The following editorial contains views that are the opinion of the author and not necessarily the views of Allakhazam.com

Generally speaking, most of the online gamers that I meet have some sort of a comic-book background. Love them or otherwise, there’s just something about watching a Heroes (or Villains) story unfold. That’s why it came as no surprise when I found myself anxious to know more when DC Universe Online was first announced, in early 2006. Seeing the game at Comic-con in 2008 brought a smile to my face but, after our demonstration at CES on Thursday, there are quite a few new reasons to be intoxicated with anticipation.

Sitting down on the couch with the Creative Director, Jens Andersen and Senior Producer, Wes Yanagi was something that I was admittedly nervous about because I felt that they really needed to raise the bar from what we had been shown previously. Fortunately, they did just that; which is to say the game is looking great!

The first thing that I thought to myself when the game loaded was that the environments that one might expect to see inside the DC Universe were starting to take shape. Jim Lee and all of the artists involved in the game have done an amazing job capturing the eclectic essence that makes DC unique. But, as is so often the concern among gamers, I wondered just what the game would contain at release. During the demonstration another individual in attendance voiced my apprehension when he asked: ‘Will everything be in the game at launch?’ Jens replied: “What's everything? It's called DC Universe. That’s massive. There are planets in far off reaches of the galaxy and the universe that would need to be built for this. The great thing about our project is, we're going to have a big splash when we launch. We're going to have enough places that people will say ’I know that place, oh cool, they even did that place?’ You'll see stuff like that but we have time to grow. I mean we're a live game. We're focusing on Earth right now, and all of those great places that are on Earth, but there's so much more. It's the DC Universe”. Answers like this get me speculating about how epic DCUO expansions will be. Perhaps I’m thinking entirely too far ahead though, I digress.

Obviously Heroes and Villains are only as good (or bad, as it were) as their reputations allow, so we wanted to know all about how a player will be making their characters known, even worshipped. While the team hasn’t quite worked out all the details, Jens did tell us about a system that they call headlines. “We have a system we call headlines which is competitive stuff between players, individual things that you can collect for yourself, as a personal achievement and it's all about making it on the front page of the Daily Planet. Reporting in that news paper is a huge portion of this universe and we're paying off on that in terms of the notoriety and fame factor. We’re going that newsy newspaper route” Jen explained. It was obvious to see that Jens wanted to tell us more, considering how excited he was when giving us the information about the systems that will be involved. We’ll wait patiently, for now!

I typically, have concerns and I like to avoid sweeping them under a rug when I write an editorial. DCUO is being launched on the PC and the PS3. Great news, right? Maybe. Unfortunately there have been a number of rumors about SOE leaning against having PS3-PC cross-platform play for the game. What this means is that players who want to play DCUO on the PC, won’t be able to play with their PS3 buddies. Now that alone would be annoying, but if this does in fact come to fruition, will the PS3 players even be able to sustain their own DCUO community? I think this game could give people a reason to buy a PS3, but if cross-platform isn’t supported will it share the same problems that EQOA has with population and content updates? I happen to think so.

Having voiced my only real tangible concern, it seems appropriate to talk about the DCUO business model that still hasn’t been decided on. I’d bet on the typical $15 (or so) per month subscription model, with micro transaction options available through Station Cash. When the question was asked, it was clear that how DCUO will make money isn’t relevant at the moment “There are a lot of different business models and we're going to explore which one works best for us when we get a little further down the road" said Jens, before Wes Yanagi chimed in saying: "Right now we're just focused on making a really fun game, because if we have that then we can decide which business model we want to pursue”.

Sony Online Entertainment has committed to making this game as good as it can possibly be. The potential here is huge, and it’s obvious that they are being extremely careful with the franchise that’s involved. As such, they’ve said, and continue to say that the game won’t see the light of day until it’s solid. Although the game has come leaps and bounds, there is still more work to be done. Chances are, DC Universe Online won’t be hitting store shelves until 2010. I expect the wait to be worth it.

Andrew "Tamat" Beegle
Editor-in-Chief
Allakhazam.com