City of Heroes / City of Villains

Reviewed by: Pugilist

Game Name: City of Heroes/ City of Villains (CoX)
Publisher: NCSoft
Game Type: MMO
Number of Players: Effectively Unlimited
Solo Play Ability: High
Playing Time: 5 minutes
Ages: 13
Game Cost: $19.99
Expansion Cost: Variable
Monthly Fee: $14.95
Game Score: 91.2% / 100%

Background

City of Heroes was the first MMORPG (Massively MultiPlayer On-Line Role Playing Game) I had ever played. I had avoided the genre because I just could not see myself paying a monthly fee to play a game I already purchased. Well, 2004 rolled around and a bunch of my friends convinced me to give City of Heroes a shot. As it involved superheroes, it was an easy jump to make and, reviewing the account interface, I knew I would not be in a cancellation hell cycle should I need or desire to drop the game.

You know what I'm talking about, those monthly services where it is so easy to set up and takes an act of God to cancel. MMO products in general do not suffer from this and NCSoft specifically makes it quite easy to manage your account including adding and canceling games and services.

The game itself takes place in different neighborhoods, or zones, of Paragon City. Zones are reached through either connecting areas or through the in-game transport system, the train. A later addition has allowed transport between zones to be via base transporters, significantly reducing the time required to go from point A to point Q.

The game premise is simple. As a hero, you are out to stop crime. As a villain, you are out to perpetrate crime. An overlay to this is the Rikti invasion of a few years back. Aliens invaded Paragon city, thus heroes from all over the world responded to repulse the invasion. Shattered neighborhoods and lost citizens and heroes is the result. Villains followed, mainly because of the fabulous riches involved in acquiring the alien technology and, of course, to deal a bit of smack down to the heroes.

The Game Mechanics

Arguably, one of the most engaging things about City of Heroes and Villains (CoX) is character creation. You can create a character in five (5) minutes or spend well over an hour; I've done both. Sometimes I just want to try something out or reserve a name, sometimes I want to test color and component combinations. The CoX character creation tool was always great and over the last three (3) years has been continuously updated and expanded to allow additional levels of individualization and customization.

CoX plays like a standard MMO. You have fairly standard character classes, tankers - damage absorption, scrappers - toe-to-toe melee fighters, blasters - ranged damage, controllers - like it says, enemy control and team enhancement, and defenders - team enhancement and enemy detriment. Once you get a character to level 50, you have the ability to create Warshades and Peacebringers. These are characters that have additional abilities and can function as different classes at different times, which really adds another layer of enjoyment to the game. As part of your character creation, you decide on an origin; natural, technology, science, mutation, and magic. To date, origins have a limited effect on your character, mostly governing what type of enhancements (added to your powers/abilities to make them more effective) you can use. Additional plans for origin integration have been hinted but nothing significantly affecting the game has come to pass.

As far as getting around in the game, you can move via keyboard or mouse; you can set up your own key-binds for just about everything, you can generate macros and key binds for actions, etc. You can control video and audio settings for performance or detail. About the only thing I do not care for with the CoX universe is the non-standard keyboard default setup. They use a QWES setup by default. I change mine immediately to WASD. Friends who do not and then play in First Person Shooters, like Halo, have a few moments of frustration as E ejects them from their Banshee rather than turning them right. Me, I view it as an extra point for my side.

Additions over the years have included an updated physics engine which more realistically renders explosions and physical objects. This has done a lot to increase the general cool factor of game play, especially when you blast an opponent and see them bounce off of a wall or post. Nine (9) free content expansions have been put in place as well as paid expansions such as City of Villains.

The Play Experience

CoX is a dead simple game to play. While they have continually added complexity to the game (PVP arenas, PVP zones for Heroes vs. Villains, Clan/Guild/Group housing, a crafting system, a game difficulty setting, a player economy, Group/Clan raids, Badges, Social interaction areas, just to name a few) none of these area are required to just play the game. If any or all of this is your cup of tea, you can dive right in and have a ball. None of it, however, is required to progress in the game.

When it comes to actual combat, all attacks must be player initiated. Granted, you can set one (1) of your powers to auto-initiate, but there are no 'stand back and watch the action' fights. If you just stand there and the opponents are of a dangerous enough level, you'll get your butt kicked, and you’ll deserve it.

For organizing your attacks you have a total of ten bars, each with 10 slots in it. Up to three (3) of these can be visible at any time and you can dump your powers and abilities in them for quick access. You are allowed to put a power or ability into multiple bars and I often do, especially as I progress in levels and find a need to segment my style of play depending on the mission or objective. Powers and abilities within the three (3) visible bars are accessible by pressing 1-10, Alt 1-10, and CTRL 1-10.

Attacks fall into four (4) main categories:

Targeted – an attack against a single, selected opponent
Targeted Area – an attack that affects a selected opponent and those around that opponent
Melee Area – an attack that can affect all enemies within melee range
Ranged Area – an attack you place in an area that affects all opponents in or traveling through that area.

Defensive powers fall into three (3) main categories:

Toggle – you select a power and it remains on until you turn it off
Auto – the power is always on and costs no energy/endurance to maintain (I love these)
Timed – You select a power and it remains active for a specific amount of time

Depending on your character, your mix of offensive and defensive powers will vary. For my scrapper character, Pugilist, I run at about a 50/50 ratio; including auto defensive powers. For my blaster, Powderkeg, the only defensive powers I have are temporary based on mission or story arc completion.

As your character gains levels you choose new powers or extend the potential of your current powers. For most of the game you’ll choose new powers at even numbered levels and add two (2) slots to these powers on odd numbered levels. Later in the game the new power choice levels slow down but you get three (3) slots to add rather than two (2.)

Respecs

So, let’s say you hit level 15 and decide: “Damn! I screwed up! What was I thinking six slotting brawl?” Do you just delete the character and start over? Not at all. One of the early additions to the game was a re-specification system. Should you decide you chosen the wrong path at any point, you have the opportunity to do a re-specification of your character. These respecs allow you to recreate your character and balance out power choices. You cannot change the player name, origin, or class, but you can recover from mistakes.

There are two main ways to gain access to a respect. The most common is to do the respect mission and get the opportunity awarded at the successful completion of the mission. The easy way is to maintain an active account and during those times game balance issues are addressed, characters are awarded respect opportunities.

There is a third way. One of the veteran awards is a character respec. Veteran awards are covered in more detail later, but, but, basically, they are gifts and opportunities awarded at three (3) month intervals for players with active accounts.

Missions

Once you design your character and enter that game, you'll have a contact who will give you missions. You can spend the entire game just hunting around, taking out bad guys (or good guys, if you are a villain) and testing out strategy and powers. As with all other MMO, you gain experience by either doing missions or hunting. Your contacts give you missions that have rewards associated with them and these awards and greater experience allows you to advance more quickly than just hunting. Endless hunting, or grinding, appeals to some folks. Me, I’d rather gnaw off my own arm.

As for missions, they fall into four (4) main categories:

Hunt Missions - You must defeat a set number of villains of a set type or types
Rescue Missions - You must save a person or persons, sometimes you must escort them out
Recovery/Destroy Missions - You must find and recover/destroy an item or items
Defeat Missions - You must defeat a specific opponent or opponents

Except for the hunt missions, which can take place game wide, zone wide, or area specific, all missions are instanced. For those of you who have played other MMOs, this means that you don't have to worry about getting a mission to defeat X and you know this item/opponent only spawns every 140 minutes and you can count on people camping those spawn points, hoping for the drop that they can then sell. In CoX missions, this can't happen. Each mission is instanced for you and your team, no one else can get in, no one else can force you to come back and try again later.

Unless the mission is timed (you have X amount of time to complete it or you fail) you can choose not to complete the success requirements of a mission and come back to it over and over. While I'm not a big fan of this, there have been times, especially with the escort missions where I got my victim eliminated, where I've taken the route of resetting a mission. Having that option is nice.

An early issue with CoX was getting stuck in the 'tween' zone. Basically, you would finish all the missions from your contacts and they would not give you more until you'd hit a specific level. If you incurred a lot of debt, this might entail you being in the 'tween' zone for up to three (3) levels. It was very frustrating and you'd find yourself joining the worst possible teams, just to avoid having to hunt to gain XP to grind through the levels. There where times when I just parked a character and created a new one rather than deal with the frustration.

One of the updates to the game introduced a per zone contact that would give you missions as long as you met the level range of that zone. Furthermore, every time you completed a certain number of missions, based on the zone, you'd get a special mission with special rewards and challenges. This addition removed the awful grind factor, since successful missions come with an XP bonus that kicks your character progression into high gear.

If none of that strikes you fancy, most zones have giant monsters or events you can take on. All of these require at least one team and are actually more enjoyable the more people you have. And while these are zone events that happen on a timer, no one needs be excluded. If teams are full and you want to jump in, do so, you'll still be eligible for rewards. These rewards are based on the amount of damage you or your team do, so don't be surprised.

Loot

Another deviation from standard MMO practice is the loot drops. While CoX has expanded the type of loot that drops, you don't have to grab it first or auction for it or anything else. Rather the loot drops hits folks automatically. Got an item you don't want? Sell it or give it away and move on. Additionally, each type of loot has its own repository. Inspirations, items you use during battle to enhance your capabilities temporarily, and Invention Recipes, items you use to craft, are tied to your level. The higher the level, the more slots you get, which should come as no surprise.

Enhancements, items that improve your abilities on a more permanent basis, are limited to 10. Most enhancements are good for a range of levels; basically they have increased effect if you are 3 levels below it, reduced effect if you are three (3) levels above it. If you are more than three (3) levels below or above the level of the enhancement, it is ineffective. Enhancements you create yourself, via recipes and salvage, are supposed to never expire, which promises to be quite nice.

Enhancements now fall into Five (5) categories:

Training – anyone can use them and their benefit is limited
Dual Origin – characters who are one of the two origin types (i.e. mutant, natural) can use them and the benefits are greater
Single Origin – only characters of the origin type (i.e. science) may use them and the benefits are excellent
Special – these are multi-purpose enhancements (i.e. damage and endurance) that are awarded for specific events, task forces, trials, etc. Excellent short term enhancements
Recipe – the newest type of enhancement that you create after getting a recipe drop and associated salvage drop. They promise to be quite nice.

Additional loot items like salvage (used to create things) are very open ended and I've not hit the upper limit, if there is one. Salvage itself falls into several categories and can be used for several things, including special costume pieces during special events.

Lastly, there is influence and prestige. Influence is in-game currency you use to buy enhancements, inspirations, tailor sessions (right below, read on), give to other players, buy things from the new player based economy, etc. Prestige is similar except that it's gained for your Supergroup/clan. Influence and prestige is awarded for battles and mission completion.

Character Avatar Customization

So what do you do with all these costume pieces? You make new costumes for your character, of course. At level 20, 30, and 40 you have the opportunity to run a special, quite easy, mission and open up another costume slot. These allow you to create new outfits for your character at the tailor shops; as your fancy and tastes decree. Is it required? Absolutely not. But if you have a desire to have a themed costume for an event or team or just because you always wondered what your character would look like as an elf – have at it.

General Play

As stated, however, all the things they have added to CoX has not affected its ease of play. If you like playing solo, go for it; run around, defeat villains, kick butt, take names, and get transported to the hospital when you get your butt handed to you. What are the consequences of losing a battle? You incur debt; which slows your game progress until your XP debt it erased. As this debt does not become an issue until you are level 10, it gives you a fair chance to get used to the environment and your character's abilities. One of the nice things about this system is that you never lose items or levels just because you get your butt kicked. Also, no one can steal anything from you, as some high level folks are wont to do in other games.

PVP

CoX premiered without a PVP environment. After much clamoring, the folks from NCSoft implemented an arena system and it's been just about ignored since. Oh sure, because of my charming personality, I get the occasional “MEET ME IN THE ARENA!” Private message, which I promptly ignore or, if the mood strikes, turn into an entertaining for me chat session.

Much more popular has been the PVP zones where people playing City of Heroes (COH) and City of Villains (COV) can meet and battle. The PVP zones are level controlled so if you decide to drop into a level 15-20 PVP zone with your level 50 character; they get capped at level 20. Within the PVP zones you have missions that can involve taking on the environment or battling other players and you can garner some fairly impressive temporary powers upon completion.

I'm not much of a PVPer. When I want PVP action, I fire up a shooter and have at it. I've spent time in most of the PVP zones, however, and had some fun. I've even done the arena with certain folks and that was OK. Not my cup of tea, but nothing inherently wrong with the implementation.

Conclusion

The CoX universe continues to be a satisfying playground. With the release of Issue 9, that would be the 9th free expansion, they've filled out even more of the universe and expanded content. Additional paid expansions have been City of Villains, Collector’s editions of both COH and COV, and the Good vs. Evil Edition. Each of these added either custom components or powers. Additionally, the NCSoft folks have instituted a veteran’s reward system that provides you additional powers, costume pieces, and game items based on the amount of time you've been a subscriber.

Added to all of this, the CoX universe has holiday specific events that allow you to gain temporary powers, costume pieces, and badges. Most of these events come with a set of missions that force heroes and villains to work together and take place in the player social area, Pocket D.

And while I'd love to see the level cap get pushed up, even as a paid expansion, I still enjoying playing the game at every level. What's more, you can give it a try for free. Just go to www.coh.com.