Forbes Peice on City of Heroes development

[Xilren's Twin]

Thanks to Terra Nova, of course.

Interesting piece on City of Heroes over at Forbes.com.  Most of a look at the business side of how this title became a success, and the resounding theme that help lead to their success? Keep it simple.

Notable quoteable

In the 18 months before the Heroes debut, Cryptic's staff of 35 made the art and story come alive in 480,000 lines of code. The code is separated into 740 computer instruction files that handle everything from dressing up a character in an almost infinite selection of outfits (a total 10 to the 27th power, in fact) to flying through the city, as well as 25,000 graphics files. At peak hours 30,000 automated villains roam each of ten versions of the city. All the possibilities are managed by 600 2-gigahertz chips (from AMD) in ten servers. They can manage four teraflops, equivalent to the world's biggest supercomputer.

Almost posted this in the CoH area, but what the hell, more insight on the creation of one of these beasties...

Xilren

[WayAbvPar]

an almost infinite selection of outfits (a total 10 to the 27th power, in fact)

Crikey. That is one big number! That was the part of the genius- letting everyone look distinctly different made it really fun to people-watch.

[Triforcer]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't CoH the game where you are in your own instanced zones most of the time?  I play MMORPGs, for the most part, to be a part of the parade and watch it in equal measure.  Its the heros and retards and interacting with hundreds them all at once that gives MMORPGs life.

[edlavallee]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't CoH the game where you are in your own instanced zones most of the time?  I play MMORPGs, for the most part, to be a part of the parade and watch it in equal measure.  Its the heros and retards and interacting with hundreds them all at once that gives MMORPGs life.

Depends... you can go in "door" missions that are instanced for you and your group, or you can play in the main city zones, although the max population is capped. Once reaching the cap, another instance of the zone is created. Appears to work well, IMO.

In your quote above, I would have to disagree with the interacting with retards giving the game life. For me, I deal with enough retards on a daily basis at work, I would rather be shielded from them at play. I play MMOs because I can play with the group of people (family, friend and friends of friends) that I have grown to know over the course of the last several years. A game that allows us the latitude to interact in a relatively open environment with many choices of recreation is what we look for, and so far, MMOs are about our only choice. The fact that many other people, including morons and mouthbreathing troglodytes, are allowed in that world as well is a cross that I have to bear. I use whatever tools I have to limit my exposure to the idiocy - turning off the broadcast, shout and auction channels, for instance, but I would just like them to go away... far away.

I understand your point tho... I just wish there was a way to filter out the jerks.

Zipper

[Miguel]

(a total 10 to the 27th power, in fact)

For the science inclined nerds out there, plus I was bored at work:

Avagadro's Number = 6.022x10^23 (the number of atoms in one mole of a substance)

Atomic Weight of Aluminum = 26.98 grams

Number of moles of aluminum equivalent to the number of costumes in CoH = 1X10^27/6.022x10^23 = 1660.58 moles

Mass of 1660.58 moles of Aluminum = 44,804.95 grams, or 98.778 pounds.

Density of Aluminum metal = 2700 kg/cubic meter

Volume of 98.778 pounds of Aluminum Metal = 0.586 cubic feet.

==============================================

So there are the same number of costumes in CoH as there are atoms of Aluminum in a solid block measuring one foot wide by one foot deep, with a height of 7 inches, weighing 98.778 pounds.

Astounding!

[The Hanged Man]

I still enjoy the game because its challenging. A group of veteran players with good characters don't walk over poor AI for Phat lewt like many other MMOGS, they can still get their butt kicked if they don't have good teamwork. A good example is the people who power level to 30s and then get slaughtered in the Respec mission at the nuclear reactor.

[Lanei]

I still enjoy the game because its challenging. A group of veteran players with good characters don't walk over poor AI for Phat lewt like many other MMOGS, they can still get their butt kicked if they don't have good teamwork. A good example is the people who power level to 30s and then get slaughtered in the Respec mission at the nuclear reactor.

An interesting counterpoint to that is that with a reasonably balanced group of skilled players, the respec mission is a cakewalk.  I did the respec mission in a pickup group with my scrapper, 2 tankers, 2 defenders, and 2 blasters.  We suffered 0 deaths in the mission instances, and only had one bad fight, in the first door, before people shook out the group dynamic.

If I could count on even half the pickup groups in an MMOG to be that good, I wouldn't solo so much.

[Moroni]

I don't think the ratio of good players/groups to bad ones is any different in any mainstream MMORPG. It's just blind luck to find a group of people who know what they're doing and aren't jerks. I've done pretty well in most games but I also tend to stay away from the highly beaten paths.

Miguel, do gold next, then einsteinium!

[jpark]

Will pvp (city of villians) increase the load on these servers?  Or does PVE or PVP make any difference?

[eldaec]

Will pvp (city of villians) increase the load on these servers?  Or does PVE or PVP make any difference?

Only really if it encourages zerging.

It's likely to lead to some slowdown, if only because group vs group means 16 players rather then 8 in group vs mobs.

But nothing serious unless they go for daoc style 100 vs 100.

[Soukyan]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't CoH the game where you are in your own instanced zones most of the time?  I play MMORPGs, for the most part, to be a part of the parade and watch it in equal measure.  Its the heros and retards and interacting with hundreds them all at once that gives MMORPGs life.

I've had more social interaction in CoH than most other MMOGs. This is mostly because the instanced missions are more fun in a group and missions, task forces, and trial zones promote grouping. I had actually let my subscription lapse for this past month (and still received the comic, thank you Cryptic!), but just resubscribed last night. I logged in and loaded up a Blaster I have and within 3 minutes had a group and was headed off to do a mission. I completed that one and one other with the 5 person pick-up group and we all had a blast. Some fights were close, one person did "die" once but we revived him. I still feel that CoH is one hell of a fun time and for someone like myself, it can provide entertainment even when I only have 30 minutes to spare. I've never felt that it was lacking in the MMOG feel. Sure, I haven't encountered the frustration of being in a camp-line for a rare drop and haven't seen the in-fighting between allied guilds, but I hated that shit so I don't miss it. I suppose it's just a matter of whether or not you like a bunch of melodramatic crap in your community or not. Oh, an capes are fucking awesome in CoH.

[eldaec]

an almost infinite selection of outfits (a total 10 to the 27th power, in fact)

Crikey. That is one big number! That was the part of the genius- letting everyone look distinctly different made it really fun to people-watch.

The key thing isn't the number of outfits.

The key thing is that the differences are real and visible.

note to SWG: 100347439263 different eye colours or cheek bone settings are irrelevant.

The basic colour and designs on your torso, and shape of your clothing is what is relevant.

CoH wins on character design because without armour loot they are free to let you design your look, rather than fit it around the uber loot template that EQ/SWG insist must cover up any effort that goes into individuality.

[eldaec]

Depends... you can go in "door" missions that are instanced for you and your group, or you can play in the main city zones, although the max population is capped. Once reaching the cap, another instance of the zone is created. Appears to work well, IMO.

Probably also worth pointing out that now the population has spread out more than at launch, instances in city zones aren't all that common any more.

Certainly the days of zoning into a choice of Atlas Park 1,2,3,4,5 or 6 are over.

[schild]

If monsters dropped clothing that did nothing and you could collect outfits and it would drop the aggro of those specific mobs - I'd be ALL over the game. I love that kind of stuff.

For an example, run the mission where you dress up as one of the guys in The Lost. It's already implemented, now just make it "useless" lewt. It wouldn't be sellable/tradeable, it would just go into a hero closet of sorts.