Interviews
City of Heroes’ Michael Lewis Gives Us a Glimpse Into the Superhero World
“The city needs a lot of heroes!”
Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s …. YOU!!
Ever want to be a superhero? Ever want to be able to soar through the skies or command nature, or shoot deadly rays from your fingertips, or even be built like a bulldozer with the strength to knock down walls?
As a child, were you a fan of DC Comics or Marvel comics and dreamed of the adventures you would have if you had such powers?
Well, get ready, because those dreams are closer to reality – in a cyber way, of course.
NC Soft and Cryptic Studios will be bringing online game fans City of Heroes this springs – a massively multiplayer online role-playing game in which players take on the role of superheroes battling an invading alien army. But that is only the surface storyline of this game. Character customization, unique costumes and abilities, quests and plotlines that will draw players in will have them launching into a battle against evil faster than superhero wannabes can say “Shazam!”
City of Heroes takes place in the world of Paragon City, a metropolis that has its share of crime, alien invaders and underground monsters. Each superhero falls into one of five Origin types – mutant, science, magic, natural and technology. The game will have approximately 40 different power sets, and players can even go so far as to design their own costume to create truly unique characters.
Michael Lewis, CEO of Cryptic Studios, took time to talk with GameZone.com about this upcoming title.
Question: The world of a superhero has likely been every child's fantasy.
Tell us a bit about the creative process that spawned City of Heroes. Where they
any comics or cartoon series that inspired the game?
Michael: It was the genre that really appealed to me: it is modern, and therefore accessible, but fantastic, and anything can happen. In other words, a superhero setting is like modern-day orcs and wizards. In fact, it was the promise of the upcoming (at the time) movies like Spiderman and X-Men that got me really excited about doing a superhero game. I was counting on them being well done and reviving the popular appreciation for comic book heroes, and that worked out pretty well.
Q: Players will be allowed to create their own superheroes, but obviously, these characters won't be all powerful. Will the characters have weaknesses akin to Superman and kryptonite, or will they basically be mortals endowed with limited powers in certain areas?
Michael: We made a conscious decision to leave out explicit weaknesses a la kryptonite, but characters do have limitations. Because a large part of the fun in an on-line game is playing with other people, we’ve tried to ensure with our Archetype system that every character is not only powerful on his own, but can also make a unique contribution as part of a super team.
Q: On the same note, how in depth is the customization of the characters?
Michael: City of Heroes has the most versatile character creation system in any MMP to date. I don’t mean silly things like lots of attributes and numbers to optimize - we’ve left that out. If you play a close-combat guy, there’s only one best way to spend your points, so why make a player figure that out? I mean the important stuff, like what makes you different. What powers do you want, and what does your character look like? Unless you try, you’ll probably not run across someone with the same or even similar costume, and there’s so many ways to pick different powers that it will be rare to stumble across someone who shares your exact powers as well.
Q: What is the overriding storyline to this game and will players actually have any effect on that storyline, or does the game follow rinse-and-repeat brand of missions and quests used by other MMPs?
Michael: The Rikti invasion storyline (you can check it out on the game Web site) is just the beginning. As players progress through the missions, they will uncover and thwart the plots and schemes of various villains and their organizations … the idea is that it’s like playing through a comic book, but you get to choose which plots you want to be involved in. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to play through all of the plot lines simultaneously … you’ll have to choose your fights.
Q: This game is a bit of a departure from the standard MMPs. What do you think will make it unique, and how will you counter having a host of superheroes inundating a city worse than a flock of pigeons camping a statue?
Michael: The city needs a lot of heroes! That’s the premise of the storyline … but don’t worry, there is plenty of ground to cover, so players won’t be tripping over each other. We’ve tried to balance keeping things small enough that you can find people to play with, but big enough that it doesn’t seem like heroes outnumber the NPCs … which they don’t, by the way.
Q: How will players band together? Will this be akin to the standard allegiances of other games, or are you treading new territory? What will be the advantages of being in such a group?
Michael: We’ve got a few systems for teaming up. A Team is a temporary alliance, useful for helping out with tougher missions or simply playing with friends … and although solo play is totally do-able, everyone agrees that Team-ups are way more fun! A Supergroup is a permanent organization, useful for communication with larger groups of players. And finally, Task Forces are like persistent Teams that are required to complete certain story arcs … these can be members of your Supergroup, or others, but once you start a Task Force, you can’t add people to it.
Q: Will there be zones or servers for players to battle each other? Can players take on the roles of villains? How do players level up their characters?
Michael: No and No. When we do player villains, we want it be a real Super Villain style game, not just thugs with super powers. So needless to say, it’s a ways off. We’ll probably do an arena-style competition system in the not too distant future though, for when you really need to find out who is ‘better’.
When a hero levels up, the player is given the opportunity to improve existing powers, or obtain new ones. Characters in City of Heroes are defined by their powers, not table of numbers, so you can immediately notice a significant improvement, and even new play style options, with each level.
Q: Will there be an open beta for this game and when will it launch?
Michael: Keep your eyes on http://www.coh.com/ for an announcement about our beta plans. The game is currently scheduled to launch sometime in mid spring.
Q: If you could be any comic book legend, who would you be?
Michael: It wouldn’t surprise my friends to hear that Reed Richards is my protégé
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