Champions Online pre-orders detailed

Atari and Cryptic Studios have announced details on exclusive Champions Online pre-order and launch content for select retailers in North America including Best Buy, Amazon.com, GameStop and Wal-Mart. With the game coming out on September 1st, Cryptic is getting the buy early crowd revved up with specific retail pre-order bonuses.

GameStop customers who pre-order the game will receive access to the Early Start Program, the exclusive Insectoid Airfoil costume piece and the Experimental Anti-Graviton Generator flight travel power at character creation. Wal-Mart can get the Limited Edition Package with collectible lenticular cover that includes an exclusive zone map, iron-on decal and an additional ten in-game micro-transaction dollars.

Best Buy customers who pre-order will get the Lil’ Champ Pack, which contains a persistent pet from the Champions universe. Best Buy customers will receive a functional damage resistance item and access to the Early Start Program and head start weekend as well. Amazon customers will get the High Roller Pack with three unique apparel options (harlequin headpiece, black knight helmet, grenade chest strap), and an additional five in-game micro-transaction dollars.

Finally, all pre-order customers receive guaranteed access to the Champions Online open beta test on August 17, 30-days of free play and five in-game micro-transaction dollars.

Nemesis Online to follow Champions Online?

I remember many years ago when City of Heroes was announced and i’d had the chance to grill Jack Emmert about the game. One of the first things I asked him was “will users be able to play as villains?” The answer was an emphatic yes. Seeing the regularity and frequency of that question being asked, Cryptic decided that it really needed to have that Villain system in place, so instead of building it from scratch, the developers simply used the City of Heroes technology, changed it a little and pushed it out because they only had a year to do it.

With Champions Online Cryptic wants to once again offer players the chance to be a villain, but this time it won’t rush things, according to this news report.

This information comes from this G4 Jack Emmert interview, where he gives the dark side of the MMO world, Nemesis Online, some attention. Here’s an excerpt:

G4: So, if you were to make – I don’t know what the opposite of Champions Online would be –

JE: Nemesis Online.

G4: Nemesis Online! Is that something you’ve talked about?

JE: Yes, we have. Look, if Champions is successful and people want that, heck yeah. But, I think that I already have a very different idea in mind for that. I think in City of Villains, we were asked to make the game in about a year, and so we were kind of focused on “We gotta get this done.” So, we just took the template of City of Heroes and copied it. If I were to do it over again, I would create a very different type of gameplay for villain worlds.

So is the future going to be Nemesis Online after Champions Online is complete? If fans want it, yes - but the moral of this story is don’t expect as fast a turn-around as we saw with City of Villains.

LOGIN 2009 Speakers

Evergreen Events has released the official schedule for the 2009 LOGIN Conference, a week-long event dedicated to the business of online gaming - from multiplayer technology to MMOs and all stops in between. Looking through the speakers list on the conference’s official site, there’s a lot of familar names and companies attending including my former colleague from GameSpy Todd “Tungsten” Northcutt (consider that and official shout out, Todd). The annual event takes place in Seattle, Washington May 11 - 14 at the Seattle Marriott Waterfront Hotel.

So who will be at LOGIN? Robin Walker from Valve Software, and reps from such companies as Xbox 360, Atlus Online, Turbine Entertainment, Sony Online Entertainment, Simutronics, Netdevil, Near Death Studios, 38 Studios, VentureBeat, Bohle Company, Funcom, Divide By Zero, GamerDNA, GGL Global Gaming, Wonacott Communications, Gazillion Entertainment, Flying Lab Software, Cryptic, THQ, Big Fish Games and on and on. Over 85 speakers are expected to attend to give speeches, partake in panels and interact in over 60 sessions across three and a half days.

For more information on LOGIN, hit the link above.

Ubisoft Looking for More Growth?

Interesting news this week out of Ubisoft. It looks like the publisher just isn’t happy with its current size. During a presentation at the 36th Annual UBS Global Media Conference, Ubi CFO Alain Martinez is currently negotiating with at least three different studios for possible acquisition.

“We have about three deals within the five million Euro range, each of them, that we are negotiating,” said Martinez. “Probably, one or two of them will be closed in the next three or four months.”

This year has seen no shortage of acquisitions and mergers in the video game industry, and Ubisoft has already picked up more than a few studios of its own, most recently acquiring World in Conflict developer, Massive Entertainment.

And while Ubisoft seems to be eager to snap up available studios, it recently missed out on one major acquisition. According to Martinez, Ubisoft was in talks to pick up MMO developer Cryptic Studios, only to lose out to Atari earlier this week.

“We lost one deal which we were a bit mad,” he said. “We lost Cryptic. It’s a U.S. company. That was taken by Atari [and] we were a bit disappointed.”

2K Games Signs Champions Online

Champions Online, Cryptic Studios rebound after its long-time marriage toi City of Heroes, now has a publishers. 2K Games announced that it has secured the rights to Cryptic’s next super hero MMO, with plans to publish it in the early part of 2009 on PC and Xbox 360. The game is based on modified rules from the Champions pen and paper RPG, which Cryptic bought earlier this year. The idea behind the game is to give players a more robust creation system that in turn gives them better control over the powers they can select and have access to.

To say I’m excited about Champions Online would be a major understatement. The only thing Cryptic needs to worry about is SOE’s DC Universe game, which also looks pretty damn awesome. I’ll be scoping both these games out at E3 next week.