An MMO showdown: City of Heroes vs. WoW vs. EVE

For some gamers born and bred with traditional first person shooters and console games, MMOs are a daunting prospect, with an appeal that's not fully understood. The stereotypes (which are sometimes true) that persist are that "MMOs are boring, MMOs are too slow, all it is is kill quests, item gathering, stat-gazing and crafting -- and all those things are boring, boring, boring."

Ludo and Dante from gaming-centric site Man vs. Horse refused to 'be slaves to those opinions' and put together a cleverly written MMO Showdown. They played the trials of City of Heroes,World of Warcraft, and EVE Online respectively and wrote about their experiences with these titles, having devoted roughly 7 hours of solid play to each game. Which MMO came out on top from the perspective of two experienced gamers, but MMO noobs? You might be surprised by the answer.

City of Heroes

Ludo chronicled the 'Man vs. Horse' noob experience, and seemed quite taken with the fantastic customization in City of Heroes. He went from this rich aspect of the game to "an incredibly dull tutorial sequence that seemed to validate all of our prejudices towards the MMO genre." Despite this rocky start, Ludo found some interesting aspects to the game. That depth of customization was reflected in the player avatars he encountered, with no two looking alike. He also came across a few oddities, such as a speedy hero decked out in a smoking jacket with a cape, and a rather iconic ninja who stood at two feet tall in height.

As trials, Ludo and his friends had some difficulty in grouping, but the strength of most MMOs -- the player community itself -- saved the day, and they were invited to join a Super Group as well. Some of the flaws inherent to the game mechanics of City of Heroes were outweighed by Ludo's view that customization and the satisfying feel of the powers themselves make the game solid.

His verdict: tempted to subscribe, if it weren't for the upcoming Champions Online.

World of Warcraft

While Ludo and Dante were a bit enamored with some of the more dynamic aspects of City of Heroes, they went into the industry-shaping title World of Warcraft next. WoW, when compared to City of Heroes, has very weak character customization -- with both Undead of different classes looking essentially the same.

From there the duo was troubled by the limitations on their actions as trial members, and -- surprisingly to them -- trouble finding people who would group with them. They expected the most popular MMO of all time to have more of a social element to it, but paradoxically they found most players were more concerned with leveling than the 'massively multiplayer' aspect of WoW. Coupled with the need to go out and kill animals (fighting villains in CoH at least had some discernible purpose), and the lack of immersion they felt in World of Warcraft, Dante stated: "WoW makes no pretense of being anything more than these simple, shallow and god damn it I'm going to say it, dull mechanics. Why should it? Millions of people enjoy increasing these numbers, for reasons beyond my comprehensions, but for me, every time a number floats out of an enemies head a little part of me dies inside."

His verdict: disappointed.

EVE Online

Much like City of Heroes, EVE Online allows you to customize your avatar, creating a unique look. (Unlike City of Heroes and World of Warcraft, however, EVE limits you to being a snapshot until Ambulation rolls out in 2009.) While they liked the character creation system, they were disappointed that the avatar is so underused in the game.

One of the first things they did was try mining, which they found to be an exercise in boredom, and caution other new players away from it. They quickly grasped how to control their ships and navigate (using a menu-based system), and were impressed by the 3-D star map you can pull up. Ludo wrote, "Bringing up the map of the universe for the first time was an awesome moment. You'll see huge collections of systems and stars, linked by intricate jump gate pathways. EVE's world is huge and alive with people."

They also played it safe, by staying in high security space. As trials they faced no barriers to grouping, or forming a fleet, and were soon running missions. In truth, it's the same quest game mechanic found in other MMOs, but given the sheen of a space setting. "It also helps that EVE is easily the prettiest of the MMOs we played. At times it's staggeringly beautiful. You'll forgive the time it takes to travel between space stations as you watch the glowing nebulae glint off of your ship's hull. It's impossibly slick," Ludo said.

But for Ludo and Dante, that's where the 'slick' aspects of EVE ended. The interface was counter-intuitive and kept cluttering the screen as they played through their trial. Having things you buy automagically go into your backpack doesn't apply to EVE, where you need to manually move things from one place to another. But more than anything, they struggled with EVE's learning curve. For them, it just wasn't fun, but then again it wasn't all bad. Ludo wrote, "It was satisfying and intriguing in a way that the other trials weren't, but in retrospect the hours of hardship weren't really worth it."

That's some pretty damning commentary on the game, maybe even moreso than what they said about World of Warcraft, but there was also an upside to this view. Ludo followed up his criticism and said, "EVE is fascinating for the fact that it's so different to any other game I've ever played, coming closest to ancient space trading stalwart Elite. Of all the trials, we'd be most tempted to play EVE, if just to unravel its mysteries, to join its enigmatic guilds and learn more about the huge world that has been created by its inhabitants. Ultimately though, it's a game you'll want to read about more than you'll want to play."

His verdict: interesting concepts, poor implementation.

Their decision about which MMO is right for them -- debated over whiskey and stolen wifi -- is that it's none of the MMOs they've even played so far. Champions Online stands as their ideal title, and they'll be holding out their subscription dollars until it arrives.

[Via Rock, Paper, Shotgun]