Earlier today, in a joint press release with NCSoft, Cryptic Studios announced that they will no longer be running the CoH/CoV games, and has thus decided to sell the IP to the publisher. It is very shocking news, and we can’t even contemplate what might happen to the game. However, that is not what we are here to discuss. Today, we look at the future of Cryptic Studios, the company that gave us one of the most unique MMORPGs that still exists today.
If you were to look at the Cryptic website you’d notice they have placed a F.A.Q. (here) detailing the issues of the move. Unfortunately, within this F.A.Q. is very limited information on what the company plans on persuing next. So what could be in their future as a company? Three words: Marvel Universe Online.
Marvel, after losing its original lawsuit against Cryptic, has now decided it would be better to bring them into their midst and have them develop their newest endeavor, an MMORPG based off the Marvel comics. This can be seen as a good and bad thing. First off, for those who loved the character creation within CoH, you can expect the same type of creation within Marvel Universe Online only with, presumably, more options and much better graphics. No doubt there will also be more powers and other such things comic book fans love. However, with Cryptic signing on to make this their new MMO can we expect there to be more grind as well? What about the endgame? CoH was notorious for having almost no end-game material.
Cryptic has a good history, but only time will tell whether they have learned from their past mistakes or not. Personally, I think it is a bad idea to have the same company who has developed a Super Hero MMORPG already, develop another one. Although, I wouldn’t mind being proven wrong. The ball is in Cryptic’s court.
So, basically, you think the Marvel MMO will be City of Heroes in a Marvel universe? That’s certainly a possibility.
But I think it’s more likely that Marvel will push them in a different direction. What that direction is, I don’t know. I do know that Marvel is accustomed to linear storytelling, and past video game adaptations have all mimicked this linearity. The gameplay in those games was more about the player unlocking the linear stories than exploring and making meaningful decisions.
Honestly, I don’t what to expect, but I’m betting Cryptic’s going to feel some pressure from Marvel to make design choices they wouldn’t have made otherwise.