The Digital Continuum: Champions Online needs...

Champions Online is a fun game, but it still needs work like any recently released MMO. Some of these needs are purely subjective on my part, but others are definitely a necessity. The way I see it, if Cryptic can work these changes in before the end of the year they're well on their way to keeping my subscription into the far, far future.

To improve its tutorial

Simply put, the current tutorial is unsatisfactory and one of the biggest contributors to difficulty frustrations. Why? I guarantee 99% the player base is skipping past those walls of text because the last thing they want to do after finally creating their character is read a bunch of instructional material. The tutorials should be dynamic, they should make players want to invest their attention.

I have three friends playing the game right now, and all of them don't fully understand the game in its entirety. This has severely impacted their ability to enjoy the game on a long term basis, and that's a serious problem.

My suggestion would be to add a new mission that taught players the different types of critters. I've spoken with people who honestly didn't think there was much different between a henchmen and a villain -- or even a master villain. Another way to inform people that these guys are different would be to give their health bar a noticeably more ornate frame. Nothing says, "I'm a big scary monster, rargh!" than a fancy frame.

Bring back the original Jet Boots

In beta, Jet Boots were a very fun travel power because they allowed you to charge their travel speed by pressing the shift key. It was possible to over-charge the boots, resulting in a nasty tumble that could potentially spell your doom, but it was a ton of fun. Later on, that feature was removed and the power simply became a toggle that auto-shifted on its own while you had it on.

Just make it an advantage, and poof, problem solved. If that's not an option, then at least do something to bring it back because I loved traveling around with that version of the power.

Keep up the pace

With content already coming in October, we're off to a great start. But there's always the future to think about. The first thing that needs to hit after Blood Moon is that new tutorial, which should be followed (or accompanied) by some new 30-40 content. Next, I'd love to see guild housing of some variety. Finally there's always new powers, and personally it would be great if Cryptic fleshed out some of the existing power frameworks -- Archery comes immediately to mind.

I'd also really like to see Power Armor's Wrist Blasters power get palms as a emanation point, because I'm an Iron Man nerd and shooting from my wrists just doesn't cut it.

Watch its tight wire show

Balance, balance, balance; always the topic at hand with Champions Online. It's still something of an issue even after a recent patch toned down critter damage. That change certainly helped, but I think the biggest factor here is that tutorial. I guess this is kind of cheating, but I really do feel like it's just that important to the game.

I also wouldn't mind seeing some more costumes and unlocks for PvP play added, but to me that seems somewhat less important than getting everything else implemented beforehand. Then again, I'm happy with playing PvE content until I hit the late 30s anyhow.

But ultimately, what this game needs (and already has, mind you) is a loyal following. So far, Cryptic has done nothing but prove they care and they're listening and so long as that keeps up, I'm sure my future features will be about more about wants than needs.