That's a really good question. For the record, I'm not really opposed to anything. I've got preferences, but they're mild ones. And, I think it's better to express them than not. One of the issues that comes up with superhero games are that the various characters feel like they're from different worlds. Different games. So, I'd advocate for some discussion and understanding beforehand just so that everyone feels like they're inhabiting the same universe. That's pretty capacious, still: Hawkman, Batman, and Steel all undoubtedly inhabit the same universe. Spawn and Archie probably don't. To be a bit more explicit, there was a game I was playing in before where most of us had kind of "classic" superhero motivations: justice, morality, responsibility, etc. And, one of the other PCs didn't seem to be all that interested in doing anything well ... heroic. I could actually get behind both some investigation or some punching. I think investigation is actually kind of hard to run, and M&M isn't built for making it a real feature of the game (cf. Gumshoe). What I was referencing above is basically this. Nearly all M&M games have the following abstract set-up: the PCs are a newly-emergent group of heroes who are cleaning up the city from [insert series of criminals and supervillains here]. Roughly the Spider-Man origin story arcs. There's nothing wrong with that. It's a fine campaign set-up, and one that I've enjoyed and run a few times. Just, given my druthers (and to be clear, I'm just one potential participant), I'd want something a bit different. I think that's a narrow band of superhero storytelling, and I suspect there's more than a little bit of the ye olde D&D 1st level adventurers meet in a tavern lurking under the surface behind it. Ideally, I'd like there to be at least the possibility of there being more of a sense of history (e.g., criminals know who Batman is, and have feelings about him), or really just some other options. For instance, I'd love to play a game that was more Justice League/Avengers inspired, as I think that's where many of our favorite characters are from and I really loved the Timmverse cartoons. And, I think it opens the door to some different, dramatic stories. There are a few other options that occur to me, some that are more gritty or supernatural or dark, but really just something a bit different from the Spider-Manesque set-up I described above. I do like the idea of the weight of the world (or city or nation) being on the PCs' shoulders, but few M&M campaigns, outside of the few I myself have run, embrace that.
