City of Heroes (2004)

If City of Heroes were still around, I dunno... I might still be playing it, aged graphics and all.

I think what I loved most about it was that it was not a Marvel, DC, or any other kind of big corporate-backed superhero entity, but it was every inch the 4-color superhero experience that any of them could've put forth. The leveling, gameplay, diversity of power sets, campaign missions, PvP, squad missions, monster raids... this felt like I was LIVING in a comic book superhero city-world, and I could not get enough of it. You had multiple slots to create all kinds of different concepts for your hero, and you could play them to max level (or not) and then take on the endgame content.

Fond memories of this game:

• Using my energy/force field hero to LITERALLY bounce opponents from one rooftop to the other until I killed them;
• Trolling other players in the PvP zones and knocking flyers out of the air and watching them fall a looooooong distance (I only did this to entertain my little sister, who thought it was hilarious) to their near deaths;
• Kroatoa was a thematically awesome map;
• Getting pissed off at higher level mobs, gaining about 5 levels, and then coming back and revenge ROFLstomping them. I was always petty to the AI.

I loved this game so much for the overall experience. I love it still. Hopefully we'll get a spiritual successor that proves worthy some day.

On several different shelves because of its nebulous status: Played because I've played it during its heyday, Wishlisted because, like Spider-Man Unlimited, it's officially gone and I WANT IT BACK DAMMIT, and Playing because I occasionally log into one of the legacy servers that run the game.

If City of Heroes were still around, I dunno... I might still be playing it, aged graphics and all.

I think what I loved most about it was that it was not a Marvel, DC, or any other kind of big corporate-backed superhero entity, but it was every inch the 4-color superhero experience that any of them could've put forth. The leveling, gameplay, diversity of power sets, campaign missions, PvP, squad missions, monster raids... this felt like I was LIVING in a comic book superhero city-world, and I could not get enough of it. You had multiple slots to create all kinds of different concepts for your hero, and you could play them to max level (or not) and then take on the endgame content.

Fond memories of this game:

• Using my energy/force field hero to LITERALLY bounce opponents from one rooftop to the other until I killed them;
• Trolling other players in the PvP zones and knocking flyers out of the air and watching them fall a looooooong distance (I only did this to entertain my little sister, who thought it was hilarious) to their near deaths;
• Kroatoa was a thematically awesome map;
• Getting pissed off at higher level mobs, gaining about 5 levels, and then coming back and revenge ROFLstomping them. I was always petty to the AI.

I loved this game so much for the overall experience. I love it still. Hopefully we'll get a spiritual successor that proves worthy some day.

On several different shelves because of its nebulous status: Played because I've played it during its heyday, Wishlisted because, like Spider-Man Unlimited, it's officially gone and I WANT IT BACK DAMMIT, and Playing because I occasionally log into one of the legacy servers that run the game.