shadow35

Haha on the Anonymous. But no. Let's do all we can legally to get the word out there, to maybe find a pro publisher to rescue this game if at all possible.

But Penny Arcade is a great idea!

CoH is a turn-based Massively Multiplayer game with separate, distinct servers. its server structure is completely different than GW2's, so much so that I doubt it is even possible to transition CoH's servers into something GW2 could even use. Not to mention that CoH's servers are what, 8 1/2 years old now (or were they changed at one point then re-named the same things)?

I love CoH to death, but haven't you ever noticed how even within turn-based MMORPGs, the older ones have much slower combat than the newer ones do? This is because of hardware differences, and game engine differences because of at-the-time-of-launch hardware restrictions. Aion has much faster turn-based combat than CoH or WoW; it's much newer, with newer hardware to run on. But CoH and WoW have faster combat than Dark Age of Camelot, which is about to turn 11 years old, does. And even if they moved DAoC to a newer server, its whole engine was created back with those older technology limitations in place, so that mega-slow combat speed is all that's all it's capable of (And DAoC is one of my fav MMOs of all time, so that's not a dig.)

GW2 is a real-time multiplayer game with one overarching server and many channels of that one server, despite what they try and make it look like in the "server" list. GW1 had a zillion different channels, too. When you get a name for your character in GW2, it becomes "taken" on every "server," which alone is a dead giveaway. They can call channel 1 "Yak's Bend" instead of "channel 1," and channel 2 "Ferguson's Crossing" instead of "channel 2," etc., but that doesn't change a thing.

And each of these channels' zones have WAY lower population caps than real massively multiplayer servers like CoH's do. I played the early start and frequently got dumped into some "overflow area" as it was called on-screen.

ArenaNet is desperately trying to make this single server look like a bunch of them to justify their exorbitant cash shop prices. "Well, we're an MMO but we don't have a monthly fee...." No, in fact you are NOT an MMO, lol.

My post about GW2 here has nothing whatsoever to do with CoH shutting down. I felt this way on August 25th, right when the purported "servers" first came up and I saw what was really going on, and what they were trying to charge for this nonsense despite what was really going on.

So...You pay 60 bucks for FIVE character slots in an EIGHT CLASS game. This made me mad. Sorry, ArenaNet fanbois if you're out there reading this. Then character slots are freaking ten dollars each on top of that! So you're up to 90 bucks just to play this...wannabe massively multiplayer game coming out of the gate, storage restrictions and blah blah extras aside.

Okay, it's real-time combat like the first one, which is nigh-on impossible to do with full-fledged massively multiplayer servers because none out there can track thousands of players in real-time combat simultaneously like that. I get it. This is why games like CoH, and WoW, and EQ2, and Dark Age of Camelot, with full-fledged, massively multiplayer servers are turn-based to begin with.

So ArenaNet can't do this the same way with real-time combat. So they make channels. Even Tera (real-time combat) does this, just to a lesser degree than GW2. FPSs have always been set up with a lobby players meet up in, then it's instanced outside the lobby for this same reason. And GW2 is not *as* totally instanced as GW1 or FPSs are. Within each channel of each zone in GW2, a few teams and some soloers are intermingling. But massively multiplayer it is not. Separate servers it is not. So something equal to MMO fees every month it should not have. It should not cost you as much or more average per month to play something that is not an MMORPG.

Your mileage may vary, and all the more power to you, but this whole CoH shutdown/NCSoft announcement handled so poorly AFTER GW2 has launched is just icing on the cake in my "Avoid NCSoft at all costs in the future" book.

That was actually a good idea to PM John Smedley. Even though the rumor was proved false (unless the dude who claims he PM'd him is trolling/lying for some reason), I still hope a seasoned publisher buys out CoH and fast.

And I'm still going to play my toons exactly as I would have, a little of this, a little of that, bringing on whomever I please, right until the final hour.

And I still want to follow Paragon Studios and see where they wind up if CoH really does go down. You know, there's one thing we haven't thought of: If they can approach a publisher as a team and get the green light for a new MMO project, just think of what they could accomplish with all this experience under their belts!

I doubt NCSoft would allow CoH2, but hey, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning by Big Huge Games wasn't originally Amalur at all when they were owned by THQ. It was only revamped to reflect that world and lore once 38 Studios rescued them from bankruptcy and closure. I know 38 went bust, that isn't my point; my thought is that whatever technology Paragon was working on for CoH2 (if they were actually working on a sequel to CoH), well, maybe they could revamp those ideas into another world altogether and go from there.

I'll bet they always had dreams of things they couldn't do with CoH due to engine and lore limitations, etc. Maybe they could do those things now, with proper backing.

And I still think pitching to Valve, and writing to other publishers (with links to this forum and the petitions) can't hurt. Don't give up until the fat lady sings as they say!

It's at 10,441 right now.

I have been spreading the word on other gaming forums, and more importantly, adding that link. If nothing else, it shows Paragon Studios how much gamers at large care (if they are told!), and it also shows potential professional MMO publishers that this is a game worth trying to buy!

If anyone else plays other games, please take a few minutes to spread the word on their forums as well. The news outlet idea is an awesome one, too! And be sure to include that link. Every little signature helps.

It's already at 10,050!

And many other game forums like Blizzard's official Diablo III and World of Warcraft boards, Guild Wars 2 Guru, and Aion's official forums are all expressing their disgust at NCSoft and this whole CoH closure.

And has anyone seen massively.com? The front page keeps getting dotted with CoH announcements and memoirs, and those threads are long and unified as well!

Looks like it's NCSoft against the western world here.

You know, you all bring up excellent points about CoH2. The super-secret new project that we all kinda more than suspect is CoH2 would definitely fit right in with SOE's longstanding commitment to multiple versions of its franchised games. And heck, even Praetoria and the revamped newbie zones, never mind the newer power sets and their awesome animations, show a little bit more of what the devs are capable of nowadays.

Even if this doesn't happen because NCSoft/Nexon won't sell it off, I'm glad to hear that SOE is on the ball and trying here, and I'm also glad because it shows that multiple publishers are smart enough to know what NCSoft is not. At least the devs can feel a little more appreciated and respected for all those years they've invested in CoH-- even just looking at the constantly-climbing petition amongst the few of us who ever visit forums compared to the gamers at large can show them that.

But I do SO hope SOE can pull this off!

Remember that first Rikti invasion with the giant eyeballs that could two-shot you even if they were grey? The hot new meeting place became the hospital.

And I also remember Steel Canyon when they first tried adding crazy whirlwind powers to the bosses there.....

Yeah, I'm staying right til the end, too.

Thank you, Positron and Paragon!

I really hope the lot of you can somehow stay together. If your super-secret project was CoH 2, then NCSoft isn't going to allow that, but if it wasn't, then maybe what you were working on could somehow be revamped into a kickstarter project or an MMORPG for another publisher.

Please, I hope all those at Paragon leave their Twitter addresses (maybe sticked in one thread at the top?) so we can all follow you to wherever you might land.

Thanks again for having given us all the chance to soar across the horizons while avoiding that daily grind we call real life.

Best of luck to all of you.

PS/ If you wind up making another game, put in an Easter egg villain name with the letters of ncsoft scrambled to make that villain's name, hehe. We'll all know who you really mean. :P

Yes, in fact I wouldn't be surprised if the forums closed long before November 30th. That would save hardware and personnel costs. I mean, NCSoft isn't exactly going to come here through Google Translate and answer all our questions or give us their opinions or reasoning-- and if they did, they'd get pelted with verbal tomatoes and rightly so. And with the way people are plastering these boards with private server ideas, offers and requests, I'm surprised they haven't shut them down already, lol. Not that I'm complaining or I disagree in theory with the sentiment behind it, mind you....

Thank you, Sean, and thanks to all at Paragon Studios for giving us a second home away from that grind we call real life.

Keep us posted on where all of you wind up! We want to follow along!