Controlling your hero is simple enough and the game does have built in support for the Xbox 360 controller for Windows, featuring button mapping and a quickly understandable controller interface. Even the keyboard mappings are fairly simple at the lower levels as players have a limited number of options in their power portfolio. Initially, regardless of the choice of power archetype you make, you have two basic abilities – one that generates power points and one that is chargeable and spends these points. The longer you charge, the more effective or damaging the power becomes and use is based on a see-saw application of the two base powers to manage resources.
As you advance in levels you gain new traits – adjectives that tweak and boost statistics and new refinements or power stunts for your powers that enhance the basic power or add a cool tailored effect. Players will find it takes a long time to really max out the powers in this game and each power can be augmented only five times though maxing even one power out takes quite a few levels.
Unlike a traditional MMO where the acquisition of skills/talents or abilities really fills out a character's deck of available actions, Champions seems to focus on refining a core set of abilities that players will choose throughout the career of their hero. This fits pretty well in the setting, for example over time Wolverine doesn't really gain new abilities (or rarely does anyway) in the comics but new writers tend to refine or tweak the way his powers work – Champions character advancement system replicates this dynamic pretty well.
Lots of folks out there might think that the lack of the big name license like Marvel or DC comics would hurt a super hero game, but strangely the universe Champions occupies has almost as long and storied a history as any modern major comic book universe. Champions began life as a traditional tabletop role-playing game – its in many ways the D&D of super hero RPGs and continues as a pen-and-paper game to this day. This long history means that players will be adventuring in a world with some developed depth to it. Millennium City, Dr. Destroyer, the Champions are all very well detailed figures in the game's universe and have existed in their various forms for over 20 years.
Fans of Marvel and DC will also quickly notice the homage that Champions and its settings play to the archetypes and heroes of those media empires – sure there is no Incredible Hulk in the Champions world, but a similar archetype – the irradiated mutant berserker Grond – serves a similar story purpose and allows players to experience some of the key elements of the popular Marvel universe without being constrained by Marvel's licensing or continuity.
The game begins with players taking the role of a new hero in a tutorial instance – the game organizes players into small instances which limits the population a bit to control camping and resource farming problems common in many massive world single instance games. Your hero is tasked with defending Millennium City from an alien incursion while discovering the fate of the city's world famous super team – The Champions. You encounter key NPCs and learn the tricks of the game while cruising through the first 5-8 levels of experience.
Page 2 of 3
