COH goes PVP

I love desserts. I'm not picky: Creme Brule, Tiramisu, Sorbet, Entenmann's chocolate chip cookies. You make it...I'll eat it. But there was one time I had a ton of dessert in my fridge but no actual food. Fine, I thought, I don't need to hit /pizza or anything. I'll just eat dessert today. Well, it doesn't work that way. By evening I was not only nauseous but at the same time hungry for a hot meal.

When I first got City of Heroes I thought it was so delicious - gorgeous graphics, fantastic character creation and combat that is still twice as fun as EQII. But in two months I was completely sick of it. To be fair a part of that might be due to the fact that COH does something well which other MMORPG's don't. It actually allows you solo effectively.

You see I have soloist inertia. Unless I'm forced to, I gravitate a bit towards soloing. Now, in EQII soloing is so useless and dull I never do it. But in COH I soloed quite a bit. And it turns out it is the community, more than the graphics, that keep you involved with a game.

But, beyond that, the sweet COH lacks many of the basic nutrients a good MMORPG meal contains (equipment, housing, a feeling of depth).

For what it is though, COH is well executed. I logged on around Halloween to find trick-or-treating heroes being chased by pumpkin-headed monsters. I logged on near the winter holidays to find heroes hitting each other with snowballs. And you can find fun user created events like costume contests. Over at Kill Ten Rats you can read nine great recent entries about what playing COH is like.

And now, COH is coming out with an Arena update which will allow player vs. player combat for the first time. It was originally thought that PVP combat would not be introduced until the City of Villains expansion. And you can imagine that most companies would have made you pay for an expansion for such a dramatic gameplay change. But COH is doing it for free and I must admit they managed to pique my interest again.

And let's give credit where credit is due...EQII's recent "amazingly innovative" mentor system innovation is really nothing more than the sidekick system COH had from day one.

Sometimes a hero is someone who just tries hard with the little things.