When people ask me what was so memorable about City of Heroes, in addition to the character creator, mechanic customization, enemy variance, etc, I think of the city itself. The history, the feel of the city, the sneaking suspicion that the city planners were a bunch of insane escaped mad science experiments...
What?
Okay, look, I got on Titan Network's Icon program and looked around Atlas Park to remissness, and I was reminded that Paragon City was a very interesting city with a lot of variance to it. Including some things that just make no sense, or some thing that just add a little flavor into the zone when it wasn't needed. And they didn't need to do it, but they did, and I appreciate it.
Or I just find it hilarious.
Okay, look, everyone who has played City of Heroes remembers this view:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/bsxvGek.png[/img]
Please feel free to take this moment to sigh nostalgically.
But does anyone remember this one?
[img]https://i.imgur.com/ogS2dKb.png[/img]
Yes, that's a building in Atlas. Actually two; they're not connected by any kind of walkway, only those tresses. Really. They both seem stable on their own, but they're just... tressed together. There's two different instances of this setup on the Atlas Park map, no less!
[img]https://i.imgur.com/DCvZuv8.png[/img]
One of them has a fountain.
There's several different styles or large building in Atlas, most of which are used twice. Here's some handsome specimens whose architecture made me smile:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/m5AnWJh.png[/img]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/FHidfNG.png[/img]
Of course, small buildings, like this little brick apartment are repeated extensively.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/gEGDKlD.png[/img]
But that's not too big of a-what's that?
[img]https://i.imgur.com/eaorhQY.png[/img]
Wh-there's a brick apartment with extra corners? Just, a brick apartment with corners grafted on? There's two of this specimen in Atlas, and I have been told that designs like this aren't too unusual in real life. Still, it means that they made a fancy rare version of the brick apartment.
And that's not the only building in Atlas that's been to the corner clinic:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/gudVBsT.png[/img]
This guy is one of a kind, and at first I thought it was just one building pasted on top of another. It's not; this was specifically built this way. And then only used once in Atlas Park!
[img]https://i.imgur.com/H1YR9XJ.png[/img]
Representative Sample of the statues everywhere in the city. This one's in a little shallow lake. I don't know why. It's just... there. I don't think there was a plaque nearby or anything, but I might be wrong.
And if we're talking about details, we can't forget the signs:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Bz6sey6.png[/img]
I don't even think Blackwell has a mission, just a billboard.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Jb0o8jT.png[/img]
Hotel Geneva and the attached Royals Book Store. I wonder who's wearing the pants in that relationship.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/eBYq2LO.png[/img]
These guys are daring, advertising brazenly in Atlas Park. Even more so than you know! See, this little bondsman place...
[img]https://i.imgur.com/UBlIoRN.png[/img]
Is a stone's throw away from the Atlas branch of Icon!
As I was exploring, I kept finding signs for RH. What's RH? A Pharmaceutical company? Well, it's not like it matters.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/v3nEnHA.png[/img]
Except that the Paragon Transport Administration seems to rent an office in the RH building.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/4TfCs4y.png[/img]
I remember this ad! I'm pretty sure every speedster in the city remembers this ad! See, if you didn't have super jump or flight and you wanted to get on the tram, you had to climb that staircase there to get up to the tram station. Or you could head left a ways to get to a ramp, but of course you weren't afraid of super-speeding up stairs!
So I don't know about alla y'all but I got hover on my speedster to avoid having to climb those stairs.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/d7p0Gxo.png[/img]
Graffiti tax. I remember the Paragon City Graffiti because sometimes police officers would be standing around staring at it. And that was just a cool detail, something that added a little to the city. Give you a feeling that the police really were trying to help.
One thing I noticed about Atlas is that there's a lot of Green space. Not just the fountains and planters, just...
[img]https://i.imgur.com/j64BXGm.png[/img]
Little tiny park rectangles. You can find these all over the place near businesses.
Of course, businesses also take their planters seriously, like this one here:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/C7ebttG.png[/img]
Yes, you know a business takes their location in Atlas Park seriously when they have four water features and six grassy things.
As an aside, it's possible that the greatest battle in Atlas park was not on the steps of City Hall, but between the green areas and the tile slopes:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/4QIt288.png[/img]
The tile slopes don't go anywhere. They're just around.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/gPh8qOU.png[/img]
Look at this conflict, frozen in time.
Shopping centers pitch in for the greenery, too! Such as this one with a pair of water features and planted flowers.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/yWP70aq.png[/img]
Can't you just imagine yourself sitting down and staring deep into that sewer pipe? Just peering into the darkness hoping beyond hope that nothing is watching you back.
Pedestrian traffic is very important in Atlas Park. That's why out behind the back of city hall you can find this:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/VS8rgmL.png[/img]
Pedestrian traffic bridges so the pedestrians can go over the pedestrian traffic below!
I mean, sure, that might just be an artistic thing. That'd fit in, too. Why, take this for example:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/fQHPpO3.png[/img]
If this tall modern art installment was painted bright blue and spewing water, it would fit right in in my home city!
Atlas Park's greenery requirements leave it up to the companies on HOW the greenery happens, and so some companies have gotten creative.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Q4VOSRA.png[/img]
Like this one, who put a park INSIDE their building.
No, go back and look at that again. THINK ABOUT IT. Trees need about the same depth in soil as they have in height. That place must have 15+feet of dirt under there!
Come to think of it, those greenery standards are likely what's going on in the Argosy Dirt Pit:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/j5akAZ9.png[/img]
I don't know why you need semi trucks full of gravel to greenify your dirt pit, but as long as they're making progress I won't complain.
Of course, the big problem in Atlas is the wide variance in elevation. You think being sent to the wrong side of the complex by your GPS is bad, just imagine if you thought your destination was on the wrong side of this:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/wBmEZK5.png[/img]
Yes, each of those areas has a different elevation. I assume that the zoning committee cleared this. Actually, the zoning committee probably did this on purpose. The Zoning Committee is not a group of sane people.
Smaller companies sometimes need to get creative to fulfill their needs. Take this one for instance:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/rhxdsw2.png[/img]
No shady alleyway? Just create one! Perfect.
In any case, after a long day's work it would be nice to be able to leave your building and be able to spot your car at a distance. This is made possible because auto manufacturers in Titan City know that more colors exist than White, Black, Silver, and Hotrod Red.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/euuTaUd.png[/img]
Truly, this is an amazing city. It likely helps that no one's purchased a new car since the rikti attacked.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Z5SricR.png[/img]
Yep, count 'em: That's SIX little headlights.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/W3Lwag6.png[/img]
This car has normal headlights, but the maker decided that they wanted to appeal to the market that liked bulletproof rears over visibility.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/4wh5aa8.png[/img]
Found this portal. I don't know what it is or where it goes. Seems important. I'm not worried about it, though.
Even if the heroes are gone, the Atlas Lions continue their vigil. The park is in good hands.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/MrhiyIo.png[/img]
Check out the full album: https://imgur.com/a/hAqihAo
Under Construction...
This is pretty great. a lot of CoH was like this; lots of small things that weren't particularly important, but gave the city its character.
An infinite number of tries doesn't mean that any one of those tries will succeed. I could flip an infinite number of pennies an infinite number of times and, barring genuine randomness, they will never come up "Waffles".
Indeed. The city really was a main character.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
I'm almost positive that portal went to Praetoria.
Oh my god. ???? The feels.
Thanks for this.
A few comments on this images above (musing tone, not "correcting" or anything like that).
The seemingly random corner details on those brick buildings is in fact (as you mentioned) a very common thing in real life. It's one of a great many techniques to add visual interest to what could otherwise be a very sever, austere facade. It's generally only one of many such features used on a building, though the nature of CoX as a video game would have meant cutting out most of the rest to save on processing power. Here's an example:
[img]http://lingmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/hannover2.jpg[/img]
Pretty sure the wierd back window on that tan car is supposed to be one of these:
[img]https://i.pinimg.com/originals/d0/21/97/d02197c6eefa1b1dcc00a29c51b54d2a.jpg[/img]
The very low detail just makes it look strange.
As for the tower-top park, don't ya know? CoX was just ahead of the times. Eco/Green-towers are a real thing these days:
[img]https://weare.travel/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/weekend-a-Milano-bosco-verticale-we-are-travel-blog.jpg?x15858[/img]
As a note, the comment about the trees needing as much dirt above them as below them depends enormously on the type of tree.
There are quite a few spots on I-90 in WA state where you find full-sized pines growing over roadways with only a few feet of dirt.
https://imgur.com/1yBFiHW
[color=#ff0000]Composition Team[/color]
[img]http://missingworldsmedia.com/images/favicon.ico[/img]
I can vouch for this as several spots like the one shown exist on the Western Oregon and Washington freeway overpasses particularly near the major city regions.
"A sad spectacle. If they be inhabited, what a scope for misery and folly. If they be not inhabited, what a waste of space." ~ Thomas Carlyle
Thanks, Lost. That was both a nice trip down memory lane and quite hilarious.
Based on what MWM has told us, I look forward to a much more realistic looking Titan City.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Neat! All of this. I appreciate pointing out details that I don't know or missed. I never got very far in CoH so I'll be missing some context for certain things, and my breadth of travel is also limited.
I do intend to continue this (when, I don't know). I'm considering maybe Mercy next. I doubt Mercy will have as much content as Atlas did, but comparing the hero and villain start zones might be nice.
Under Construction...
Where was that building with the garden under the dome?
I don't remember ever seeing that in-game!
"I don't think you understand the gravity of your situation."
It's near one of the corners, I couldn't tell you more (my navigational sense is so bad it's almost a superpower). The funny thing is that from the ground it looks normal; unless you specifically note that the building is unique in the zone. So only fliers and maybe high-end super jump characters would ever know it's a thing.
As an aside, I was trying to keep the map out of screenshots, but it didn't always work. Should I leave the map in in the future, so people in Icon or Paragon Chat can find these same locations, or keep it out for maximum vision of the views?
Under Construction...
In I think. It’s not like there’s any reason not to. Funny thing I was on a couple weeks ago and looked at some of these same spots. The dome garden being one of the last ones.
"A sad spectacle. If they be inhabited, what a scope for misery and folly. If they be not inhabited, what a waste of space." ~ Thomas Carlyle
Brb putting a park at the IDS center :p
[hr]
[color=red]PR, Forum Moderator[/color]
[url=http://cityoftitans.com/forum/desvipers-creative-impulsivity]My Non-Canon Backstories[/url]
Avatar by MikeNovember
This specific building was added during the revamp of Atlas Park, towards the end when they redid the starting missions, added phasing tech (and subsequently destroyed Galaxy City) and put in the new Sewers trial. That might be why you don't remember it.
If you don't know already, and IIRC, there are doors at the base of the building that let you up to the park on top. (If the program you're using allows it, that is. I have no idea as I'm not familiar with it.)
Welcome back to Weird Stuff Tours, and today we've been shanghaied to Mercy Island.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Dxu0XSx.png[/img]
While not as memorable as Atlas, I still found a lot of really wonky stuff here. See, while Atlas is very square and clean-cut, Mercy has this... chaotic, jumbled look to it.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/yhYCT5B.png[/img]
You likely won't really remember a lot of the architecture from the Rogue Islands, which is fair because a lot of it is interchangeable. However, you likely will remember the Arachnos sigil. I mean, how could you forget it? It's honestly a MASTERPIECE of graphic design: Simplistic but distinctive and not reliant on any colors.
Also, it was EVERYWHERE
[img]https://i.imgur.com/gX7f8xr.png[/img]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/WgNtpQQ.png[/img]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/kcdCt3a.png[/img]
That last one is cool to me because it shows that the sigil is really flexible in its design, allowing it to be used in interesting ways.
However, whatever genius made that sigil was left out of the civil planning. For instance, the giant statue up there?
[img]https://i.imgur.com/zcOVP3P.png[/img]
There's no doors on that side of the building. It only intimidates newbie villains who want training.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/aVrPHuK.png[/img]
Something Arachnos seems fond of is these long, crawling things through areas they control. I guess the idea is that soldiers can stand up there and sneer at the normal people.
They lead out to guard towers, some of which make sense and some don't. Like this one, that isn't even across the street from Arachnos HQ:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/uKPhMlq.png[/img]
Of course, just when you think you've gotten it figured out you realize that people can't actually get ON the walkways.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/cx8uoio.png[/img]
Looks like they were important enough to take money from other places in the budget, though. The Mercy Island Medical Center doesn't even have a building.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/tcl9osk.png[/img]
Hey! Remember this place?
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Sc3Otrl.png[/img]
This is where Arachnos soldiers fired on crowds of rioters!
This is not a happy place.
On the way down the ferry, however, the unfeeling blue-grey metal is interrupted by a shanty town.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/S6I9s0h.png[/img]
Why does Arachnos let them set up there? Are they just not allowed to leave and making the best of it?
I recall shanty towns being endemic in the rogue isles, but I do NOT recall most of them being this daring.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/mlJot9L.png[/img]
You can find a whole bunch of these not only along the sides of the fortress, but in the bowels of it. These people just do not care!
[img]https://i.imgur.com/KJn0xtG.png[/img]
Sakes alive, this one is three or four stories tall! It might be better constructed than some of the brick buildings around!
[img]https://i.imgur.com/B92fgGW.png[/img]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/HuuhBcr.png[/img]
A Microcosm of Mercy Island architecture. Mostly; I couldn't get the industrial area in the shot.
Otherwise, most of the architecture is pretty bland. But I did find this!
[img]https://i.imgur.com/zv00MVw.png[/img]
It's a clocktower. It's also an arch. If not for the whole 'squalid' and 'ruled by arachnos' thing, this would be a decent tourist attraction.
Other than that, the architecture I noticed was triangles. Not in tresses, just... triangles.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/11CcuqI.png[/img]
There's fences around the perimeter so it's clearly some kind of hardened location. Just a big concrete triangle for some reason.
This building must be a serious place, it has TWO triangles.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/vGihg82.png[/img]
This triangle has crushed cars.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/IfnZtOH.png[/img]
Despite those oddities, there's still things around to remind you that there's normal people that live here. Someone's certainly trying to keep the place pretty.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/2WkSqgo.png[/img]
There's a gazebo. Maybe more, this is the only one I found.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/W2KlJTe.png[/img]
Someone's clearly taking care of the trees in this plaza. Oh, hey, there's statue guardians, too!
[img]https://i.imgur.com/20KMLmD.png[/img]
But instead of lions they're Ronus.
I have been alerted that that reference is too obscure. So they're now 'wingless griffon things'.
I'd rather have them in my neighborhood than the withered robed demon men.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/vHKgHqD.png[/img]
However, if there's one place that Arachnos City Planning is staggeringly incompetent, it's infrastructure.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/LPnrCoI.png[/img]
There's just pipes everywhere. Some just sticking building together. Some form rooftop networks.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/gHVM88q.png[/img]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Iq1WFC4.png[/img]
And if the water lines weren't bad enough, the power is also worryingly mis-wired.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/EOTIOOu.png[/img]
That left connector is SPARKING. That cannot be safe!
Are underground pipes just banned on Mercy Island? For crying out loud, sometimes there's pipes that connect to THE SAME BUILDING.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/D4aTMnQ.png[/img]
No, wait, underground pipes are not banned. You can tell because there's places where underground pipes become aboveground ones.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/CY4HelG.png[/img]
And these massive pipes split into smaller pipes that connect to...
[img]https://i.imgur.com/83sptMC.png[/img]
Two factories. One at a time.
There's even places where the piped come up out of the ground...
[img]https://i.imgur.com/ymeppgr.png[/img]
So they can go BACK INTO THE GROUND.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/QVVlmVr.png[/img]
The industrial areas aren't much better. I can only assume that on top of being health and safety nightmares the inside of the factories look like the old windows pipes screensaver.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/zdYaMPB.png[/img]
I'm not sure what they're burning to make purple smoke, but I'm pretty sure that's not supposed to be released into the atmosphere.
Going around the edges of the island, you can find a lot of boats. Big boats, small boats, cargo boats, fishing boats,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/4guEG2G.png[/img]
Even one sporty boat.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Ju8S7DR.png[/img]
Seems like boats have been a concern around here for quite some time.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/w0aqxPD.png[/img]
I'm fairly sure this boat is up to no good.
There is a fair area that's a bunch of rubble. A lot of it is generic rubble, but some of it is interesting:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/76CR35r.png[/img]
There's nothing inside these houses, but you can go in the hole!
The good news is that someone is putting forth some effort to clean up the rubble.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/29ZYNlr.png[/img]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/lZjYBnu.png[/img]
The only thing left is signs. There's a lot of signs around, here's some of the highlights:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/gvhMCNG.png[/img]
Hard to imagine the RI having a cinema industry. Wonder if they make heist films? Romantic shlock? Slasher movies?
[img]https://i.imgur.com/wctEmRJ.png[/img]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/WWz6iJL.png[/img]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Fa0rCpL.png[/img]
Seriously, these are just great. If you want to see more, I have more, just check out the full album: https://imgur.com/a/WX6pgxU
Under Construction...
This makes me feel like I should have spent more time in the Rogue Isles. Good stuff.
Another great tour! I especially liked 'I can only assume that on top of being health and safety nightmares the inside of the factories look like the old windows pipes screensaver.'
I recall those triangles as being combat arenas, with NPCs fighting one another.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Speaking of the Rogue Isles, I visited Russia not long after City of Villains came out, and it was clear where the devs got some of their style inspiration.
(A couple characters inserted into a real Moscow photo for dramatic purposes.)
[url=https://imgur.com/ShwwMrS][img]http://i.imgur.com/ShwwMrS.jpg[/img][/url]
Spurn all ye kindle.
Wait ... no one TOLD YOU?
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Q4VOSRA.png[/img]
This building, at ground/street level, has a marked access door which will take you up INSIDE the conservatory dome. Circle around the building and look for a door with a sign that looks like a generic man icon climbing stairs. The door next to the sign will "mission door" transport/teleport you up into the dome on top of the building.
There's also another building in Atlas that does this, except that it doesn't have a dome on top. Instead, the "crown" of the building is open to the sky, and is all masonry (so no greenery) but it feels a lot like a Temple to the Sky Gods when you're up there. Just look for the "stair access" door down at street level.
[center][img=44x100]https://i.imgur.com/sMUQ928.gif[/img]
[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
You should have seen the first version of Atlas Park. The architecture was a mix of old brick and concrete slab [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brutalist_architecture]brutalist[/url] styles that felt like they belonged more in a totalitarian state. The one good thing I can say about those buildings was that they looked ... SOLID ... as opposed to being artful fantasies. It wasn't all that "pretty" to see, but it did instill a sense that the buildings of the city were to the extent possible/necessary "hardened" against attack/damage by superpowered individuals. Essentially, all the buildings were "armored" in some form or fashion, to allow them to resist property damage.
It was only after the Atlas revamp that you started seeing glass and steel buildings at all. Before the revamp, all the skyscrapers in Atlas were basically concrete slabs.
[center][img=44x100]https://i.imgur.com/sMUQ928.gif[/img]
[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
Unfortunately, I'm using Icon and the door code isn't a thing; I'd need to manually tab through the spawn points to find the inside of the dome. This is also why I'm not showing off the inside of buildings despite some of them being really cool. Sometime when I've got a lot of time to spare I might go through indoor areas/mission areas and try to find weird stuff.
As for the RI, while there's a fair amount of interesting details the dull colors and fairly interchangeable buildings make the areas somewhat forgettable. It's a shame, too, since there clearly WAS care and thought put into things, it just FEELS more homogeneous. I get that it fits for the lore, it's just a shame is all. Doesn't help that Mercy Island has a total of four areas, so if someone says 'that one building with the pipes in Darwin's Landing' you have fully half the map to look over.
From here things are less clear-cut, so if anyone has requests for me to go over I'll be happy to hear them. Keep in mind that I'm not just looking for the landmarks of areas: I'm looking for wonky stuff, so even zones without many traditional landmarks might have good stuff in them. Just look at what I got out of Mercy Island, that map is basically just two forts, a wall, and a lot of buildings and I managed to find a smuggling operation, bulldozers, a sporting boat, and a gazebo.
Under Construction...
I actually specifically mentioned this in my last post? (Unless you're meaning "while the game was active."
As someone who studied architecture for a time, I cannot tell you how irrationally infuriating it is to see some of those "artful" buildings. *cough*LookingAtYouChampionsOnline*cough*
I mean, it's one thing for the building to be highly stylized. There are plentiful examples of that in real life. But it's another thing entirely for a building to be [i]Physically or Logistically impossible[/i] to even exist.
I'll take the Brutalism over that any day.
Okay, this time were swinging into the first hazard area: Perez Park! It's a spooky place with lots of trees.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/hDK9v3r.png[/img]
But it's not just trees! It's also got some civilization around the outside. And we're going to be starting there to put off getting lost in the woods as long as possible.
The architecture is very different than Atlas'... older, maybe? Because looking at these buildings...
[img]https://i.imgur.com/6QCNUBC.png[/img]
The word "Brutalistic" that people have been throwing around does seem to fit. The skyscrapers are still BIG, just less... grand, if you will.
And that style isn't just the buildings. You also have brutalistic grassy features,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/IJjM8gx.png[/img]
Brutalistic hedges,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/Qi5GjOq.png[/img]
Brutalistic pillars that look like they should have something on them but don't,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/AYbJfOq.png[/img]
Brutalistic hero statue plaza,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/n2NYh7X.png[/img]
It's kind of absurd.
Other than that there's some interesting things around, like this tanker who the city felt was important enough to get two fountains,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/ZbIwflR.png[/img]
Gravel smuggling operation,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/tLXaaH3.png[/img]
Genius from the Paragon City Department of Roads,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/lhfZXf0.png[/img]
A fountain with a little old lady on top,
[img]https://i.imgur.com/umo2NIt.png[/img]
WAIT! That has a exploration badge on it. This is no 'stuff you found while playing the game tour'! Disregard that fountain.
Somehow, despite this being a hazard zone and gang central, there's still stores operating.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/L4ZCGdk.png[/img]
Turn out Hotel Geneva and Royals Book Store working together is a fairly normal thing in Paragon City.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/wjCDr5u.png[/img]
The first sign, however, I noticed was this:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/49I2hv6.png[/img]
And this got my interest! I know enough German to know that 'sch' is a very German arrangement of letters, and Germans love to just gestalt words together to form new, interesting words! Let's see, maybe 'scheh' is something? Or 'zade'?
Nope, it's the name of the narrator in 1,001 Arabian Nights. And that only opens MORE questions: is it a bookstore? A hero trying to get good PR? What's going on?
I was just going to just leave the rest of the signs for the full album (link at the bottom of this post!) but during my last sweep of the zone, way up against the zone wall, I found this:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/wKlXkPp.png[/img]
I don't know who chose the placement for this ad, but they likely got fired.
So, going into the park proper the first thing you'll notice is these:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/x0e0nX6.png[/img]
I... think they were emergency exit boxes. If you were hurt and deep in the zone you could click one of these and be taken back to the zone entrance or something. They're kind of just around and I'm not sure if their placement is any good.
In any case, the basic design of Perez is really good.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/TpKL2pZ.png[/img]
Abandoned lamp posts and benches, gnarldy trees, half-buried statues, and this neat green fog effect when you're deep under the canopy.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/i54LAnX.png[/img]
In the interest of putting off getting lost longer, let's get a bird's-eye view first and see if there's anything interesting from above...
There's neat little boathouse or ranger station or something.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/DXSnMTd.png[/img]
An open-air amphitheater, if a bit of a poorly-made one.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/w6jXVuS.png[/img]
The roof is important for the best acoustics! It's about parabolas!
The river leads to a fair facsimile of a marshy area, with bridges in various parts of disrepair:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/ZgPbkMM.png[/img]
And there's a number of little clearings like this, just circles in the forest:
[img]https://i.imgur.com/8xFpjD3.png[/img]
But none of this is particularly weird. It shows consideration in design, and we like that here, but it's not all that unusual. And going under the trees we develop a very different problem:
Basically the entire undertree area looks like this.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/gy11Vij.png[/img]
Gnarldy trees, greenish fog, and a fork in the road.
See, Perez was meant to be a maze, you can tell it in the design and setup, but it isn't a very good one. Most every path goes somewhere, either to a fork in the road or out of the treeline eventually. The paths aren't all that densely packed, so it's not terribly uphill to get from one place to another as long as your destination is in one of the few dead-ends in the maze. And when I say few, I mean FEW: there's a total of five. Yes, I counted, and I took screenshots of them.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/93R5gz5.png[/img]
The most unique one, which terminates suddenly in a zone wall.
Now, all this could be improved if there were more real loop-backs and more minor landmarks, but there's basically none of either of those. That or the only time I can't get lost is when I try to get lost. Without minor landmarks the area basically all blurs together into another green tree corridor, and there's little fear because you know you'll eventually get to an exit there's so many of the things.
See, in REAL mazes like this, minor landmarks would be most necessary: they give the maze-explorer a chance to re-orient themselves after a long loopback, giving them a chance to try a different path if they correctly identify the intersection they're at. Perez's "maze" isn't complicated enough to warrant them, but at the same time it'd be nice for there to be some to liven up the place.
Alternatively, they'd make it easier to find mission entrances scattered around the inside of the forest. However, I did find two silly entrances!
[img]https://i.imgur.com/u6xVkj9.png[/img]
This one has a rock all to itself!
[img]https://i.imgur.com/aEzYRYE.png[/img]
And this one is up two ledges!
All the same, I have NOT found the amount of weird I wanted to find! What's my plan B?
...stuff you found while playing the game tour! Let's find all the exploration badges!
Actually, we've already found three. The fountain (no history behind it, the badge just names who donated it), the boathouse (what you'd expect), and the amphitheater (also what you'd expect.) Let's find the rest fast.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/rhaH8ZP.png[/img]
This badge has a bit of an interesting story behind it, but it's on a generic hero statue. I wouldn't be so upset if more hero statues had little stories connected. What about fountain tank? Did he like water? Did he break a fountain once and the city places fountains by his monument as a joke? He doesn't get a badge.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/zMrDpO6.png[/img]
There's a badge on this little dock thingy. Or, maybe not this one. One that looks basically just like this. It just used to be a romantic meetup before everything went to hell.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/vIgJBYw.png[/img]
A bridge. Something about it being important in the gang war, but not why.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/iYfIJ8K.png[/img]
A half-buried statue next to a tree. Wow.
Okay, all these badges are really lackluster, BUT I still have hope for one. Blood Moss: It's about a rock which the circle of thorns thinks is the basis of the strange energies in Perez Park. It's not an easy one to find! I wound up using Icon's special commands to go to its XYZ coordinates (it's the last dead-end in the zone!). And it's...
[img]https://i.imgur.com/OBg6s6v.png[/img]
Some level geometry with a different grass texture.
why
WHY?!
If there wasn't a badge there I'd never suspect it was special! And I get it, Paragon city is a city where some normal places have strange history, but why is basically every exploration badge like that?
Why can't you put a badge near... abandoned spooky picnic tables?
[img]https://i.imgur.com/5BkCAIv.png[/img]
Or the top of this plateu?
[img]https://i.imgur.com/YskaUZx.png[/img]
Why... okay, no. This tour is done. Everyone back on the bus, we're leaving.
Even the lions don't want to be here.
[img]https://i.imgur.com/vLUd2x3.png[/img]
https://imgur.com/a/Vwgb3yW
Under Construction...
The biggest challenge in the Perez Park Maze was that all of those dead-ends and Badge locations had vicious killer monsters scattered about. One could declare Kings Row to be boring until this happens...
[img]https://img00.deviantart.net/f8d7/i/2017/227/7/9/clockwork_apocalypse_by_fireheart5150-dbk6kfh.jpg[/img]
Clockwork Apocalypse!
So, you're trapped under the trees, looking for the path Out, when you stumble into a million little Tazer-bros, or mutant homeless guys, or a gang of Doctor Hannibal Lechters with interest in your liver... Not boring anymore!
Be Well!
Fireheart
I know, but other areas have had solid things going on in them even without enemies to worry about. Like Atlas' layout, or Mercy's pipes. This is kind of an examination of map and asset design more than the game itself, and in that aspect Perez Park doesn't stand out as much as Atlas or even Mercy.
Under Construction...
How about Talos Island next, or maybe Peregrine Island, that place is a jack of all trades so to speak.
And there is always Independence Port with the Kraken and just about every other building being set on fire!
The Carnival of Light in the Phoenix Rising
"We never lose our demons, we only learn to live above them." - The Ancient One
Avatar by lilshironeko
I remember there was a crack in the zone wall in faultline (if i recall the zone correctly) You could fly out of the zone and there were buildings far in the distance. If you flew to them they were 2d images and you could fly right through them. I scoured the forums to see if anyone else had found this crack in reality but I never found anything about it. I miss finding little things like that in the game.
Ooof. Circle of Thorns Ruin Mages. Those were the worst. Seriously, who decided it was a good idea to create [i]BOSS[/i] ranked mobs stacked with CC abilities and put them in at a level [i]before players gets access to any sort of mez protection[/i]???
(aside from Break Frees of course)
Honestly I don't think most of the zones in CoH were very interesting. This is particularly true for the launch zones. They were largely inconsequential backdrops for your characters to fly past. I generally attribute that to them likely trying to conserve resources/money/time during development. It wasn't until they started revamping/adding individual zones that they started to add in really interesting zone features.
I'm glad they appear to be approaching it from a different angle with CoT. From everything I've seen, they're trying to make every place you go to have its own character and sense of being. That's not really something you can manage without a lot of dedicated design work.
An infinite number of tries doesn't mean that any one of those tries will succeed. I could flip an infinite number of pennies an infinite number of times and, barring genuine randomness, they will never come up "Waffles".
One of my favorite memories of CoH was from the old King's Row (before the revamp), coming across a pair of detectives, a rookie and his partner.
The older one was complaining about the lack of stores in King's Row and how when his wife called him to pick up milk on the way home he had to go all the way to Galaxy City to pick it up before heading home. I fell out of my chair laughing (literally).
Unfortunately, after a couple new computers I lost my copy of that chat, so I only have the memory of it now. :(
It is ok to have some nondescript and reused assets within reason. It makes the unique stuff stand out that much more.
King's Row was definitely a little heavy handed with the cut and pasted tenement buildings.