Well, the Champions Online Beta seems to be over. It was a lot of fun. I've posted some memories of it in my scrapbook here for you all to enjoy. I'm not crying though. The head-start weekend starts this Friday, and the game formally releases this Monday. So let's take a few days to pause for some perspective.

It totally whomps on City of Heroes. I've built or tried to build Kryptonian girls in both (and other) games. The super strength/invulnerability sets on CoX always seemed underpowered and unsatisfying. It took a lot of building and leveling up in Champions Online to get my Power Girrrl toon to specs, but once she was there she was VERY satisfying. She had decent invulnerability, heat beam eyes, even frost breath...but it was her strength that they finally started to get right in a video game. My only complaint was that the breasts size slider wimped out WAAAAY too soon. But then again, the game's rated Teen so there has to be some limit.

Yeah, Champions Online was buggier'n a picnic bench on a termite mound when beta first opened. But by the time beta ended a week later there were only 3 mishes I couldn't accomplish and really only a couple of things I was left hungry for.

My only concern now is for replayability. The world may be open, but the missions are quite linear. We'll see how fast they start adding on new branches. Regardless: for letting me hoist tractors n' beat people with them Champions Online earned my lifetime subscription.