Champions Online - Bag of News

A lot of news about Champions Online showed up in the last 24 hours. To start with there is an article about the technical challenges of the Nemesis system used in the game.

Having a Nemesis is iconic in superhero comics, and we are very excited to bring it to players in Champions Online. Battling and defeating your Nemesis brings a special superhero feel to Champions Online. Also, other games haven’t really given players a chance to customize their own adversaries. We also like that it brings the fight to you. Instead of making the player always go out to find missions, we wanted the Nemesis to reach out and grab you, bringing you into a story. All of that sounds great, but the big challenge is how to implement it.

Then something about the current state of the game.

Making Your New Character’s Easier to Make

Both the character and costume creation systems in Champions Online are incredibly flexible and powerful. This has many positive effects for our players, but also presents some problems because of the complexity of the systems. We’ve been banging away at this issue for the past couple of weeks and are currently in the process of simplifying the character creation flow without losing any of the power behind the system. We should start seeing the first stages of this (power set selection) in beta next week.

Honest Gamers have finished their preview.

Thanks to a great, original art style, venturing through different areas becomes a leisurely stroll rather than a mundane chore. Even character skins follow this refined (if not a little loony) aesthetic. Combat is kept fun and varied not only by the aforementioned power-ups corpses leave behind, but also through the personalities and looks of foes. Enemies are wacky and include crazed, steampunk robots and leather-clad dominatrices. The game almost becomes one giant self-parody, with quest-givers presenting a serious story to the player, before getting them to go fight giant, humanoid chickens. This balance of humour and emotion is just right, and offers a far more compelling atmosphere than the click-through text screens in World of Warcraft or Age of Reckoning.

Senior Game Designer Randy Mosiondz spoke with the Champions Online Daily News to discuss what it means to be a hero in Champions Online.

“The game is very action oriented. You’re often in very high pressure situations and you have to go in there and start kicking ass, as a superhero. There’s a big problem and you have to solve it. It sets the stage, so to speak, of why you’re here, right now, and what these other people, the public, are doing here.

“You help bring a resolution to the immediate crisis, and thereby you progress the story arc. Then you’re dealing with the aftermath of that crisis, dealing with all the other factions and situations that are occurring, the stuff that real people have to suffer.

And finally you can win a personalized tour of the Champions Online Beta Preview with David “Hot Stuff” Bass? They are giving one random Facebook fan access to the Champions Online Beta Preview. That fan will also get to spend an hour with David “Daeke” Bass exploring the ins and outs of the Champions Online Beta Preview. All you have to do is become a fan of the game on Facebook.