So after browsing the Steam Store tonight, i saw a free trial for Champions Online. Not later then 10 minutes, i was already in the menu of the game.  About four hours later, i logged out and was posting the fallowing on the official forums. Enough said, i was not impressed by the quality of the trial.

I’ve just alt-tabbed out of the game at level 6 and after the “buy the game” pop up when wanting to do Desert Crisis.

First off, Unlimited Free Trial is too much said. It’s not unlimited in any way, it’s not a trial (try-all), but yes, it is free.

I was in the game for 4 hours. 2 hours i made my awesome Bounty-Hunter-Former-Mercenary-Chick with cybernetic implants, the rest was the tutorial. Here are my impressions step by step.

Got in, set the settings a bit higher since i’m certain my rig can run it nicely, made char. Got ingame, tried to add a friend or whisper to a mate of mine which was doing the same thing. No chance, can’t do it on a trial account. I ‘wtf’d’ then moved on. After the first couple of seconds, i had to restart the game to lower the settings since it seemed i overestimated my rig. I can run Crysis at max highres, but unfortunetly CO is a tad more demanding, while offering a lot less in terms of graphical bonuses.

So i started shooting Qullar in the face a bit. Messy targetting, lag. Worked with it. Noticed my character was running.. oddly, tried to go to the coustome selector to change my stance, no go. Continued shooting Qullar in the face and doing missions. Not extremely challenging or hard. Level up, oh, powers trainer? Awesome, gonna wait for that. Oh travel powers? Awesomer, i wanna get some jetpack/jetboots action in here. Shoot more Qullar in the face.

Get to the Open Mission, have a bit of fun, got first, got bonuses. Nice. Still too many enemies, did not feel ‘epic’ enough. Moving on, get into the Champions Building. Got in, shot some bots in the face, moved on. Bossfight, killed, activated beacons. Ok, now can i get to a trainer? Please? Ok, get out, talk to one of the heroes, ok so i go to this Desert location and there i can find a trainer and start leveling up and stuff? AWESOME. Finally.

Click helicopter. Pop-up “Click here to buy the full game”.

I alt-tabed.

I’ve read this thread and i’ve seen my oppinions already stated but i have to underline. “What the hell is this?”
I mean i did not play anything in my “trial” that whould make me buy the game. Anything. And what use is level 15 if i can’t upgrade my powers/stats?

I mean, i thought they would atleast let us try out some powers or allow us to use our travel powers to atleast get a nice “WHEE” feeling that we might pay for to continue. But this? I’m sorry but pushing 2-2-2-1 is not fun, and if i were b it more less mmo-savvy, i’d think this is about all that there is to do in the game.

I’m sorry but the trial is not a trial, it’s a demo, there is a difference, and furthermore, the demo atleast has to make you want more, make you want for the fun to continue. I’m sorry but the “Buy the game” pop up left me utterly cold.

As in writing, the motto is “Show, Don’t Tell”. Don’t tell us that we’ll have awesome fun with the powers and enjoy the game AFTER we buy it, show us that it’s fun and we will consider it. As said, there was nothing, besides the character creator to make me wanna buy the game. The only real reason i might is to be able to play my awesome bounty-hunter chick more, but come on, i need more then that to spend my money on. If atleast i could have talked to my mate, and enjoy the limited trial together, we might have stuck for a month to alteast try it out more, but as it stands, i did not even have a chance to enjoy the game with him. To add to that the fact that the game looked a bit unpolished and unoptimized.. it feels like Cryptic really tries to not take my money.

TL; DR version: Trial did not show enough, i’m not gonna subscribe.

That was my experience. Don’t get me wrong, the game might be nice, but i won’t buy it on something that the demo/trial/whatever should have presented to me. Sure, i could estimate this as just ‘buying the game’ normally, but if i wasent so inclined when it launched, i won’t really do it now, and the trial did not help sway my oppinion.

Ah well.. there’s plenty of MMO’s in the sea.