Discussion: A City of Heroes Retrospective - Part III

For the third and final part of our City of Heroes 7th Anniversary Retrospective, our developers share their favourite things about Paragon Studios! And last but not least, Melissa “War Witch” Bianco and Jesse “Ghost Falcon” Caceres will also let you in on some of the pranks that have punctuated life in the City of Heroes team!

But read on for the last chapter of our tryptique!

What are some of the things you love the most about Paragon Studios?

Matt “Positron” Miller, Lead Systems Designer

“I love the fact that everyone who is working on the game loves the game with a passion. I’d love to say it’s all the after-hours gaming that goes on here, but the fact is, everyone seems to be working on making City of Heroes better in those after hours instead.”

Melissa “War Witch” Bianco, Lead Designer

“ The people – I don’t care how ‘perfect’ your job may seem, if you can’t get along with the people you work with, it’s wasted. I have such joy working with these people, they’re funny and smart and passionate and creative. “
“I go to work and I get to have posters and pictures and SWAG hanging around all over my cube and no one gets mad!”
“I love that we have events like BBQs, and Bounce Houses, and Bowling, and parties – we get to hang out socially, too, not just professionally.”
“We’ve all come to know and love Stinky, the neighborhood skunk who hangs out on occasion”
“My team, they rock.”
“I don’t love the Tetris machine anymore, but that’s only because I’m really bad at it.”
“The correspondence Wall – anytime we get a post card or a letter, it goes up there – those are always really fun to read (I love that people take the time to write them!)”
“My morning walks with Television and sometimes Black Scorpion, or whomever else we can drag out at 7:15 a.m. to go to Starbucks. I’m already on my Green Reward Program, trying to catch up to Black Scorpion who already has his Gold card. Yes, I’m an achievement type girl.”

Nate “Second Measure”Birkholz, Lead Producer

“I love the atmosphere, the huge number of very humorous and dedicated people I get to work with, and getting to work on one of my favorite games of all time. I also really love the sheer number of roleplaying games and board games scattered around in people’s cubes. When I was interviewed for the job, I did it in a room absolutely full of miniatures and games, and as an inveterate gamer (I worked my way through college in a comics and games store) I felt very much at home. “

Jesse “Ghost Falcon” Caceres, Business Manager

“The past seven years has been an amazing journey for City of Heroes. I was a hardcore City of Heroes player before joining the NCsoft publishing team in 2004. There have been a lot of good times, and one of my continued challenges is to keep the “fanboy” within me in check. Most publishers and developers work on a project, publish it, and then walk away. I’ve been fortunate to have been a fan of this game, work on it with extremely talented people, and help evolve and make it continually better. It’s great to see have seen and driven on the road that brought us to this seven year point, however I’m looking at the roadmap of the things to come, and I feel we’ve outgrown the wheels and are ready to grab our capes and fly. “

Tim “Black Scorpion” Sweeney, Systems Designer

“My favorite thing at Paragon Studios has to be the all of the smart and brave people I come to work with every day. Very “Band of Brothers” on occasion.”

Joe “Hero 1” Morrisey, Senior Designer

“The team. The studio. The games we make. I’ve always believed that Paragon is more than just the title of our studio. It’s a way of life for us. We hold ourselves to a higher standard than others and it shows. We want to be the best. To make the best superhero game out there. To create the best team culture there is. To create the most rewarding experience for us as well as the players. It’s all a part of our culture and I love it.”

Vince “The Dark Watcher” D’Amelio, Principal Programmer

“Paragon Studios manages to maintain a better work/life balance than any other game company I’ve worked at. They understand that MMO development is a marathon, not a sprint and work very hard to make realistic schedules so we don’t burn out. “

John “Protean” Hegner, Lead Missions Designer.

“My coworkers. I like every single one of them. We play D&D after hours, collect Warhammer 40k and Warmachine armies, go to lunch and geek out about geek things (like geeking out about geek things). I’m friends with a great many of them and we all “get” each other, we’re all on the same wavelength. Nothing disrupts creativity more than not liking or trusting co-workers. I’ve had more than my fair share of that sort of work environment, it’s suffocating. Paragon is liberating.”

Infamous Prank, courtesy of Jesse Caceres

Sticky notes under the mouse pad

“In 2010, Melissa and Matt put sticky notes under the optical mice of all computers in the studio. When I came in, I thought something was wrong with my computer until I looked under my mouse….I didn’t think it was a joke at the time, and thought I accidentally left a sticky on my desk, until I heard that it happened to the entire studio….”

Infamous Pranks, courtesy of Melissa Bianco

The Bertie Bot Bogus Flavor Bowl

“One of the things we’ve always done at work on City of Heroes for years, is bring in food and leave it in the kitchen for everyone to share. Sometimes we bring in cookies, candies, and fruit from the trees in our back yards, etc. This is also where edible presents from Players or vendors are put.

On this particular day, I had a bunch of Bertie Bots left over (I’d eaten all the good flavors) and only the icky flavors remained. So this co-worker, who shall remain anonymous, took a bowl of the gross flavors and put them in the kitchen. A few people got nailed by some really disgusting flavors, constantly eating one after another hoping to get the bad taste out of their mouths. Unfortunately, they never got better! Barf, dirt, booger, ear wax, grass, you name it – it was there! (I kinda feel guilty, but not super a lot, since I had to clean up the Tootsie Poo.)”

The ‘WHAT Did They Eat?’ Bathroom Caper

“I don’t know what the deal is with game development and/or guys in particular, but bathroom humor was really popular in the early days. On this particular occasion, someone placed a device in the men’s bathroom (the doors were painfully thin, by the way, one cough and you could hear it down the hall) so as people went in, after a few second they’d trigger that WRETCHED NOISE. Well, you can guess what it sounded like. Again, it was the highlight of the day. Grown men giggling like girls. Honestly.”

The Shock Pen Scenario

“This one was my fault and the joke was kind of on me. When Matt ‘Positron’ Miller and I were at GDC in San Francisco a few years ago, I discovered a joke shop and picked up a shock pen. The problem is, I’m a really crummy liar, so when I’d offer up my pen for people to try I’d start giggling or making these wretchedly obvious faces so few people actually fell for the joke. And if they DID, I absolutely lost it. It was totally ridiculous and I should never play practical jokes for the same reason I should never play Poker. I give EVERYTHING away.

Oh, and a year later, that pen was still sitting in my pen case and I grabbed it (utterly forgetting it was there), went to use it, shocked myself and screamed in the middle of a work day. Yeah. Great joke.”

The Case of the Missing Cereal

“Most of our cubes come with a cupboard. My particular cupboard houses several boxes of cereal, some snacks, etc. – just in case we have a global emergency, I have food for the entire studio. So I went to grab some cereal for breakfast and pulled out the first box (I had four) and it was empty. I kind of did a mental, ‘Nice going, Mel. Can’t be bothered to throw away your cereal box?’ and then picked up the next box. I may be lazy, but I’m not THAT lazy.

Someone had poured out all of the cereal and put the box back (empty bag inside). Then I grabbed the next box. And the next. All gone. To this day, no one will fess up to it. I’ve accused both Second Measure and Positron, but neither will cop to it. Some have tossed Television in as a possible suspect, but he hasn’t admitted anything. The case remains unsolved. I had to go out and buy some more boxes of cereal.”

The YouTube Video

“This was utterly ridiculous, only because it’s been caught on tape forever and ever. I was sitting in the Art Department going over some changes to the environment of Shadow Shard (or maybe it’s Eden). I’m in the middle of a biiiiig stretch when I feel a blast of air and I turn my head. Right then, another artist uses one of those blow horns you use at a hockey game in my face and I’m caught on tape forever making this horrendously ridiculous terrified face (in slow-mo no less) for ever. And ever. I was so scared it was either pee my pants or start laughing. My family still laughs at me when they watch it.”

What, no link to the youtube video?

I would love to see Black Scorpion on stream and on the boards more often. I miss how Castle would acknowledge his consideration on issues.

I had no idea Nate was an invertebrate. You think you know someone. On the other hand, I think its no surprise what Positron likes the most is the fact that everyone works late hours and can't apply for overtime. I would like to one day see those early morning Starbucks runs though:

Melissa: I'll have a grande mocha frap, and how would you like your coffee, Black?
Tim: Cream, two sugar.
Melissa: Black: cream, two sugar.
Starbucks: one black, one cream and two sugar
Melissa: No, cream and two sugar, right, Black?
Tim: Right.
Starbucks: so, black.
Tim: What?
Melissa: TV?
Starbucks: Not here.
Matt: Huh?
Melissa: Black?
Matt: Black.
Tim: Huh?
Melissa: so that's mocha frap for me, Black: cream two sugar, TV: black.
Starbucks: one frap, two black, one cream and two sugar.
Tim: Just one for me.
Melissa: ...



Matt: Hey Melissa, haven't seen you all morning. Didn't you go for coffee like three hours ago?
Melissa: Die, Miller.


Edit: I confused myself even and used the wrong name

You know, the air horn prank is just a variation of the suddenly screaming at folks to get them to jump.

Why is one considered funny and the other considered sociopathic?

It's too bad you're only doing three of these, Avatea... I love stuff like this. It makes you guys "real".

Now that I think of it, it's probably a good thing I don't work there. Considering some of the practical jokes I've played, I'd get lynched, fired, sued, or some combination thereof within a month.

Not to mention I'd wreck poor Melissa's weight loss efforts coz I'd be bringing brownies to work on a regular basis... (although if they could properly harness the sugar buzz, their production would skyrocket!)

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite