Champions Online - Preview @ 1UP

This is the first preview of Champions Online we've covered. This one is quite interesting too:

For the uninitiated, Champions is simply a pen-and-paper RPG about superheroes. "It has thousands upon thousands of players to this day getting together in their basements or local game stores, rolling six-sided dice and playing," says Emmert. "It's a game that a lot of people -- if they haven't played it themselves -- have heard of." I've played my fair share. My main, so to speak, was a wind-wielding college student code-named Turbulence who whipped up tornadoes and was a cocky douchebag. And despite the fond memories forged over awful Round Table pizzas, Champions still strikes me as an odd name to latch onto. Unlike a Marvel or DC universe, Champions isn't known for its personalities or places -- its Batmen or Gotham Cities. To wax industrial, I thought the point of acquiring intellectual property was to wrangle folks hoping to cross sabers with Darth Vader or go spelunking in the Mines of Moria -- otherwise, why bother with the headache? And as far as I know, no one holds a patent on the concept of superheroes. City of Heroes flew on its own; Lewis uses the word "debacle" when discussing Cryptic's dalliances with Marvel; I tell them I'm surprised they chose to go with a license once again.

"There's no license here," says Emmert. "We bought Champions and own it. We really wanted an IP...we believed strongly in an IP, and we thought we could capitalize on its strengths with an MMO. And when we acquired the Champions IP, a lot of interesting things came out of it. The way you design your characters in Champions is different from what we were thinking about in Marvel."