CoH Community Quiz: Melissa Bianco, World Designer Up Next

Who is Melissa Bianco?
Melissa Bianco graduated from Capilano College, in British Columbia, Canada, with a Media Resources degree. She worked in the film and television industry in casting, post production, and as a talent agent in the mid-90s, which was right around the time she started beta testing MMOs. She has tested or played several MMORPGs from Meridian59 to World of Warcraft. She moved to California in 1999 and joined the Cryptic Studios Team in 2002.

What does she do?
Melissa Bianco is the World Designer for City of Heroes / City of Villains. She works in conjunction with art, programming, and other designers to design and implement new zones, map sets, zone and world events, and the occasional mission. She’s well-known for putting “easter eggs” in her work and she loves to write the dialogue you see villains and NPCs saying as you wander through the zones.

Why does she call herself War Witch?
Long before Blue King Studios came on board, Cryptic Studios and NCSoft put together a comic book as a promotion to generate interest in the game. Melissa saw War Witch in the comic, loved her sassiness, and asked to use it as her board name. She began posting on the forums when the game went live as War_Witch and people just began to associate the character with Melissa. She readily admits that she didn’t create the character; she just loves to use it. War Witch has become synonymous with Melissa, especially since she finds ways to slip in War Witch references any place she can.

Read War Witch’s sassiness for yourself in the digital version of the early promotional comic for the original City of Heroes game. http://www.cityofheroes.com/comic/promo.html