f13.net forums - CoV interview

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April 19, 2024, 04:47:26 PM

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ATs...

Brute = WoW Rage based Warrior
Stalker = Light Tank
Destroyer = Ranged-Dmg / Buff-Debuff
Dominator = Control / 'Assault'
Mastermind = Pet class

Quote from: www.gamecloud.com

Last year, developer Cryptic Studios and publisher NCSoft released City of Heroes, their long awaited super hero themed MMORPG, to solid sales and reviews. Now the one big thing that most reviewers and players felt was lacking in the original game is about to be taken care of in City of Villains, the stand alone MMO that will give player the chance to try out the dark side. Gamecloud got a chance to chat with the game's lead designer David "Zeb" Cook to find out more about City of Villains.

Gamecloud - First, why did Cryptic make the decision to make City of Villains a stand alone game, rather than an expansion to City of Heroes?

David “Zeb” Cook - It seemed like a natural idea. In City of Heroes we let you play a hero. In City of Villains, you’re a villain so we wanted to give the full experience from the ground up. We didn’t want to put a barrier to people who might be interested in doing that by saying they must have City of Heroes first. That would be forcing them to buy the game. Instead we would rather people said, “Hey, this is fun! I think I’ll check out City of Heroes too.”

At the same time, we’ve made it so City of Villains adds to the City of Heroes game, so that if you already have CoH. Not only do you get to be a villain in CoV, you also add new features to your City of Heroes game.

Gamecloud - How will the character creation for the new game differ from the setup in City of Heroes?

David “Zeb” Cook - Initially there was thought of having you earn your stripes, as it were, that you started as a simple thug and somehow earned your superpowers. In looking at it in more detail, we saw that for players a lot of the fun was that you were cool right out of the box. We didn’t want the “go kill rats, earn your level” model, so we ultimately decided to stick with the idea that you are an ubervillain and you have got powers right from the start. This way we could focus on what made being the bad guy fun.

Gamecloud - What sorts of new archtypes will be put into City of Villains?

David “Zeb” Cook - Because we didn’t want players to play just the same old characters, CoV has 5 all new archetypes that are unique to being a villain. These better match the comic book style of villains too. These are the Brute, a melee guy who gets tougher and meaner the longer he is in combat – he’ll be interesting with other team members because he will want to rush from fight to fight while his Rage is still pumped up; the Stalker, who uses defense and stealth to make quick strikes – but who has to be careful and use his new powers like Placate to keep from being killed; the Destroyer, who combines ranged attacks with buffs/debuffs; the Dominator, a master of control and assault; and the wholly new Mastermind, who can summon minions and support them while they do his fighting.

Gamecloud - What are some of your favorite new powers that will be available in the game?

David “Zeb” Cook - Tough one… The mastermind ability to summon and control minions is certainly one. Nothing like having zombies to order around. There are enough that I haven’t had time to try them all!

Gamecloud - What will the quests be like in City of Villains?

David “Zeb” Cook - For CoV we wanted to give the player more ways to feel in control of his mission selection and do more things to make missions interesting and varied. We’ve added a new type of contact, the broker, who can give you missions based on different groups you might be interested in battling and even point you toward banks that have valuable loot. Our other contacts are more individual each with his own set of missions and storyline that isn’t necessarily shared with other contacts. Players will know that if they go talk to Dimitri they’ll be dealing with Arachnos agents.

Gamecloud - Will there be any hero style NPCs for City of Villains players to combat?

David “Zeb” Cook - Absolutely! One of the things Jack Emmert (our beloved Creative Director) insisted on was that villains have to battle heroes, not just villains. How can you feel like a bad guy otherwise? So we have created groups such as Longbow and the Legacy Chain who are heroes and troublesome pests for all villainous evildoers.

Gamecloud - What kinds of new zones and locations will the game have?

David “Zeb” Cook - There is a completely new set of zones that are set in the Rogue Isles, the home of Lord Recluse (and the leader of Arachnos), along with a new zone for Paragon City. These zones range from the casino island of St. Martial, Port Oakes with it’s old colonial fort, the secret rocket base of Warburg, and the smoking industrial of hell of Sharkhead Isle.

Gamecloud - How will the game's PVP content be handled?

David “Zeb” Cook - One of the big goals of PvP is to make it part of the gameplay without ruining the fun players are already having. PvP play occurs only in special PvP zones. Each of these zones has a special objective. Success in these zones will allow you to gain temporary powers or buy from special stores, for example. Who you get to fight depends on the zone you’re in. In some, it’s every man for himself, while others are purely heroes vs. villains in true comic book fashion.

Gamecloud - What other new gameplay elements will City of Villains have?

David “Zeb” Cook - Base building! With the release of CoV, supergroups in both City of Villains and City of Heroes will be able to build customized bases. We’re creating a system to give as much choice and flexibility as the costume creator did for characters. And then, once you have a base, PvP players will be able to go base raiding against each other.

Gamecloud - Will there be any graphical improvements made for the game?

David “Zeb” Cook - Tons of improvements. We are updating to support the capabilities of the latest graphics cards. You’ll see reflections in armor and windows, bloom from light sources, ripples and refractions in the water, and more. We’re also working to improve our engine to handle more polygons and even more detailed textures. The visual difference is quite noticeable even on older graphics cards.

Gamecloud - After the game is released are there plans for free expansion packs like City of Heroes did?

David “Zeb” Cook - We intend to continue to support our titles. That’s about all I can really say at this time, because we have lots of ideas.

Gamecloud - Finally is there anything else you wish to say about City of Villains?

David “Zeb” Cook - Well, we just finished another one of our company tests this afternoon and I wish I could really convey the excitement I feel! There’s so much that’s cool and interesting that you just have to see, because I can’t describe it well enough.

Will the 'grind' still be in there? That is to say, why do you hate me?

Sounds cool. The Stalker AT sounds like something I've been wanting to play in CoH since the get-go. More rogue, less berserker.

I want to play a dominator. Looks to be like a Controller without the suck.

I likely will try out a mastermind. I am a sucker for pet classes and I always disliked having to get so high with my controllers before getting the pets.

Kaid

Quote from: kaid on July 25, 2005, 07:28:27 AM

I likely will try out a mastermind. I am a sucker for pet classes and I always disliked having to get so high with my controllers before getting the pets.

Kaid

/nod

Maybe Brute or Dominator... I mostly play a scrapper, right now, although for ages my preferred char was a controller. They do rather suck, however. Most of the names sound a bit masculine. Maybe Brutes can be Bitches and Dominator can be Dominatrix if you're female.

They have always had some rather flash leather outfits.

Quote from: MrHat on July 24, 2005, 06:57:31 AM

Will the 'grind' still be in there? That is to say, why do you hate me?

If they took that out, I'd be back now, with or without CoV. Although, more depth would be even better. (Items, weapons, bases, etc.)

The novelty of a very simple-fun MMOG wore off really damned quick. I like to play with the shiny trinkets too.

Quote from: Dren on July 25, 2005, 10:46:22 AM

Quote from: MrHat on July 24, 2005, 06:57:31 AM

Will the 'grind' still be in there? That is to say, why do you hate me?

Agreed. I'd be back in a heartbeat. The most fun 13 levels I've ever had. 5 times. Most fun movement scheme in any game ever. I still remember the time I first leap up the tallest building I could find, then proceed to super jump from rooftop to rooftop, I think I have a picture of me over looking a gang robbing this poor lady. How very marvel.

Thirded. When I only hit 24 after straight play for 6 months and used almost all my free time to hit even that I said fuck it and quit. I wrote a long paragraph about how it was a great game but was hurt in it's strongest point (replayability with different archtypes/ power arrangements) by the grindy nature. Too bad I know it was a futile effort.

I have to say that xp requirements in coh after like 24 did ramp up to hard and to fast. The changes they have made may help offset that a good bit but man for a game that is mostly about playing through various alts to try new stuff in different ways they really could have cut xp requirements in half and still been fine. Its not like they need to worry about people flooding the end game.

kaid

What really ramps up in CoH after mid twenties is the shortage of content.

Nothing much changes on most heroes much past 30. So content is critical.

You might take note that Cryptic is aware of the content problem and is adding a hefty pack of it every issue. Also their content becomes increasingly better designed which creates high hopes for CoV.

Issue 3 added Striga Island, which is al lvl 20-29 zone with a ton of new content and is said to be the best zone in the game. Since then the 20s seem to be quite enoyable now. Issue 5 will add Croata, which will be a lvl 25-35 zone.
As a result probably the only boring grind parts in the game will be lvls 15-19 and 35-40, hopefully their next issue will address those problem areas. After lvl 40 things improve quite a bit too, but there is indeed still not much to do once you hit 50.

Quote from: Abel on July 26, 2005, 02:55:14 PM

Croatoa gives me hope that other city zones will have equally dynamic spawns and more mixed bags. There's stuff that _starts out_ fighting, patrols that seem to spawn to come across fights and act as reinforcements for one side or the other, the continuation from random street patrols that started in Striga Isle, and a lot more interplay between villain groups. There's a definite sense of territoriality that the younger zones could use a lot more of.

10-19 also get the occasional fire in Steel Canyon or rave in Skyway City, and these events tend to happen once every few game-days (1 minute = 1 hour), so it's likely that at those levels the ordinary experience will be supplanted by the occasional backpack fire-extinguisher or throwdown with a troll bulked out on Supradine.

--GF

I would have thought they would have looked at WoW and thought that they should mirror that XP curve, but I think you guys are right, there really isn't enough end-game content to support that move. However, that weakness can be overcome due to the pure fun of creating new characters and trying new powers, etc. I still think they chose the worst road to take on that front.

Perhaps they will consider this once they have PvP fully implemented with CoV. Then at least they'll have a partial end-game content maker all in its own. As long as they continue to add content to missions, creatures, storyline in addition to the PvP they might get both the PvE and PvP people satisfied at least for awhile. Drop the XP curve and they'd have a winning combination in my mind.

I'd keep CoH/CoV in my hip pocket for gaming for a very long time if I knew I could level up a completely new hero/villain in 4-8 weeks at a fairly casual pace. My daughter still asks me about CoH and if we can create a new hero again. She loved that part.

Yeah, CoH really had too long an experience curve. It was way too fun, and still has some of the best content and combat I've seen. But the long advancement curve... arg.

Is it just me, or do the classes in CoV sound a LOT like WoW classes? I mean, the Brute even generates rage. So we have:

Brute = WoW Warrior
Stalker = Rogue
Destroyer = Shaman
Dominator = Mage?
Mastermind = Warlock?

I definitely want to try out the Mastermind.

Quote from: HaemishM on July 27, 2005, 01:53:00 PM

To me, they sound alot like classes that people have been wanting in CoH since they started playing, especially the Dominator and Mastermind... I think a lot of pet-herding controllers will go be masterminds when CoV comes out, due to the 'only one pet' change in issue 5.

And even if they are sorta similar, I'd lay odds on having more fun with them in CoV combat than in WoW combat.

Alkiera

The more I read about CoV, the more I really don't care whether I get some kind of discount for owning CoH. I am buying it for sure. Destroyer sounds very fun. I liked Blasters in CoH but was annoyed by the "melee" secondary. Never really made any sense to me.

Drop my XP curve and they can have more of my money.

I adore the concept of CoH, and Cryptic is top-notch in my book, alongside BioWare and (defunct) Black Isle Studios, and hell, even Westwood (Nox, anyone?).

Drop the XP, PLEASE. I want a good excuse to resume the reception of my monthly CoH comic and play my beloved Scrapper.

First time using Super Speed = Top 10 moment in gaming ever, for me. Just the sfx in CoH make the game cool.

Okay guys, I'll see what I can do.

Not that I work for Cryptic but... yeah. I'll tell 'em.

To hell with Cryptic. I hope they lose their asses on CoV. They had a great game at first and then went and fucked it up. The game has been a complete turd since a month after release. Maybe their judgement was skewed by other NCSoft games like Lineage. Maybe they thought it could fly, but that doesn't excuse anything. If they played the game from start to finish themselves, instead of looking at it from every other angle, then they'd realize that the pace just doesn't fit.

Anyways, that's my constructive 2 cents.

Actually I didn't feel the pace was too slow when I first went from 1-50. It's only on creating additional characters that I feel it's too slow for me to make the whole trek. Particularly slow are the lower levels once you've lost the novelty of trying something new. Usually level 12 does it to me.

I forgot if you mentioned before when you first played? At release, or later on?

At release, the XP rate was quick (not terribly quick, but better than WoW's at least). I felt like I was playing a superhero game (as I should). After the xp change, it didn't feel very superhero like at all.

Also, you came from Daoc. What's good enough for you just might be brutal for me.

Good point about DAoC.

I started at release (April, if I recall), didn't get my first 50 until about December.

In DAoC it took me a full year to get to level 50. Next character took me maybe 6 months or so. The next took maybe one or two months. Then I flipped out and quit.

I am pretty impatient when it comes to grinds of late, though. Like I'm having trouble leveling more characters in Guild Wars. That says something, I think.

By the way, isn't my new avatar just the most fantastic thing ever? Look at those owls- they're hilarious.

Quote from: Llava on July 28, 2005, 02:11:02 AM

By the way, isn't my new avatar just the most fantastic thing ever? Look at those owls- they're hilarious.

Yes, I rather like them. I just couldn't find an opportunity to say so until now.

*Note the lack of green text*

They're owls? I thought they were sliced bananas.

Quote from: Stray on July 28, 2005, 12:24:42 AM

I played from release for about 4 months, getting my main to 24. When you talk about an exp nerf, do you mean the purple nerf? Yes, that did indeed suck. It was fun as hell slaugtering things the game's con system is saying should kick your ass.

Quote from: shiznitz on July 28, 2005, 07:07:55 AM

Quote from: Stray on July 28, 2005, 12:24:42 AM

Solution: Take the color purple out entirely, and change it to yellow. wink

I could give a damn about con. All I know is that the game's pacing was great. It still took people 3-4 weeks to level anyways (unless you were using assault/devices....Or maybe it was just devices. I can't recall).

It was almost anything coupled with devices due to the accuracy debuff from Smoke Grenade stacking with itself, allowing players to use it over and over (and the ability doesn't cause a group to attack) until the enemies' accuracy hit the floor of 5%.

Quote from: Llava on July 28, 2005, 12:31:38 PM

This "bug" was the only reason I kept playing after 20, though. As has been said one million times here, the post-20 exp curve should have been halved.

I'm going to second everything Haemish said (again).

I will pick it up for sure, if only to get super jump again. Dominator sounds hella fun. I <3 controlling people.

It'll be nice to have company again. I've been very lonely, especially on the test server. I probably won't go back to Victory until after I5 goes live. New Issues on test ruin the live servers for me. Dunno why, just do.

Quote from: Signe on July 28, 2005, 01:58:25 PM

My friends who play and I have also spent a silly amount of time on test since i5 went live. The new powersets are pretty fun... and I've been enjoying the effects of the controller changes on a low level MC/Rad controller.

In fact, just yesterday I decided to log onto live and play my main a bit, so I can have him a little further along before his defenses become nigh useless. (tho they are supposedly changing the the nerf to /Invuln to be not so bad, it hasn't hit test yet that I know of).

Alkiera

When I5 goes live, I'll be playing a saucy little archery tart. Probably Trick Shot/Radiation Def. Will decide later. Hopefully it won't be active til I'm in Arizona.