City of Heroes has long dominated the superhero MMO without any challenges. Marvel sued the game over allowing likenesses of its characters but failed to ever come out with their own licensed property. Now, DC Comics characters are getting their own game in DC Universe Online, from Warner Bros. Interactive and Sony Online Entertainment.
At E3 and Comic Con, SOE showed off video and more details of the
upcoming game, and it sounds very much like a City of Heroes/Villains clone. Instead of playing as the DC Universe heroes or villains, players will create their own custom character, choosing the outfit, powers, and affiliation of their own unique superpowered persona. The DC Universe characters will show up as mission-giving NPCs and in other capacities though, which makes sense - no one wants to see a game with a thousand Batman-esque characters beating up on a thousand Jokers. The only thing that sets DCUO apart, so far as has been shown, is the use of licensed characters and places like Gotham City instead of City of Heroes' original characters and locations.
Being a superhero is a common fantasy, and City of Heroes is one of the most fun MMOs out there, mostly due to its unmatched character creation system. Players have almost unlimited choices in creating a character's look and powers (thus the Marvel lawsuit) and coming up with the coolest or most outrageous hero or villain is sometimes more fun than spending time in the game proper. This isn't to say the game itself wasn't fun, but it did get a little repetitious faster than most MMOs. Whether DCUO allows as much freedom and creativity remains to be seen.
DC Universe Online hasn't given away too many details about its gameplay yet, but it did say it will have simple console-type action, which no doubt is because it will have a simultaneous PlayStation 3 version. What the videos have shown of the action makes it look a little too simple, with some characters just standing in one place punching over and over again. Let's hope there's more to combat than that, since the great thing about MMOs is how the characters grow and have so many places to explore and things to do. City of Heroes' biggest weakness is that, despite being fun for a while, it's not very deep or involving. Most of the customization is done up front when designing the hero, so there isn't actually a whole lot of options once in the game, compared to other MMOs. It's too early to tell yet if DC Universe Online is taking its cues from that part of City of Heroes also, but if it wants to stand out it will need to have a lot more that just licensed characters to set it apart, since only a handful of them are widely recognizable anyway. Regardless of The Dark Knight's popularity, the prospect of perhaps, at one point, fighting next to Batman isn't going to be enough to sell DCUO on its own.
More details will continue to come as the game progresses. Join DC Universe Online's MySpace page to keep up to date with the developers, and keep an eye here for more impressions.