Marvel Goes MMPORG

traskjd writes "C|net reports that Vivendi Universal has announced that they are working with Marvel Enterprises to create a Massively Multiplayer online game. The game has your favorite Marvel characters such as the Hulk. However don't hold your breath as the game is touted as coming out in 2005." Ha. Maybe DC will get their act together, and then CowboyNeal can fufil his wildest dreams as the Green Lantern.

Comments

Character limit?

[Spazholio]

I've been a Marvel fan for quite some time, and am well aware that there are many charaters in there, however, that number is quite finite. Once people snatch up all the pre-existing characters, how do they plan on having anyone else play? Make up your own character? Give them whatever powers you choose? Maybe have 1,836 people ALL playing Spider-Man (not to mention all the irritating Venom/Carnage/clone divergents)? Sounds like an interesting idea, I'm all for anything that brings comics to the forefront, and dispels the notion that they're ONLY for children. Hope they can pull it off.

Re:Character limit?

[vjmurphy]

And does Marvel really want the typical MMORPG attracted to this game playing Spider-Man et al? Nothing like having your flagship characters spouting things like "fag" or "u r gay" to other characters.

I would bet that only GMs would get to play any named characters to avoid such problems. Of course, that would pretty much make the game worthless. Who wants to play Color-Excreter Lad when you really want to play Black Panther?

Re:Character limit?

[Bilestoad]

Did you play "Freedom Force"? There was a wealth of abilities and attributes for creating your own character. Running out of Marvel identities shouldn't be too much of a problem, in fact I wouldn't be letting random players have Marvel characters at all, but I would have all the big names as NPCs or hire people to play them as staff - kind of like walking into Disneyland and there's a guy in a Mickey Mouse suit, if you know what I mean.

Or, auction the Marvel characters, or compete for the right to play them. You could use a ladder system like Bungie did for Myth online, top player of the month gets to pick a Marvel character first, and so on.

Re:Character limit?

[shut_up_man]

These are the same problems Sony & Lucasarts are going to have with Star Wars Galaxies. What stops people from ALL becoming Dark Jedi called Darth l33t with double-ended red lightsabers? I'd expect Marvel start players as fairly weak heroes and allow them to improve their powers and run factions (superhero groups) up to the point where the highest level players might be in the realm of the X-Men, Alpha Flight, etc. If they want to be Spider-Man, yay... they'll just suck compared to the real thing. Sony have also indicated in Galaxies that heroes like Luke Skywalker and Han Solo will make the very very rare appearance, but will be impossible to kill, to prevent lame stuff. Of course, that didn't quite happen with Lord British on UO...

Re:Character limit?

[Zathrus]

What stops people from ALL becoming Dark Jedi called Darth l33t with double-ended red lightsabers

Presuming that there's interdependance on other PCs, then people will discover quickly that role-playing an "evil" character is no different from being an asshole. And in MMORPGs most assholes don't make it because they get a rep and can't advance by themselves.

So while there may be a preponderance of dark jedi (although I think SOE claimed they would be "limiting" the number of people playing Jedi somehow), they'll virtually all wind up being really nice guys, just like Dark Elves did in EQ.

Of course, as a reformed EQ addict, I can't implore people enough to stay away from EQ or SW:G or pretty much anything else like it. There are people who can balance something addictive like a MMORPG and real life, but most geeks don't fall into that category -- goal-oriented, highly focused personalities tend to get sucked in to this kind of thing, especially since it fulfills a social interaction need often not found elsewhere in geek life.

Of course, I appear to have replace the EQ addiction with a somewhat lesser /. addiction...

Re:Character limit?

[artemis67]

Will there be a nuclear power plant near by? Radioactive fallout from a nuclear accident should be good enough to generate a few hundred thousand Silver Age heroes.

Or, maybe a hole in the ozone layer allows the city to be bathed by those mysterious Cosmic Rays(tm).

Re:Character limit?

[Zork the Almighty]

This game will end up just like "The Tick", with thousands of superheroes, all with useless abilities. Me, I'm SlugMan, oh no ! Salt ! AARRGGHH....

You can already do this!

[Anonymous Coward]

Try freedom force -- www.myfreedomforce.com!

i should be...

[bje2]

well the girls have always told me i'm like "The Flash" in bed...oh, wait...

I'm a little skeptical

[Metaldsa]

I love games, I love comics, I love Marvel. However, this just doesn't sound that great. The point of being a superhero is that you are unique. Its not really strength, but relative strength, that people desire.

An example is how Wonder Woman is not unique in her amazonian land. However, when she is off fighting against normal criminals she is unique. Imagine living (as an amazonian) in the land of the amazonians? Everyone is the same strength so it would be quite boring.

The only way to alleviate this problem would to make the server size limited compared to other MMORPGs and the size of the maps huge. If you could visit 30 cities, average of 50 heroes to a city, it would be fun. That makes only 1,500 per server. I have heard the new Star Wars MMORPG might have 50,000 per server (but I could be deadly wrong). If you end up in a city with 1,000 heroes it would seem like you wouldn't get that unique feel you read about in the books.

Re:I'm a little skeptical

[squaretorus]

Imagine living (as an amazonian) in the land of the amazonians?

WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO DO TO ME!!!!!!

Reverse the characters

[squaretorus]

Rather than playing a super hero, the game could be based around inhabiting the land of the superheroes - and trying to get yourself into positions where you require their attention.

I'm not into Marvel, having been a DC kiddie, so forgive the character references. But if you kick some ass outside a cinema you get a pounding from Batman, if you don't wash for like, a year, you get a fungus on your toes that Swamp Thing has to come and eradicate. Say 'Im gonna shag that Lois Lane good' enough and eventually Superman will kick your ass.

You build up 'exposure' points until you earn the right to BE a supe for a while!!! Then you can go around listening out for people saying "Where's little jimmy!"

Re:Reverse the characters

[mccalli]

Say 'Im gonna shag that Lois Lane good' enough and eventually Superman will kick your ass.

Well no. Say that for long enough and eventually it would be Lois Lane that kicks your ass...

Cheers,
Ian

Re:The Beyonder

[Ubergrendle]

Oh yeah, well i have the Infinite Gauntlet, so there! Actually, no, wait, I'm the Anti-Monitor so there! No, wait a sec -- no, actually, I'm Dr Manhattan...

The problem with comic book universes is that they're always trying to one-up the past and come up with the REAL ultimate threat. Take a took at the X-Men. Magneto was the real badass mutant...but hold on, if you think HE was bad, just wait until you tangle with the Hellfire Club. Whoops, never mind...those Sentinels are even WORSE...except, well, for that Mutant Massacre thingy with Mr Sinister.

Did anyone ever read Zenith?

[Hobbes_]

2000AD comics.

It's about a superhero who couldn't give a toss about saving the world.

One point in the story line was that there were multiple universes. In one of these universes it was all populated with superheros and only one normal person, who was being pestered the heck out of.

In a world where everyone wants to be a hero, who plays the normal people?

One of the things, well really the only thing that makes MMORPG's is the human element. I think this alone is what may stunt the growth of such games. If all the normal characters are NPC's then there are no worries about secret identitys and a lot of players will treat the NPC's as fog of war.

By the way, anyone who can't wait until 2005 I recommend you check out City of Heroes which plans to Beta test in early 2003 and has some nice movies of the gameplay. They also have a very indepth FAQ (Geek level :)

Re:Comic book setting not appropriate for an MMORP

[mccalli]

Who are you going to save from Evil, your fellow superheroes?

Yes. You see, it's all in a day's work for Bicycle Repair Man...

Cheers,
Ian

Who wants to be a super hero...

[clickety6]

... when you be a super villain instead, and get away with using cheats because it's only acting in character ;-)

Re:Who wants to be a super hero...

[unicron]

Or just choose an invulernable, omnipotent character, like the Overseer. Destroy the universe as a whole everytime you log in.

Earth - Smoking hole of hellish torment

[Chase]

Ha, what a riot. It will be a realm with a few super heroes and thousands of super villians. How much fun is it to sit in your Heroes Hall when you could be out throwing cars around and knocking the top of mountains off.

The major problem will be PvP. You can't really have a Marvel story with out Super-hero vs. super-villian.

Chase

Re:The problem with these licenses

[Kintanon]

Star Wars RPG takes care of this nicely. In the Star Wars RPG most people end up being more like Han Solo or Leie, or a Storm Trooper than a Jedi. Each party of 6 might have 1 Jedi in it. Some parties will have none, and in some rare campaigns you'll have 5 Jedi and a noble. I think that with the range of character classes available the Mass Jedi problem won't be quit as big as people think. I personally would rather be Han Solo than Luke Skywalker (Whiny farmboy....) but then, that's just me.

Kintanon

That's easy -- CLONES!

[mblase]

Spider-Man's been cloned at least once, maybe twice. One clone of Cable. Two of Marvel Girl (if you count Phoenix). The villain Carnage had, I think, six "spawns" with basically identical powers. If you need to re-use the same Marvel character more than once at a time, it's insanely easy. The technology's there. :)

I foresee two big problems with a Marvel MMPORG, though. First, the resurrection factor -- it's impossible to keep ANY Marvel character dead, whether he be good, evil or civilian. So there's no danger to the player, right? Get killed, come back a few days later, repeat ad nauseam. Want to fight? Just run in, guns or powers blazing, and expect to get resurrected next week if it turns out to be fatal.

The second is the power-upgrade factor. This is a corollary of the death factor -- ninety-nine percent of the time, in the Marvel Universe, a super-hero's resurrection is ALWAYS accompanied by an amplification of his powers, if not a completely new set of them. So there's actually an INCENTIVE for players to rush in and get killed -- they'll increase their level status that much more quickly, possibly taking entire quantum leaps with each successive death.

I'd like nothing better than to play a Marvel mutant super-hero online, myself. By skillfully employing the above tactics, I'd be at god-level powers in a month, no sweat.

Weighty subject

[Dirtside]

Maybe DC will get their act together, and then CowboyNeal can fufil his wildest dreams as the Green Lantern.

Don't you mean the Green Lighthouse?

2nd rate heros

[phriedom]

The very first thing I thought of when I read this was: Mystery Men. Since it just wouldn't do to have everyone be Spider-Man, most of the players will, at least at first, have to throw forks or swing shovels. Then I realized that if people create their own characters and make their own names, it will be more like The Tick because if people can't be Batman, then there will be a Der Fliedermouse (spelling?) I think I would choose something like The Mutterer or The Umpire if I were to play.