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What does DCUO need to do to beat City of Heroes
MysteryB
Member UncommonPosts: 355
Hey guys, I just thought I would write a little about what DC Universe Online needs to be better than City of Heroes/Villains. I am a long time CoH player (5 years on and off) and am really looking foward to DCUO.
I think it looks awesome, if they can come through with half the stuff they have promised, and make it fun like CoH has been for me for 5 years now than I am fully on board. I have been on/off on CoH but most of the time it has been a blast. Alot more at the beginning though, it has changed alot and I still play it but its not what it used to be, for me atleast.
One thing CoH has that I think DCUO (or any MMO for that matter) needs to have to be fun for me is a great grouping aspect. On games like WoW you group for instances, and maybe to take down a boss every once in awhile, but most of the time you are going it solo and I dont think thats how an MMO should be. CoH has in my opinion the best teaming aspect of any game out there. They reward you for teaming, in some games exp is cut in half for grouping and more for doing it with alot of people, but in CoH they cut the exp but give you alot more enemies to beat thus more exp.
One thing that CoV failed to do for me that I hope DCUO does well is making you feel like a villain. In City of Villains I never really felt like a bad guy, most of the missions were just opposite wording, like on City of Heroes you had to rescue someone but on CoV you "kidnap" them, but both tasks include beating the mob that has them and running them out. I hope DCUO is more than just opposite missions, I want the heroes to be heroic and the villains to be badass'.
DCUO will be a great game if they can do what they are saying they can, I have no problem with it being on ps3 as well as PC, i think for it to be a success they need to make them on the same servers though. I hope it is a good game, and if City of Heroes 2 ever comes out (NCsoft recently got the rights to it) than I will play it, but as for the recent future its DCUO for me.
Mystery Bounty
Comments
DCUO is already beats CoH/V. I played the game about a year and a half ago and it was addictive. The PvP was a lot of fun unlike CoH/V. I never liked having to go to certain PvP areas to fight against villains.The game's action is a lot faster too. I just can't wait to see how much has changed since pre-alpha.
I think the fact they are trying to make it playable on consoles will make this game less interesting. I prefer having 15-30 different command options. i don't like being limited to 5-10.
$OE would have to fumble the ball in the most epic fail way imaginable not to beat CoX, considering all the rich history of the DCU they have at their fingertips.
That said...
I'm hoping for some alternate means of leveling besides beating up NPCs until my eyes bleed. I don't expect to be able to level from 0-max helping old ladies cross the street, but rescuing a bunch of citizens from a burning building, maybe stumbling across a conspiracy or two stopping random on-the-street mischief would be a nice change-of-pace imo.
Destructible environments to some extent. It won't feel like a "super battle" unless and until I knock someone through a building.
I'd agree on allowing villains to feel more villainous. CoX got the hero-side right for the most part, IMO. You start with saving random citizens, to saving the block, to saving the entire area, to saving the city, to saving the world to saving multiple dimensions. Villain-side you start a lowly thug and the contacts treat you like hired help (as opposed to someone to be feared) pretty much the whole trek to 50. That, and while I don't consider myself a hardcore rper by any stretch, I usually build my characters with a concept in mind and prefer to try to stay within that concept, which is difficult to do in the framework of the CoV missions, especially when you're trying to get the accolades or hunt merits outside of SFs and trials.
Last, I do have to disagree about teaming, since it had to be brought up in that context. I'd agree that CoX did fairly well balancing solo and team, especially of late, because they used game mechanics to encourage teaming without punishing people who choose to solo which, IMO, is the way it should be.
If DCUO has better combat.
The city of heroes combat is fair. My biggest criticism of COH is lask of choices within the powers. Very narrow choices and in many cases all of them are boring. Some of the options are build ups (bonuses to powers) or new powers which don't do anything. When checking the forums about powers you find formulas. So all you find for blasters is the same formula. Yaaawn.
If the choices are better and none of them are worthless DCUO will go far.
Why CoH? CoH is a year old MMO. Nobody needs to beat a MMO from the past. It needs to beat CO. Thats the competition. What you say is like saying, what does SWTOR need to beat Everquest. The question is, what does it need to beat CO.
To be brutally honest: very little actually. To beat CO it just needs to be halfway decend. Good group gameplay. Balanced classes. Interesting zones and not FORESTS, DESERTS and SNOWLANDs. Superheroes belong into a city. Period.
If DCU is just a classic, normal MMO and NOT like the many disasters we had for the last few years, it will beat the trash which is CO easily.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Void.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
SAme as with CO. DCUO is a more action oriented game and will probably not compete directly against CoX. The customer base will, most likely, be drawn in from the comic book world together with a few from other games here and there.
Just my opinion.
All statements I make is from my point of view unless stated otherwise.
They need an endgame. THat's the only thing CoX lacked. IMO if CoX had an endgame ala WoW or EQ2, it would be the best MMO on the market.
The classes, the powers, the combat, the customization, the travel powers, the class tweaking, and the possibilities with implants really make that game stand out.
It's too bad they've accepted falling into the whole "Cap then reroll an alt" niche bs.
I'm excited about DCUO although I've been playing COH since beta. I tried CO for a bit after released but it paled in comparison.
What I'd like to see from DCU however is:
No classes. I've played most architypes in COx and even though they are fun I'd like to be able to mix and match. Whats to say my guy can't use guns at range and switch to martial arts at short range something the "majority" of classes in COx wont let you do. In General I just find classes too restrictive.
I'm looking forward to the fast paced combat, some of my favourite super hero games are on the PS2 (Marvel Ultime Alliance for eg) which have a much more enjoyable combat than the standard MMO fare (tbh "turn based" combat in MMO is really tiring me) but the RPG section is limited so I'm looking forward to see what DCOU can offer in this regard.
For one thing, the game could use a beta test to make sure things are fun from a players point of view. There isn't much time left to makes changes if they plan on releasing in a few months.
They need to make the combat more superheroic, and much of that comes from stuff like REAL knockback. Freedom Force got this down pretty well. If you had super strength with high knockback and you punched somebody, they'd fly back, hit something else and damage that, too, possibly destroying it. THIS is the bread and butter of superheroism. Massive damage pouring out of a character and another character being able to take it or avoid it, while seeing the effect of that power around them. The effect of a power can't end just with the other character receiving it. Misses have to put holes in walls, hits from, for example, heat powers should leave a person or object smouldering.
Also, customizing powers, NOT just colors of powers... I'm talking about range, AoE, etc. This is MUCH MORE IMPORTANT than custom costumes, as CO's failure makes evident. Freedom Force also did this well. The closest in MMO format I've seen is Ryzoms "action edit" mechanics, which are pretty sweet. If only those folks got the CO license...
Anyhoo, I know this stuff is difficult to pull off in an MMO, but the company that does it will likely have a hit on their hands... assuming everything else about the game doesn't suck...
For DCUO to compete with City of Heroes it needs several things:
1. Better Customer serivce. I've contacted Sony CS before and the run around I got still makes my blood boil!. While NCSoft has surprised me with the effort they will extend. No matter how good a game is, if it doesn't meet your needs, it will suck!
2. Much better costuming. If you don't think costumes are a big part of playing superheroes and villains, than you really should be playing something else. I'm not impressed that every toon I make looks like someone in a track suit or a knight in armor!
3. Make the missions more flexible. In CoH, if you run out of Inspirations---the equivalent of breaking your equipment---you can step out of the mission, get some and return to where you left off. I've never done the 'Save the Titians/Save Raven's Soul' mission, because my equipment keep breaking before the finial. I got that mission at 7 and wasn't able to finish it when I tried again at 12! Something has got to be wrong with that! Also, the repetition of the intro cartoon becomes quickly annoying. It seems you need a team to do many missions in DCUO while in CoH, if you know what you're doing, you can get any mission done solo.
4. Say what you will about CoH powers, I'm not entirely convinced the powers in DCUO are effective. I'm not talking about punching and shooting, but things like 'Glamor.' They appear to be little more than a minor annoyance to my foes.
5. On one level DCUO online has already got CoH beat:as it is a newer game. It has had at least six years of learning from the competition and using newer technology. With comics a dying medium, the future of DC's heroes lies in the movies and MMOs and DC/Time/Warner have deeper pockets than NCSoft. Likely, they will eventually buy out of stiffle COH.
6. DCUO might also consider changing their control system at least for keyboard and mousel. As I can see repetitive motion injuries for the fingers arising out of the rapid and continuious use of the mouse. Not all of us have XBox.
Maybe it matters to you or maybe it doesn't but in six years Marvel by then will probably get its @#S! together and come up with a new game to make this one look dated too. Finally, for the record, I've played CoH for six years and I wish I had started with the DC heroes. That should say a lot. Cheers!
It's always fun to read old threads.
Please do not necro post in old threads.