So, how would you set up a Marvel MMO?

[dvandom]

The more I find out about DC Universe Online, the more I think they're Doing It Wrong. But the original premise that lets them have thousands of new heroes running around, that works fine. When setting an MMO in an existing property, you need a reason why there's all these non-canon characters, after all, and "Lex Luthor came back from a horrible future with a bunch of stolen powers he's giving out in an attempt to avert that future" works fine.

How would you set up the MMO premise for Marvel?

Make this an alternate Earth where Scarlet Witch never turned into Crossover Queen. The world still has thousands of mutants, and governments around the world are desperate to find ways to cope with this explosion of powered entities.

New players can create a mutant, or a tech/training character from one of the many programs set up to deal with mutants. Other origins (magic, cosmic rays, etc) would be unlockable or added in expansions. Mutants would start off with one power and learn new ways to use it as they gain experience. At some point, they'd unlock a Secondary Mutation. Tech characters would have access to various relatively mundane gear (think SHIELD agent grunts, so maybe jetpacks as the high end), and instead of a Secondary Mutation they'd get to pick up a more advanced tech path (powered armor being an obvious possibility). Both archetypes would have access to training abilities (martial arts, mental resistance techniques, etc), although the tech characters might get better versions.

Comments

[z-gryphon.livejournal.com]

Setting a game in any established genre universe is going to lead to the same basic problem: simply by being established, the universe already has hordes of hugely powerful NPCs who have done, or are destined to do, everything that is actually of any real interest in the universe. LucasArts discovered this first-hand with the full-speed run into the closed patio door of the marketplace that was Star Wars Galaxies, Cryptic learned it (or rather evidently didn't learn it) with Champions Online - and actually anticipated it by creating the City of Heroes universe from the ground up with the all-powerful NPCs that player characters can never, ever be as awesome as right from eight o'clock Day 1, which was an interesting but I might say a bit misguided approach to the problem. DC's going to run into the same thing with DCUO and any Marvel MMO will have exactly the same problem too. There's just too much history in any pre-established fictional universe for the flavor to be preserved without the Signature Characters who, by their very existence, make the player characters' journeys pretty much meaningless in the grander scheme of things. Whatever you do, however powerful you are, you're going to wake up tomorrow morning and there are still going to be Skulls blowing up people's cars in Kings' Row.

As a premise pitfall, I think that's more or less insurmountable. You can wave your hands all you want - and your suggestion for Marvel's not a bad handwave as they go - but at the end of the day you're still going to be in the same corner, because it's dictated not by any kind of dramatic requirement, but rather the cold numbers of how an MMO works. Actually, I think that's my whole beef with shared-world games in general. You can never actually be in any way significant to the universe, because that would change all the other players' gaming experiences, and that's neither practical nor good business. It's why I eventually got so tired of City of Heroes I haven't even bought the expansion that would finally allow me to do with my first City of Villains character what she was designed to do in the first place (that is, bag the villain game and become a hero).