City Of Heroes Gets Furry

While there may be a couple of big-name rivals on the block for City Of Heroes, it's not lying in a puddle, defeated by its foes. It's continuing to battle on, expanding itself like some sort of... some sort of SUPER HERO! I'm not very good with simile today. The next additions to the streets of Paragon City come with ears. Which is to say, there's an Animal Pack, which will add a bunch of new costume bits and bobs for characters, along with other fauna features mentioned below.

So in the pack, due out on the 23rd Feb, will come with sixty new costume parts and patterns, letting you pick from cat, bird, wolf and - er - minotaur features. Along with these bits and bobs, they say, come six new emotes, letting you do some quite disturbing things like Sniff each other. What is the world becoming? That's along with Savage, Hiss, Feather Burst, Fur Bust (sic), Fur Fly and Feather Fly. Which adds up to seven.

There's two new auras (blimey, it's been a while since I played CoH - in my day it was all capes and fighting crime), Flea and Beastly Rage. They are "tintable" which I'm almost certain isn't a word. And rather more excitingly, if you're not just playing dress-up, there's a whole new travel power: Beast Run. It opens up at level 4, letting you sprint and pounce like, well, a beast.

It's going to cost a weeny £6 (or €9, which is a stunning hike), and appears next Wednesday. Which means I can finally realise my dream to play a game as Harvey Birdman. (Apart from that PSP game, Mr Pickyface.)