Going on a year ago now, my favorite MMO, and my favorite video game, City of Heroes was shut down for good. This post is not about that shut down, how utterly bogus and out of nowhere it was, or how important something as simple as that video game was to me as a representation of a certain time period in my life. We all know it was bogus. The studio that was shut down knows it was bogus. NCSoft, the company that shut it down, knows it was bogus.
That said, when City of Heroes went belly up, I found myself searching high and low for a new game to replace it. I tried Champions Online, but for some reason that game, for how close it is to CoH failed to grab my attention or interest and I think I played a total of 20 minutes on it before moving on. I tried WoW but my interest in that waned even quicker than it did in CO. I just couldn't stand it. I even tried The Secret World. While that one lasted a while, I haven't played in some time - I'd probably go back and play some more actually. Finally, after searching, I've landed on DC Universe Online.
When I first heard that City of Heroes was going to be shut down, I tried out DCUO. I liked it, but my interest faded very quickly and I went back to playing CoH as much as I could (which wasn't very much, given I work full time and during those months also attended a class at SUNY Albany). However, a few weeks ago - I think in June or early July - I returned to it and I have come to really love the game.
The graphics are beautiful, combat is comic booky and quick paced, as well as fairly physics friendly. And there's nothing to me quite as cool as fighting alongside Batman, Superman, or Wonder Woman (or on the villain side of things, The Joker, Lex Luthor, or Circe). Better yet, when I took out Bane on my first try a part of me thought: heehee I beat Bane in one try - suck on that Bats! Then I remembered that Batman is cool and could beat me up and I decided to stop gloating. I have also been able to very nicely model my characters off of characters in my book series; an added perk and not something I could do with CO or CoH.
While the costume creator is not even close to what CoH's was, I have come to realize that that's because you really build your costume as your character grows. That said, I do wish there were more things available at the costume creator portion of the game, and I think that the developers could do with expanding that a bit. At the same time I think that the artwork for each costume piece is beautiful and intricate, and I imagine it to be what City of Heroes would have been if they had been able to update their graphics engine.
My big issue with this game comes from a non-gameplay standpoint, and that is the community. One of the best aspects of City of Heroes was the community - seriously it was much more like a social media network wrapped up in a superhero game. Everyone was friendly and helpful. People were perfectly happy to team at any time no matter what, and if someone didn't feel like teaming they closed off the option or said "no thanks, i just feel like soloing it tonight." It never came across as rude or disrespectful.
The DCUO community could not differ any more. I've made the decision to stand in the background and observe rather than try to contribute or ask anything, because I feel like, whenever I say something, there's going to be at least one person who's like "stop being such a n00b" or "what're you, a troll? stop being stupid" and other such things. It's an air of disrespect that flat-out bugs me. I was asking a simple question about raids - no need to get snarky. There are aspects of this game that confuse new players, and while it can be frustrating to get the same questions about certain things, if a community isn't willing to help new members, then they need to prepare for a day to come where they stop getting new members altogether.
Worse still is the teaming aspect of things. In this game, you can't just team up with people to go knock heads or have some fun. No, the stats have to be just right and you have to have the perfect gear and the whole shebang. The result is this - what about the people who don't play the game for the stats?
I don't play DCUO because I want to have the best controller, or healer, or tank. I play the game because I want to be a superhero fighting baddies. Because of that I don't focus on gear as much - unless my setup is so bad that I can't beat a certain villain without dying a million times. I just want to have fun, and it would be nice to team up with other people who just want to have fun and play a game. It's just a game, yet teaming is treated like life or death. While I understand and respect the desire to have people on your team who know what they're doing, I'd prefer if teaming weren't treated so much like a job interview with everyone closely scrutinizing combat statistics and were treated more like friends gathering. Unfortunately, unless you have a group of friends in the game who feel the same way as you, the odds of finding a lighthearted team of fun-havers is slim.
CoH was not nearly this snobby about teams, or about gaming in general. It had its people (every game does, video or not) that took it too seriously, but overall the community accepted everyone and so did the teams. The number of times in City that I was asked by a totally random group - without even looking at my statistics (whoa, who'da thunkit) - if I wanted to team up for missions was beyond count.
In short, I love DCUO, but only as a solo player. I've given up on teaming. Which is fine - I don't care that much about teaming, though it might've been nice to feel like it was an option. So, I float around in the background and go to dcuo wiki for help if ever I need it.
-Tom
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