The Champions Online Daily News official blog has posted an interview with Cryptic CEO John Needham that touches on numerous topics, from releasing MMOs in a market dominated by World of Warcraft to Atari's acquisition of the company.

Needham said he spent seven years at Sony Online Entertainment playing MMOs, and it was the social aspect of the genre that kept him coming back for more. "Interacting with real people is what gets me to play every night. That's why I believe that online gaming is the future. It’s about all I play right now. I just don’t play a lot of standalone console games anymore," he said.

The CEO said instead of directly competing with World of Warcraft, Cryptic is creating games that don't force players to make a choice. "Champions can be played right alongside World of Warcraft or EQ" because it's accessible and doesn't require you to invest 20-30 hours a week to succeed, he said.

Needham also discusses Cryptic's acquisition by Atari. Cryptic initially wanted to obtain venture capital to remain independent, but the economic collapse made acquisition a natural step. "We’ve been real happy to be with [Atari] ever since," he said. You can read the full interview below.

Behind his desk, he keeps a giant slayer sword; the sort of weapon that was maybe forged in the Mysterious Age of Darkness. John Needham, businessman, boss of Cryptic Studios, really likes MMOs.

“I spent seven years at Sony Online playing MMOs,” he says. But it’s not the swords and sorcery of Everquest 2 and its ilk that really get him excited. “These are fun games. But the reason why I keep coming back every night is the social aspect of having a group of friends playing along.

“Interacting with real people is what gets me to play every night. That’s why I believe that online gaming is the future. It’s about all I play right now. I just don’t play a lot of standalone console games anymore.”

At SOE, Needham handled a lot of the business that underpinned games like Everquest 2. He came to Cryptic just over a year ago, and it’s been a busy, busy 12 months

One of Cryptic’s big deals is asserting its own difference in the MMO market, dominated by World of Warcraft, but ready for something fresh.

“We’re doing different kinds of games to standard fantasy fare. So Champions Online is a superhero game, and it’s a lot different to a World of Warcraft or Everquest because you don’t need to invest twenty to thirty hours a week in Champions to really succeed in the game.

“When you look at games like Conan and Warhammer, they were directly competitive to World of Warcraft and they forced players to make a choice. Am I going to subscribe to Conan or am I going to subscribe to World of Warcraft? We’ve designed our games so players don’t need to make that choice. Champions can be played right alongside World of Warcraft or EQ.

“Accessibility is something we talk about all the time. We want Champions to be as simple to get into as possible for anyone. People love superheroes, so we want to make a game for them, regardless of their experience with MMOs. This game is easy for them to get into and have a lot of fun playing.”

Of course, there are already MMOs that have tackled the superhero genre and Needham isn’t ignoring Cryptic’s own fan-base. “We have a lot of fans that play City of Heroes (NCSoft) so I think we’ll get a lot of them coming over and seeing what we have to offer with Champions Online.”

The Atari Deal and Being Boss

There have been significant changes at Cryptic during the past year. When Needham came to Cryptic his first job was “to find money”.

Cryptic was looking for Venture Capital love to fund its development of Champions Online, Star Trek Online and other MMOs. But there was a problem. This was right at the time when the economy was falling apart; right at the time when the one thing in the world you could not find was investment.

“We wanted to get venture capital or private equity money and stay independent,” he says. “But as we got deeper into summer and then into fall, the economy started collapsing. At the time we were also looking for a publisher for Star Trek Online and so we were talking to Atari and a couple other publishers. It just naturally started opening up acquisition conversations. We knew the guys at Atari had a great reputation; we liked their strategy of focusing on the online publishing space. We were building something they needed, so it just seemed like a great pairing. We’ve been real happy to be with them ever since.”

The last year has also been a learning experience for him, in terms of feeling out what it means to be a CEO.

“When I was a right hand guy or the next level down from the CEO, I didn’t have the pressure of being the leader, being the guy who’s spearheading the whole company,” he says.

“As CEO, you’ve got to be on your game all the time. You’ve got to be available to your employees and able to address what they want. You’ve always got to be thinking about that next thing that your company is going to be tackling.

“It’s a different kind of focus. I’ve got to set a standard personally that everyone strives for here in the studio. But I’m really confident in Champions Online and in everything that we’re doing here, because the guys we’ve got here are some of the smartest people I’ve ever worked with.”

Next week we’ll hear some more from John about the company’s development focus and its Genesis system.