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City of Heroes opens Issue 16: Power Spectrum
NCsoft has deployed Issue 16 for City of Heroes/Villains, bringing in a bunch of delicious new options for Paragon City's finest (and the Rogue Islands' worst). Powerset proliferation is ongoing, bringing formerly barred powersets to archetypes that were previously denied them. This issue brings a particularly pleasing improvement: Being able to jump from one part of the character creator to another, without having to complete it all in a fixed-order. That's a huge help for players looking to refine their look and character-concept during design.
City of Heroes announces Guest Author Program for Mission Architect
No doubt it's Champions Online that seems to be getting the superhero MMO headlines of late in the gaming press, both for the new title's release and for some of the issues they've had in relation to that launch. But competition is generally a good thing from a gamer's perspective, and City of Heroes is also stepping up their game, particularly in regards to the Mission Architect. When the devs introduced the Mission Architect to City of Heroes, it was their first step towards embracing player-generated content and adding new dimensions to the game experience. They've announced that the next step with Mission Architect is to have a Guest Author Program where "comic book notables try their hand at mission design." NCsoft says the program will "invite influential writers and aspiring game or story designers" to collaborate with the City of Heroes devs and bring these missions into the game.
NCsoft and Paragon Studios announce HeroCon 2009 for October
Paragon Studios and NCsoft today announced that HeroCon has been expanded to a two-day convention and will be taking place on 24th- 25th October. This year's event, which is taking place in San Jose, California, is the 2nd HeroCon and offers a chance for fans of City of Heroes to meet up and share their passion for the game. As if you needed anything else to tempt you into attending, the tickets cost $79.99 and there's even a goody bag which includes a special con t-shirt and an exclusive in-game item.The event promises pre-con activities on the Friday night as well as developer panel discussions, live mission event and contests, social events with the development team and there's even a rather posh-sounding banquet dinner with live entertainment and an awards ceremony. As usual Matt "Positron" Miller and Paragon Studios head, Brian Clayton, will be doing a community address as well as the usual round of interesting announcements – hopefully including something about the Going Rogue expansion.For more information on the event and where to stay, check out the official site.
SDCC 09: City of Heroes devs on the future of player-created content
This week marked the annual pilgrimage to Comic-Con International in San Diego for the comics and gaming faithful, and a number of superhero MMO developers were there as well to whip the fanboys (and girls) into a frenzy. When you think about it, comic conventions are as big for superhero games as other events like E3 and PAX. Massively was on the ground at SDCC this year and among the games we took a look at was, not surprisingly, City of Heroes. We caught up with City of Heroes game designers Joe Morrissey and Matt "Positron" Miller who shared with us a bit about how things have changed in the game in recent months, and gave us some info about the content and features on the way in Issue 16: Power Spectrum.%Gallery-68649%
Paragon Studios details Issue 16 power customization
Just when you thought the City of Heroes character creation process wasn't involved enough, we get word that the power customization in the upcoming Issue 16 will definitely include the ability to change the color of your powers at creation. We had previously heard that this may be the case, but a new Issue 16 overview on the CoH website confirms it.This recent news also includes much more information on enhanced difficulty settings and the proliferation of powersets among all Archetypes, allowing more types of players to possess more powersets. Check out the entire overview of Issue 16: Power Spectrum for more information.
Additional Mission Architect slots for City of Heroes now available
Hey there, look, we need to talk. We've seen you deleting and restarting your custom created missions in City of Heroes for a while now. At this point, we think you've probably recreated the entire 52 storylines a couple times over. It's too hard for us to watch you slave away for hours before getting another idea and starting all over again. That's why we're here to tell you that Paragon Studios has announced the sale of additional Mission Architect slots. You can now add one, two or five extra slots for $5.99, $9.99, and $19.99 respectively.So please, stop giving us that puppy dog look every time your creative juices begin to percolate. Especially when, for the price of a DVD, you can max out your available mission slots at eight -- eight! In another few months, we suspect you'll be asking for 16, though.
Power customization teased at for City of Heroes
We've always operated under the assumption that City of Heroes was designed in such a way that power customization would be very difficult. So a recent forum post hinting by lead designer Matt "Positron" Miller showing that it's apparently happening makes this news all the more interesting.Of course, all we get are a couple screenshots of purple and blue imps to tease us, but then again what else do you really need to know right now? Well okay, we suppose you could know how colorization works and if it's something that's done only during character creation or at any time while playing. It would also be nice to know the extent that powers could be customized, too.We'll just have to wait until July to hear more about Issue 16. So until then, dream about City of Heroes in whatever color you like -- even made up ones!
City of Heroes dev blog talks character customization
Massively is proud to host a new dev diary from the folks at Paragon Studios. This particular dev diary was written by Christopher Bruce, Senior Lead Animator/VFX Artist for City of Heroes, and it pertains to the character customization options that have been improved with Issue 15. Enjoy!In addition to supporting the two new task forces for Issue 15, we also wanted to focus some attention on expanding our character creation system. Character customization is a hallmark of City of Heroes and we're always striving to improve and expand upon our players' ability to create a truly unique super powered hero or villain. For Issue 15, there are two new costume sets available to everyone, created by the newest addition to our character artist team, Cheryl Austin. "Vines" is a new pattern while "Ulterior" is a new texture set, both of which work with most of the existing costume pieces. Cheryl has also created over twenty new face textures, something we haven't done since City of Villains launched. While our options for individual costume pieces and sets have continued to expand over the years, our selection of faces hasn't received the same amount of attention. Her goal was to create a set of new face textures that were a bit more subtle and realistic and while also working well across our full range skin tones.%Gallery-64392%
One Shots: Ready and waiting
Any hero worth their cape can tell you that Atlas Park is generally considered to be one of, if not the, biggest hangout on many City of Heroes servers. Normally the statue near Ms. Liberty is a fairly laid-back spot for heroes to hang out and hold costume contests, but it truly gets to be fun when event monsters spawn there unexpectedly! Today's One Shots was captured by Ryan F. who was hanging out on Atlas' knee during the recent anniversary events and managed to capture this image of heroes poised and ready to deal with the next wave of nasties. Sunday is a popular day for people to log in and get some MMO time. So while you're out adventuring, why not take a snap of your favorite game? We'd love to see what you're up to. Just email your screenshots to us here at oneshots AT massively DOT com along with your name, the name of the game, and a brief description of what's going on. We'll post it out here and give you credit for sending it in!%Gallery-9798%
City of Heroes senior designer Bruce Harlick on return of The 5th Column
Massively mentioned yesterday that City of Heroes Issue 15: Anniversary has gone into open beta testing. Along with that announcement and an overview of the Issue 15 features, Paragon Studios senior designer Bruce Harlick has written a developer diary titled "A Circle of Fifths: Designing the Ultimate Fifth Anniversary Task Force and Strike Force" Harlick writes that when Paragon Studios was hashing through ideas for the game's strike force and task force for the City of Heroes 5th Anniversary, bringing the 5th Column back to Paragon City seemed the right thing to do. It also lets them bring The Reichsman into the game, leading to some interesting mission arcs. Harlick writes, "I didn't want the two arcs to be simple mirrors of each others, with the villains doing something and the heroes stopping it." He adds, "I wanted the villains to succeed with their plan and to deal with the consequences, and I wanted the heroes to deal with an emerging big problem." Have a look at Bruce Harlick's developer diary on City of Heroes Issue 15: Anniversary, for more about what he describes as "a story that's worthy of the return of one of the biggest threats to ever hit Paragon City and the Rogue Islands."%Gallery-64392%
City of Heroes Issue 15: Anniversary open beta begins
NCsoft has announced that City of Heroes Issue 15: Anniversary has entered open beta. They write, "We are pleased to announce that City of Heroes content Update Issue 15: Anniversary has gone straight into Open Beta phase. Now is your change to celebrate the return of The 5th Column by playing and giving feedback on the new Task Force and Strike Force."But what will Issue 15: Anniversary introduce to City of Heroes? They've put together an overview of the update that gives more info on the Villain Strikeforce and the Hero Taskforce (both Levels 45-50), new costumes and costume change emotes (colorful transitions between costumes on a given character), as well as greater character customization options. If you're interested in checking out the Issue 15: Anniversary open beta, they've got a forum thread that will walk you through getting set up to play on the Training Room test server.%Gallery-64392%
Rampant farming forces Paragon Studios to remove City of Heroes badges
When City of Heroes brought us Issue 14, they also brought something rather unique to the MMO space with the Mission Architect -- the ability for players to create their own mission scenarios and share them with other players. Unfortunately, when many games offer achievements of some sort, there are people who figure out ways to cheat the system and farm them out... which, sadly, has proven to be the case with City of Heroes. Synapse (aka Phil Zeleski) from the City of Heroes development team addresses this in a recent blog post. He writes: "We really didn't want the Mission Architect to be an environment that encourages farming for XP, Rewards or Badges, and we thought long and hard about the current Architect badge situation. Ultimately we'd like it to be a place where you go to play great player created content." To keep the Mission Architect system in keeping with their initial goals, Paragon Studios is removing the badges commonly farmed from the game, 90 of them in all, which he lists in his post.
One Shots: Things that go bump in the night
City of Heroes continues to be a popular place to be, especially with the recent anniversary events. Today's One Shots comes to us from Ryan F, and was taken of Jurassik going nuts in the Hollows during the recent event. Ryan wrote in to explain a bit further: Because there were sooooo many people in the same small area it seems a lot of them didn't show up in the screenshots (battle fraction). In some images barely a fourth of the battle against the rikti, zombies, or Giant Monsters can be seen. At times I would not have been surprised to find out there was more than 100 heroes fighting around us. If you're playing a game we haven't highlighted here recently, we'd love to see your screenshots. It's always interesting to check in on lands we don't often see! Just snap a screen and send it to us here at oneshots AT massively DOT com along with your name and a quick description of the image. (Server info, guilds, etc are also welcome in there too -- it's up to you.) If we use your image, you get full credit for sending it along.%Gallery-9798%
Heroes and villains go rogue in new City of Heroes expansion
What is left for a company that has released City of Heroes and City of Villains, two MMO titles focused on both sides of the hero/villain spectrum? Why, it's City of Toeing the Line Between Good and Evil, of course! Okay, not really, but City of Heroes Going Rogue -- the next full expansion pack from Paragon Studios -- might as well be called that.The new expansion will take players to Praetoria, a realm occupied by both the bad and the good that is ruled by Tyrant, the "evil incarnation of the game's main protagonist, Statesman." Praetoria will feature a new alignment system that will allow heroes to become villains, and vice versa, based on the decisions they make. This means that heroes who become villains can travel to the Rogue Isles for the first time, and the same will go for villains-turned-heroes, who may now experience Paragon City.There's no word on release date or price for City of Heroes Going Rogue right now, so hopefully E3 will swoop in and save the day. In the meanwhile, you can entertain yourself with a barebones site for the expansion here.
Massively Hands-on: The first five levels of Champions Online
This last weekend, press had the opportunity to spend my time within the Champions Online beta. After playing more than I would safely recommend, I bring you my personal takeaway in an effort to get out as much crunchy information goodness on the upcoming MMO as possible.It opens with a downwards view of Millennium City under siege by a fleet of alien ships. As the camera pans down towards the ground, you overhear two chattering voices of men on a radio discussing their dire situation. Alien invaders known as the Qularr are besieging the city by putting up force fields that are sectioning off much of the city.With the cities' Champions are seemingly nowhere to be found, it's up to you and any other recently created newbies to help save the day -- and save it you will.
Massively Hands-on: Creating superheroes in Champions Online
This last weekend, press had the opportunity to spend my time within the Champions Online beta. After playing more than I would safely recommend, I bring you my personal takeaway in an effort to get out as much crunchy information goodness on the upcoming MMO as possible.Do you like options? I really hope you love options, because you're going to get smacked upside the head with so many options when you first encounter Champions Online's character creation, that your mind -- much like my own -- is going to be reeling with all the possibilities.Each and every time I made a thematically new hero, the creation process ate up more time than I ever thought possible. Let me explain why this happens, and what you can expect when you first sit down to make your very own creations.
One Shots: Anniversary smackdown
Things were absolutely crazy in Paragon City and the Rogue Isles yesterday with all manner of baddies showing up in City of Heroes! Players who logged in during the event were not only treated to lots of fun, but lots and lots of strange occurrences - like monsters in zones they normally never show up in. Today's One Shots shows off one such moment of eek from City of Heroes yesterday that was sent in to us by Ryan F, who writes: In [this] image "triple jacks" you can see the first two jacks quite dead on the ground and the third fading out in the middle. That's only a small taste of what we've been fighting. Lord Recluse and all his friends have made several appearances; sometimes in double or quick succession. Pile on rampant rikti and zombie raids, and you get a whole lot of fun. Oh and some wicked experience, Prestige and Influence...but it's all about the fun.If you're playing a game we haven't highlighted here recently, we'd love to see your screenshots. It's always interesting to check in on lands we don't often see! Just snap a screen and send it to us here at oneshots AT massively DOT com along with your name and a quick description of the image. (Server info, guilds, etc are also welcome in there too -- it's up to you.) If we use your image, you get full credit for sending it along -- plus you get the bragging rights of showing everyone you game with!%Gallery-9798%
Massively Exclusive: An anniversary chat with Matt Miller
Unless you've been hiding under a rock, you undoubtedly know that today is the 5th anniversary since the launch of City of Heroes - an MMO giving players the chance to don tights and fight for truth, justice, and the fun of it. Recently, we had the chance to catch up with Matt "Positron" Miller, Senior Lead Designer for Paragon Studios, who gave us some of his personal insights into what the last five years have been like - and a bit about what players can expect in the next five. Be sure and join us after the break to read more about what's planned for Paragon City and the Rogue Isles! Massively: You've got five great years of City of Heroes under your belt. What's it been like watching your MMO grow and develop over that time? How about staying together through everything your team has been through, to finally becoming Paragon Studios?Matt "Positron" Miller: I think that it's a testament to the game that so many of us who were here at the launch are still on the project. Watching CoH grow up year after year is awesome. I look back to what CoH shipped with compared to where it is today and I am blown away by how much quality free content we have added and given back to our players over the last five years.
City of Heroes celebrates their 5th Anniversary with Issue 15
Been hoping to hear some more details on Issue 15? Well, true believers, your wait has ended! Earlier this morning, the newly rebranded Paragon Studios (formerly NC NorCal) announced their plans for Issue 15, aptly titled Anniversary! Along with some improvements to the Architect system introduced in Issue 14, I15 brings with it a new Fifth Column Taskforce; and not just the exact same one for Heroes and Villains, either. While the story arcs are based on the same premise, they will be told from different perspectives, thus giving the Villains some of that unique content they've been asking for. In addition to this, the Paragon Studios team is adding in a series of costume-changing emotes for players, supplementing the ones recently introduced in the Magic super booster. Also, for those of you who are as addicted to the character creation part of the game as we are, there are 20 new faces to check out. This, of course, ensures that several people will be heading for ICON, and perhaps even dusting off a costume change Veteran reward token for a makeover. (Like we really need an excuse for that!)
City of Heroes player created content surpasses dev's in 24 hours
It seems as though Paragon Studios have hit content gold with their Issue 14 free update and its Mission Architect system. In the short span of just one day, the City of Heroes community has made more content for the game than has been built during the entirety of the game's life. And even though initial excitement is bound to sizzle down as time passes, we can't wait to see what kinds of missions come out of the players who stick with it over the coming weeks and months.Something that caught our eye was the fact that 70% of all player created content uses custom enemies made with the character creator. If there's one thing you notice after playing an MMO long enough, it's that all the enemies you fight start to become stale no matter how wonderfully designed they may be -- it's inevitable. With this update, however, there's no telling what strange creation you'll end up fighting when a new mission hits the list.The launch definitely seems to have exceeded everyone's expectations, and what's really encouraging is that this is only the beginning for custom created game content in not only City of Heroes, but MMOs as a whole.
