*NOTE* This is very long, there's a tl;dr at the bottom if you're lazy and bad at reading
Today I'm going to talk about a fairly new MMO called DC Universe Online. I have over 100 hours (and two max levels) on it thus far, so I think I'm qualified to make a lengthy review on it. I should also note that this game is a few weeks old and still has a few bugs that needs to be fixed (like any MMO launch).
One of the first things you'll notice when starting is the character creation screen. You can choose from a range of powers like Fire/Ice (Tanks), Nature/Sorcery (Healers), Gadgets/Mental (Controllers). After you pick one of the powers above you can make up your costume, many are quick to point out that there is a lack of costume options compared, to say, City of Heroes. The reason for that is a lot of the costume pieces are actually found in the game itself from armor you buy/find.
Next thing after picking your powers is which weapon you want to use. The weapons available at the moment are One-Handed, Hand-blaster, Bow, Brawling, Dual Pistols, Dual Wield, Martial Arts, Rifle, Staff and Two-Handed. Each weapon has it's own strengths and weaknesses. For example, Dual Wield lets you have two melee weapons and it hits very quickly. Two-Handed in comparison is fairly slow but packs a bunch of damage when you slam your hammer into some idiots face. There is no class requirements on which weapons you use, so you can be a healer running around with a giant hammer. You also choose your means of transportation here (Either Super-speed, Flight, or Acrobatics). If you played City of Heroes before you might be used to getting capes and your travel powers later on, but you start with them in this game.
The last thing to note before going in-game is that you have to choose a mentor. Each side (Heroes and Villains) have three mentors. Villains have Joker, Circe, and Lex Luthor. Heroes have Superman, Batman and Wonderwoman. The choice of mentor decides what end-game armor you'll be able to get (It's pretty much a cosmetic difference) and what missions you'll get at the start. Personally, I picked Joker because he's awesome.
Okay so you enter the game and notice a few changes from the generic MMO. First off, the camera isn't like WoW where your just moving a cursor around your screen to click on things. It functions like any action hack-and-slash game. Next thing is that the combat system itself has been revamped to be actually interesting. Left-click does your melee strike and right-click is your ranged attack. As you progress through the game you'll be able to unlock more combo moves for your weapon. For example, Rifle users can unlock the 'Flamethrower' combo in which you hold Right-click and move forward when you're near an enemy to catch their eyes on fire.
This MMO has a combo system. You get +1 Combo point for each uninterrupted hit you do against the enemy (I don't believe there is a max hits you can get). The amount of supercharge you get depends on how many combo points you got before the enemy died. Supercharge is a small meter that fills under your energy bar that, when full, improves the damage and stun effects of many attacks. Supercharge is also used by a few useful skills that can eat up 25% to 100% Supercharge.
This game also uses a action bar like any other MMO, but it only has enough slots for 6 powers (and a slot for health item and a trinket). You have to pick your action bar powers carefully since there's no way to use the powers that aren't on it.
Okay, so you've learned how to use your attacks without accidentally killing yourself. The tutorial sets up how most of the instanced missions play out. You'll get a voice over (in this case it's some dude named Calculator telling you to stop being a retard and get off Brainiacs ship). On your way through the tutorial you'll get numerous cut-scenes and eventually a big bad boss. In this boss battle you fight alongside either Superman (For Heroes) or Lex Luthor in his power-suit (As Villain). After you survive that you teleport off Brainiacs ship and go to your mentors city (Lex, Superman, and Circe are Metropolis. Batman, Wonderwoman, and Joker are Gotham).
You'll get a tour around the safe-house where you get quests from and sell your gear. After that you embark on some missions from your mentor. It's obvious the developers tried to make interesting missions for you to do, and for most of them they succeed (There are a few annoying missions involving the Green Laterns later on). For most missions they are in the city itself and you'll usually find other players in that missions area (When you have a mission active it shows a big square around the area the objectives are in). Depending on what kind of server you picked (PVE or PVP), you can be attacked by max level players if they are feeling particularly dickish. It should also be noted that a lot of missions have heroes and villains doing their stuff in the same area, so you might run into an enemy player the same level as you trying to do the same quest. If you get killed the only penalty you get is a small durability hit on your armor/weapons (You pay to repair in a safe-house) and have to respawn in about 10 seconds from the nearest respawn center.
On the topic of PvP (I'll just talk like you picked a PvP server), you have to watch out for gankers. There are a lot of enemy players at max level (30) who want nothing more than to kill someone 25 levels lower than them. The most common thing to do is use the /shout feature and ask for a high level to come and show the enemy a magic trick. You don't get any penalty or reward for open-world PvP (Arenas are a different matter altogether). There are two places in particular that max level players love to gank at and that's the 'Science Police HQ' and the Hospital, both are in Metropolis. It's not uncommon to see entire leagues (Guilds) beating the crap out of each-other in these areas, with frightened low level players trying to get out of the way of the carnage.
Another departure from standard MMO mechanics is the clothing system. In, say, WoW you find this cool new chest-plate but when you put it on you notice it makes you look like a blind circus clown who stole his clothes from another circus clown. In this game each armor piece has a 'Style' on it. You just have to equip the armor once and you can now use that style any time you want. Or if you want, you can just lock all your clothing selections and just stay the same exact model from level 1 to 30. You can also change your weapon model. In the clothing menu you can also change your three primary colors on the fly without having to pay anything. So if you want to troll a bunch of enemy players, set all your clothes to a bright pink and start /dancing over their corpse.
The game uses the Unreal 3 Engine (Notably used by games like Unreal Tournament 3, Bioshock, Gears of War etc). The game looks excellent if you set everything to high. You get all the current-gen features like fully-dynamic capes, bloom and all that good stuff. It also runs remarkably well even on aged computers like mine. I haven't updated in a few years and I'm able to play 'High' at a smooth 50-60 FPS.
The controls for the game work fine for me but some people have issues with the mouse and keyboard. If you have a game controller you can plug that in and use it for the game. From what I hear it works fine and many people swear by it.
When you level up in the game you either get Skill points (Spent on your travel powers or weapons) or Power points (Spend on either of the three power trees you get). In the power points menu you get three trees, two are from the power you picked and the last one is 'Iconic' powers. Iconic powers are things that notable superheroes from the DC Universe use, like Batarangs or Wonderwomans lasso. Personally, I didn't use any of the powers in iconics but at level 22+ you can get passive bonuses in the Iconic tree that are extremely useful (Things like extra HP or ability to pick up cars).
Even when you hit max level you can still 'level up' by doing feats. Feats are this games version of achievements, you get them for doing things ranging from getting 100x Combo spree or defeating a boss without using any healing items. Each feat you accomplish gives you points ranging from 10 to 30, when you hit 100 you get a free skill point.
Many MMO's have the issue of having a giant open world (City of Heroes is a prime example of this) that is just not very interesting to look around. This game tries to combat that by placing little markers on-top of buildings or on the ground. When you use the markers (There are three types green, blue and yellow) you get a little gift. Greens give you a little soundbite or conversation ranging from the Joker talking about his plans to blow up a orphanage to a bored drive-thru attendant telling you about the specials. Blue markers give you a item for a collection (Collect the entire collection and you get XP and a nifty armor piece). Most green markers have 4-6 total in the collection. Personally the collecting mini-game feels like 'Crackdown'.
When you're leveling up you get access to 'Alerts' which are essentially giant Dungeons you partner up with fellow Villains/Heroes to complete. You can either go into them with a premade group or just let the Queue System put you into a PUG. They generally last about 30 minutes and give some nice loot to help leveling up.
Each class has two forms. One is their class form (aka Healer, Tank or Controller) and the other is DPS form (Primarily used when soloing or if your group already has the other three classes active). In PvP there is a rock paper scissors dynamic. Tanks are designed to kill Controllers, Healers are designed to kill Tanks, and Controllers are designed to kill Healers. That's not to say that if you're a tank and against a Healer you'll automatically lose, but you are at a disadvantage. If you're being attacked you hold Shift to block, if the enemy does a melee attack against you (that isn't a block breaker) they will take damage and fall over. If you see someone blocking then either use powers on them or your ranged attack. *NOTE: To dodge you hold Shift then move in a direction.
The missions themselves in the game are fairly easy and encourage soloing. It takes about 20-30 hours (Or faster if you're good) to get to max level. One of the things I really like about this game is that there isn't really a grind getting to 30. As long as you follow the interesting story missions (Doing stuff like beating up Superman or double-crossing Mr Freeze) you'll get to the max level. This is where most MMO's taper off at. In my opinion this game plays like a fun little SP RPG that just happens to be a MMO. If you really want to you can just imagine that all the enemy players are just really annoying NPC's who like to teabag your body.
Luckily, there is a fairly large amount of endgame content to keep people busy. Duos, Hard Alerts and Raids are introduced at level 30. In Duos you and one other player replay through older missions (But much harder and new cut-scenes and bosses). Some of the hard alerts are just revamped copies of older ones (just more difficult) but there are a few new ones. Raids are the hardest missions in the game and require 8 players total to beat. Raids are known for the extreme difficulty and the need for complete communication (ventrilo is encouraged). Whenever you complete a alert, duo or raid you get marks. You spend Marks on Iconic armor which is the best of the best armor. You can only get marks once from a single mission though so there is a limit to how many you can get a day.
On the less positive side there are quite a few bugs in the game. Since it's still relatively new you can expect to see the occasional glitch. Most glaring issues have been fixed so far with patches. SOE is planning a big inclusive patch sometime this week. Most bugs are harmless (Like your cape spazzing out) but some are annoying (Like getting stuck picking something up so it looks like your character is taking a dump and can't move. If you're in combat you'll probably die). There are also reports of crashes but I've only had two total. There is also a few UI issues like the chat is sometimes unresponsive, SOE said they plan to fix that though so who knows.
In closing, this game does a lot of things right. A fun combat system, interesting quests, quality voice acting (from people like Mark Hamill as the Joker) and a comfortable leveling time. The main gripes with the game can be easily fixed with patches and SOE has promised they would try and put out free content patches every month or so.
tl;dr - It's a fun MMO that I like more than WoW and CoH combined.
Today I'm going to talk about a fairly new MMO called DC Universe Online. I have over 100 hours (and two max levels) on it thus far, so I think I'm qualified to make a lengthy review on it. I should also note that this game is a few weeks old and still has a few bugs that needs to be fixed (like any MMO launch).
One of the first things you'll notice when starting is the character creation screen. You can choose from a range of powers like Fire/Ice (Tanks), Nature/Sorcery (Healers), Gadgets/Mental (Controllers). After you pick one of the powers above you can make up your costume, many are quick to point out that there is a lack of costume options compared, to say, City of Heroes. The reason for that is a lot of the costume pieces are actually found in the game itself from armor you buy/find.
Next thing after picking your powers is which weapon you want to use. The weapons available at the moment are One-Handed, Hand-blaster, Bow, Brawling, Dual Pistols, Dual Wield, Martial Arts, Rifle, Staff and Two-Handed. Each weapon has it's own strengths and weaknesses. For example, Dual Wield lets you have two melee weapons and it hits very quickly. Two-Handed in comparison is fairly slow but packs a bunch of damage when you slam your hammer into some idiots face. There is no class requirements on which weapons you use, so you can be a healer running around with a giant hammer. You also choose your means of transportation here (Either Super-speed, Flight, or Acrobatics). If you played City of Heroes before you might be used to getting capes and your travel powers later on, but you start with them in this game.
The last thing to note before going in-game is that you have to choose a mentor. Each side (Heroes and Villains) have three mentors. Villains have Joker, Circe, and Lex Luthor. Heroes have Superman, Batman and Wonderwoman. The choice of mentor decides what end-game armor you'll be able to get (It's pretty much a cosmetic difference) and what missions you'll get at the start. Personally, I picked Joker because he's awesome.
Okay so you enter the game and notice a few changes from the generic MMO. First off, the camera isn't like WoW where your just moving a cursor around your screen to click on things. It functions like any action hack-and-slash game. Next thing is that the combat system itself has been revamped to be actually interesting. Left-click does your melee strike and right-click is your ranged attack. As you progress through the game you'll be able to unlock more combo moves for your weapon. For example, Rifle users can unlock the 'Flamethrower' combo in which you hold Right-click and move forward when you're near an enemy to catch their eyes on fire.
This MMO has a combo system. You get +1 Combo point for each uninterrupted hit you do against the enemy (I don't believe there is a max hits you can get). The amount of supercharge you get depends on how many combo points you got before the enemy died. Supercharge is a small meter that fills under your energy bar that, when full, improves the damage and stun effects of many attacks. Supercharge is also used by a few useful skills that can eat up 25% to 100% Supercharge.
This game also uses a action bar like any other MMO, but it only has enough slots for 6 powers (and a slot for health item and a trinket). You have to pick your action bar powers carefully since there's no way to use the powers that aren't on it.
Okay, so you've learned how to use your attacks without accidentally killing yourself. The tutorial sets up how most of the instanced missions play out. You'll get a voice over (in this case it's some dude named Calculator telling you to stop being a retard and get off Brainiacs ship). On your way through the tutorial you'll get numerous cut-scenes and eventually a big bad boss. In this boss battle you fight alongside either Superman (For Heroes) or Lex Luthor in his power-suit (As Villain). After you survive that you teleport off Brainiacs ship and go to your mentors city (Lex, Superman, and Circe are Metropolis. Batman, Wonderwoman, and Joker are Gotham).
You'll get a tour around the safe-house where you get quests from and sell your gear. After that you embark on some missions from your mentor. It's obvious the developers tried to make interesting missions for you to do, and for most of them they succeed (There are a few annoying missions involving the Green Laterns later on). For most missions they are in the city itself and you'll usually find other players in that missions area (When you have a mission active it shows a big square around the area the objectives are in). Depending on what kind of server you picked (PVE or PVP), you can be attacked by max level players if they are feeling particularly dickish. It should also be noted that a lot of missions have heroes and villains doing their stuff in the same area, so you might run into an enemy player the same level as you trying to do the same quest. If you get killed the only penalty you get is a small durability hit on your armor/weapons (You pay to repair in a safe-house) and have to respawn in about 10 seconds from the nearest respawn center.
On the topic of PvP (I'll just talk like you picked a PvP server), you have to watch out for gankers. There are a lot of enemy players at max level (30) who want nothing more than to kill someone 25 levels lower than them. The most common thing to do is use the /shout feature and ask for a high level to come and show the enemy a magic trick. You don't get any penalty or reward for open-world PvP (Arenas are a different matter altogether). There are two places in particular that max level players love to gank at and that's the 'Science Police HQ' and the Hospital, both are in Metropolis. It's not uncommon to see entire leagues (Guilds) beating the crap out of each-other in these areas, with frightened low level players trying to get out of the way of the carnage.
Another departure from standard MMO mechanics is the clothing system. In, say, WoW you find this cool new chest-plate but when you put it on you notice it makes you look like a blind circus clown who stole his clothes from another circus clown. In this game each armor piece has a 'Style' on it. You just have to equip the armor once and you can now use that style any time you want. Or if you want, you can just lock all your clothing selections and just stay the same exact model from level 1 to 30. You can also change your weapon model. In the clothing menu you can also change your three primary colors on the fly without having to pay anything. So if you want to troll a bunch of enemy players, set all your clothes to a bright pink and start /dancing over their corpse.
The game uses the Unreal 3 Engine (Notably used by games like Unreal Tournament 3, Bioshock, Gears of War etc). The game looks excellent if you set everything to high. You get all the current-gen features like fully-dynamic capes, bloom and all that good stuff. It also runs remarkably well even on aged computers like mine. I haven't updated in a few years and I'm able to play 'High' at a smooth 50-60 FPS.
The controls for the game work fine for me but some people have issues with the mouse and keyboard. If you have a game controller you can plug that in and use it for the game. From what I hear it works fine and many people swear by it.
When you level up in the game you either get Skill points (Spent on your travel powers or weapons) or Power points (Spend on either of the three power trees you get). In the power points menu you get three trees, two are from the power you picked and the last one is 'Iconic' powers. Iconic powers are things that notable superheroes from the DC Universe use, like Batarangs or Wonderwomans lasso. Personally, I didn't use any of the powers in iconics but at level 22+ you can get passive bonuses in the Iconic tree that are extremely useful (Things like extra HP or ability to pick up cars).
Even when you hit max level you can still 'level up' by doing feats. Feats are this games version of achievements, you get them for doing things ranging from getting 100x Combo spree or defeating a boss without using any healing items. Each feat you accomplish gives you points ranging from 10 to 30, when you hit 100 you get a free skill point.
Many MMO's have the issue of having a giant open world (City of Heroes is a prime example of this) that is just not very interesting to look around. This game tries to combat that by placing little markers on-top of buildings or on the ground. When you use the markers (There are three types green, blue and yellow) you get a little gift. Greens give you a little soundbite or conversation ranging from the Joker talking about his plans to blow up a orphanage to a bored drive-thru attendant telling you about the specials. Blue markers give you a item for a collection (Collect the entire collection and you get XP and a nifty armor piece). Most green markers have 4-6 total in the collection. Personally the collecting mini-game feels like 'Crackdown'.
When you're leveling up you get access to 'Alerts' which are essentially giant Dungeons you partner up with fellow Villains/Heroes to complete. You can either go into them with a premade group or just let the Queue System put you into a PUG. They generally last about 30 minutes and give some nice loot to help leveling up.
Each class has two forms. One is their class form (aka Healer, Tank or Controller) and the other is DPS form (Primarily used when soloing or if your group already has the other three classes active). In PvP there is a rock paper scissors dynamic. Tanks are designed to kill Controllers, Healers are designed to kill Tanks, and Controllers are designed to kill Healers. That's not to say that if you're a tank and against a Healer you'll automatically lose, but you are at a disadvantage. If you're being attacked you hold Shift to block, if the enemy does a melee attack against you (that isn't a block breaker) they will take damage and fall over. If you see someone blocking then either use powers on them or your ranged attack. *NOTE: To dodge you hold Shift then move in a direction.
The missions themselves in the game are fairly easy and encourage soloing. It takes about 20-30 hours (Or faster if you're good) to get to max level. One of the things I really like about this game is that there isn't really a grind getting to 30. As long as you follow the interesting story missions (Doing stuff like beating up Superman or double-crossing Mr Freeze) you'll get to the max level. This is where most MMO's taper off at. In my opinion this game plays like a fun little SP RPG that just happens to be a MMO. If you really want to you can just imagine that all the enemy players are just really annoying NPC's who like to teabag your body.
Luckily, there is a fairly large amount of endgame content to keep people busy. Duos, Hard Alerts and Raids are introduced at level 30. In Duos you and one other player replay through older missions (But much harder and new cut-scenes and bosses). Some of the hard alerts are just revamped copies of older ones (just more difficult) but there are a few new ones. Raids are the hardest missions in the game and require 8 players total to beat. Raids are known for the extreme difficulty and the need for complete communication (ventrilo is encouraged). Whenever you complete a alert, duo or raid you get marks. You spend Marks on Iconic armor which is the best of the best armor. You can only get marks once from a single mission though so there is a limit to how many you can get a day.
On the less positive side there are quite a few bugs in the game. Since it's still relatively new you can expect to see the occasional glitch. Most glaring issues have been fixed so far with patches. SOE is planning a big inclusive patch sometime this week. Most bugs are harmless (Like your cape spazzing out) but some are annoying (Like getting stuck picking something up so it looks like your character is taking a dump and can't move. If you're in combat you'll probably die). There are also reports of crashes but I've only had two total. There is also a few UI issues like the chat is sometimes unresponsive, SOE said they plan to fix that though so who knows.
In closing, this game does a lot of things right. A fun combat system, interesting quests, quality voice acting (from people like Mark Hamill as the Joker) and a comfortable leveling time. The main gripes with the game can be easily fixed with patches and SOE has promised they would try and put out free content patches every month or so.
tl;dr - It's a fun MMO that I like more than WoW and CoH combined.
