Neutra

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I've seen this movie. The ending sucks.

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QFT.

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Out of curiosity, to the doomsayers, knowing that almost all the current devs are still going to be working on the game, what brings on the doom? I'm honestly not seeing a reason for it.

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I think it comes from the history of acquisitions mainly, with regards to games. Usually whenever a company buys out a game, it's because the game is tanking, like when SOE bought Matrix Online or when EA bought Mythic and now owns Dark Ages of Camelot.

However, the case with this acquisition doesn't come from the fact that CoH was doing poorly. CoH is doing great.

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First I am not a doomsayer. This could be good, could be bad.

I see where your coming from, but my reservation (and I'm sure others) is that reguardless of how well COH is doing; companies rarly buy other franchies with the intention of maintaingthe status quo. It's pretty safe to assume that with full ownership Ncsoft will be looking to make some pretty ambitious changes (ie great things). As of yet there hasn't been a successful transition between changing hands of and MMO as such changes are meant to gain new players usually at the cost of upsetting the loyal current fan bas. This inability to balance the new and old is far to common I think to assume things will be AOK. All, that being said I have more faith in NCsoft then almost any other production company in the business (which wouldn't take much).

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Ah, gotcha.

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SOE was not the company that did Matrix Online did. That distinction belongs to Monolith. SOE's attempts were to save an already destroyed game -- in essence, they got a pale and tried to save the Titanic after it started sinking. You can shovel all the water you want out, but the huge gaping hole still existed.

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Oh yeah, agreed. They didn't actually pull the trigger, they just bought the thing afterwards. I was just trying to emphasize that whenever a game gets bought up by someone, it's because the game wasn't doing well or is nearing the end of its run. The players were expecting it, so no one is surprised when it is bought.

In the case of CoH, I don't think anyone was expecting NC Soft to pull a move like this. We were just chugging along innocently

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There is quite a bit of supposition in your post. But to be honest all your points SEEM valid and I hope to Christ your right. I've been here since the beginning like many board members and I'm not going anywhere. If this acquisition means more money, more talent, more content, more EVERYTHING then woo hoo!

I stand by my reservations though that this could be both a blessing a curse for CoX. Personally though. The best news I could have heard is when Castle said he WILL be coming with us to the new NCSoft building and staying on COH. He's the best dev we got and losing him would have been a tremendous loss for the game.

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Heh, yeah, you're right. I'm an optimist though. I went ahead and changed the title of "The Future" to "The -Potential- Future" so that people don't think that it's set in stone. I'm praying to everything holy that it works out well. Like you said, with huge potential comes huge disaster. I'm really trusting NC Soft with this

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I need to get my forum title changed (-_^)b

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[censored] YES! We're getting Poh back! Seriously, rejoice. That awesome UI we have, thank this guy....at least I think Poh said he was the one that did the UI Regardless, we got Pohsyb!

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I've seen this movie. The ending sucks.

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QFT.

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Out of curiosity, to the doomsayers, knowing that almost all the current devs are still going to be working on the game, what brings on the doom? I'm honestly not seeing a reason for it.

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I think it comes from the history of acquisitions mainly, with regards to games. Usually whenever a company buys out a game, it's because the game is tanking, like when SOE bought Matrix Online or when EA bought Mythic and now owns Dark Ages of Camelot.

However, the case with this acquisition doesn't come from the fact that CoH was doing poorly. CoH is doing great. I think NC Soft saw the potential of the game and wants to take it to the next level. Unfortunately, Cryptic Studios is too tied up on other projects to really focus on CoH, so they decided to buy it from them.

Also, the idea that NC Soft OWNS ALL of CoH probably causes some fear. In the past, if things went bad, NC Soft could have pulled out of publishing CoH, but CoH wouldn't have died off. Cryptic would have had to find a new publisher for it is all. Now that NC Soft is the only owner of CoH, if they want to shut it down, that's it -BOOM- it's done. End of story.

However, I don't see this being the case like I stated before. There's too much potential for CoH to be tanked.

And as a final note, remember, NC Soft is -NOT- SOE. They're not going to completely [censored] everyone and give Kheldians to everyone and nerf Regen until it can't move. Posi and the rest of the Devs are alllll coming over. They're going to be the ones doing the balancing, they're going to be the ones picking people for the future CoH team.

NC Soft DOES have a final say in everything, but like I said, they're not SOE. I'm sure they'll let them do pretty much anything they want. NC Soft is just giving Posi and company their checkbook for the most part.

Plus, I don't think the fact that the ENTIRE current CoH team PLUS some of the other people working at Cryptic ALL moving to this new company together is a fluke. I'm sure they know what they're getting into. I'm sure they see the positive to all this.

HERE'S A SIMPLE EXPLANATION AND ANSWERS TO WHAT THIS ANNOUNCEMENT MEANS:

The Past
<ul type="square">[*] Cryptic Studios and NC Soft both owned CoH. In order for anything in the game to happen, both NC Soft and Cryptic had to agree on it.[*] Cryptic studios has a ton of people working at it. Of all those people, only about 20 were working on CoH. Everyone else was working on MUO, or the other secret project.[*] Of all the money Cryptic Studios had, almost all of it was being used on MUO, since Microsoft is paying for them to make it. CoH was only getting a little money from outside investors and other places to be worked on. That's why they had such a small amount of people working on it.[/list]
The Present
<ul type="square">[*] Cryptic sold their rights to CoH to NC Soft. Now, NC Soft completely owns CoH. Cryptic Studios has NOTHING to do with City of Heroes anymore.[*] Now that NC Soft owns CoH, they have created a completely new, separate studio called NC Soft NorCal, to work ONLY on CoH, not any other game. NC Soft completely owns this studio, however, this studio will be doing it's own thing. NC Soft will be paying for everything it does.[*] ALL of the Devs working on CoH at Cryptic are moving to this new studio and working for NC Soft, not Cryptic Studios anymore.

Anyone that had worked on CoH in the past was offered a chance to come work at the new studio and leave Cryptic. Some people are taking that offer and others are not. So we WILL have some of the original team from the past working at the new studio along with the current Dev team.[*] Positron will remain the Lead Designer, but there will be a new "Statesman" -type- person that he will be working with. This person is NOT Jack Emmert, aka Statesman.[*] Jack Emmert, aka Statesman, is not going to be involved with NC Soft NorCal. He will continue to work at Cryptic Studios, but will no longer be involved with anything having to do with CoH.[/list]
The -Potential- Future
<ul type="square">[*] Once the deal has been completed, Posi and all the other Devs will be moving out of Cryptic Studios and into the new NC Soft NorCal building. NC Soft has hired some other people already to work at the new studio, so they will be joining them. They will be hiring MORE people to work at the new studio.[*] MORE MONEY. CoH will have stupid amounts of money thrown at it to make it better then it already is. All of those projects like Shields, Weapon Customization and so forth that required a LOT of time, and thus a LOT of money, to do, will be able to actually get done. NC Soft is now a giant sugar daddy like no other NC Soft is HUGE. WoW has Blizzard throwing money at it. MUO has Microsoft throwing money at it. CoH now has NC Soft throwing money at it.[*] Bigger Staff. They will be hiring a LOT more people to work on CoH. With more people they can finally have TWO teams, one for CoH and one for CoV, working at the same time. They can have a team working on PvP, they can have a team working on Events, and they can have a team for just about anything else you can think of.[*] Issues will be BIGGER after this change. More people means MORE content, MORE TFs, MORE zones, MORE Epic ATs, MORE of EVERYTHING. All those things we were told couldn't be done right away because they just didn't have the people for it, GONE. They'll be able to do just about anything with a full staff. Think about, 100 people working on CoH versus the 20 people working on it right now.[*] Faster releases, less secrets, shorter response time. Now that NC Soft owns ALL of CoH, they don't have to ask Cryptic for permission to do anything. Decisions will be made much quicker now that there aren't two different companies trying to agree on things. If we ask for something and NC Soft says "OK!", that's it, it'll happen.

In the past, if Cryptic Studios wanted to tell us something, but couldn't because NC Soft said "not yet", that won't happen. Now NC Soft can tell us anything we want, they have all the power to release information anytime they want.

And best of all, since there's no more delays with trying to get both Cryptic Studios and NC Soft on the same schedule, Issues, fixes, expansions and all that will be coming out MUCH quicker.[*] CoH can actually have Marketing! That's right, with the NC Soft Marketing team and all the money NC Soft has, they can actually use real songs for trailers, they can actually try and make commercials for CoH and all sorts of other things. CoH will have the capability to advertise like WoW does. Shirts, hats, key chains, toys, it could all happen.[/list]
Answers to Concerns
<ul type="square">[*] All of this does NOT change anything in the game right now or anytime soon. Issue 12 WILL be coming next year and has already been worked on by the Devs.[*] The Boards WILL not change. NC Soft actually owns and runs the boards already. If anything the Boards will be getting BETTER.[*] Issues will NOT be slowing down. In fact, they will be speeding up.[*] All of the Devs will still be here to hang with us, work on the game and everything. All they're doing is moving to a new desk.[*] NC Soft is NOT going to be changing or working on the game. Positron and all the other Devs will continue to be the ones to make the decisions for the CoH world.[*] Regen is not getting nerfed.[/list]
In conclusion, this is a FANTASTIC announcement. It's one of the BEST things that could have happened for CoH. It sounds like they already have plans for future expansions, possibly a CoH 2 and tons of new content for issues. Next year is going bring a LOT of new toys and content to the game!

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and of course, another I11 puzzle was in the Times.

Linky

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DT seems to fit into that pattern...whatever it may be.

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Yeah, I am totally stuck trying to figure out what it says o.O

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didn't even mention weapon customization... which, I believe, is the best part of the Issue.

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Yeah, it really is one of the strongest points of the issue. Conventional wisdom about what new players want to hear probably says that no one really cares about customization and want to know more about loots, content and powersets, but honestly, customization is a huge draw to a game since it helps personalize the experience of it even moreso.

If it were me, I'd have opened the article with talking about Ouroboros, then the new enhancements, then the new Powersets and finally closed it strong with Weapon Customization.

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Alright, I didn't read all 40+ pages. Anyway, has there been any clues as to where these Oroboros Bases will be situated? Will they be set up in low traffic zones like Galaxy and Skyway, or dropped into Talos like everything else?

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Nothing yet.

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Although, the picture they have in the Game Updates section make the bases look like they're way up in the sky or something. That glowing, golden orb might be a way to TP onto it if you're not a Flyer. Sorta like how there are the Blue Orbs in the Shadow Shard that TP you back to FBZ.

I would LOVE it if the bases were up high somewhere within the city or off of an island. It would look so ominous and bad[censored].

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I think the idea of having the ability to dual wield knives would be cooler. I agree that the length of these are way too long. Even something similar to what the redcaps wield, except design them differently. Give them a unique shape, something! So much potential...*sigh*.

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Well, I tested it, and even the Red Cap blades are fairly large as well. If you want to see the other results, you can check them out here.

Ok, I've figured out what was turning me off from Dual Blades. After blowing the pics up as big as I could, it's the picture of the female that was throwing me off of the actual size of the swords and their thickness. Seeing her hold them makes them look huge and skinny, but if you look at the 4th picture with the guy fighting Clockwork, they actually do look cool with the different hilt and curved blade. They've got a good thickness and length to them.

And looking at the poses again makes me giddy to think of what a giant, chain of attacks will look like

The blades in the pictures are a bit too skinny for my taste. The length is cool, but I'd rather they have been thicker or something. If not, then at least shorter if they were going to be that thin. Still though, dual wielding has always been wicked.

The stances for Dual Blades look amazing. That last picture makes me wonder what the rest of the attack poses will look like.

Willpower looks pretty cool. I'm not in the camp of "it HAS to have minimal F/X" so I don't care what they do with it. The fact that one of the animations uses the MoG animation makes me smile though. That's my favorite animation in the game

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Also never enter a drinking contest with a Scot!

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Dude, seriously. I thought you had dropped your glass the first time it hit the table...then I saw it was empty and almost choked. I think I need to practice some more if we head out to the Bay.

It really can't be said enough times just how amazing that weekend was and how great it was to hangout with everyone and just be relaxed and shooting the breeze. Plus, I even got to meet BillZ! Oh, and those Tabula Rasa beanies were the freaking bomb. I wear mine like every day now.

Hey guys! Sorry Disco and I couldn't make it yesterday morning to breakfast, we were just exhausted from the night before and we stayed up pretty late after Opal's. It was a sincere pleasure to be able to meet you all and hang out like we did. I couldn't have asked for a better weekend and it proves just how awesome NC Soft and CoX are.

I'll def be keeping in touch more if I'm up near the Austin area and hopefully they do hold something in the Bay area in the future. Disco and I will def fly out there to meet up again.

There are some other pictures *cough* that I'm currently trying to get a hold of, but I'll need to send those via PM And thank you very much for the Lethal Weapon shot TJ. It hit like a hammer...so I did another one later that night

Thanks again for setting everything up Missy and Moggie. Hope everyone got home well after everything!

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!!!

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Oh wow, awesome! Now all you have left to say is that there's going to be an Issue 11 Announcement at the MnG and I think we'll all explode.

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I really like the carpooling idea...makes it easier for everyone to set up a designated driver if they need one. If everyone needs a meeting place and isn't too concerned with a meeting spot that is too terribly close to downtown, I can offer our hotel for the initial meeting grounds. We're staying at the Amerisuites near Dave and Buster's (I wanted a place nice 'n close to the meet 'n greet so I could stumble back to the hotel if I had one too many "refreshments" ).

Or, party in Ex Libris' room is a viable option too!

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That works for Discochild and myself. We're staying at the Embassy that's right next to DnB. We too wanted to be within stumbling distance of our hotel Miss Informed has my number already and I'll PM it to you later as well Manoa. We're def down for some 6th St. action, totally forgot how to get there though, lol. I do remember very clearly that parking sucks horribly around there, just like everyone else is saying.

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Bored in Austin? Park the rental on 6th street and take a walk. You can easily burn a few hours.

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Ah 6th St., how I miss you. We should take Ex there and claim it's her birthday. See how far she can make it down the street

Yeah, we're doing something Friday and I know I'm going out for some "refreshments" in the evening Friday night. Nothing too crazy though since I actually want to look presentable Saturday, lol. We'll def all get together though both days. I know I want to get to DnB early.

You're definitely going to be missed Arctic. It was great getting to meet and chat with you at last year's Meet n Greet and you're a great guy in person, just like here on the boards. Best of luck in your future endeavors, you've got some great talent. Def stop by and say hi anytime you can. Cheers

You know, only I would manage to somehow forget to put myself on my own list.

*hangs head in shame*

I put this list together of people on the boards that said they'll be going or possibly going:

From TX
Mad_Malkavian
BillZBubba Pinnacle/Guardian
MissInformed Justice
Escher
Texas Justice Justice
Balorn
Sleestacky Liberty
KnightOwl
Nameless_Hero
SuperGoober Justice
DiscoChild Justice
Rachael_Storm
Soul_Train
Horatus
Omega_Brawler
Palabras_Son
Solarexx Virtue/Champion
Nameless Hero Virtue

Out of State
Manoa CA - Justice

Possibly Attending
Belabras
Rooftop_Raider
Rei_kun
Keitaro
Burning_Brawler
Penny_Cillin
Kirbyrockz
mr_sachmo


If I forgot anyone, I apologize. It's what I've managed to scrounge together from various posts. Can't wait to see you all next week!

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Photo 3: Archon Voss' awesome Mordheim table.

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Good lord that looks nice. No wonder you guys have him designing zones for the world. How long did that take him to make? I made a few, small scenarios for Warhammer 40k a long time ago with my brother and they took a good couple of days to layout, but a whole town *whistle* props to Voss, lol.

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SexyJay gave us a real Texas Style Barbecue not too long ago. Good stuff...I could feel my arteries hardening!

As far as public appearances go, I swore off trade shows about a decade ago (or maybe, I was sworn off of them. Something about being forced to demo a product I thought was doomed and being honest about it when asked...not real sure.)

A "Meet &amp; Greet" might be different, and there is at least a small chance I'd go to one locally. I hate travelling and dislike crowds -- not a great combination. Makes me a bit anti-social.

Besides, EvilGeko and Angry-Citizen would kidnap me, lock me in a room and do horrible things to me.

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LoL, I try to picture Jay cooking and I keep picturing him wearing a giant chef hat and dancing around to "Sexy Back" and using the spatula as a microphone.

And that whole trade show deal sounds...awkward I've only ever had to go to two trade shows and I thought they were pretty fun. It's a LOT of standing around. I wish I'd worn bed slippers or something by the end of the day.

It'd be awesome if Cryptic itself hosted a Meet n Greet there locally. I'd def try and find a way to get alllll the way back out there again. Rent a bus with a bunch of people from TX or something, heh.

And I can't comment on whether EvilGeko would or would not put that plan into motion. He's a bit off, that one. I mean look at him.

*everyone looks over at EG as he's there making a mousetrap car out of balsa wood and CDs*

See?

Honestly, I just want to eat a bunch of Arby's when I get up there We don't have any down here in McAllen. We thrive off Tex-Mex and barbeque every day, so I'll pass &gt;.&lt;

I'll bring you guys a bunch of Taco Palenque if you want in exchange for directions to Arby's. It's great food, dunno if Austin has any up there yet though.

It's funny when people come to Texas and suggest having a barbeque and think it's going to happen the next day. You get some very odd looks. It's more like "uh, you mean a week from now, right? I mean, you just suggested it today, so we have to prep everything. You can't just 'have' one short notice."