City of Villains
Platform: PC
Publisher: NCSoft
Review Type: Touchy
Version: Retail
I've been playing World of Warcraft for over a year so I'm not entirely sure if my reaction to City of Villains isn't a result of conditioning. I've played other MMOs and this game feels more like Everquest than Blizzard's contribution to the genre. The one trait that all persistant world games seem to share is their tendancy towards complex and byzantine interfaces. Considering the depth of this kind of endeavor, I guess it's kind of unavoidable. Still, City of Villains felt like a step back in refinement after experiencing the clean, customizable World of Warcraft user interface.
It's no surprise, consider the praise heaped on City of Heroes, that character customization ranks high on my list of things I like about City of Villains. It's a bit of a bummer that my Night Elf, a character I've spent just under a month as, will always look almost exactly like all the other Night Elves in Azaroth. The breadth and depth of creativity that the City of Villains character creation menus allows is astounding.
I would have liked to see a little more diversity in some of the design. For example, do you really need that wide of an array of shoulder spikes? Couldn't you trade one set for a parrot, so a brother can make a proper pirate?
My biggest gripe with City of Villains is the issue of role play. The game doesn't really encourage in-character behavior. When you create your character none of the servers are labeled as havens for gamers who prefer a little more immersion and a little less a/s/l. And as a result, very few players are really pretending to be bad.
After teaming with some other super villains to rob a bank -- a mission that requires the punching, kicking and blasting at least a hundred security guards -- one of my teammates commented on the pleasure he takes in fighting "pigs." His quip did not go over well. Several players were deeply offended by this villain's, well, villainous comments.
And that's my biggest problem with City of Villains; most of the time you don't feel like much of a bad guy. You run errands for your boss. You clear rogue gangs and snakes out of the sewers. The job at hand is to literally clean up the town. It's not until our heist that I actually felt like a bad guy. And almost nobody else's heart was truly in it.
Publisher: NCSoft
Review Type: Touchy
Version: Retail
I've been playing World of Warcraft for over a year so I'm not entirely sure if my reaction to City of Villains isn't a result of conditioning. I've played other MMOs and this game feels more like Everquest than Blizzard's contribution to the genre. The one trait that all persistant world games seem to share is their tendancy towards complex and byzantine interfaces. Considering the depth of this kind of endeavor, I guess it's kind of unavoidable. Still, City of Villains felt like a step back in refinement after experiencing the clean, customizable World of Warcraft user interface.It's no surprise, consider the praise heaped on City of Heroes, that character customization ranks high on my list of things I like about City of Villains. It's a bit of a bummer that my Night Elf, a character I've spent just under a month as, will always look almost exactly like all the other Night Elves in Azaroth. The breadth and depth of creativity that the City of Villains character creation menus allows is astounding.
I would have liked to see a little more diversity in some of the design. For example, do you really need that wide of an array of shoulder spikes? Couldn't you trade one set for a parrot, so a brother can make a proper pirate?
My biggest gripe with City of Villains is the issue of role play. The game doesn't really encourage in-character behavior. When you create your character none of the servers are labeled as havens for gamers who prefer a little more immersion and a little less a/s/l. And as a result, very few players are really pretending to be bad.
After teaming with some other super villains to rob a bank -- a mission that requires the punching, kicking and blasting at least a hundred security guards -- one of my teammates commented on the pleasure he takes in fighting "pigs." His quip did not go over well. Several players were deeply offended by this villain's, well, villainous comments.
And that's my biggest problem with City of Villains; most of the time you don't feel like much of a bad guy. You run errands for your boss. You clear rogue gangs and snakes out of the sewers. The job at hand is to literally clean up the town. It's not until our heist that I actually felt like a bad guy. And almost nobody else's heart was truly in it.
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