First, there was a new instance being shown off: Joker's Carnivale. A little showing of what going through an instanced mission in DCUO will be like, including an end boss fight with Harley Quinn. I will say it played out in much how you would have imagined an instanced mission would go.

Not until Harley was defeated and you move over to check the body did I get to see the new things being shown off. For instance, seeing one of the 52 Jim Lee hand-drawn animatics showcasing a bit of insight into who Harley Quinn is. Let me tell you that it does not resemble the goofy style of the animated shows, but something more akin to Batman: Arkham Asylum.

Defeating a boss obviously has its perks, including epic loot. In this case, her jester's hat to be exact. Similarly to every other MMO, when you place it on your character, it appears on your toon's head. Where DCUO's system divergent is two-fold:

For one, when it pops onto your head, it takes the colors of your costume into account and recolors itself accordingly. The demo character had a really nice metallic gray and blue going on, which her red and black hat took on from the start. Nice little feature in case you don't want to look like a patch work creation for gear sake.

What if you don't want to look goofy with a jester's hat? I mean, the demo character was a bad-ass-looking Robo-Batman. That leads us into the second cool thing. You can decline the new look of your character, but keep the stats of the item active. To go even further, once the item is "soul bound" to your character, it is forever in your toon's costume closet - even if you sell/discard/destroy it. You won't retain the stats if you are not wearing it, but if an item looks cool, you can forever keep your look as your gear increases.

While that was the bulk of what was being shown and discussed at Fan Faire, I was able to pick the brains of a few of the developers behind the game. A level designer and design manager to be exact. While they mainly stuck to what has already been shown or discussed above, I was able to weasel out a few fun details for us to enjoy.

• Jim Lee is effectively the Art Director for the game as all art assets need his approval to be placed in the game. (DC fans should love this.)
• All the PVP modes, including Iconic PVP will be available at launch on 11/2/10. (No having to wait for these things like other MMOs in the past.)
• In Iconic PVP, your gear and level means dick as you will have all the gear and abilities that come with that character. (Meaning, when you are playing as Batman you will have all of his moves and gear so you can truly be the bad ass he is - even at level 10.)
• Leveling in DCUO is going to be rapid and you will be able to reach the Level 50 cap quickly. (For two reasons. They want you to feel like a hero the entire time playing and not start out a wuss and stay a wuss for months as you level up. Also, they have loads of end-game content ready for you at launch and want you to experience it before future updates bog it all down.)
• Gotham and Metropolis are announced zones with all their own drama going on. (These are the only areas announced, but you can rest assured that all the other iconic areas are either already present or in the pipeline.)
• For now it is only the basic Earth realm from the comics, and only the comics. (Not that the films and shows haven't played their part in the canon, but the comics are too rich to be ignored.)
• The closed beta for the PC is coming soon and it is not a beta as most would think. (Unlike other "beta tests" it isn't a demo, it isn't a load test and it isn't a 'please find out bugs.' It is a 'do you like the content and how the game play feels' test. If that makes sense.)
• The PS3 closed beta will follow a few weeks after the PC's. (Not because it won't be ready, they developed in parallel. It's mostly because of the limitations on how to distribute over the PSN.)