City of Heroes
City of Heroes is a massively multiplayer online role-playing computer game based on comic book superheroes that was developed by Cryptic Studios and offered by NCsoft. The game was launched on April 28, 2004. As of 2004, Cryptic was developing the game's first expansion, City of Villains, to allow users to play as supervillains.
In the game, players create superhero player characters which can group with others to fight various villains in Paragon City. The appearance of each superhero character is customizable to an unprecedented degree for 3D online games. The superpowers of each character are chosen based on archetypes (similar to character classes). The available archetypes are Blaster, Controller, Defender, Scrapper, and Tanker. In addition to the archetypes, there are five different origins: Natural, Mutant, Science, Technology and Magic. Unlike races in fantasy MMORPGs, the origins only decide who the player's contacts are and what type of enhancements (collectable power-ups) they can use.
Expansions
Cryptic is planning on expanding its game with both purchasable expansions and freely downloadable patches/updates:
- Issue #1: Through the Looking Glass (June 29, 2004) - high level content
- Issue #2: Shadows of the Past (September 16, 2004) - added capes, new zones, new villains, respecification of powers, and a dance club.
- City of Villains - (pending, 2005) ()
Pricing Structure
- 1 month for $14.95
- 3 months for $41.85 ($13.95 per month)
- 6 months for $77.70 ($12.95 per month)
- 12 months for $143.40 ($11.95 per month)
