Sunday, September 2

My dog just died.

Or at least it feels that way. My beloved City of Heroes is shutting down. I have been subscribed to this wonderful game for over 7 years now. Every Sunday afternoon I came together with a few friends and we ran, fought, killed and died together. Many great near live characters were created. And now it just suddenly comes to an end. I am very disappointed in NCsoft. They couldn't even send active players an email or something. I had to read about it on Syncaine's blog. Oh well, it is nothing I can do about it. All good things must come to an end. Although this could have waited a few more years.

Farewell my love.

19 comments:

  1. Correction. It was not about killing and dying, but arresting and trips to the hospital.

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  2. Yeah, that was a bit of a downer.
    Not sure if I'd compare it to Old Jeller, but maybe to a pair of well worn but still your favourite shoes. Can't really wear them anywhere 'decent' but great for shopping or doing stuff around the house. I never could throw those away.

    Many people singing CoX's praises now, but apparently less than 125.000 people were still playing it, even after it went F2P.
    It's an MMO that did so many things right in my opinion, it's a shame to see it go. CoX showed the world there was a niche market for Superheroes in MMO space, all the following ones showed that the niche isn't that big and that movie derivative work doesn't really cut it.

    Did Charr ever make it to 50 or is she stuck at 48-ish?
    Hmm. CoX, Vanguard SOH, Fallen Earth, The Secret World. We have a taste for rare quality. :-)
    Shame that exclusivity isn't a good thing in MMO space.

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  3. Lateral Shift is 46, and hasn't logged in for 624 days apparently. But I think it has been even longer since we actively played for a while. My guess is that Charr will be 46 too. There is still time left to reach 50. Although with my current play schedule it will be a challenge. I haven't logged into anything the last 10 days. Except for COH on Sunday Afternoon. What am I going to do on Sunday afternoons now?

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  4. 46 sounds about right. I logged into Charr after CoX went F2P but didn't really do anything with her or the game, but her last login is probably less than Shift's.

    I recommend applying your freed up Sunday afternoons to coming up with a better gaming shcedule so I won't have to miss you as much as during the last two weeks

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  5. I found this out from a group of friends just a few days ago. I know I haven't played CoH in a long while, but it was still the game I suggested to others just getting into the wonderful world of MMOs. It makes me sad to be losing such a great game.

    So now I need a good game to give people that's easy to learn and get into. Any suggestions?

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  6. Hey Jeni!
    Too bad it's for this sad occasion but it's great to hear from you again :-)
    Wha tyou say is echoed by lots and lots of people. "It's a great MMO, I haven't played it in years though". Which isn't a criticism by the way. With most MMO's when you burn out on them some resentment creeps in. Not with CoX. It's just that good.

    As to your question, right now I'd have to go with Guild Wars 2. It's very smooth, a bit different from the classic MMO setup but not in a bad way. People new to the genre will not be bothered by preconceptions anyway, and I think most vets will take to it immediately.
    It is possibly at risk of becomming the New WOW once the fence-sitters give in even if it is the love child of Warhammer Online and Free Realms :-)

    *dodges the collective bricks of MUtants*

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  7. I thoroughly enjoyed Freerealms for a short time, lots of fun to be had, reviewed it here I believe. GW2 lots of fun to be had too, but I'm expecting better longevity :)

    Always sad to see a good game go down, it's left lots of people with fond memories, was never the game for me but appreciated why others enjoyed it so much.

    Jeni - always great to hear from you! I'll echo Lani and suggest GW2. Good fun and easy to get in to and no sub fee :)

    Phe- It's been too long, haven't seen you in Tyria yet!

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  8. Hi Jeni! Even though it is a sad occasion I'm happy that you thought of us, and came to say hi. I hope all is well with you.

    The COH community is trying their best to still keep it still alive with petitions, crowd sourcing, and special forums signatures. Have a look here for more details.

    Maybe it is good thing they shut it down completely. I was still giving them my $15 every month, but maybe it has been fun enough. There is not need to drag the game on forever.

    I am a bit disappointed in fellow bloggers though. Have you guys already forgotten the utterly brilliant MMO we have been playing the last month and a half? GW2 might be nice game, but The Secret World is still for me the most wonderful gaming experience in recent years. It has the most absorbing and immersive world ever created, and some of the best NPCs I have seen in any game, MMO or otherwise.

    Jeni, please pick up The Secret World. You won't regret it. Even it won't last you as long as COH or WOW. But it is just too good to miss.

    Sorry I haven't been in Tyria yet. I did create my characters, but then I ran off to India for work, and this week I am playing host for a bunch of colleagues from Sweden. They are leaving tomorrow, so hopefully I'll get some time this weekend. But my social life has suffered as well these past weeks. So I still won't be online much.

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  9. Recommended GW2 because thejeni wanted something easy to get in to. TSW is an amazing game but the skill system means it's easy to gimp yourself unless you do some research first. For depth and an immersive world TSW wins, GW2 doesnt take itself as seriously and is more immediately about getting in to the fun, I'd recommend GW2 over TSW for a newbie for sure.

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  10. Yes, I agree with you, Geeky. GW2 is a very accessible game, and a great game for almost every kind of player. You can't go wrong with GW2.

    But the fanboi in me just flares up when it comes to TSW. It is such an under appreciated gem that I want to tell people about it at any opportunity.

    I guess you will have to tell people to try both, Jeni :)

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  11. It's alive!

    I'm sorry you feel like your dog just died. I'm happy to see everyone is still here though, and with a face from the past even. Hi thejeni! I'm blackphoenix from the good ol' days.

    I'd have to go with TSW as well. Taste for rare quality indeed. Of course, I might still be a bit jaded because of the path they went with GW, but that's just me. I'm sure GW2 is a good game.

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  12. @ Phe: I did not recommend TSW because for me it doesn't fall under the category "easy to learn and get into".
    That doesn't mean it's not a great game, it is. It's way more on the hobby side of the spectrum, which makes it less accessible for people. If Jeni'd asked for an MMO to recommend to adventure game buffs, then I'd have linked to the order page.

    And sadface for not being part of your social life

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  13. I think I am becoming proper English and get the urge to apologise for everything :)

    First for accusing Lani and Geeky on ignoring TSW. I had not even read Jeni's question proper and jumped the gun already!

    Second for excluding Lani from my social life. Living in a different country makes it somewhat harder. Although I haven't seen Geeky either in ages and we are (sometimes) working right around the corner from each other. Sorry Geeky! (yay, a sub-apology)

    Now I expect you to apologize for making me feel like I had to apologize.

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  14. "Now I expect you to apologize for making me feel like I had to apologize."

    Nah, someone has to break the trend :-)
    I was just making a subtle comment on your apparant segregation of your social life based on geography vs networked. For me my friends I speak with online are as much part of my social life as those I meet in person.
    That's all.

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  15. Thanks for the suggestions, I hadn't thought about GW2, but if it is anything like the origional, that is a more basic game to get started on.

    I have to say The Secret World almost had me, about 1 1/2 months ago a co-worker had mentioned it to me, and we got into some long discussions about it. I started doing some digging around about game plan, and came across something that is sadly a game breaker for me: open world pvp. That just makes a game unbearable for me.

    And once I heard the news about CoH I hopped over here because I knew you all would feel my pain as well. Such a shame. I saw the petitions and the ingame events planned to try to save the game, but not even 200,000 people have signed the petition yet, not sure if it would convince them to change their minds.

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  16. Hey Jeni, TSW doesn't have open world PVP as far as I know and that's after playing the beta and some months after launch. Might be there's a duel system or something but otherwise PVP is in fact segregated.

    There's a queued system for three PVP maps, battlefields if you will. The results of which (marginally) affect PvE. You get a minute XP bonus (in a game where you don't care about XP) and some coinage that can be used to buy PVP kit.

    So really, you have no excuse now :-P

    And yes, the petitioning and such will most likely not save CoX. Only thing I see that could is Paradox convincing NCSoft to give them the IP and engine Licenses.
    NCSoft owns the IP, Cryptic licensed the engine to NCSoft for dunno how long.
    We don't know why NCSoft is killing the game, we don't know if it is profitable or not. If it is, NCSoft probably kills it because they feel that with the same investment elsewhere they can generate a larger return on investment.
    So why would NCSoft allow Paradox to become a competitor? Even if whatever they plan to do with the money they wouldn't be investing in Paradox's work went to something outside of MMO space, CoX would remain another MMO in a cut-throat market.
    The only reason they'd do that is for money. Does Paradox, a subsidiary of NCSoft have deep pocktes? Doubtfull. They'd need an outside investor.

    I doubt NCSoft would relinguish because of signatures from fans. It might help Paradox get an outside investor, that's all.

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  17. Ohhhh, no open pvp... now that's a different matter all together. I do have one other excuse right now, the new WoW expansion launches on the 25th of this month *grin*

    But it is always nice to have some sort of back up game for when I need a break from WoW.

    And as much as I would love to see CoX survive I just don't think there is enough of an interest for an investor. I've done some reading and the numbers just are not there.

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  18. Yep, no open PvP in TSW. I've been playing since launch (and beta too) and haven't once been requested to duel, so I don't think that's even an option, though I could be wrong. The people in the game seem a lot more "mature" than your typical MMO fare. You can PvP if you want to, but it's pretty much the same as battlegrounds in WoW. You join a queue and wait your turn to start a round in an instance battleground. With the exception of the Fusang Projects, which is an ongoing battle between the three factions to maintain control of "bases."

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  19. Is always tough when a game dies. I signed on the last day of SWG, did one slow walk around mos eisley and left. You learn the in and out of every place, a thousand memories...and a switch is flipped, gone. Hope you and Lani are well, miss you two about in Vanguard.

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