Elinda wrote:
For a change of pace I thought I'd go the superhero route rather than elves and dwarfs (Rift looks too familiar). So, my choices are CoH/CoV and DCUO.
I feel ya. I think the reason why WoW and LoTRO didn't stick with me can be summed up with the phrase "A decade of Everquest".
Champions Online is going Free to Play on the 25th. You're limited to select archetypes and it's the usual "Hey, we have a cash store" type thing (CO was big on the cash store even prior to F2P) but it's no risk to try it out. I personally hated the art style with a passion and didn't care for the tone of the game but I can't really rip on the game play.
City of Heroes and DCUO are like comparing apples and rolling pins. DCUO is more like an arcade style game and made for game controller play. The UI is clunky and feels like junk compared to most MMOs. The chat interface is a joke. But it's much more action based than your average MMORPG. There's a
whole lotta mouse/controller button clicking that goes into combat. I didn't care for it but that's mainly because I wanted an MMORPG not an MMO-Arcade Game and not really a failing with DCUO. Character customization is a pale shadow of that in COH or CO. Graphics themselves looked nice though. I'll let other people talk up its praises or criticisms though since it just wasn't my thing and that alone doesn't make it a bad game.
City of Heroes has the advantage of seven years worth of content although some of the older content is less of a selling point (kind of like saying "EQ has a quest where you can hand in orc belts!"). The new stuff is pretty good though and the newbie experience has been revamped by starting players in a new region with updated graphics, missions, etc. It's the most traditional MMORPG of the three (not that CO is far off) in so far as gameplay and mechanics. It's more of a "the adventure is the journey" theme so there hasn't been much of an "end game" although the last couple additions have been changing that. I'm happy to answer any questions but I'm won't spend a lot of time now talking it up. There's a free trial if you want (although the trial restrictions suck, blame the RMT'ers). I've learned that MMORPG enjoyment is so subjective that it's hard to ever just say "This is a great game, you should play it" since my reasons might be far different from yours.