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| City of Heroes Issue 8: To Protect & Serve Interview by Jonathan Trevisani,Computer Games Online  Jonathan Trevisani: What is the main focus of the latest expansion pack for City of Heroes? Will the heroes finally be able to compete with all of the extras that the villains have been enjoying?" title="City of Heroes Issue 8: To Protect & Serve Interview">Computer Games Online presents an interview with Matt Miller, CoH and CoV Lead Designer at Cryptic Studio about the latest update to the superhero massively-multiplayer online game City of Heroes/City of Villains. Issue 8: To Protect & Serve introduces new features that are focused on the good side of Paragon City.Jonathan Trevisani: What is the main focus of the latest expansion pack for City of Heroes? Will the heroes finally be able to compete with all of the extras that the villains have been enjoying? Matt Miller: Issue 8 gives a lot of the bells and whistles that Villains enjoy over to Heroes. Heroes get a random mission pool similar to the newspapers in the form of the Police Band missions, as well as their own version of the Mayhem Missions, called Safeguard Missions. We did a lot in this issue to bring parity in terms of features to both sides. Jonathan Trevisani: What are some of the features of Issue 8? How will they change the game play that already exists in Paragon City? Matt Miller: Besides the abovementioned two, there is a rework of the Faultline Zone, showing that the city is finally rebuilding after so many disasters have befallen it. In addition we have Veteran Rewards, which are cool bonus rewards your characters get based on how long you've played the game. Jonathan Trevisani: What are the details of Safeguard missions? What are some of the benefits to completing Safeguard missions aside from the feeling of heroic virtue coursing through your veins? Matt Miller: Safeguard missions involve foiling a bank robbery that is taking place in Paragon City and preventing other mayhem that villains are causing throughout the zone. Foiling the bank robbery will give the player a really cool long-lasting temporary power, and allow them to tackle various side missions that then pop up in the instanced zone. These side missions carry with them badges as well as more temporary powers for you to uncover. Jonathan Trevisani: How will Issue 8 expand on the heroic deeds and the sense that the city is thankful that the player has chosen to defend its citizens? Matt Miller: With the Police Band and Safeguard missions you really get a sense of being reactive to crimes in progress. Heroes don't go out and cause heroism the way villains go out and cause villainy, so there needs to be something for heroes to do in order to save the day. Jonathan Trevisani: What is the Fault Line Zone? How has it changed from the previous area restricted to players? Matt Miller: Faultline used to be a Trial Zone, which meant it was for groups of 6 to 8 characters. Now it's a City Zone, which is good for groups of 1 to 4 characters, with a nice Hazard Zone section (good for 4 to 6 characters). There's been a lot of rebuilding, as well as new shops opening, and new missions to tackle. One thing that was uncovered during the reconstruction was that Arachnos had been digging around in the old Supergroup bases looking for powerful weapons and artifacts that had long been forgotten. Jonathan Trevisani: Are new solo missions available or do they require a super group? What are some of the details of these missions? Matt Miller: A large majority of the content in Issue 8 is available to either a solo player or a group if they decide that's the way they want to play. Jonathan Trevisani: How is the City Of universe coming along in your perspective? What other expansions would you like to see? Matt Miller: We're moving forward at a nice steady pace. I wish we could get the issues out more frequently, and that is something we are trying to do. I would love to see the seeds of the storylines we have been planting for the last two and a half years to come to fruition and fully expect that to happen in the coming years. Jonathan Trevisani: Will future expansions be dedicated to both heroes and villains in the MMO or will they have combined updates? Matt Miller: We're concentrating on content that is available to both heroes and villains. This isn't to say that heroes won't get something unique to them, like, say, a Task Force given out by Statesman himself, but new systems will definitely be implemented on both sides going forward. write your comments about the article :: © 2006 Game News :: home page |