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Community => City of Heroes => Topic started by: A Cyclops named Steve on December 13, 2012, 05:40:04 AM

Title: I just can't do it.
Post by: A Cyclops named Steve on December 13, 2012, 05:40:04 AM
I tried I really did. I thought I was ready to game again(this is the longest I have gone without playing anything for as long as I can remember) and I just couldn't do it. We played for about an hour and it just felt wrong. I was sick to my stomach the whole time. Guess I'm just not there yet. :gonk:
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: healix on December 13, 2012, 07:08:21 AM
Steve, everyone here knows how you feel....hang here with us in the forums. Vent, laugh, take comfort and fight with us to get our city back.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Tenzhi on December 13, 2012, 07:35:32 AM
I've never had that sort of attachment to a video game, but I have had that kind of attachment to roleplaying game groups (both offline and on).  When those fall apart for various reasons it tends to demotivate me to starting/joining a new game, and when I do it often seems like the new game is a pitiful attempt to recapture something that has been forever lost.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Victoria Victrix on December 13, 2012, 08:55:03 AM
I feel the same.  I tried Champions out last night and besides being as ugly and clunkier than CoH I4, the ONLY interaction I had with another player was some moron that kept challenging me to PvP (in the trial zone?  REALLY?) and wouldn't accept a refusal for an answer.

It made me feel sick and depressed and ready to break out in tears.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Tenzhi on December 13, 2012, 09:29:35 AM
I feel the same.  I tried Champions out last night and besides being as ugly and clunkier than CoH I4, the ONLY interaction I had with another player was some moron that kept challenging me to PvP (in the trial zone?  REALLY?) and wouldn't accept a refusal for an answer.

It made me feel sick and depressed and ready to break out in tears.

There's a Social menu, in it there is a whitelist option where you can set duel requests (among other things) to whitelist/friends only.  That's the definitive "no" that they have no choice but to accept.  I look for that sort of option in every game that has duels ever since my first sojourn into WoW when I continually had to set people to /ignore in order to stop their duel-spam (they put in a working option to auto-decline sometime later I found out on my second brief attempt to enjoy WoW).
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Nebularian on December 13, 2012, 11:50:52 AM
I think I am going to try something a lot of people have talked about.  Everquest.  Never tried it...but  a lot of people hold it up as an example of what could and should have happened to COH.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Kyodai on December 13, 2012, 03:59:18 PM
I hear ya Steve.  I've always played several games at a time, but they all sort of lost a bit of flavor after d-day.  I started playing SWTOR about a week ago, and have been pleasantly surprised by the community there.  Very helpful, courteous and mature (so far).  Teaming is a bit more challenging, but i attribute that to the immersive quality of the leveling experience.

Still tough though.  I hit the CoH icon in my quicklaunch by accident last night, out of habit.

--Kyo
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Thunder Glove on December 13, 2012, 05:18:23 PM
I know the feeling.  I took the game off my sidebar, so I haven't accidentally tried to play it, but I still type "boards.cityofheroes.com" into the browser out of sheer habit every single day, only to be greeted with the bleak Sunset page and another kick to the gut.

Champions is vaguely filling the void while I'm actually playing it, but ... even then, most of what I'm doing is attempting to get those frail weaklings whipped into some semblance of the 50+3 godlings they're modeled after.

Edit to add:

VV, there's a channel for CoH refugees on Champions that I always have on, called "CoX".  I know there's a slash command to add it (/join_channel CoX or /channel_join CoX, I forget which), but you can also go to Chat Settings (by clicking the little square on the right side of the chat box) and add it from there.

The CoX channel has the full gamut of players from CoH (including the trolls screaming "the game was clearly losing money and failing, despite all evidence to the contrary!" and the "It's been a whooooole week, so I've moved on, and you should too" folks), so I've had to put a few on /ignore already.

But, in general, it's a bunch of helpful folks, and I rarely have even the regular CO chat on.  I'm @zazelby.  (Don't ask where that name came from; I'm not sure why I picked it myself)
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Arachnion on December 13, 2012, 05:38:59 PM
I still type "boards.cityofheroes.com" into the browser out of sheer habit every single day, only to be greeted with the bleak Sunset page and another kick to the gut.

This. I have to stop myself from going there every day now, like I did in the past.

 :'(
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Dollhouse on December 13, 2012, 06:02:04 PM
I feel the same.  I tried Champions out last night and besides being as ugly and clunkier than CoH I4, the ONLY interaction I had with another player was some moron that kept challenging me to PvP (in the trial zone?  REALLY?) and wouldn't accept a refusal for an answer.

It made me feel sick and depressed and ready to break out in tears.

Yeah. Just...yeah.   :(

I've given Champions Online two pretty good tries now (closed beta through the first six months of live and a recent three-month sub that just ended), but it just doesn't work for me. Champs has some things I like about it, sure. I actually (slightly) prefer the feel of the combat system to CoH, and I can imitate reticule targeting in the UI.

That and...um...well, that's about it, really.

It's by no means a bad game, but it simply fails to grab me, to make me want to log in and play. In both cases I mention above, the latter part of my subscription remained largely unused: I simply wasn't inclined to play. The latter case was effected by my laptop imploding, for sure...but I don't think that would have mattered much.

I think more than any other factor - and there are many - it's that the game fails to take itself seriously enough. Not that a comic book superhero game (of all things) should be "srs bzns" in the same way a game like, say, TSW works best. Yet somehow Champs always comes across like it's making fun of the genre. Moreover, the game has too little respect for the Fourth Wall, which I find to be a lethal immersion killer.  For someone like me, who never really found the genre to be the biggest draw of CoH and who instead tended to operate on the fringes of canon, with characters who would only be caught dead in spandex if they were cycling, CO's cartoonish look and almost satirical presentation just never worked.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: A Cyclops named Steve on December 13, 2012, 06:18:34 PM
Thanks everyone! :D I am so glad I still have my family here
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Arachnion on December 13, 2012, 06:40:33 PM
No offense to people who like Champions, but it is a generic brand/store brand soft drink when compared to CoH, which is a popular, loved, name brand soft drink.

 ;)
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Thunder Glove on December 13, 2012, 07:08:16 PM
No offense to people who like Champions, but it is a generic brand/store brand soft drink when compared to CoH, which is a popular, loved, name brand soft drink.

 ;)

I do like Champions, but ... this is exactly 100% how I feel about it.  It feels like a pale imitation.

There's lots of games I like, but there was only one game that was my all-time favorite, and I want it back.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: A Cyclops named Steve on December 13, 2012, 07:16:11 PM
No offense to people who like Champions, but it is a generic brand/store brand soft drink when compared to CoH, which is a popular, loved, name brand soft drink.

 ;)

I'm considering giving CO a whirl my problem is the power set I want is a premium set and I really don't know if I'm willing to put money into it just yet.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: okami on December 13, 2012, 08:13:03 PM
I'm considering giving CO a whirl my problem is the power set I want is a premium set and I really don't know if I'm willing to put money into it just yet.

You have to get a (as in one per account) character to level 10 before you can use the store. Or get access to the non-crippled costume creator. You can then delete that character and still retain your "I made it to level 10 now let me give you money" perk.

So if you want a paid AT you'll have to give it a go with a free one first.

I haven't looked in awhile but a month or so ago you could get CO boxes off amazon for around $5 that would give you 30 days of subscription and 5.00 "cryptic bucks" which I hope translate to Zen now, I haven't used my code yet so I can't verify what happens with those.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: A Cyclops named Steve on December 13, 2012, 08:19:20 PM
You have to get a (as in one per account) character to level 10 before you can use the store. Or get access to the non-crippled costume creator. You can then delete that character and still retain your "I made it to level 10 now let me give you money" perk.

So if you want a paid AT you'll have to give it a go with a free one first.

I haven't looked in awhile but a month or so ago you could get CO boxes off amazon for around $5 that would give you 30 days of subscription and 5.00 "cryptic bucks" which I hope translate to Zen now, I haven't used my code yet so I can't verify what happens with those.

Ah ok. Thanks. I really have little knowledge of CO, other than its "store brand" feel and that the animation isn't my favorite.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: JWBullfrog on December 13, 2012, 08:28:02 PM
I will admit that I have a lifetime account with Champions Online. I purchased it so I could get into the STO Beta.
 
This is good because it will take me at least that long before I ever, really, get into CO.
 
On it's own merits it's an ok game. However, it is not good enough to really hold my attention.
 
It is ugly. Not the world, mind you. I find the environments to be quite nice  but I just cannot stand the modeling style they've used for characters. If they change the character models to more closely match another system (say STO) I would be more inclined to play.
 
It is clunky. The mechanics of the game just seem so... meh. Combat makes very little sense, character advancement makes very little sense, how NPC's react (i.e. the fact that everything within a mile of my character aggros when I shoot an isolated target) makes no sense. Blocking makes no sense.... you get my point.
 
I have tried, and will continue to try, to give this game a chance. But as it is right now, I find it lacking.
 
I have tasted fine wine, grape juice is not a substitute.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: okami on December 13, 2012, 08:48:09 PM
Ah ok. Thanks. I really have little knowledge of CO, other than its "store brand" feel and that the animation isn't my favorite.

You get a travel power at 6 (right after the tutorial) which can help with movement animations. Acrobatics is ninja run, athletics is a more normal if slightly leaned forward run.

I really suck at selling things which is probably why they keep me locked away where there's no chance of a customer coming in contact with me. It might be because when sales sells someone the moon I get to do the Apollo myself from scratch.

Quote
It is ugly. Not the world, mind you. I find the environments to be quite nice  but I just cannot stand the modeling style they've used for characters. If they change the character models to more closely match another system (say STO) I would be more inclined to play.

I tried STO after CO and my first thought on seeing the characters was "Why can't CO look like this! It's the same friggin' engine!".
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Kistulot on December 13, 2012, 09:07:42 PM
The thing that oddly felt the most depressing to me about CO were the environments, and how small it feels.

It has such few zones, and the Desert and Canada are essentially zones more akin to Eden or The Hollows - not places you'd actually expect to find people, but disaster areas... and that didnt feel very compelling.

CoH had a world in a city. It felt like it was alive. CO feels like an artificial gameworld.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Electric-Knight on December 13, 2012, 09:51:56 PM
Just  a quick story to show how I can relate what you're saying:

I played SWG for 3 years. I know that may not seem like a lot when we compare it to the 8 years CoH was in existence, but... c'mon, three years with one game (that you play for HOURS and HOURS every single day, haha...) is a long damn time.
I found baby animals that I tamed and trained and watched grow bigger and older - and one, in particular, became my constant sidekick (I still miss you, Ozzo).

Okay, I said "quick story", didn't I...

After that game was taken from me (and my wife, who joined me and loved the game as well) - they changed the game in drastic ways, leaving the same virtual world, but with a whole new game system (akin to turning chess into checkers and/or if CoH turned all the ATs and powersets into just 5 ATs and each AT only had ONE powerset, instead of all of the options - seriously).

So, okay (that summed up), we lost our most favorite game and virtual world ever.
It was pretty tough. I played that game far more often, and for longer hours, than I did CoH (things were a little different for me back then!).

Afterwards, I decided that we'd try each and every mmorpg free trial out there, to have some fun and see what there was.

I made a silly choice... I chose the CoV Free Trial first!

We both played it... LOVED it!! And both decided that we wanted to buy it, subscribe and keep playing (before the trial even finished).

That was great, of course, but after about two months, we both realized we still had some healing to do. It was just too soon. Our old home kept coming to mind. The resentment toward the company that stole it from us was still far too fresh... all of that stuff that you, unfortunately, are all too familiar with.

So, we cancelled our subscriptions, both agreeing that we'd definitely be back in a little bit.

While that little bit ended up getting delayed a while longer than we'd planned... we absolutely came back and never stopped our subscriptions since (Must have been April of 2008, I believe).

Anyway... I feel ya.
Take your time. Don't worry about it.
The time will come. Of course... SWG and CoH were basically the last of a similar breed. Virtual worlds vs. video games. Games that are more open, more about options, customization with fully-realized virtual worlds and care and love of immersion and personal attachment and interest beyond what most others cater towards... not directed theme-park ride or something you had to play somebody else's way.

I was lucky enough to find another one, in CoH (with a FAR, FAR, FAR better development team and community!!!!!)... I'm sure we'll find a happy home again. Maybe it'll be the same home we just had... maybe it'll be something coming out in the future... Maybe you'll find something out right now, who knows... But, don't fret about not being ready yet. ;)
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: A Cyclops named Steve on December 13, 2012, 10:58:21 PM
Just  a quick story to show how I can relate what you're saying:

I played SWG for 3 years. I know that may not seem like a lot when we compare it to the 8 years CoH was in existence, but... c'mon, three years with one game (that you play for HOURS and HOURS every single day, haha...) is a long damn time.
I found baby animals that I tamed and trained and watched grow bigger and older - and one, in particular, became my constant sidekick (I still miss you, Ozzo).

Okay, I said "quick story", didn't I...

After that game was taken from me (and my wife, who joined me and loved the game as well) - they changed the game in drastic ways, leaving the same virtual world, but with a whole new game system (akin to turning chess into checkers and/or if CoH turned all the ATs and powersets into just 5 ATs and each AT only had ONE powerset, instead of all of the options - seriously).

So, okay (that summed up), we lost our most favorite game and virtual world ever.
It was pretty tough. I played that game far more often, and for longer hours, than I did CoH (things were a little different for me back then!).

Afterwards, I decided that we'd try each and every mmorpg free trial out there, to have some fun and see what there was.

I made a silly choice... I chose the CoV Free Trial first!

We both played it... LOVED it!! And both decided that we wanted to buy it, subscribe and keep playing (before the trial even finished).

That was great, of course, but after about two months, we both realized we still had some healing to do. It was just too soon. Our old home kept coming to mind. The resentment toward the company that stole it from us was still far too fresh... all of that stuff that you, unfortunately, are all too familiar with.

So, we cancelled our subscriptions, both agreeing that we'd definitely be back in a little bit.

While that little bit ended up getting delayed a while longer than we'd planned... we absolutely came back and never stopped our subscriptions since (Must have been April of 2008, I believe).

Anyway... I feel ya.
Take your time. Don't worry about it.
The time will come. Of course... SWG and CoH were basically the last of a similar breed. Virtual worlds vs. video games. Games that are more open, more about options, customization with fully-realized virtual worlds and care and love of immersion and personal attachment and interest beyond what most others cater towards... not directed theme-park ride or something you had to play somebody else's way.

I was lucky enough to find another one, in CoH (with a FAR, FAR, FAR better development team and community!!!!!)... I'm sure we'll find a happy home again. Maybe it'll be the same home we just had... maybe it'll be something coming out in the future... Maybe you'll find something out right now, who knows... But, don't fret about not being ready yet. ;)

forgive my ignorance, but what is SWG? I have seen it mentioned several times and for the life of me can't figure it out. (CoH was my first MMO and really first computer game since my days playing kings quest and police quest, I did mainly counsel games before)
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Arachnion on December 13, 2012, 11:02:38 PM
Star Wars Galaxies.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Tenzhi on December 13, 2012, 11:03:42 PM
No offense to people who like Champions, but it is a generic brand/store brand soft drink when compared to CoH, which is a popular, loved, name brand soft drink.

 ;)

Shasta was always better than Coca-cola, Pepsi, and 7Up products.  As were Aldi brand drinks.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Minotaur on December 13, 2012, 11:06:30 PM
I still can't really find the enthusiasm to play much of anything else, a little Diablo 3 but that's about it.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Arachnion on December 13, 2012, 11:11:16 PM
Shasta was always better than Coca-cola, Pepsi, and 7Up products.  As were Aldi brand drinks.

I usually drink bottled water and lemonade, myself.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: A Cyclops named Steve on December 14, 2012, 12:08:29 AM
Shasta was always better than Coca-cola, Pepsi, and 7Up products.  As were Aldi brand drinks.

If you want to find some awesome sodas and you are in the states(although they might ship internationally) check out sodaemporium.com its a fun site but for the love of god just so NO to bacon soda...
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: voodoogirl on December 14, 2012, 12:15:56 AM
Well, we could all band together and create a settlement on the Deliverance server in Wurm Online...
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: faith.grins on December 14, 2012, 12:35:36 AM
I still can't really find the enthusiasm to play much of anything else, a little Diablo 3 but that's about it.
I like D3, but I've gotten one character of each class to level 60, and find little else to keep bringing me back to the game.  I feel like the real problem is that each class may have dozens of skills and runes to pick from, but at level 60, past Act 1 of Inferno, you've really only got about three builds that cut it.  I happen to like one of the Barb builds that cuts it and one of the Witch Doctor builds, and that's about it.  It provides me with very little replay value.

-shrug-
I mean, I definitely got $60 of entertainment out of it, I guess I'm not really complaining.  I just figured after 10 years, it'd hold my interest for more than four months.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Triplash on December 14, 2012, 06:25:57 AM
Shasta was always better than Coca-cola, Pepsi, and 7Up products.  As were Aldi brand drinks.

I'm partial to Jones sodas myself, and Stewart's has a few good flavors.

The analogy stands though. City of Heroes was the favorite, while the other options feel like no-name, "me too" brands. It's like this commercial I saw way back in the day when dinosaurs roamed the earth. This guy is looking in the fridge for something to drink and he takes out a bottle of generic soda nobody's ever heard of. He stares at it in stunned horror, and his buddy asks him "So what's it taste like?" He tries it, thinks about it for a second, and says, "Tastes like... chicken." It's a reference to how nothing about its flavor stands out in any way.

That's how those other "superhero" games sit with me. They taste like chicken.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: 0nehanklap on December 14, 2012, 07:03:36 AM
I've had an old CO account lying around unused for years, complete with a few (locked out) freeform toons.

So I took the special deal they just had (3 months for 30 bucks) to run them again.  My 28 Force-based Blaster, Greysun, is actually more fun than I remember, probably due to the specialization trees they added boosting his damage & the Questionite Store's (Armadillo) armor boosting both DR & Dmg. 

The biggest problem I recall with the game was the linear feeling:  a few missions in this neighborhood, go 2 blocks over for a few missions, then go to canada for a few, then run to the desert for a few, then back to downtown.  Roll a new toon & repeat.   Looks like some new content is there now to ameliorate that some, but There's no Dev team pushing out new stuff all the time, so its just not gonna be good for a stable of alts like it was in CoH.

If you do play though, the Freeform is definitely more fun.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Triplash on December 14, 2012, 07:26:06 AM
To be completely honest, my opinion of Champions is not based on playing it, it's entirely based on comparing it to City. I fully intend to give it a fair chance at some point, but I'm not there yet. If I tried it right now I'd just end up looking for the bad points. That's not a fair chance, so for now I'm holding off.

What I did do is pick up Minecraft again. It doesn't hold me like it once did, but it's familiar and I like it, so it'll do till something better comes along.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: DamianoV on December 14, 2012, 01:38:02 PM
The hard part for me right now is to take a game on it's own merits, to approach it in the way those devs intended, as opposed to approaching it as CoH redux.

I'm kind of getting there with DCUO.  Part of the leg up on that one was that I've got a character in the mid-20s for level from my first try with that game, who can actually kick some derriere (soloing small groups of +1/+2, that kind of thing... the Circe/Aquaman tag-team is still a little beyond her tho).  The constant clicking (it is essentially designed as a console game) is the big issue for me with that one...

CO has a lot of issues, but it can fill the void for short periods.  I think, to have any chance at all, you've got to do three things: 1) largely ignore global chat, 2) hold your nose and blow past the initial levels as fast as possible, and 3) luck into a build you can stomach playing.  So many little irritations in that game: auto-follow turning off if you hit jump, for example, just frustrates the h*** out of me, so I can't play melee characters for long.

TSW is okay... I really like the setting, the various abilities I've tried so far have both flavor and punch...  but the development system drives me nuts.  Or maybe it's just the interface for spending those points.  Whatever it is, I open that thing to spend my AP and SP, take one look, and shudder.  If there is a way to present less useful information for making decisions using more screen space, I don't know what it would be...
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: MaHaBone on December 16, 2012, 06:15:50 AM
Lets see, in the past two weeks, I have tried:
Champions Online.  Hated it.  So much.  So ugly.  So clunky.
Dragon Age: Origins.  Bored to tears.  Made Champions look dynamic.
Dungeon Fighter Online  A side scrolling 80's style Beat 'em Up style game as an MMO?  Should be a recipe for instawin.  ...it's okay.  But a far cry from a win.
Vindictus  Okay, at least a step up from CO.  Servers are crazy slow, and the muzik is horrid, but at least smashing scenery is therapeutic.

Currently downloading DCO off of Steam.  We'll see how that goes...

At least once a day, I hear a word or phrase and think "Oh crap!  That would be an amazing costume/concept for a character!  I should-- ah hell."
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: A Cyclops named Steve on December 16, 2012, 06:48:26 AM

Dungeon Fighter Online  A side scrolling 80's style Beat 'em Up style game as an MMO?  Should be a recipe for instawin.  ...it's okay.  But a far cry from a win.


lol! DFO was actually what I was playing. And TBH it was a lot more fun before sunset, now I find myself just wanting CoX to the point nothing else will do.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Xarina on December 16, 2012, 09:54:35 AM
I feel ya.  I am finding everything I play very....cookie-cutterish.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: samfivedot on December 17, 2012, 12:18:53 AM
I've tried really really hard to give CO a chance, but I just can't get into it no matter how badly I want to. The combat system is incredibly clunky (I swear I died like 15 times just on the tutorial boss), and while I don't mind the graphic style itself, the game looks terrible in motion. The animations are so unnatural.

DCUO... eh. I hate how all characters have essentially the same backstory, and the actual customization is a joke compared to CoH. I can't get invested in my characters. TR-109 and all the other CoH lunatics I played were my creations, but my DCUO characters just feel like... well, MMO characters. Not a big fan of the controls, either. All the clicking and the mouse-operated camera, ugh.

I've been playing Torchlight 2, and it's a great game, but I know it's not what I want to play :\
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Arachnion on December 17, 2012, 12:33:05 AM
I too have been in a lull ever since the sunset.

I haven't even *tried* playing other superhero games, because I know they won't cut it.

Having tried CO in the past... I wasn't impressed, or liked it at all.

I'm trying to fill the hole by following the more technical aspects of what we have left, on our computers, and such.

Demo recording, editing demos, fiddling with unreleased things people (read: Codewalker or Leandro) put out.

Oh and helping people around here, of course :D
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Triplash on December 17, 2012, 02:38:32 AM
the actual customization is a joke compared to CoH

Uggh, I know what you mean. I've been playing Torchlight 2 a fair bit myself, and it IS a fun game, I love it. But leading up to its release the people on their forums were getting all excited over how you could pick from four different faces, and six different hairstyles, AND six different hair colors!!! ZOMG!!!

......*groan*
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: MaHaBone on December 17, 2012, 03:26:38 AM
My 5 minute for DCUO for anyone considering giving it a go:
+Free to play
+fast download off of Steam
+Intro movie is fairly baddass.  Two thumbs up, would watch again.
+Environments look NICE (I daresay this is the one and only thing it has on CoH.  I flew about Metropolis and Gotham, and both cities looked detailed, luminous, and well-realized)
+Destructible environments!  I spent a few minutes just whaling on dumpsters.
+I'm not a huge DC nerd but-- holy shit!  Ambush Bug!
+Nice color-picking system.  Full spread of brightness, saturation and hue.  But...

-very confusing creation system
-No body sliders
-seems like you can only use 3 colors for your character.
-WEIRD class/classless system.  Seems like everyone is part Blaster/Scrapper/Fender/Troller.  Lots of Jacks of All Trades.  No masters.
-As someone mentioned, REALLY lousy customization.  Even when you do get you character to look a way you like, all the lewt and gear forces you to change you appearance to boost stats.  Lame.  So very lame.
-the nav system sucks ass
-All of the characters look rubbery
-No special characters in name.  Bleh.

+/-The combat system is more action game-y.  If that makes sense.  Less about the right power at the right place and time.  More about mashing the right key.  Some may like that.

Verdict: if you're looking for a methadone/come-down from the sunset, you could do worse.  Not likely to become your "Next Big Thing" but its mildly interesting.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: corvus1970 on December 17, 2012, 03:31:02 AM
I concur with the above in regards to DCU Online. Good summation.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: SeaLily on December 17, 2012, 03:46:38 AM
The only incorrect thing there is the gear forcing your appearance to change.  It does that by default, but you can just lock your costume so it never changes unless you decide to do so.  They got that much right, at least.

Other than that I agree with basically everything there.

I'd like to add it's a very fun game if you're a PvPer though.  Particularly the Legends mode, where you play as Batman/Superman/Luthor/etc etc etc so it's pre-balanced pretty well.  But if you're looking for a CoH-style PvE experience with lots of customization, that's not here.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: healix on December 17, 2012, 04:19:02 AM
I have been playing Brickshooter (a puzzle-block game), Cradle of Persia and Freecell. I popped in my Oblivion disk and went exploring again. CoH is warm cookies and cream....the other games are melba toast and skim milk. (for me, anyway)
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Jonfan on December 17, 2012, 04:41:54 AM
Well after 3 weeks I finally went back to my computer to try and find a game. The search for one was almost as dismal as the games I tried out.

I played Champions back in the 80's as a tabletop game. I like it back then. Steve Jackson came up with a good system. Believe me when I say that that CO has nothing in common with the tabletop game. The graphics are just plain lousy.

It's like they whitewashed everything and muted all the colors to give it the feel of reading an old comic book. The thing is, with CoH, I wasn't reading a comic book, I was IN the story. I felt a part of it all. You won't experience that at all with CO. The game has done so many thing wrong it's hard to know where to begin.

I have just finished downloading DC Universe and while the graphics look much better and more like the game we all truly love, I'm not holding my breath.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Tenzhi on December 17, 2012, 07:13:53 AM
Even when you do get you character to look a way you like, all the lewt and gear forces you to change you appearance to boost stats. 

This is patently untrue.  There is a "Style" menu where you can selectively "lock" your character's appearance and switch between styles you've acquired with that character on the fly.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Phaetan on December 17, 2012, 10:20:54 AM
Steve Jackson came up with a good system.
Shouldn't that be Peterson and/or Long?
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: redgiant on December 17, 2012, 10:52:42 AM
I think I am going to try something a lot of people have talked about.  Everquest.  Never tried it...but  a lot of people hold it up as an example of what could and should have happened to COH.

I've played EQ from its launch in '99 through today's expansions.

I tend to classify MMOs more from player attitudes and maturity than just what genre or year they originated. This is mainly for my own compatibility assessment, since the most important factor to me is that the population lives in the world and doesn't constantly pull me out of it (which unfortunately is also why most of you will have a hard time finding a suitable replacement MMO; the playerbase is just all wrong in almost every other MMO out there now).

EQ, DAoC, CoH, LOTRO and some other older games, in their prime were like that. A lot. CoH held onto that aesthetic better than all of them as they aged.

WoW was never really mature, it was too big. But it did have a ton more cooperation out of necessity early on than it does today.

Games today, even the old guard ones I mentioned, are solo-fests. They made grouping a dirty word, because not grouping pulls in more numbers (quantity not quality). And once a game lets soloers run amok, in no time you have way more mouth breathers and immature jerks than regular folks just wanting a MMO to commune with.

If you are going to try EQ, you have a choice between the live servers (I suggest Luclin/Stromm) or an EQEmu-based server (I suggest Project 99). P99 is the most faithful to how the first 3 expansions of EQ worked, which is its whole point of existence. The nice thing is that everyone on it realizes that.

You are forwarned: classic EQ like P99 is hard. Harder than any modern MMO would even try to be now. Which is actually its charm for those who love world simulation and challenges. You earn everything you get, every level, every item. But I guarantee you that you will actually REMEMBER getting those things down the road, since your adventures are imprinted on you due to their effort. Most people who played old EQ can still recall in detail their characters, zones, who did what, raids, and definitely dungeon crawls. In fact, CoH shares this aspect of memory to it also.

And the nice thing about classic EQ (and P99 in particular) is that everyone groups because you have to. It is a social and role-interdependence game, and you will meet people you don't know in real life who you will know throughout your character's life. You can get bufs, travel and services like corpse location/recovery from different classes, there's even a live market for that sort of thing. Sure you can do simple things solo early, and even some classes can get away with soloing for special reasons and places (I'm looking at you kiting bards). But by and large it is a role-based grouping game, with mobs and environments that would rip you in two in a second if you tried to step into them alone. Actually some will rip you up even with a full group at times. Even a severely twinked alt isn't a God and everyone dies from time to time.

No auction house, its all trade channel hawking and certain places known to be centers for trade (the East Commonlands tunnel mainly). No instances anywhere for anything, its all one big open world and the dungeons and raid content are also not instanced.

Everything from travel to dungeons to dying and recovering your gear puts the fear of bejesus into you, just like a really dangerous world should do. Mobs don't leash, they chase you until you die or cross a zoneline. If you die, you run back naked to get your gear wherever your body lies (yes, that includes deep in a dungeon; and yes, there are a couple options for locating or summoning your corpse to a safe spot in the zone but only with a necromancer to do it or bard to point it out). Death is something to avoid (xp loss and corpse recovery), unlike almost every other game that just puts a slight inconvenience on you for it.

There are always folks leveling new characters in P99, so finding groups early on isn't a problem. You may want to move to a starting city area that has more folks depending on what you roll (oh, and all races have their own home cities - complete ones - and local hunting areas). Even that is daunting and dangerous depending on how you need to get there (no flight paths; just boats, wizard/druids can portal you, or run).

Try it, if you like a dangerous challenge with no free lunch, you will love it.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: MaHaBone on December 17, 2012, 02:57:30 PM
The only incorrect thing there is the gear forcing your appearance to change.  It does that by default, but you can just lock your costume so it never changes unless you decide to do so.  They got that much right, at least.

This is patently untrue.  There is a "Style" menu where you can selectively "lock" your character's appearance and switch between styles you've acquired with that character on the fly.

Ah, I was wondering about that.  I'll go back and check that out... or I won't.  Dunno.  The spirit isn't exactly moved, if you know what I mean.  But thanks for the info!
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Jonfan on December 18, 2012, 02:03:02 AM
Shouldn't that be Peterson and/or Long?

No Steve Jackson was the creator of the character system behind Champions (pen & paper game.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Tenzhi on December 18, 2012, 05:46:48 AM
No Steve Jackson was the creator of the character system behind Champions (pen & paper game.

Steve Jackson was behind GURPS.  I don't believe he worked on Champions, though I believe GURPS may have been inspired by the HERO System that Champions used (and which preceded GURPS by a few years).
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Phaetan on December 18, 2012, 10:15:33 AM
Steve Jackson was behind GURPS.  I don't believe he worked on Champions, though I believe GURPS may have been inspired by the HERO System that Champions used (and which preceded GURPS by a few years).
This was my understanding as well.  I may be mistaken, but I'd never encountered a mention of him having a hand in the HERO system.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: indiramourning on December 18, 2012, 04:48:42 PM
Hi Steve.   Games I've enjoyed lately are: WAR, The Secret World, and as a more long term new home, Lord of the Rings online.  I'm not looking for another super hero game.  Heck, I never played CoH because it was a super hero game.  I just loved it for the endless variety of power combinations, awesome combat, easy teaming, and the fantastic community.  The community in LoTRO is very nice.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Dr. Gemini on December 19, 2012, 03:28:27 PM
Steve Jackson was behind GURPS.  I don't believe he worked on Champions, though I believe GURPS may have been inspired by the HERO System that Champions used (and which preceded GURPS by a few years).

Actually GURPs evolved from Steve Jackson's "The Fantasy Trip" rules that came out in the late '70's. Champions was '80 or '81 I believe. so they may have been inspired by TFT.

Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Kaiser Tarantula on December 19, 2012, 04:16:21 PM
Dungeon Fighter Online  A side scrolling 80's style Beat 'em Up style game as an MMO?  Should be a recipe for instawin.  ...it's okay.  But a far cry from a win.
I really wanted to love this game.  But eventually some really crappy enemy designs (enemies that can attack you from offscreen with attacks you can't see coming suck), coupled with the wonky quest ranking system (with a score for "technique" that makes absolutely no freakin' sense for any sort of rational beat-em-up gameplay) and a gear durability system that discourages farming coupled with an economy that pretty much requires it put me off.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Arachnion on December 19, 2012, 05:58:19 PM
I really wanted to love this game.  But eventually some really crappy enemy designs (enemies that can attack you from offscreen with attacks you can't see coming suck), coupled with the wonky quest ranking system (with a score for "technique" that makes absolutely no freakin' sense for any sort of rational beat-em-up gameplay) and a gear durability system that discourages farming coupled with an economy that pretty much requires it put me off.

I played a summoner in DFO up to like level 30, then quit.

It was kinda fun, but not really.

 :-\
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: dwturducken on December 19, 2012, 08:15:55 PM
The biggest problem I recall with the game was the linear feeling:  a few missions in this neighborhood, go 2 blocks over for a few missions, then go to canada for a few, then run to the desert for a few, then back to downtown.  Roll a new toon & repeat.   Looks like some new content is there now to ameliorate that some, but There's no Dev team pushing out new stuff all the time, so its just not gonna be good for a stable of alts like it was in CoH.

This is how I think of the beginning of CoH:Freedom. The higher levels retained the diversity, with some minor adjustments and additions, but, until level 5, when you could run over to KR and get the radio or the Hollows and start the missions, there (which, while linear, never got old for me), you had to either run the Habashy missions and then have a choice of two contacts. I realize that wasn't a drastic change from the pre-Freedom missions, but I missed that origin-specific aspect. It actually made the origin choice mean something, even if it wasn't much. After Freedom, every character was Natural.
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: JaguarX on December 19, 2012, 08:26:06 PM
natural mutant
natural technology
Natural Science
natural magic
natural natural
Title: Re: I just can't do it.
Post by: Minotaurus on December 19, 2012, 11:48:36 PM
I'm feeling the same right now.  I just feel so empty.

Worse for me is that.. I can't even make my namesake character in any other MMO (except maybe WoW but that boat long ago sailed in the fun department for me..)

I played CO a bit off and on but it just doesn't have the same effect on me. I beta tested it and played it to death back in the day but it just can't hold my interest any more.  Its just so.. solo.  And sadly I can't make my character there either.

I just don't know.  I'm currently tinkering about in Everquest but only a little every now and again.  Nobody groups at anything but max level any more it seems.  And they introduced that horrid 'defiant' gear and mercs.  Mercs seem fine in concept but in practice nobody groups since they have a merc.