I didn't realize how much I missed travel powers until I returned to some old MMOs for a very short time.
http://www.virtueverse.net/wiki/Shadow_Mokadara
Quote:
I personally hate any other MMO because of how travel is handled. Take Blizzard's Gorilla, for instance.|
Originally Posted by ShadowMoka
I didn't realize how much I missed travel powers until I returned to some old MMOs for a very short time.
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1-39: Run, unless you're a specific class.
40: Spend an absurd amount of cash buying a travel power.
41: Spend an absurd amount of cash (and a quest) LEARNING HOW TO USE SAID POWER.
42-60: Spend an inconceivable amount of cash to buy an 'epic' travel power.
60: Spend even more frivolous amounts of cash to buy a flying travel power.
60: Spend even even more frivolous amounts of cash to TRAIN TO FLY THE POWER.
70: Spend money on the most expensive thing in the entire game to buy an 'epic' flying travel power.
City of Heroes:
Hit level 4.
My guides:Dark Melee/Dark Armor/Soul Mastery, Illusion Control/Kinetics/Primal Forces Mastery, Electric Armor
"Dark Armor is a complete waste as a tanking set."
*the people here are wonderful! THAT is what makes CoX the BEST. YOU!
*teaming up is easy to do, if that's your preference. There are PuG's happening all the time. Global channels, Broadcasts, LFT flags, LFM search functions. It's also easy to chat with people (friends and strangers) when you're solo, too (The other superhero MMO's are horrible to try to find regular teams, much less find friends).
I agree with the OP and specifically
1. Costumes - you look cool from the minute you start playing. You don't start looking dull and try to get cool looking stuff. And you choose what you look like, it is not dictated by the best armor at your level type of thing. It is your character and your look.
2. Variety of ATs - they truly are varied. MM, stalker, tanker, and controller all play totally differently.
1. The People
2. The Stories
There are no words for what this community, and the friends I have made here mean to me. Please know that I care for all of you, yes, even you. If you Twitter, I'm MrThan. If you're Unleashed, I'm dumps. I'll try and get registered on the Titan Forums as well. Peace, and thanks for the best nine years anyone could ever ask for.
City of Heroes has many great features, including the ones mentioned. Above all, the one that keeps me here, and keeps me coming back after trying other things, is that unlike many MMOs, it doesn't try to force me to play any particular way, and it certainly doesn't demand I make the game my #1 life priority before I can have cool things. It is a game that tries to be a game, instead of a job, or an e-sport.
I 2nd the people. I love the people i play with. They're generally all awesome people who are more than willing to forgive my mistakes and help me improve.
Developers who listen to their community and respond, whether by including new content, making changes, or letting us know why they didn't
SKing/Exemping is a big one. I don't have to have a different toon for every friend i play with, i can just join with them at any time! This is brilliant, way underrated and taken for granted in CoH.
How i look is irrespective of how awesome (or lame) i actually am. It takes you to the end game in some other MMO's before you look cool, and even then you may be stuck looking cool, but no the kind of cool you want to look like, or having to sacrifice visual aesthetic for performance. I hate that.
Not having to buy 5 ranks in the same skill over the course of my characters life. I had forgotten about how that one Blizzard game, and that other one with hobbits and elves etc. and the new one IN SPACE! all made you do that. I was at a friends house playing the aforementioned SPACE! one. Having to buy the second rank (wait...having to spend in game currency on new skills ANYWAY is plain stupid) in one of my skills caught me off guard and elicited a "What?! isn't this 2012? Aren't we past this silliness yet?" from me. Seriously, is there a point to that?
Loads more. I remember playing and about a dozen times in a 2 hour session i kept asking myself "why on earth is a new MMO using these stupid 'features'? haven't we gotten past this by now? For pete sake, i still have to PICK UP LOOT!"
I have been playing CoH for almost 5 years. I am an amateur artist. The ability to design characters in almost every aspect in costume design is the heart of my love for the game. I am also an avid video gamer. The flexibility to make various types of characters with various strategies and builds is so incredible, you can literally go almost anywhere. I do have a power gamer streak in me. The ability to focus on the details of building one character until the shiny spots are blindingly bright fills an evil need.
I am still tilting at the windmill of making Blasters truly a ranged class. (look at them, they are designed as Blappers from the ground up, prove me wrong....) And true robot thigh costume. But I got Tanks for heads at halloween. (I am still giggling over this and making up odd characters) And my wife got a flying carpet (She is new to the game, and yes, it meant that much) and a hundred other little things.
Oh, and by the way the writing and design get better, and Better, and BETTER every year.
Still, work on that ranged thing....
I'm not sure if this still applies with all of the new stuff in this game since launch but what I really liked about this from the early days was its ease of use. Playing the game seemed very intuitive and natural. Sure there was/is plenty of nuances but it felt easy to play, easy to level, easy to team, easy to communicate.
Loaded game, signed on, made a cool character (imo) and started blasting stuff.
Never looked back.
People.
Costumes.
Ease of teaming via SK system and now the SSK.
Travel.
Pinnacle & Virtue:
A bunch of Heroes - Alpha Team, Legion of Order.
A bunch of Villains -Black Citadel , Pinnache.
Quote:
Well, the gorilla learned its lesson to a degree and made the entry-level travel power available at 20 and dialing down the other level stages, but otherwise, it's designated mounts as a combination of money sink and speed throttle. The broader question is why anyone would create a virtual world and then make it difficult to travel around it. Paragon Studios understands that travel should be part of the fun of playing and therefore gives us multiple options early on for getting around.|
Originally Posted by Nalrok_AthZim
I personally hate any other MMO because of how travel is handled. Take Blizzard's Gorilla, for instance.
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Similarly, a few other MMOs have features similar to SSKing, but for the most part, game studios fail time and again to allow players the freedom to play alongside whoever they want.
There are a number of reasons... The best way to say why is to contrast and compare, but since that is not allowed...
One of the biggest problems with game design that I find...as in it really annoys me... is when I am presented with an option and that option is then revealed to not actually be an option because that other selection is incredibly hard to do or it just doesn't work... or the programmers simply don't pull out the rewards or what not for that other choice to make it look like there are even more options v.v
In CoH I can choose anything and it pretty much works out.
In answer to the thread title: yes.
More seriously, everything except being Recluse's lackey or being roped into saving the world as a villain.
Where to now?
Check out all my guides and fiction pieces on my blog.
The MFing Warshade | The Last Rule of Tanking | The Got Dam Mastermind
Everything Dark Armor | The Softcap
don'T attempt to read tHis mEssaGe, And believe Me, it is not a codE.
I don't know. I don't even think this game is really all that good, but I find it far better in the long run than the numerous other MMOGs I've played and it's the closest thing to a create-your-own-superhero video game I have.
Goodbye may seem forever
Farewell is like the end
But in my heart's the memory
And there you'll always be
-- The Fox and the Hound
Quote:
Begone from this place |
Originally Posted by Tenzhi
I don't even think this game is really all that good
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@Golden Girl
City of Heroes comics and artwork
Adding to all of the above, I'm still amazed at the brilliant design of the AT system. The same game plays completely differently with different builds, even in the same AT. This is one reason why I still love playing my 50s all the time.
--NT
They all laughed at me when I said I wanted to be a comedian.
But I showed them, and nobody's laughing at me now!
If I became a red name, I would be all "and what would you mere mortals like to entertain me with today, mu hu ha ha ha!" ~Arcanaville
Quote:
That's how the gorilla used to be. These days it only makes you wait until level 20 to get a regular mount and level 40 for a fast mount these days. Mounts and riding skills are also a tiny fraction of what they used to cost. As someone who got an epic land mount before the nerf, I don't miss the old gold grind.
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Originally Posted by Nalrok_AthZim
I personally hate any other MMO because of how travel is handled. Take Blizzard's Gorilla, for instance.
1-39: Run, unless you're a specific class. 40: Spend an absurd amount of cash buying a travel power. 41: Spend an absurd amount of cash (and a quest) LEARNING HOW TO USE SAID POWER. 42-60: Spend an inconceivable amount of cash to buy an 'epic' travel power. 60: Spend even more frivolous amounts of cash to buy a flying travel power. 60: Spend even even more frivolous amounts of cash to TRAIN TO FLY THE POWER. 70: Spend money on the most expensive thing in the entire game to buy an 'epic' flying travel power. City of Heroes: Hit level 4. |
On Liberty:
Aardwolf - level 50 claws/invulnerability scrapper
Anchor - level 50 level gravity/forcefield controller
Dr. Dusk - level 50 mercenaries/dark miasma mastermind
...simply...CoH. 
Quote:
If you read the post carefully I think it may be as close as he/she comes to making a compliment.
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Originally Posted by Golden Girl
Begone from this place
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Quote:
This I think is really key. It's a quiet but revolutionary idea in MMOs that I think a lot of other games still don't get. What you look like and what you can do are two totally different things.
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Originally Posted by dugfromthearth
I agree with the OP and specifically
1. Costumes - you look cool from the minute you start playing. You don't start looking dull and try to get cool looking stuff. And you choose what you look like, it is not dictated by the best armor at your level type of thing. It is your character and your look. |
Avatar: "Cheeky Jack O Lantern" by dimarie
For me, it's a mix of these:
- Character variety
- Teaming
- Gameplay openness
For character variety, this is both visual and mechanical. Both sides have only been improved with time. Costumes started varied, and have improved since then. Powers, even animations can be tweaked in most cases to fit a theme.
On the mechanical level, archetypes play differently. But more than that, archetype powersets play differently. Empathy is nothing like dark miasma. Dual blades and energy melee are different animals. More than this, different primaries/secondaries play differently. An electric/kinetic corruptor is a sapper extraordinaire. A fire/kinetic corruptor is a crazed engine of burning destruction. More than this, the build changes. You can have a energy/energy blaster built for extreme range that plays totally differently than an energy/energy blaster with the fighting pool and built for defense and blapping.
For teaming, you can bring just about anyone along for most content, and they can play along at whatever level. If it's lower level, you high character still gets their rewards. The lowbie doesn't get squashed. Beyond this, just about any team thrown together will have different interactions and tactics depending on the powersets and archetypes involved. You can do the same content 5 different times with the same players, and different powersets/archetypes will radically change tactics.
And finally the openness- you aren't stuck doing missions a, B, then C...there's enough content that you can play different arcs all over the place. If you miss something, flashback to it. Most content is made to be able to be done by anyone, so it doesn't matter how many come, what they are playing as, they can do it if they know their powers well.
Quote:
There are specific things about this game that I will lavish praise upon. The costume creator is great and has gotten better with time, for instance (which isn't to say it's perfect). As a whole, though, I typically would say that the game is rather hum-drum although it is currently the best available and is apparently the only game I've found worth maintaining a subscription to for a great length of time. |
Originally Posted by Blue_Centurion
If you read the post carefully I think it may be as close as he/she comes to making a compliment.
|
So, basically, it's the best there is at what it does, and that may not be saying much, but it is saying something.
Goodbye may seem forever
Farewell is like the end
But in my heart's the memory
And there you'll always be
-- The Fox and the Hound
I could talk about all the options to customize the look of your character, from the classic superhero look to many far out themed ideas (A rusty robot pirate? Sabretooth tiger mage? Blue alien lady in a gleeming metal uniform? Done, done and done.) to the way you can now customize the way your powers look. I could talk about the mountains of content and how after four years of playing there's still stuff I've never done. I could talk about the great creativity outlet we have with the Mission Architect. I could talk about how easy it is to team up with a group of people without having to worrying about differing power levels.
I could talk about all of those things, and certainly all of those are good. But mostly, I'm here to see what hat Zwillinger will wear every Wednesday.
AE Arcs: #10482 N00b Rescue Duty, #164100 The Four Treasures of the Tuatha De Dannan
I have been playing COH since sometime around Issue 2 or 3. And in that time I have dabbled in a couple other MMO's from time to time but I always find myself thinking that COH did things better. So what did COH do that is so much better than those other games? Here is my list. Feel free to add your own bullets.
• Character Customization Pt 1 (The Costume)
Not only do we have the literally thousands if not hundreds of thousands of possible costume combinations to choose from, but we have multiple slots to save off different costumes for different occasions. In fact our costume creator is so good, that one of the complaints of the game I hear from time to time is that certain powers obstruct the costume in some way.
• Character Customization Pt 2 (The Type)
Assuming you have a VIP subscription and the Epics unlocked, you have 14 different AT's to choose from when creating your character. Each of which plays different from the rest. Not only that, but even characters within the same AT can be very different when selecting different Primary and Secondary Powersets. Taking that into consideration, you have hundreds of different characters to choose from each of which is unique. Going even deeper, you could even argue that two characters that are the same AT, with the same Powersets could be very different based on their personal choices of which powers to choose and focus on.
• Travel Powers
I can't begin to tell you how grateful I am to have travel powers early on. In other games I quickly get tired of running all the time until I can finally train into and afford some kind of speedier method of travel. In COH I can pick up a Travel power as early as level 6, or level 4 for things like Ninja Run.
• Mission Architect
The ability to create your own missions is simply just awesome. It adds a whole new level to making the game fit your own personal story.
• Sidekick / Exemplar system
For me this is the biggest and best part of what makes COH so great. I can team up with anyone, at any level and not be penalized. I honestly don't know why this feature isn't in more games.
Thought of some more......
• Global Friends list
It is very nice to add a friend once without having to add each individual character they make. Plus, my friends list carries over to all of my other characters so I don't need to rebuild it every time I make a new character.
• Audible cues for private messaging
I am often engrossed in the game and frequently ignore the chat window. Especially when I am soloing. To have an audible cue when I get a personal message is a nice touch.
• Inspirations
I will admit I am stealing this from someone else in the thread but it bears repeating. Inspirations that are not on a cooldown between uses makes the game sooo much better. The fact that you are limited in how many inspirations you can carry at any one time makes it impossible to exploit.
• Auctionhouse
I love the fact that the auctionhouse works cross-server. This gives lower population servers the same opportunity to get whatever they are looking for as higher population servers. Also, though it was not part of implementation, cross-faction auctionhouses is a nice touch as well.
• Level Pacting
I know it is not currently working, but the ability to level pact with another person is awesome. I can create a pact with my friend and not have to coordinate our schedules for EVERY play session. This goes hand in hand with the sidekicking system of course.