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f13.net  |  f13.net General Forums  |  The Gaming Graveyard  |  City of Heroes / City of Villains  |  Topic: COH vs. D2 0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.
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Author Topic: COH vs. D2  (Read 7697 times)
Furiously
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on: August 24, 2004, 11:02:15 AM

COH had great gameplay, groups were fun - you could pretty much make any work. Yet I only stayed subbed 1 month after my free month.

Am I becomming less likely to do the level grind? Perhaps a bit.

I am trying to think what aspects of the gameplay I didn't find addictive/appealing.

I think for me it boiled down to a lack of dropped loot.

Which got me thinking about what I find so fun about D2 or EQ or any of the other game out there.

In COH - you only have your level to look forward to, (I figure you should see new sights along the way regardless).

In D2, the most addictive thing in the game to me was the random loot. I am really surprised no MMOG has taken the D2 approach to items. Seems we only have "uniques" and "common" items in most online games. The rares/sets/slotted in D2 made item collecting it's own minigame in a lot of ways.

I didn't play to level - I played to packrat.

I could be completely wrong, but I have a feeling the advanced quest system in WOW will be pretty darn boring after playing my 3rd character.

Xilren's Twin
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Reply #1 on: August 24, 2004, 11:17:13 AM

One problem with D2 style loot is after a certain point your entire character is purely dependant on your equipment (sorta like eq), and that part I don'lt like.  But loot in general? Sure.

Actually, Shadowbane did this best of the current crop of mmorpgs.  It made both looting and even shopping enjoyable b/c you would never know what might be up.  Random cool loot that isn't unbalancing was one of the best things about hour to hour SB gameplay.  I hear AC1 did this pretty well too.

I wouldnt mind if CoH added loot so long as it didn't have any impact on combat.  Call em trophies or items you can use in your headquarters, new costume bits or particle effect stuff.  

Xilren

"..but I'm by no means normal." - Schild
Nebu
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Reply #2 on: August 24, 2004, 11:21:19 AM

I'll take you a couple of steps futher as another person that subbed one month and left.

Loot collecting is a mini-game and leads to other aspects of mmogs that can be enjoyable (i.e. trading, selling, etc.).  I missed that as well.  There is also the "paper doll syndrome" of loot that attracts people as well.  The ability to change your toon's look was patched into CoH and shows that this also has some mass appeal.  I'm not the min/max type, but template building for some is also another aspect of the loot system.

Crafting. I don't know why I miss this in games when it's usually implemented so poorly to ever consider enjoying... yet, I do.  I think it's like being asked to the dance when you don't want to go.  At least you had the option.

Probably my biggest gripe with CoH is coupled to one of CoH's greatest strengths:  the action is so fast and furious that you need TeamSpeak to communicate.  I hate downtime in games but have to admit that it creates a social atmosphere.  When you have nothing immediately going on, you tend to branch out socially.  Archetypes tend to also strengthen social structure in that (using EQ as an example) you went out of your way to get to know people playing classes that you need to succeed (especially the people that played them competently).  

One thing is certain, you learn a lot about your personal tastes playing mmog's.  My biggest draw to online games is the ability to have a gaming experience with other people.  Yes, this comes at the cost of having to wade through 100 assmunchers for every good person, but some of those people make even the most mundane games (*cough EQ*) more enjoyable experiences.  In CoH there was never any social connection, never any real sense of community.  I was just another nameless/faceless player in the fast-paced monster zergs happening in every zone.  Maybe this is why I've started calling mmog's "IRC with pictures".  I'm just a social creature...

"Always do what is right. It will gratify half of mankind and astound the other."

-  Mark Twain
kaid
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Reply #3 on: August 24, 2004, 12:43:14 PM

The fast and furious pace of COH deffinatly does limit some chit chatting. This is one reason I usually play with my couple of friends as we are not uber by any means so we just bop around and chit chat for a while between mob groups.

In most pickup groups its just a deadly silent non stop charge through mobs. At higher levels it can get really silly for utter lack of down time. In a group I ran in a task force we had me a force fielder, a empathy defender with the full bore end recharge power and a kinetic defender in addition to a controller a tank and a blaster.

What this means due to force fields nothing could really hit any of us. The rare times that we did get hit we had healing in bucket loads and with the speed boost and endurance recovery aura we had infinite end. COH is fun but that group was basically god mode no limits on power usage and no real fear or possiblity of death other than as a complete fluke.

Kaid
Krakrok
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Reply #4 on: August 24, 2004, 01:23:54 PM

In D2 you play to beat the game. In COH you play to kill mobs.


I beat D2, I don't play it anymore.

I killed mobs in COH, I don't play it anymore.
ahoythematey
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Reply #5 on: August 24, 2004, 01:31:03 PM

In D2 I played to beat battle.net more than anything, since it seemed steadfast in refusing to drop decent items upon my characters(except for that one time a bul-kathos wedding band popped out of a dying monster).

Needless to say, it was a losing battle.  B.net won, and I moved on.
schild
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Reply #6 on: August 24, 2004, 05:58:25 PM

I think there are things to compare - mechanics, but not the actual games. You see, D2 has loot. CoH does not. You can stop there. D2 vs. Guild Wars will be more viable.
Merusk
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Reply #7 on: August 24, 2004, 06:08:45 PM

I still don't get the fascination with D2.   I bought it based on recommendations from people I worked with.  As soon as I got to the and of the first chapter I was bored as fuck of clicking and running around.  Started the second chapter, didn't even make it past the first mission and stopped playing.

  I went back to it a few months later, having forgotten about it, and tried playing with some cheats.  THAT didn't even keep my interest, so I uninstalled and began wondering why the hell people thought it was so great.

The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
ahoythematey
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Reply #8 on: August 24, 2004, 06:16:04 PM

Some people like it, some people don't.  That's about as scientific as I can get when talking about what makes people play D2.
Arnold
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Reply #9 on: August 25, 2004, 12:23:29 AM

Quote from: Furiously

In D2, the most addictive thing in the game to me was the random loot. I am really surprised no MMOG has taken the D2 approach to items. Seems we only have "uniques" and "common" items in most online games. The rares/sets/slotted in D2 made item collecting it's own minigame in a lot of ways.


AC1, 1999.  K, thnx.
Furiously
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Reply #10 on: August 25, 2004, 07:32:36 AM

I mean a game people play.

HaemishM
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Reply #11 on: August 25, 2004, 09:17:35 AM

Never played the Diablo games. I've seen people play it often, and it just never appealed to me. I do not get it.

CoH is fun so long as you don't try to play it like an MMOG. Play it like a console game.

stray
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Reply #12 on: August 25, 2004, 10:40:04 AM

Quote from: HaemishM
Never played the Diablo games. I've seen people play it often, and it just never appealed to me. I do not get it.

CoH is fun so long as you don't try to play it like an MMOG. Play it like a console game.


Yet, even then, it lacks much of the richness and depth sp console games provide. Fun while it lasted, but there just isn't much to it, whether on the MMO side of things, or on the console/story-based side of things. The action provides a good foundation though, so maybe I'll give it another chance in a year or so.
Krakrok
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Reply #13 on: August 25, 2004, 10:58:31 AM

Half the fun of D/D2/BG:DA/GW etc. is co-op mode (pick me up groups don't count except maybe in GW). Halo probably falls into that category too. I wouldn't have played Halo all the way through if it wasn't for co-op.

I'd go as far as to say that co-op mode hack-n-slash brings back co-op arcade sidescroller goodness (aka Golden Axe).
Jain Zar
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Reply #14 on: August 26, 2004, 08:36:51 PM

I enjoy bashing stuff in CoH, where I couldn't stand it in Diablo 2.  

I kind of wish it was a solo rpg with some storyline and RP bits like KOTOR and Fallout, but its core gameplay mechanic is super fun for some reason.
Big Gulp
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Reply #15 on: August 27, 2004, 09:45:26 AM

Quote from: Jain Zar
I enjoy bashing stuff in CoH, where I couldn't stand it in Diablo 2.  

I kind of wish it was a solo rpg with some storyline and RP bits like KOTOR and Fallout, but its core gameplay mechanic is super fun for some reason.


Same here.  Hate the Diablo games, love CoH.  Still playing it hardcore, and I have yet to get bored.  Frankly, I also only see the game getting better, especially when CoV comes out.  Bases, danger rooms, real animosity between hero/villain groups.  I can't wait.  It'll finally give SG's some reason to exist other than just being a friend network or extra chat channel.
shiznitz
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Reply #16 on: August 27, 2004, 11:52:33 AM

Quote from: HaemishM
Never played the Diablo games. I've seen people play it often, and it just never appealed to me. I do not get it.

CoH is fun so long as you don't try to play it like an MMOG. Play it like a console game.


Bingo.

If random drops make a game for you, I pity you. You are a Gamblers' Anonymous member in-waiting. Personally, random drops are a frustration for me. D2 entertained me for maybe 8 hours. EQ for 4 years. The annoyance of random drops can be overcome by other aspects of a game.

I have never played WoW.
Krakrok
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Reply #17 on: August 27, 2004, 01:47:43 PM

Quote from: shiznitz
EQ [entertained me] for 4 years.


Oh. My. God.

I'll take randomly generated items over spawn camping any day of the week. EQ only entertained me when I got to loot random items off someone who just got PKed.
Zane0
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Reply #18 on: August 27, 2004, 03:25:08 PM

I'd say that CoH has the potential to be way more than Diablo 2 could ever be, though both are enjoyable games for mainly the same reason- having a refined, entertaining, and relatively well balanced combat system.  CoH pulls ahead because of the possibilities that are present in adding to and improving upon the strong base that the game already has.  That subscription thing can sometimes go a long way.
Sable Blaze
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Reply #19 on: August 27, 2004, 09:03:43 PM

The drops in D2 weren't random in the strictest sense. Just because you had no clue how the treasure classes worked in D2 doesn't mean others didn't figure it out.

On the other hand, once you did figure this stuff out, then you had "X-monster" runs ad nauseum to obtain certain items. It may as well have been camping then.

Soooo, if I decided my new bowazon really wanted to be a witchyzon, then it was NM Mephisto runs until my eyes bled and he dropped my bow. Pretty simple really. Like EQ, you just needed to know who could drop what and roughly how often and you were go to go farm just like EQ! Hurrah!!
Alluvian
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Reply #20 on: August 29, 2004, 08:01:25 PM

Quote from: Merusk
I still don't get the fascination with D2.   I bought it based on recommendations from people I worked with.  As soon as I got to the and of the first chapter I was bored as fuck of clicking and running around.  Started the second chapter, didn't even make it past the first mission and stopped playing.

  I went back to it a few months later, having forgotten about it, and tried playing with some cheats.  THAT didn't even keep my interest, so I uninstalled and began wondering why the hell people thought it was so great.


Pretty much my experience.  I even had a copy for my wife.  My wife was bored pretty much immediately and gave up playing coop (something we enjoy in almost any other game) at the end of the first act.  We gave her copy away to her son who played it till the end of the first act and also gave up in disgust.  I tried 2 more times to enjoy that game.  Second time I made it to halfway through act 2, third time I decided I would force myself to finish the game.  I was on a mission.  Made it to maybe halfway through the third act and then snapped the cd in half and uninstalled it.  I had fun burning cd bits until my wife complained about the smell (she is asthmatic, it was dumb of me to be burning them).  So I fried the bits of the remaining cds in the microwave.  Then she complained at me about that as little flaky silver bits of the cd got in the microwave and I had to clean it out.  So it wasn't even that fun to destroy.
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