our community for another fantastic year!
Enjoy!
Best,
Brian Clayton
Paragon Studios GM/Executive Producer
What was your favorite COH issue, and what was it like to develop it?
Nate Second Measure Birkholz, Lead Producer.
Quote:
While Issue 18/Going Rogue had a lot of really fantastic features and I am very proud of how it turned out, and Issue 20: Incarnates is very exciting, I actually really like Issue 17: Dark Mirror. In addition to Ultra Mode, we created some very memorable new content like the revised Positron Task Force, provided some upgrades to commonly-used systems like the mail, added some fun new badges, released the Going Rogue pre-order Power Sets, and more! It came together very smoothlythough with hard work, to be sureand we had a lot of fun doing it.
Jesse Ghost Falcon Caceres, Business Manager
Quote:
Throughout all my time with City of Heroes, my favorite issue is Issue 18: Shades of Gray (the Going Rogue expansion). Switching alignments was supposed to have been implemented after City of Villains launched, and it was heart-breaking to see it pushed back from its original 2006 timeframe. Fast forward past the City of Heroes IP acquisition in 2007, the formation of a kick-*** studio and development team , and in 2009 we officially announced that the City of Heroes Going Rogue Expansion was in development.
There were many challenges with the development of Issue 18, and it was FUN to work with everyone to overcome them. While I could probably go on and on about how we argued about a Global Auction House or adding meaning to Hero and Villain alignments, one big challenge for me was daycare. My son was born in August 2009, and we had periods of crunch time to hit Going Rogue milestones. I didnt want to be the type of manager to leave early while asking others on the team to stay late, so I brought in a portable crib, and brought in my son during many of those crunch periods. I realize I may get some flak that its irresponsible to bring a baby into work, but no one was sick, things got done, and I was there to answer questions or give directions when needed.
Tim Black Scorpion Sweeney, Systems Designer
Quote:
Issue 20: Incarnates I started taking a look at the Incarnate System shortly after I was hired at Paragon Studios. A lot of blood, sweat, and tears and the occasional playtest where most of the dev team would faceplant as soon as Marauder came out or strange bugs like Arachnos popping out instead . A lot of brainstorming meetings coming up with ways to challenge the players and reward them for their efforts.
Joe Hero 1 Morrisey, Senior Designer
Quote:
Issue 14: Mission Architect (of course!). It was great to see the whole team come together to create something that we truly believe is unique in the MMO space. The issue started as a simple feature request from design to get better mission design tools. But as we formed Paragon Studios we wanted to do something big and bold to put our mark in the MMO space something that we couldnt do in the past. Mission Architect was the perfect launch pad of that. We all worked together to make it what it is today.
Vince The Dark Watcher DAmelio, Principal Programmer
Quote:
Probably my favorite issues was Issue 9: Breakthrough. That issue introduced the Invention System which was the largest game system I had ownership of to date and it was something that I felt changed the way the game played. It was a lot of work, getting it ready for launch, since we were only 15 developers at that time and all of us had major features that we were responsible for.
John Protean Hegner, Lead Missions Designer.
Quote:
Going Rogue. I poured a lot of sweat and tears into this issue (no blood though, sorry). It was definitely a wild ride with so many stories to tell and the moral choices being put in to supplement them. It was a great feeling to see that the fans really embraced the Loyalist vs. Resistance morality play and their reactions to some of the characters we put together. Going Rogue showed me just how great our fans are, from propaganda contests to some amusing comic strips making fun of Praetorian political entities. I think within a day of showing off a little of the Praetorian Loyalist vs. Resistance conflict the forum goers had drawn lines in the sand and put up signatures supporting which side of the fence they were on. I couldnt have paid people to pull off a more satisfying reaction. It was that positive player reaction that convinced me to go all in with Going Rogue and push the envelope as far as my body would let me. You guys deserve it. Thank you.
As a continuation of the City of Heroes' 7th Anniversary initiatives, a few of our developpers wanted to share a few things with our community.
Here is the fist part of the triptyque, prefaced by Brian Clayton, Paragon Studios General Manager and Executive Producer:
It has been an amazing 7 years of super-powered experiences in City of Heroes. I feel honored and privileged to have led the CoH franchise from the early days in 2003 to today. Every moment, from our talented developers bringing many of the most progressive (and now most widely used) features to the MMO space, to amassing the most passionate and engaged MMO community Ive ever seen, has been truly a surreal experience.
Im looking forward to another incredible year ahead. The Paragon Studios development team has never been stronger and with the continued support of our online community, were committed to driving City of Heroes to new heights this year and beyond! I hope you enjoy the retrospective Q & A below, as our team shares some great insights as to what its like to create the worlds most popular super-powered MMO!
A huge thank you to our community for another fantastic year!
Enjoy!
Best,
Brian Clayton
Paragon Studios GM/Executive Producer
Nate Second Measure Birkholz, Lead Producer.
There were many challenges with the development of Issue 18, and it was FUN to work with everyone to overcome them. While I could probably go on and on about how we argued about a Global Auction House or adding meaning to Hero and Villain alignments, one big challenge for me was daycare. My son was born in August 2009, and we had periods of crunch time to hit Going Rogue milestones. I didnt want to be the type of manager to leave early while asking others on the team to stay late, so I brought in a portable crib, and brought in my son during many of those crunch periods. I realize I may get some flak that its irresponsible to bring a baby into work, but no one was sick, things got done, and I was there to answer questions or give directions when needed.
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