Bill Roper from Cryptic Studios Gives Us Exclusive Information on Champions Online

As long as we define "exclusive" as "things everyone knows."

Article By: Pugilist

In the long ago and far away I had never played an MMO in my life.  Geekwise, I have been there since the 1960's but the whole "you want me to pay monthly to play a game I bought" realm was about the most moronic thing I could image.  I easily avoided EverQuest and Ultima and all that other crap that I know people loved and cherished and whiled away many an hour.  For me, obviously, it was a waste of cold hard cash but I try to live by a rule that state, simply "I I'm not paying for it, it's none of my business" so while I felt no draw to the MMO world, I did not criticize those who did.

And then in 2004 I was convinced to give this new game City of Heroes, developed by Cryptic Studios and published by NC Soft, a try.  And I fell in love.  No, not the "oh my God I have to wash my hands" love but the "Damn, this is why I can't find anyone to play RPG games" love."  And so I played the hell out of City of Heroes.  I didn't know anything about XP per hour or herding or optimal builds or anything like that.  Al I knew was that it was fun to create a character and fun to play.  And, as an admission, my first main character, granted I created new toon like some people eat chips, but my main toon was Pugilist, a martial arts scrapper of medium height and build with grey hair and wearing a suit and Fedora.  When a friend saw the toon as we teamed up one day he commented over TeamSpeak - Shit, that's you."  And it was and Pugilist has stuck as my online moniker ever since.

So, I have that to thank Cryptic for that as well as a great game.  Things move forward, companies try new initiatives and Cryptic and NCSoft parted ways.  Fast forward a few years and we see Cryptic making noises about Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com).  Noises are nice but noises a game do not make.  Fast forward to December of 2009 and we see Atari, not a company known for its MMO library, buy Cryptic and those noises have turned into Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) Online.

A little geek flashback.  When I was going to school, one of the jobs I held to pay the bills was at a game shop, Art's Hobby Shop in Jacksonville, FL.  I met the owner at the Gen-Con South convention and that turned into a job offer, which was wonderful. I ran their war-game department back when new games consisting of Xeroxed typewritten rules were coming out weekly.  One of the games that hit the shelves was Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com), a new superhero RPG.  Needless to say it was a success and when I heard that there was going to be a Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) MMO I thought, "Hmmm."  When I heard that Cryptic was doing it, I thought "Huh?"  And there I let it drop.  I'd trended away from City of Heroes due to time issues and never found another MMO that felt like home but in the back of my mind I knew Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) was coming, I just wasn't listening that hard.

And then we are doing our fir walk around at New York Comic Con, seeing who is there, seeing what looks interesting, wondering how much time we'll devote to interviewing and how much time to just enjoying the hell out ourselves when, across the room, I see the Cryptic booth and I see Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) Online being advertised.

"Damn," I think, "this could be worth a talk.  So we stop by the booth and I ask a few preliminary questions, showing my prowess at all things geek and becoming the envy of every person within earshot, at least that's how I remember it.  I'm pretty sure, in retrospect, the company rep was rolling her eyes and thinking "Seriously dude, get an original thought."  Regardless I remember it in light of my former description rather than the latter more likely because otherwise my fragile ego will be bruised and I'll have to buy a bottle of Luksosova vodka and drink until I feel better.

Wait a second, maybe I can do both.  More on that later.

The company rep is shuffling from one scheduled interview to another so does not really have time to talk to us.  She is very polite about it and I ask if we might schedule an interview for later in the day or on Sunday but she does us one better.  She grabs Bill Roper, one of Cryptic's Design Directors and, coincidently enough, the Design Director for Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com), and carves out an interview for us immediately.

Wow, that certainly was a lot of build up just to tell you we'd talked to Bill Roper the Design Director for Cryptic's Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) Online MMO that currently is in beta.  Oh well, get used to it.

Now, tangenting a bit, but I promise, it really does make sense this time, my first thought when I heard about Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) Online was "I bet they’re capitalizing on name recognition and don't plan to incorporate anything other than the name from the game.  That'll be disappointing."  So, as I have no social skills, the first question I ask Bill Roper was "Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com).  It was an RPG first, how does the MMO stack up?  Is it a name only thing or does it incorporate any of the Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) play dynamics?"

And Bill let me know, much more politely than I deserved, that they have done their very best to make the feel of the game as close to the play dynamics in the original RPG as possible.  Learning from City of Heroes they are taking a new approach to character creation.  Rather than locking you into broad categories, Tank, Scrapper, Controller, etc, they are opening it up and allowing players to select from, for lack of a better word, power pools. 

What does this mean?  Well if you want electricity powers combined with flame powers combined with dark defenses combines with jelly bean shooters, you're fine.  OK, the jelly bean thing I just made up, but the gist of it is you are able to mix and match, like ColorForms or Legos, aspects of your character to create a multitude of combinations and variants. 

At this point someone will point out that using "combinations and variants" is redundant and to those people I respond "So? Write your own damn story and stop bothering me."

Every indication is that the Cryptic team is doing much more than creating a CoH clone.  Now, I still love CoH, even though I've stopped playing it due to time pressures, I've nothing bad to say about the game but the intro to Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) does sound intriguing.  It looks like they are taking the ideas and experience they had developed and extending them into a more open and dynamic system.  So, for me, the next question had to be "CoH was easy so to play that I could jump right in without any MMO experience and have a blast.  Is that going to hold up in Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) or is it a more complex play style."

Gladly, the game will support a straightforward play style even though folks can get more complicated if they desire.  For people like me who have limited time to play, this is great news.  For folks who like the bizarre world that is most MMO crafting, tough shit.  I'm sure you can get as convoluted as you desire but the good news is that the neophyte can jump in and have fun.  This type of instant immersion is, in my less than humble opinion, critical,

So, game play style will be cool, character creation will be stellar, the feel of the Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) RPG will be incorporated.  All this is wonderful but, I know, I can hear it now:

"City of Heroes launched without a PvP system and the first one they put in was clunky, is this the same way?"

Short answer, no.  Long answer, there is no non-cooperative PvP.  For the 12 year old idiot desperately in need of adult supervision, this means you can't log-on, level up, and start ganking new players because your life sucks and you need to translate your helplessness and low self-esteem into being a bully in on-line games.  If that's a problem, good.  Now, this is where I have to put in the disclaimer that these are my words and positions, not those of Cryptic.  If you don't like what I've said, take it up with me.

The PvP system runs along the lines of the original Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) concept of an underground fight club.  The lower case is used as Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) was published long before the movie and if this offends your sensibilities because you believe you are Ed Norton or Brad Pitt or Bob, tough.  See the above not about who to contact.

The PvP system envisioned in the original Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) RPG has been extended.  In the MMO it's expanded to be a tournament type thing where heroes test themselves against other heroes and there is currently no zone or server based PvP.  This means you, as a new player, don't have to worry about the above mentioned pre-teen jumping you and looting your gear just for the fun of it.  That's a good thing.

So there's the PvP angle.  I'm not a big PvPer when it comes to MMOs.  If I want to go head to head I'll fire up a FPS where I don't have to worry about having the right PvP versus Quest gear and the ultra-rare super weapon you can only get after playing for 203,236 hours or buy on e-bay for $2500.  Some folks won't like it; welcome to life.

Two things, however, really piqued my interest.  One is that there will be areas of the game where player interaction and action will have a discernable and visible effect on the game environment.  Simply put, if heroes frequent an area of the game and keep the criminal element under control, the area itself will improve and change.  Neglect it, however, and the gangs will return with all the resultant after effects.

This ability to have players affect the environment was explored most recently in Tabula Rasa.  Even though the game play in TR was a bit unfocused and unclear, the ability to have your actions affect the interactions of other players adds a dimension to the game that was extremely cool.  Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) is taking this a bit further and, on the surface, it sounds like an extremely interesting prospect.

And then we have the end-game.  You know what I'm talking about, the end-game where you character has leveled to the highest level and all that's left is to run around doing the same thing over and over again or create an alt and start from square one.  Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) is taking a bit of a different avenue to end-game content.  Rather than focus on popping the level cap and adding new missions a few times a year Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) is instituting a Nemesis creation system.  Once you reach a sufficient level you will create a nemesis for your character.  You'll define their powers and back-story and all the rest and then this new villain will become part of the game.  To make this even cooler, you will be able to invite other players along with you on missions against your nemesis.  They'll be able to see if you wimped out or if you decided to make things a bit challenging.

Bill Told us it was the first step into incorporation user created content in the game and, I have to say, this concept sounds great.  Instead of waiting months for new content you blow through in a week, the content engine will be the user base.  This sound cool enough to get me to start teaming with folks, something I rarely do, because if you can find a decent base of people you can be playing new content nearly daily.

Seriously, how cool is that? 

But even better, yes, there is an even better, it turns Champions (http://www.Champions-Online.com) from your standard "Entertain me bitch" game into a template system for those people who always get tapped to be the game master, who always are creating RPG adventures, who naturally end up running a game rather than playing it because no one else will stand up and do the work.  Oh, but in this case, this person also gets to play.  Since the adventures and missions designed by the players will not be dictated but rather slipped into the regular game format, you'll have the opportunity to enjoy the fruits of your labors directly rather than hoping everyone else had a good time.

This aspect of the game, above even the character creation, really shows more promise than has been seen from any recent entry into the MMO market. 

The beta is on-going and the launch is slated for spring 2009.  That's just a couple of months away, in case you've lost track.

Oh, and to answer the nagging question, Yes, this is another game from Jack Emmert.  For those of you who don't remember, He was behind the whole city of Heroes thing.

Cool, cool, and damn frigging cool.