Electric-Knight

I agree with this so much I'll use it myself!

This really looks like a good fit for Del Toro. I'm not even all that familiar with these comics, but the designs and themes just seem to be a great fit.

I'm still not entirely familiar with all of the shutdowns, but, as far as I understand, they were all not doing so well. I could be wrong about that though (heh, there are plenty of people who likely believe the same about CoH).


Hehe, for the record, I've long felt like NCSoft was responsible for a number of things that I wasn't happy with - namely a lot of the secrecy or limiting communications or improving/funding certain features (the store, UI, marketing).
When I'd complain about "marketing", I generally felt like the real culprits were NCSoft. Now, none of this was huge, but I always felt like NCSoft was a necessary evil, if you will, hehe. Which, hey, the money-man/producer always will be, to some extent.

Always!

I honestly don't know, as I really don't know much about CO at all. It is an interesting thought though. Not one that matters ot me or anything, hehe, but yeah... Personally I've always felt like these games should have an offline mode.
One of the first I ever tried was a beta of wwiionline. It was a pretty advanced and rather ambitious project that combined flight sim, tank sim, boat and submarine sim along with foot soldiers, combat, regular vehicles all within the same exact playing field.
They had an offline mode that was just called training mode. So, you could fly/drive/run around to learn things without messing up your country's chances, I suppose, haha.
I always thought that was the way it should be (knowledge and knowhow of making such possibilities a reality for each and every mmorpg completely foreign to me, of course!).

I honestly do think it's the right thing to do. Beyond that, I'm not sure.
This situation (which is all I really have to go by) certainly felt like it called for such communications. (Then again, according to NCSoft the changes were not entirely financial. No doubt, there are numbers that'd make closing down unthinkable, but I don't know how realistic those numbers may be/may have been.)

Here's the one thing that has bothered me about this shutdown that I haven't really expressed, I don't think (although, it's common, I'm sure).
People were very willing to give more money than the monthly subscription because they felt like it was going towards Paragon Studios and the health of this game.
And they really didn't see any writing on the wall that it'd be ending any time soon. Some people tossed hundreds of dollars so that they could unlock the VIP Tiers and get those costumes/unlockables (and have an enormous pile of Paragon Points to buy things at the store as well).
While that is certainly a buyer-be-ware situation (as I certainly was not willing to shell out that kind of money for such things, but, hey, we all have our different levels and limits), it's also a situation that makes such a quick shutdown all the more harsh.
Sure, we had three months, but - Three months is not all that long of a time and those three months are just three months of fun... they're three months after being told your favorite game is going bye-bye for no good reason other than that the publisher is refocusing their vision/products. That's a bummer and makes those three months unfun for many (not everyone, but possibly most).
And it was really unseen and a complete surprise to most everyone.

The fact of the "fix everything" upcoming issue being just about ready for release... not to mention knowing that the developers had the following issue planned and surely had things pretty well pegged for the one after that as well (as we'd been told they do and as they'd drop mentions of different features and tweaks that'd come down the line in those later issues) really made the sudden (and quick) shutdown shocking. Plus the fact that they gave the development team no time to at least push those things to live.
This was not a grand sendoff to a loyal community.
And, just as individuals deserve fair treatment, so do communities. There may not be laws to tell us some of these things (and, in many cases there actually, are), it is often times pretty obvious when someone is being shady and/or someone is being treated poorly.

Anyway, stuff happens, no doubt... but, sometimes, the people causing that stuff to happen deserve to be reprimanded and/or made to make it happen in a better way.

I think I drifted off tangent there, mayhaps, hehe. Just wanted to try and answer your questions (as much as I could, at least).

Again, you're forgetting the entire issue of this particular game being (and why we're having this conversation within this particular thread) the most active game to be shut down.
This game was going well. The Developing company was pounding out things (that the paying customers were quite excited to receive) like the end was certainly no where near.
The other games, from what I understand, were not doing well.
That is the main point that should not be dismissed every time people begin to argue other specifics.

As for myself, I was not informed/educated about what NCSOft was doing anywhere else. I don't know jack about pretty much any other game these days. I just played CoH and mostly had blinders on to everything else.
Regardless, from what I understand, other games failed pretty much from the get-go. There didn't seem to be a major problem with the shutdowns. There may have been... but it wasn't widely known, at the very least.

We've certainly brought attention to questionable behavior with the closing of CoH though. Whether or not there were problems before this and whether any other communities deserved better does not, for one second, make any attempt to do the right thing now less sensible or right.
No one cared before, so why bother now? Hehe, that's just silly.
I understand if you're trying to pain people here as simply being selfish and not caring about other games and other communities, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who only followed my own game.

Years of successfully providing the implementation of thousands of catgirls has served them well.


Hehe, seriously though, I agree.

And this is precisely the point that is spawning most of the thoughts, feelings and efforts of 1) this game shouldn't be ending 2) we're going to try our best to prevent its complete removal from the world and 3) perhaps there should be certain legalities that would prevent a situation as extreme as this one (and this is entirely where this all fits into this original topic - "most active mmorpg to be shut down"? Yep, it sure felt like it and it seems wrong. And it's not just me thinking and saying it).

I'm not saying I fully believe there should be new laws in place (or any that would prevent this case). However, I am also not sure that there shouldn't. Laws just aren't really my thing (Hey, don't judge me!) and I haven't given it a lot of consideration (yet).
It does seem to me that this is a clear matter of the continued new landscape of virtual properties and the internet and the world of inter-connectivity and trying to figure out the rules and laws of such things. Simple (and complicated) as that.

It's probably best to ditch the analogies. We've seen and learned a good amount about what an mmorpg is and/or could be.
If we want to see any others remotely like this one within our future, we may need to establish new rules (whether they are just codes of conduct or actual laws... and, honestly, I'm not sure the human race is capable of doing well with just codes of conduct any more).

Again, what is the kicker to all of this? It's not that this game was struggling and dying and no good, so there you have it.
It was thriving (as much or more than it had in a long while). People were pumping money in, because they believed in it and wanted it to do well for some time to come.

"Forever" in an advertisement may certainly not mean "forever" (yay), but I think a solid argument could be made for interpreting it as more than a year.

And, in the end, the argument is not that they can't legally (or even that they shouldn't be able to legally) shut down the game and their servers. The argument is the idea of legally requiring an offline backup quality of service for situations in which the cancellation of that service (and refusal/inability to sell it) seem less to do with an actual need to drop it as opposed to simply a new refocusing and lack of care/commitment.

Now, why should that be the case for a video game that you knew was an online only game?
The answer to that is that these mmorpgs are not simply just games, but communities built around a game and sustained by customers and hobbyists and people putting in real labors of love.
Again, I'm not saying that any of that should legally prevent a closure, but I could certainly see it enabling a backup recompense (that most would feel rather worthless anyway, heh).

I know I'd be a lot happier if I could have even just a strictly single-player instance of the game, despite NCSoft being tuna-brained lousy heads (that's a Calvin and Hobbes reference and not some sort of racially/nationally-charge slur!).

I like being able to log in as Electric-Knight and zap some baddies now and then and if they won't take my money for it, I'd kindly like to still be able to (without a costume, tasers and the risk of legal ramifications).

Notice he did not say that there are no such things as "a Rangle Plot".

Two obvious possibilities jump out at me:
1) If you end up discovering you have new credit cards and charges for several orders of brass and steam-power-related items... suspect a Nemesis plot.
2) If you discover an extraneous cowboy hat purchase (assuming a Texan may notice such things), suspect Black Pebble.

Little known fact: I am Arcanaville's head writer.
Fortunately, what I write is on the back of her head, so everything that she types come from herself.

LOL!

My apologies to Cap'n and everyone, as I don't intend to turn this into a major thread derail!
Just quickly, the end goal would basically be to get them to sell the game/IP/code so that it could still be played.
Indeed (as frostdrake mentions below), the original intention was to get them to sell as quickly so that as much of Paragon Studios (and our game and community) could stay intact and continue on after the bump/detour in the road of NCSoft ditching us.
Even at the October 2nd mark, there was still a chance of us keeping such things. I'm under no delusion that NCSoft would change their minds ealiy, but it was always worth a shot.

At this point, yeah, it is likely way too late to salvage most of the team (although, perhaps my assessment of the job availabilities for them are overly optimistic). And this community and former playerbase is also likely fractured beyond what could have continued.

As for the overall reasons for fighting back, there is the microcosm and the macrocosm. We have/had the talented workers to fight for, the game to fight for, our community to fight for; We also have the ideals to fight for. Is this how we want the mmorpg landscape to be shaped? Profitable and relatively sizable games/communities that are highly enjoyed by loyal, paying customers/participants (and studio employees/designers) being shut down due to billion-dollar companies refocusing, because the profits the product makes (while quite a lot to some of us) is too small a hill for their mountain range?

I just saw someone mention recently, "NCSoft was selling a game. We were paying for access to a community". While, obviously, most of us were certainly paying for a game, first and foremost, the true community aspect is simply collateral damage to NCSoft's views. And, that's all fine... They should have separated themselves from the game (et all) and given it a much better chance to survive and continue. And our influence could (and possibly still can) alter the outcome of all of this.

Sure, but, at that time, instead of taking their "go screw yourselves" as the end of it, I felt like we should have stepped up and countered it with a larger show than we did at the initial announcement.
Even offering an announcement that no negotiations will tak place is a part of negotiating... otherwise, there'd be zero communication.
My final point is that, unfortunately, their tactic (with that announcement) worked like a charm for them.
"Stop protesting! You cannot win!"
And the majority of people walked away saying, "Oh, okay, that's over!".

Just boggles my mind that people would take that reaction.

Indeed! I intended to mention that as well. I'm happy to hear that and hope things go well with Matt!

Yeah, it is crazy.
Unfortunately, companies want the big, easily-marketed-to, most-ideal (according to our research) masses and not the hard to define, (somewhat) sensible, mature (somewhat), casual and loyal group of people with money in-hand.

Welcome to the crossroads of entertainment and business!

I've heard that this aspect is entirely untrue and just internet rumor stuff/rationalizing the scenario. And, doing a quick search shows the SOE president saying that they could have renewed the contract. Seems like more bunk trying to lessen SOE's blame (and shift it onto Luscasarts, just as people always did every time something went wrong there... which is bunk... If SOE did it, they are responsible and no one should be looking to pass the buck).

As a subscriber of SWG from launch and until a little after their NGE debacle in 2005, I don't believe that the game's population was enough to sustain it. SOE (possibly their only positive) is pretty stubborn in keeping titles running (especially after the disaster they created there... it would have looked even worse on them if the game was cancelled right after their ultimate game changes in '05), but the exodus from that game (who's population wasn't all that great after WoW and CoH came along anyway) left things pretty bad over there. I'm sure, after the server consolidation and the people remaining banded together, it seemed like a nice thing for those who enjoyed it, but it still wasn't what it was and I doubt it compared to our population.

Indeed, their Station Pass setup allows for inflated numbers and more people who may be around, but not necessarily subscribers/frequenters to that particular game. So, that may make calculating such things a bit difficult.


Anyway...

Here's the thread CD started in the Titan Forums!
http://www.cohtitan.com/forum/index....ic,6007.0.html

(It's in the General Discussion subforum)