City of Heroes is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game...but don't hold that against it. If you've tried one of these types of games lately, then you know they can be clunky, hard to get into, slow-paced, and prohibitively time-consuming. You're also probably accustomed to how they start you off as some pathetic wimp who literally can't walk and chew gum at the same time and must spend hours swinging at snakes and rats before he or she gains any reasonable amount of proficiency as an adventurer. But City of Heroes isn't like this. It lets you create your own unique superhero who starts off strong and grows much stronger as he or she keeps taking down Paragon City's ruthless criminal element. The game is attractive and accessible and features big, fast-paced battles. Above all, it succeeds at bucking most of the genre's bad trends, and this is an amazing accomplishment. Yet, City of Heroes is so streamlined that it actually feels rather stripped-down in some respects; admittedly, there's really not much more to the game beyond battling lots and lots of packs of computer-controlled bad guys. So it might not have what it takes to keep you glued to your PC for the next five years (especially not at $15 a month after the first 30 days), but for a while, it sure is fun.