Faith in my Fellow Gamer

Well, I spent today being completely unproductive - and I loved it.

Yes, I have one of those screwed up schedules that change weekly. So I had Thursday off. What to do on a Thursday - the day before payday? Hmmmm.... How about play online!

I picked up City of Heroes last week (given (a) it was the DVD edition with the first two expansions, (b) it was $20, and (c) you get a month free.) I've played it a little, getting my Mutant Tanker up to lvl 8 going mostly solo.

Today, I started playing around 8:30-9 AM. Stopped around 1 for lunch and to call my wife (maybe it was around 2,) and again around 6 for dinner. Other than that - I played for nearly 12 hours, and had a LOT of fun.

Yet, what about the title - faith in my fellow gamer? Well, since the 1337-733\|\s took over on Diablo and D2, which *were* what I used to play online (years ago,) I have not liked playing online - not unless I'm going with people I know (usually in person.) This steals part of the whole online experience - meeting people (sort of) and playing with them, seeing different play styles and builds and the like. It makes the game much less enjoyable. Prior to that, the main game I played online (this is dating myself) was NetMEch - Mechwarrior II online, and we had a *great* group (Clan Black Sheep) to play with.

Well, mix that with a monthly fee (on top of paying $50 for a game,) and I've given most MMORPGs a pass. Why would I want to pay for that sort of annoyance and frustration?

During the last few months, though, my (in person) gaming group had started playing Silver Age Sentinels - yes, no D&D, but a campy, fun superhero RPG. Unfortunately, due to some real life situations with two of our gamers (who live about an hour and change north of here,) we haven't been playing for a while. Oh, the southern group was playing (somewhat, with the holiday break and all) but - well, let's just say the itch to get back into Silver Age was very strong.

I spent $10 on Freedom Force - a squad-level RTS game, essentially, themewise similar (vaguely) to Myth. (No resource building, etc. just get your troops and go.) It's similar to Silver Age in feel - campy, 50-60's ish comic book, over the top uniforms, throwing cars to stop bad guys, that sort of thing, but it didn't really fill that need. (Don't get me wrong, it's a great game, and for $10 it's a *steal.*) So - City of Heroes it was. Hey, I have a month free, right?

How good is it? Well, let's just say sinc elast weekend, pretty much every moment I'm not sleeping, working, eating or in the bathroom, I'm playing this game. Yet, that doesn't explain the title on its own.

No, today restored my faith in my fellow gamer - specifically in my fellow gamer not being an ass. Today, I joined a team (temporary) and went cruising through a few areas I wouldn't have bothered trying on my own. First team? Awful -at least for me, being the lowest level on the group, and a tank as well. Then that team got trimmed down, and it was *great.* City of Heroes with a 3-4 person team is a great time.... It was true with the second team (which was down to two people, both lower level than me, and needing help.) We took on a number of (larger) bad-guy groups - all NPC these days, since City of Villains isn't out yet - and did better than expected. I tanked and beat on things, the Protector healed and occasionally drew out isolated enemies (so we didn't have to deal with large groups) and - I forget what class the third guy was - but they buffed, fought, and isolated enemies as well. We had a *really* good time, what can I say...

Far different from my filled-with-cheats/hacks/"hey n00b"/PK-filled Diablo experiences, what can I say.

If you want to try an MMORPG, give City of Heroes a try (and if you're on Pinnacle and see Memphis Bill, say hi.) If you don't want that, my housemate's been trying World of Warcraft and says much the same thing... the community rocks.