Bridger_NA

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Of course they could do this....

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Actually, there are technical and security issues concerning moving characters from the US servers to the European ones. We are working on it, but it may not prove to be possible.

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but I guess they hope some fools shell out for the Euro version as well as the one we are already playing.

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Erm, you might want to read this FAQ.

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Or will we be forced to move to the Eu servers???

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No one will be forced to move. If you're happy on the US servers, by all means keep playing there.

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Bridger, will the european players currently playing the US game be able to transfer their characters or not?
I thnk many players are waiting for a good solid reply on that matter.

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My apologies if you've missed my previous posts and our FAQs on the European website. The short answer is 'not at the moment'. We're looking into it, and if anything changes I'll let you know.

I'm afraid that the serial codes for the European version of City of Heroes won't work with the US client - neither will US serial codes (from the US DVD edition, for example) work with the European version.

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With the release of the European CoH, can we finally get our comics? Would be nice to get the comics for the months I paid for. (Wasnt an Opt-Out option last time I played ~6 months ago)

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Bridger, what's the official line with this?

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The European 'Deluxe' boxed set of City of Heroes will contain a special digest edition of the first four issues of the comic (for full contents, see this FAQ ).

The fate of the further issues of the comic is still being decided - I'll bring you the news as soon as we have it.

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In pretty much every online game I have ever played that has US survers and European servers, it seems that German becomes the primary language for the Euro server.

I could guess a number of reasons why, but essentially, for me, it is a self-fulfilling situation.

I am pretty sure that CoH will be the same, so I will continue to play on the US server, thus depriving the Euro server of another English-speaking player.

Just imagine if three quarters of the stuff in the broadcast channels is in a language you do not understand!

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This isn't going to happen. In the European version of City of Heroes, each server is dedicated to a specific language. If you want to play in English, you choose an English-language server. If you want to play in German, you choose a German-language server, and so on for French.

Likewise, we have message boards in all three supported languages.

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OK, I downloaded the Euro-Beta, installed it in a different folder/different drive than the US live one, and when I launch the Euro-updater, I get the US server choice.

I think I won't beta test the Euro after all.

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Are you sure you're using the right shortcut to start the beta? You might want to try posting on the European Beta Technical Issues and Bugs board to see if anyone can help...

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For me localized European support means waiting many many months to get your updates due to translations being done for the other localized versions(mostly German and French).

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I've addressed this before (check this thread), but I appreciate that you might have missed it, so just to restate: This is not going to happen. At launch, the European version of City of Heroes will be up to date with the US one. Moving forward, there will be little or no delay between updates (and when I say 'little', I mean a matter of days at most - and we're working hard to ensure that even that doesn't happen).

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I dont like paying for inferior quality.

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Neither do we, and we wouldn't expect any of our players to do so.

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Is CoV going to be released in Europe at the same time as in America?

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Yes

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We're working hard to allow European players with an existing US account to play on the European servers without having to buy the game again.


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"to play" = "to also play" or "to instead play"? Very important difference...

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If we can make it work the way we want to, that will be up to you.

Hey GreekHero,

As Ramas pointed out, I think most of your questions have already been answered either earlier in this thread or in the FAQs on the European website.

Just to be clear, though:

The game client will be available for download, but we'd recommend new players buy the boxed game, as it'll have some goodies - and the 'special edition' box will be packed with 'em.

We're working hard to allow European players with an existing US account to play on the European servers without having to buy the game again. As soon as I have any definite news, I'll let you all know both here and on the European website.

We would like to offer character transfer, but we are still looking into whether this will be technically possible. More news on this as soon as I have it.

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As soon as I can, I'll let you all know what we're working on...

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What?? Not even a hint? How can we start the wild speculation without even a hint?

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As a few other people have already pointed out, to see what's been keeping me busy recently you might wanna take a glance here...

Oh, and if anything I've talked about earlier in the thread does change, I will be sure to let you know. Otherwise, my earlier answers still stand.

RoentgenStorm asked:

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Mr Bridger, are you able to give us an indication as to the cost of UK subscription?

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The exact details are still being worked out - I'll let you know as soon as everything has been finalised.

I can say, though, that it won't be £15 a month

Hey all, sorry for the delay in getting back to you, but things are little busy here right now - more news on that soon.

Anyway...

ramas100 had a few more things to say:

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No one will be forced to buy the game again. If you are happy playing on the US servers, you are welcome to continue doing so.

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Yet you argue that there are good reasons why people will want to switch, so logically you expect most people to do so?

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I'm saying there are good reasons to have European servers, and there are good reasons why those servers will be seperate to the US ones. That's all. I am not trying to persuade any of you to switch, and I have no expectations either way.

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I'll fully admit that daoc is exactly where my secondary worry, about inferior service, comes from.

Thing is, I don't see how you break the vicious circle.

Localisation delays -> less population as vets hold out on US servers -> less money -> less capacity for your team to localise and run CS -> localisation delays.

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Like all vicious circles, the best way to break it is before it starts. As I have said before, there will be no localisation delays at launch, and we are currently putting the systems into place to ensure that, if there are ever any delays in patches and updates, they are at worst a matter of days.

Hero14 said:

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Really? Hmmmm.



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That would be my boss, not me

Jaggedy asked:

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Since my only language is English (real) then I would have to say no. I don't mean to sound overly negative. I can see real advantage in French & German servers. But why a separate server for the UK?

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Exactly the same reasons as for the French and German language servers, apart from the languages - dedicated customer and billing support, websites, message boards, community teams, competitions, events and more at peak European times. Once again, though, if you're already playing on the US servers and are happy, by all means stay there.

Mysteron said:

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quite honestly I don't want you wasting my ssubscription on translating your version of English to mine as there is no benefit at all for this

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I completely agree - although it's not 'my' version of English. I'm from Essex

MrCaptainMan asked:

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When the UK version comes out, I'll still be living in Poland. Is there going to be a Polish releease? If so, which language and server will it be in/on? If not, can I download the UK version from anywhere? And if so, can you tell me when?

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The game will be available in Poland. It'll also be available for download. The language you play in will be determined by which server you choose, and all European players will be able to select any of the European servers.

Okay guys, I'm afraid that's going to be it for now - as I said, we're pretty rushed here at the moment. As soon as I can, I'll let you all know what we're working on...

Back again...

Nestum asked:

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How about Portuguese?

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Sorry, no plans right now. No Flemish either - sorry Bronze_Warrior

R0cktart joined Rangus in his quest:

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I think I know who you are, 1st initial S?

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No

SophieX made several good points about the benefits of a European version of the game, but there was one thing that I wanted to address:

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1. Language localisation. However, this could just as easily be done on a 'global' server. Plenty of French speakers in Canada, guys...

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While it's true that the initial translation could be done for a 'global' server (you'd probably still need to use Europeans, though - the French spoken in Canada is not the same as that spoken in Europe), when it comes to supporting the game, you start needing a fair number of fluent and preferably native speakers for customer and billing support, QA and so on. For the community side, you really need people who have at least lived in the relevant country for long enough to understand the gaming and popular culture - ideally someone who grew up there.

Finding good people like this outside of Europe isn't easy. Finding good people like this outside of Europe who are willing to work night shifts on a permanent basis (which they'd have to in order to be available at peak European times) is all but impossible.

CaptainAmazing asked:

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id be intersted to know what happens to those of us that bought a pre order account and gained a prestige running power.

would something like this come accross with the transfer if transfers are even possible ?

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To be honest, I have no idea, Cap - we'll have to wait and see if character transfer is even going to be technically possible before we can start working on things like that, I'm afraid.

ramas100 seems to have misunderstood one of my earlier comments:

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But hell, if you are so sure you are going to do localisation in a matter of days (DAoC said that too - they currently run 6 months behind) you won't even need two clients to be installed, since surely you can delay the English language launch until the translation if it's really only going to be a few days (lol).

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We're not going to do localisation in a couple of days. But we don't have to wait for a patch or update to be ready for release before we translate the text - we can start before the code even enters internal testing. As a result, if there's any delay in patches or updates between the US and Europe, it will only be a matter of days.

I know a lot of gamers got burned by the European version of DAoC - I was one of them. We're going to do better. DAoC started six months behind and said they would 'catch up'. We're starting up to date and are going to stay that way.

In another post, ramas100 also said:

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It goes without saying that segregation has no benefits whatsoever for the consumer.

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That really depends on whether you feel that localised versions of the game complete with dedicated customer and billing support, websites, message boards and community teams in those languages and at peak European times offer any benefits...

Rika_ came back to ask:

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Are you avoiding my question as to why this decision was taken in the first place?

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Nope. It's just that, as a few people have pointed out, it's a business decision. While City of Heroes may be played online, the people and companies responsible for running it are based in the real world, and that means that we have to deal with the same restrictions, limitations and practical concerns as any other multinational company.

Unikorn appears to have missed some of my earlier posts:

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It would seem like extreem greed to force people to buy it again.

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No one will be forced to buy the game again. If you are happy playing on the US servers, you are welcome to continue doing so.

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Can we still log in here with suggestions to the developers or do we have to do that before we get locked out?

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Likewise, no one with an active subscription to the US version of CoH will be locked out of these boards (unless you get yourself banned, of course).

B

Covnam asked:

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What about Dev responses? Will we have to check each board's dev digestt? Or will there be a single one that links to all boards? Or will the devs simply only post in one forum?

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This is a good question, and one of the many things that we're currently considering - particularly given that not all the Cryptic team are fluent in written French and German. We have some ideas that we're looking at, but I'd be interested in anyone else's opinions or suggestions...

Fenris_XYZ asked:

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Can North Americanos play on the Euro Servers?

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Not with the US version of the game, no. I guess they could import a European copy and sign up for a Euro account if they really want.

SimoneP asked:

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In the page about the search for community coordinators is required even an Italian Localisation Manager , but you didn't mention about italian speaking servers. Does this mean that we will have just an italian distribution of the game, maybe with an italian manual, but no italian servers?

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Although this could change, at the moment we have no plans to localise City of Heroes for Italian (or Spanish, before someone asks). However, NCsoft is launching several new games next year (take a look at the official site for details), some of which will be localised into Italian, hence the position you mention.

BigBadButch mentioned:

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I really have no idea how many words there are in City of Heroes

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According to our localisation team, we recently passed the 800,000 mark. Their best estimate is that we'll be close to a million words by the time the entire game is translated. So yes, that's quite a lot more than the few thousand words of dialogue in a movie...

Maxx_Tech brought up City of Villains:

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I was just thinking about how this relates to City of Villains...for those Europeans of us looking forward to that as well. (And I'm including hoping to get onto the Beta here.) The EU servers keeping up release dates with the US servers - does that include CoV, or is that going to be 6-odd months behind like CoH is? Is it even going to be possible for EU players on US servers to get onto the US CoV beta?

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The plan is for City of Villains to be released simultaneously in the US and Europe. As far as the beta goes, we're hoping to have a European beta running alongside the US one.

Rangus continued his efforts to find out who I am:

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Ok, are you the guy who wrote the recent Eurogamer review?

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Nope

B

And there's more...

Rangus asked:

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To Bridger - Are you M. Southerns?

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No

WingedKagouti clarified his question:

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Would it be fair to assume no difference in Content (villains & zones) or Character Creation (costume & powers) compared to US?

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It would be fair to assume that, although as I mentioned, we have some ideas for 'goodies' similar to those in the US DVD Edition.

Nickwild came back for more:

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And are we actually going to get the comic? Or are we going to have to continue importing it?

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The comic and all the issues associated with it are still being considered. As soon as we have news, I'll let you all know.

hereismyname asked:

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Since the game will still be set in the US, does this mean the units won't be converted to metric?

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That's right - Paragon City will being sticking with the Imperial system.

Carrying on...

Ksala asked:

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When can we expect to see CoH launching in Europe?

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February, 2005.

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How many servers do you anticipate having?

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At least three (one for each language) and as many more as we need. The final decision on how many servers to have at release will be made towards the end of the beta.

Cog_Sprocket brought up a couple of things that weren't exactly questions, but I think are important...

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often it means Euro servers get updated way behind the others for major publishes etc.

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It may have meant that with some games in the past, it's not going to mean that for City of Heroes. Again, we're still working out the details, but if there is any delay between the US version and the European version when it comes to updates and patches, we're going to keep it as short as possible - I'm talking days, not months.

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I've heard some rumours this is due to the Euro servers having a European setting

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I can happily squash that rumour under my official boot - the European version will be set in the one and only Paragon City. Where else could you set City of Heroes but in the city of heroes?

Rika_ asked:

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Will the issues be released from 1 upwards again or straight into issue 2 (or 3 if need be). Or will it be a sign of Europe getting screwed like usual?

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No, we'll be completely up to date with the US version at launch.

Nickwild asked:

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Another question, will the DVD edition be available at UK launch?

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No. The European version will actually be more up to date than the US DVD edition. As far as the DVD 'goodies', watch this space. We have a few ideas along those lines...

SophieX noted:

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As for paying in Sterling, they may not offer that at all. They could easily just have the price set in Euros since much of Europe has already adopted the single currency, but they may still include Sterling as an option.

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You will be able to pay in Euros or Sterling.

Nickwild popped in again to ask:

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Also another question (sorry Bridger) will we get teh same chances to appear in the comic as our North American friends?

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Looking into that now. More info when I have it for you.

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Any details of launch competitions?

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We're working on these. Look out for lots of screaming and yelling about them as we get closer to launch.

NationOfJoe asked:

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when is the australian release?

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Sorry, Joe, but I don't know right now. We would like to release the game in Australia, and are looking into it.

VagabondX asked:

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Wait, so there's going to be North America boards and then European boards?

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Yes. The European boards will open around the same time as the European beta.

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Why the need to segregate us? I mean, c'mon, we can get along, right people?

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It's not about segregating, it's about community and practical concerns.

On the practical side are things like languages (we'll have boards for English, French and German speaking players, with their own Community Coordinators) and time zones. On the community side is all the stuff that's going to be unique to City of Heroes Europe. We'll be running our own website, our own competitions, we have plans for our own events - at peak European times - and so on. It just makes things easier for everyone if the European players have their own place to speak their minds and get to know each other (and us).

B

Hey all,

Thanks for the many welcomes and congrats. I see there's quite a lot to cover already...

SpongeCake asked:

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I've a question: Will those of us in Europe who are playing on US servers ever be able to switch our characters over to a European server? Will we have to buy the European version of the game to do this?

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As SophieX has already pointed out, the way things stand right now, if you want to play the European version, you'll need to buy the European game. We are looking into both account and character transfer for existing European players and as soon I hear anything definite on either, I'll be letting you know.

I should probably point out right now that those of you who have imported the US version will not be 'forced' to buy the European edition - you're completely free to continue playing on the US servers. Well, not actually 'free', as you'll have to carry on paying the subscription like everyone else, but you get the idea...

Bountytaker asked:

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Any comment to the rumors that the 5th Column are being dumped due to German laws regarding Nazi representation?

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What's going on with the 5th Column? I'm afraid you'll have to wait for Issue #3 to find out...

WingedKagouti asked a few things:

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How do you intend to launch CoH in Europe? Starting with a beta/test or just plunk down some live servers and go from there?

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We're going to start with a beta to test the hardware and the translations. We're working out the details right now, and as soon as the sign-up starts we'll be screaming about it all over the place. Including here.

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What do you see as the main differences between a US community and a Euro community?

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The European community stands a better chance of getting my jokes?

Actually, I'm more interested in hearing what all of you think about this one. What do you feel are the differences between the US community and the European one?

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What differences, if any, have been planned?

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I'm not sure if you mean between the two versions of the game or the two communities... The major and most obvious difference between the US and European versions is that the European one will allow you to play in English, French or German (and yes, we'll have servers for each language). This is obviously also going to be one of the biggest differences between the communities, and how we help support them.

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Will there be a Euro specific test server?

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Again, the details are still being worked out, but almost certainly yes.

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Will any changes to the Euro version compared to the US be handled by Cryptic or a different dev team?

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The European version is being developed by Cryptic. The translations are being coordinated between Cryptic and our localisation team here at NCsoft Europe.

Okay, that's a start. Don't worry, I will be working my way through the rest of the questions (and any more that come up) as quickly as I can, so keep on posting...

B

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Which magazines did you work for? The ones based in London, Bath or Macclesfield? (Please do not say the latter)

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London and Bath

B

Hey everyone, and thanks for the introduction, CuppaJo. It's great to be here - with my very own red name and everything

Just so you all know, I'm going to be handling the English-speaking City of Heroes community in Europe. We're currently hiring Community Coordinators to cover other European languages - if you're interested, click here for details.

So, if you have any questions about CoH Europe, ask away and I'll do my best to answer them...

Cheers,

Bridger