Customization:
Community:
Customer Service:
Role-Playing:
This is definitely one of City of Heroes' best features. The sheer number of options available for your hero's
costume is mind-boggling. And add to that the huge amount of different colors which can be selected for the
primary and secondary color on each option and it's highly unlikely you will stumble across two heroes who look
alike. But the odds of two people who come up with a truly original costume idea and end up looking the same
in-game are not very likely at all. But then again, nothing is impossible, there's always the "room full of
monkeys with typewriters… eventually you'll get War and Peace" theory. Although this system is powerful enough
to allow players to "copycat" real superheroes - doing so will not be permitted within City of Heroes due to
copyright laws.
With the game leaning more towards grouping than soloing, the community is fairly important. Overall it is
setup nicely, with the many forms of communication it is easy to find people who need you in their group or find
someone you need for your group. The Super Group features make it easy to keep constant contact with your close
friends in the game. There is a friends list to allow you to keep track of when your friends log on or off. With
no loot or tradeskills there's no economy to worry about for the most part. Inspirations and enhancements can
be traded from player to player, which leads to a nice barter system among players. Overall the community seems
quite friendly and helpful and I have never had a problem finding a group or getting an answer to a question.
Even though the game is still in beta, what experience I have had with the Customer Service has been
exceptional. My questions were answered promptly and problems solved very quickly. I even received follow-up
emails at a later date to ensure that the problem was indeed solved and if there was anything else I needed.
It's nice to see that kind of customer support in a game when so many games lately have been severely lacking
in this area.
As with most MMORPGs the amount of role-playing is entirely dependant on the player itself. Some people like
to role-play others don't. But for its credit City of Heroes provides every opportunity to allow the player
to role-play to their heart's content. With the amount of customization available in the game it is very easy
to create exactly the type of hero you want to play; complete with the exact costume you want him to wear and
the exact powers you want him to use. There is no feeling of being forced to play something that is "kinda
close to what I wanted", you create the character you want to play, which always makes role-playing a lot easier
on the player. In a lot of games you might want to play Race X and Class Y but due to class/race restrictions
you can't. However in City of Heroes you won't have that problem, whatever you want to play, you can play and
role-play as much as you want, and with eight character slots at your disposal (note: although there are eight
character slots in beta this number may be more or less in the final version), you can do it with enough
different characters to cover all the bases.
