This AM, I checked the Non-Essential folder for the company, where bits and press releases are posted, and found this.
City Of Villains Adds RPG Veterans
Hands up if you still own that Manual of the Planes...
By David Smith
08/23/2004
A pair of notable names from the pen-and-paper role-playing game world have joined the City of Villains development team, NCsoft announced today. The upcoming expansion to Cryptic Studios' MMO hit City of Heroes will benefit from the design talents of senior designer David "Zeb" Cook and senior writer Shane Hensley.
Cook is a veteran of the Dungeons & Dragons world, having contributed rulebooks and supplements to the famous fantasy role-playing game since its first edition. His noted works include the first-edition Manual of the Planes, the second-edition Dungeon Master's Guide, and the Planescape campaign setting. Hensley's most famous creation is the Deadlands steampunk/fantasy/western game, although he's also written for many different RPG publishers and game worlds.
"The addition of Dave and Shane to the City of Villains team is quite a coup," said Cryptic CEO Michael Lewis. "We want City of Villains to draw players into their roles, and so we brought in Dave, a pioneer in the role-playing game market. Shane will add substantial storylines and narratives for City of Villains. Together, they will help City of Villains maintain the high standard that fans of City of Heroes have come to expect."
The City of Villains expansion, which adds the opportunity to play as a villainous character in Paragon City and organize a syndicate of criminal henchmen, is due for release some time next year.
Now I'm real pleased that a fellow Ancient One of Gaming has a gig (Zebbo has become a wandering Ronin of electronic game design), but the writer screwed up - Zeb didn't write Manual of the Planes. I did. Zeb's big 1st edition hit was was well-received Oriental Adventures. But since the only way to send the commenter a message is to join his discussion group, this error passes without correction.
Ah well. Such is the life of the Ancient Game Dinosaur.
More later,
