Posted 9/8/2008 at 11:13 AM By boothby
Recently, we got the chance to interview Randy Mosiondz, lead designer on Cryptic Studios' upcoming Champions Online. We would like to thank him and everyone at Cryptic for their time in fielding our questions.
Q) Character customization is critical in an MMO such as this and in Champions Online you will also have to design your character’s arch-nemesis. How far will an arch-nemesis be involved in a hero’s day-to-day life? Will it be an ongoing in-flux of missions or a rare occurrence?
A) Nemesis missions are distributed throughout a character’s career. The main idea is to provide a “recurring villain” for your character to fight, so having your Nemesis show up too often takes away from that. We want the encounters with a Nemesis and his minions to be a special treat for heroes!
Q) Press releases as well as the official site have noted that character creation will also allow players to customize how an individual ability looks for their character. For instance, an energy bolt shot from one player may be a different color than from another. Do these customizations stop at outward appearance or will they extend to the physics/effects of abilities as well?
A) Currently a player can select color for powers although we are still looking at other points of visual customization. In general we want to stick to a common visual style for power effects so players can tell what enemies or other players are doing – that’s important for game-play.
Q) Will increases in current skills and granting of new abilities be done based on time, usage, or level?
A) It will be a mix. We’re still working on the final advancement system so it’s too early to say more at this time.
Q) How is death and its aspects (i.e. Item/Experience loss, re-spawning, etc) handled in Champions Online?
A) We want to keep things fairly lightweight in terms of player defeat. After all, comic book heroes tend to recovery from the gravest of injuries rather quickly! First off, there are super powers that help players recover from defeat on the spot. Otherwise, defeated characters re-spawn at the nearest “recovery point” with a temporary minor penalty. Any equipped upgrades a player has may take a bit of damage which can be recovered by expending resources. We’re still playing around with variants on this system so it may change before launch.
Q) On the topic of in-game events: On the website it states that “The story of Champions Online is constantly changing, continually evolving”. This sounds a lot like what Monolith promised in the Matrix Online (with GM ‘actors’, etc). What subsequently followed was a ruining of the whole system by harassing players and logistical troubles. What does Champions Online promise for in-game events and how will it avoid those mistakes of previous developers?
A) We plan to provide a number of free content updates which bring new powers, zones, strongholds, enemies, events, etc. into the Champions Online universe. Each of these updates expand the existing content without being completely intrusive to players. We want to base these updates on feedback from the player base, providing more of what players want over time. This allows us to be responsive to the community while providing interesting and engaging new content.
Q) Combat in Champions Online is said to be “instantaneous” and will do away with “boring auto attacks and lengthy recharge times”. This sounds a lot like the description of a potential shooter. Will combat be a skill-based, twitch-based, or some hybrid system?
A) Champions Online is more of a hybrid. We wanted to add more action-oriented gameplay to MMOs, and the super-hero genre is a great place to do it. While you can still manually target enemies players need to be aware of their environment and react to it, constantly moving around the battlefield to take advantage of the situation. Many powerful villains have “shticks” that players can learn and need to react to by moving, blocking, etc. Active blocking is another big “action” element we’ve incorporated which allows players to go the defensive to protect themselves from enemies while building for a big counter-attack. In the end, we’re trying to live up to our “action MMO” goal.
Q) Obviously, people will compare Champions Online to NC Soft’s City of Heroes considering it is the other well-known super hero MMO out there and Cryptic’s involvement in that production. What will the Champions Online experience offer gamers that City of Heroes does not?
A) City of Heroes is a fine game that we’re proud to have developed, but we wanted to do things differently for Champions Online. Cryptic has learned a lot about MMO development over the years and we’ve incorporated that experience into Champions Online. We’ve re-built our Cryptic Engine to allow it more flexibility with zones, critters, powers, missions, etc. We’re offering even more points of customization for characters both visual and functional, including open selection of powers (no classes). We’re offering a more action-oriented type of combat system where players constantly move and react. We’re offering a world full of diverse environments ranging from deserts to frozen tundra, from underwater to outer space, with lots of varied custom mission content in each of these areas. Overall, Champions Online is a very different experience.
Q) Champions Online is being developed for both the PC and Xbox 360. Is the plan to have gamers from both platforms on the same shards or will they be platform-dependent?
A) There is no technical reason why we can’t have PC and Xbox 360 users on the same shard. However, there are still a number of business decisions that have to be made in this regard.
Q) Is there anything else you would like our readers to know about Champions Online?
A) The Champions Online team has been doing an excellent job at putting together a fun and engaging super-powered world. As more and more of the areas and features come online we’re all becoming very excited about what our game is going to bring to the MMO space and comic book genre. Watch for Champions Online in Spring 2009!
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