Champions Online – hands-on

To make the missions a little easier (and tons more fun), players will be able to team up and fight evildoers together. That’s especially useful in the missions that involve giant monster fights, like the one against Lemuria’s Megalodon, a ginormous fish-creature that will typically take 20 people to fight. If you find you love your teammates just that much, you can form a Supergroup, Champions’ version of an MMO guild, which enables players to set officers, chat channels and message-of-the-days.

If you’re feeling more competitive and would rather see who is the better hero, Champions has a PvP system with three different types of fights. There’s a “Tournament of Champions” mode where you can create a team of five and battle against another team of five. “Bash” mode is the free-for-all combat that takes place in the slums of Millennium City, and “Apocalypse” mode features the end-of-the-world scenarios heroes prepare for, like prison outbreaks or villain uprisings.

Of course, no good deed goes unnoticed. Perks, like Achievements, are awarded based on various factors such as collecting items, exploring worlds, and completing storylines. These perks aren’t just for bragging, either; you can exchange them for new costume pieces and different weapon and stat upgrades at the perk store.

With so many great things in store for Champions Online, we’re excited for its release on PC this July 14, and fans of Cryptic’s notorious City of Heroes and City of Villains games should feel right at home with their new game. A version for the 360 will also be released in the future, but there’s no official release date yet.

May 13, 2009