DC Universe Online

One of the things I like about my job is the part where I have to play a lot of different games. This is not my default state -- I will happily latch on to games that I like and play them into the ground. The 100-plus hours I've clocked into every Mass Effect installment is proof enough of this. But playing a wider variety of games has given me several opportunities to see things in games, nod my head, and exclaim, "Yes! This is what people should be doing? Why do more games not do this?"

DC Universe Online had me saying that about a lot of elements. And every time I figured I was good and done, I found another one.

A month boomeranging back and forth between lower levels on both factions isn't enough time to get a sense for how the game shakes out over the long run, but it does provide a fairly good overview of the game as a whole. And there's a lot of elements in the game that I found astonishingly clever. It didn't offset the parts that I found somewhat tedious or broken, but it did make the game as a whole interesting on multiple levels.

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SOE's sixth DLC pack for DC Universe Online has launched today, bringing with it a customizable base system that allows players to build their own lair. Appropriately named Home Turf, this content update bring a housing system that players have been anticipating since launch.

Lairs are much more than housing, though. The Lair's Mainframe allows players to unlock and access new combat abilities, and level 30-or-higher players can duel it out with Lair PvP battles.

Be sure to check out all the details in the latest DLC patch notes on the DCUO forums and skip past the cut for the Home Turf launch trailer.

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Over the last couple of days, we've seen some pretty cool clips and snippets of DC Universe Online's Home Turf update. Due on January 29, Home Turf brings an innovative system for player housing, new challenges for heroes and villains, and a 1:1 PvP matchmaking system that lets players duke it out in the comfort of their personal lairs. Don't let the focus on housing fool you, though; Home Turf introduces a host of new features that have the potential to change DCUO as you know it.

We sat down with creative director Jens Andersen for a closer look at Home Turf and the many ways in which it deepens and expands upon DC Universe Online's existing content. Put simply, this latest batch of DLC offers more than just a place to hang your cape.

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Yesterday, we brought you the new DC Universe Online trailer that showed off features of the upcoming Home Turf DLC pack. Shortly after that, Jens Andersen took to Twitter to tease players to be on the lookout for a release date for the highly anticipated update. Luckily, the wait wasn't too terribly long; a recent official tweet revealed that Home Turf launches on January 29th.

Legendary players will be able to access all the new content and grab their personal lairs next Tuesday, as can all PC players and US PS3 players who purchase the DLC. The pack will be available to EU PS3 players the next day, January 30th. Following the lead of previous DLC packs, Home Turf will cost $9.99 USD.

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It's been raining for four days straight, and I've been cooped up in my house with nothing but a head cold and a bunch of time to think about my ideal sandbox MMORPG.

For this week's Some Assembly Required, then, I'm shamelessly borrowing the format from Massively's MMO Blender column to construct a perfect(ly) theoretical hybrid. I've done so once before, but this time I'm going to put the focus on fantasy instead of on the sci-fi stylings of Star Citizen and Star Wars Galaxies.

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Just a few days ago, DC Universe Online's Creative Director Jens Andersen and Systems Designer Andrew Buschmann introduced folks to the new housing lairs in the upcoming, and aptly named, Home Turf DLC via livestream. Today, the duo was joined by Ben Naumann, lead environment artist, for a more in-depth foray into the themes, styles, and overall decorating possibilities of the housing system.

Three distinct themes (dive, art deco, and gothic) will be available for all players who purchase the DLC or who have legendary status, and four others (ancient, industrial, cave, and bunker) can be purchased. Lair trim and certain coloration of the themes matches your superhero's color scheme by default, but can be altered.

The trio also demonstrated decorating and teased viewers with a quick mention of a new amenity: the suit holder. Although there is still no exact release date for Home Turf, you can whet your appetite for what's to come by watching the entire stream after the break. And for more information on the lairs, read Massively's interview with Andersen at SOE Live.

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I'm not going to lie to you, gentle readers -- I did not have high hopes for DC Universe Online when I signed in.

Why not? Lots of reasons. For starters, Champions Online turned out to be very good, and I'm not in the habit of expecting good luck twice in a row. My last outing with a licensed superhero game left me pretty cold. I already knew the game broke from a lot of accepted superhero conventions, and it sure didn't seem like a game that would encourage the same sort of roleplaying atmosphere I love. Last but certainly not least, it's always dicey playing a game designed for both consoles and computers, since frequently one or the other gets the better interface.

Despite all of this, I am happy to say that these fears were unfounded. Or at least unfounded enough for it not to matter, which is close enough to the same thing. DC Universe Online is certainly not a successor to City of Heroes, but it's a lot better than I would have guessed, and it's certainly an interesting game thus far in its own right.

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If you're a fan of superheroes, player housing, or superhero player housing, you're going to want to take a look at the latest livestream vid on the official DC Universe Online TwitchTV channel. On Friday, SOE's Jens Andersen and Andrew Bushman played around with the game's new housing system in a 19-minute excursion that you can watch after the break.

The duo explained a bit about obtaining and accessing DCUO's new superhero lairs, and they also pointed out that you don't have to be a paying customer to get some personal space. Free players will get a small apartment to call their own, while Legendary members will have more options and more available swank.

The housing mechanics will debut with DCUO's latest DLC offering, Home Turf, which is scheduled to release in early 2013.

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There's a new producer's letter up on DC Universe Online's official website. SOE's Larry Liberty checks in to update us on the status of the game's next DLC pack as well as look at what's planned for 2013. Home Turf is still scheduled for "very early in the year," and it will bring with it player bases, lair battles, endgame solo content, and more.

After that, SOE is eyeing several more DLC packs that will bring league bases to the game as well as new raids, alerts, and power revamps focusing on fire and ice. Liberty says PvP and performance issues are on the agenda as well, so click the link below to get all the details.

Would you believe that 70% of DC Universe Online's revenue comes from the PlayStation 3 version of the game? According to the UK version of the official PlayStation magazine, the superhero title and Sony Online Entertainment's Free Realms could possibly be joined on the PS3 by PlanetSide 2 in the future.

When asked directly about the possibility of the new sci-fi MMOFPS showing up on a console, SOE president John Smedley offered an artful deflection. "What I'd say is -- SOE has proven that we can bring our games to the PS3, and it's fair to say that we've got some other stuff out there cooking. I can't tell you what platforms it's for, but we're really excited about it."

[Update: We have corrected the 70% figure quoted directly from PlayStation magazine. According to SOE, Smedley intended to say that the percentage refers to DCUO's revenue, not SOE's revenue as a whole.]

SOE has an early Christmas present for those of you who've been thinking about a return to DC Universe Online. Well, technically, it's for those of you who've been thinking about a return and are former subscribers, but still.

If you've been away for a while, you've missed a lot of stuff, as 2012 featured three DLC releases and 14 game updates.

For most players, "the offer is available to former Legendary Members (subscribers) who were active and paid for at least one billing cycle" between January, 2011 and December, 2012. We say most players because there are differences in the dates depending on whether you're a PC customer or a PlayStation 3 customer from North American or Europe. Check the post on the SOE forums for full details.

John Smedley's MMO revival tour continues, with the latest stop being an interview at Polygon. The SOE CEO lends some context to impressive numbers recently released by the firm touting the success of its new business model intiative, and he also evangelized about the future of the company and EverQuest Next.

Since switching to F2P across its extensive MMO portfolio, SOE has seen DC Universe's daily revenue increase by 700%, EverQuest II's registration numbers triple, and EverQuest's registration numbers tick up by 350%. Oh, and PlanetSide 2? It's seen 1.6 million players registered thus far, 250,000 of whom log in daily. "Free-to-play is just too good of an idea," Smedley says. "The idea is just so simple. It democratizes and capitalizes, makes true capitalism out of the MMO gaming space."

He goes on to say that the MMO industry is stuck in a rut that SOE helped create via design choices made in the original EQ. "We need to change the way we do this," Smedley says. "We're building a sandbox and giving players the tools to help shape the world that they're in. That's the direction we're going in with EverQuest Next; trying to make a world that players create while being in a living, breathing world around them. It's not just a prop for them to walk around in, which is really what all of today's MMOs are. Their worlds are nothing more than a movie set."

Heroism in MMOs is a tricky thing. Most games cast us as some sort of cosmic fulcrum, but then most games also ask us to take a time out from saving the world in order to collect a few thousand rat tails or kill a boss who has already been defeated by a thousand other players.

Action combat MMOs can sometimes turn these trivial tasks into quasi-heroic moments, at least for me. Just the other day I was running yet another daily instance in DC Universe Online, but the game's nifty combos and niftier animations elevated what's normally a by-the-numbers armor grind into something reasonably exciting.

What about you, Massively readers? When's the last time an MMO made you feel heroic, and what were you doing?

Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!

Batman.

He's why I initially played DC Universe Online. He's why I bought the collector's edition pre-launch, and he's generally why I got worked up into a sweaty lather of fanboy expectation that couldn't possibly be met by an MMO with a finite budget.

A couple of years on, I've rediscovered DCUO, and now the reason I play it (a lot) boils down to three letters: SOE.

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