Reflecting on Feline

Way back in about 1985 or so, a group of friends and I decided we were going to play a superhero RPG. At first, Darren thought about Villains & Vigilantes. I was cool with that, since at the time I had only played D&D, and V&V sounded like a supers version of that. But then DC Heroes came out, and Darren bought that. I never did make any characters for V&V, and have never actually played it to this day. Hmmm…

Anyways, DC Heroes. I remember we were all walking over to my house to play in my dining room. There were four of us, I think. I was still trying to figure out what kind of character I wanted to play. Then, when I walked into my house, and saw my Siamese cat, Tippy (the tip of her tail was white), I knew. And thus, Feline was born.

His DCH incarnation was a lot like Batman, and he wore a costume that basically looked like a Siamese cat. The only adventure I played him in with DCH started with us fighting animal rights activists who were trying to destroy a college campus, and free the animals. I don’t really remember much beyond that. But I do remember doing superfluous acrobatics during the fight.

Not long after that, we switched over to Marvel Super Heroes, and Feline really came into his own. By this time I had actually started collecting comics, and Spider-Man was my favorite, so the MSH version of Feline was a lot like him. We played many adventures in that game, and Feline has stuck with me as a character for many years now. I think there was even a Champions version sometime in the late 80’s.

The next time I would create Feline for a game would be around 2002 or so, when Mutants & Masterminds came out. I never actually got to play him, but creating him for that game was very cool. To this day, M&M would be my go-to supers game, if I could convince my group to play something other than D&D.

Oddly enough, though all of the years I played the City of Heroes MMO, I never made Feline. I think I tried once, but the name was taken, and I couldn’t bring myself to rename him. I made someone similar named Devil-Cat. He was kind of a blend of Wolverine and Black Panther. Devil-Cat also has an incarnation in DCUOnline.

But, Feline was always my favorite super hero. Probably because he was my first. Today, my favorite comic book character is Captain America, but I’m also a big fan of super strength characters like Colossus and Hercules. Still, if I had a chance to play in a supers RPG again, I would probably make Feline.