Discussion: End of Top Cow CoH Comic
By
adathebloody,
Posted on: 2007-05-24 15:38 in News, Events and Announcement Discussion
Not cool, man. I'm sure other things can be done to offset the cost and/or time spent on the comic. Maybe just a comic panel every day/week? The comic was part of the deal for signing up, afterall. If I had to make a choice between the comic and meet and greets, meet and greet be damned. IMHO. 
Also, the Marvel worls is starting to flesh out being more like the "City of" universe anyway these days, with the Civil War and Initiative storylines. Hero registration? Can we say "get ready for our MMORPG world? and hey! it even fits canon in with our comics!!".
Seriously, I think that Cryptic is going to be spending a lot of time and energy on Marvel (by the by, isn;t Top Cow/Image now in bed with Marvel's Distinguished Competition?), and sending money to Image/Top Cow sure isn;t on the top of their list to piss off their benefactors, plus add the possibility that someone at marvel may get the idea to put out a one or 2 or even 6 shot limited series featuring CoH/V characters during major game storyarcs, I don;t think we've seen the last of it... and as someone said... we weren;t getting a monthly anyway, except for the last 3 months, its been largely bi-monthly.
Anyway.... here we go Marvel MMO, and I know for one, I would play it if they had a PC client, but I'm not buying an X-Box to play an MMO, as the interface is too clunky for RP-style gaming.
I'm almost 100% sure they are related, and you know what? you don't piss off your major benefactors. Marvel is putting money into Cryptic, only for Cryptic to give money back to a major competitor's ally company? (Top Cow/Image are now attached to DC in some way, not sure how financially tied they are, but all the Widlstorm stuff has somewhat crossed over with the DC universe recently with Infinite Crisis and all). Marvel probably said something like "look, we don't appreciate it, but we understand contractual obligations, so let the contract run out, and we'll even print one shots and limited series for you later on.... as long as we don;t have to take the burden of regularly producing a comic with very little value outside the gaming community"
Cryptic most likely said "that sounds fair" and went ahead with the deal. I think its a ok idea from am monetary perspective, though I will really miss the comic, depite how bad its gotten the last few months, 19 and 20 look like they'll be good enough to really make me wished they kept it going.
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What are we waiting for? Looks like all we need now are for comics to start getting submitted.
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You're absolutely right. I guess if the people getting paid to do community work aren't doing their job we should.
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Aren't doing their job? they've gone through several community coordinators recently, CuppaJo moved on, she was wonderful, Lighthouse tried, but I suspect Lighthouse wasn;t the one for the job, Ex Libris on the other hand has shown herself to be a very capable and hard working woman, that I respect as much as our beloved CuppaJo! (god how I miss Cuppa, but Ex Libris is turning out to be better than I could ever have hoped for in terms of community support, getting to know the community by talking to them on Global Channels, etc.)
Just because the Comic is not a priority for them, doesn't mean they aren;t doing their jobs, please refrain from comments like that, that are disparaging and insulting to people who try their hardest. Even I'm a little upset about the Comic, but I don't go do that.... and its not up to the community coordinator to fix the things we normally have the most major issues with anyway, its their job to explain it to us and take the flack which generally should be focused at developers, because as we all know (and I am a developer myself), developers are mostly malcontents who don;t deal with other people well. 
Mixed feelings on this. I feel that having the comic has been a good thing, and I have enjoyed some of the issues. On the other hand, I have never been impressed with it, and the issues I've liked I liked in spite of things that I considered dumb or poor.
That's just my opinion, and not meant as a slam on the people who worked on the comics. But it just didn't do it for me. IMO it could have been a much better vehicle for the game with better writing (and better art, at times).
So I view its passing as a sort of lost potential more than anything. Given that it hasn't lived up to that potential (for me) I guess it makes sense to let it go. But it makes me sort of sad for what could have been.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
Hmm sucks for sure Kinda, was just reading thru them all this last month lol, ah well Bigger n better things I hope, anyways went to sign up for the last comic and it says I have to Pay 1.99 with Credit card???? Thot we could just get it free..
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The comic has had a great run. It has always served as an ambassador for the game; showing comic readers the potential that can be found in City of Heroes or City of Villains to set their imagination free! However, when we evaluate the production and distribution of the Comic, our current feeling is that the needed time and energy can be more wisely spent and net a more direct impact to the game.
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Yeah, I can see the reasoning of pulling the plug on an ambassador that costs too much to maintain.
However, I feel it's ultimately a bad choice in this situation. First I think that it is and always was a mistake to approach the comic book as an ambassador to the comic book cultural space from the mmorpg cultural space. Instead it should have been treated as more of a bridge between the two, and the game should have been directed to personify half of this bridge as well.
Ideally, the book should have directly reflected events in the game, and the game should have directly replicated objects in the book.
Yes this kind of synergy would have been a logic and implementation nightmare for the devs. But the payoff, a true, rich innovation on the culture of the superhero throughout today's society, and a potentially-trailblazing leadership in both cultures, would have been well worth the choice to at least preliminarily stand up to the horrors. Inwardly, I'm very disappointed that the devs are letting that potential die.
However, I can't really begrudge the devs. Just because the coh-game-book synergy wasn't handled trailblazingly doesn't mean the game isn't still fun, (although the excessive overhead of ios is straining things). It's just not as exceptionally special as it once was.
Perhaps the devs can compensate a bit for the loss of the comic book by hiring one or more comic book artist(s) on staff to produce comic-book-style art pieces of player characters upon player request? Perhaps restrict requests to those willing to spend some of their in-game, built up, free-tailor-session tokens for the service. Maybe that could help keep the game's foot in the comic culture's door.
I feel that our community coordinators are, and always have been doing an AWESOME job.
...doesn't mean we can't help out.
Here's a call out to every poster who ever slammed the comics on these boards, saying, "I could do better". TIME TO PUT UP!
Publishing a paper comic is a huge expense, and I totally understand it being discontinued if it's not showing as profitable (how that can be gauged, I have no guess...), but literally anybody can make a .pdf.
And I hear David Nakayama might have some free time now that a project of his has ended... 
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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I won't miss it per se. But I'll be a [censored] about things anyways.
I frankly don't feel that the two "support of quality player initiatives" features or more contests are in any way compensation for the lack of something that was billed as a feature of the game that'd be part of our subscription.
More Staff-sponsored in-game events and heavier focus on new in-game content is on the other hand something I can get behind.
That said?
We have a great many fledgling (and not so fledgling) artists here, some of which I'm sure would love a wider audience than the art forums. Why not toss in an offer to publish people's actual comics as downloadable PDFs through the main website as part of an 'official' anthology? As a derivative work of COH, it should be nicely covered by the EULA's 'non-exclusive rights' clause. That way you could at least claim there'd still be a COH comic.
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This entire post is endorsed by the Official Mr. Mighty Fan Club. Good job. Spot on.
Mighty-speed, GO!
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Marvel is putting money into Cryptic, only for Cryptic to give money back to a major competitor's ally company? (Top Cow/Image are now attached to DC in some way, not sure how financially tied they are, but all the Widlstorm stuff has somewhat crossed over with the DC universe recently with Infinite Crisis and all).
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Image is/was a house of creators with seperate creative companies all published under the same umbrella company. When Wildstorm jumped ship to DC, it was Jim Lee and his flagship comapny that made that jump, and in doing so left Image comics. Thats why wildstorm title can be seen in some DC crossover events, because it is a DC owned property now.
Thats not the same as a one-shot special made between two companies that they both would see a proffit from. Like the DC/Marvel epic event sometimes companies decide to share a little to get more face time with the fans, and to create hype. Just because they've worked together in the past doesn't imply ownership.
Marvel wrote up an offer for whatever man hours and development obligations they would want from Cryptic and Cryptic jumpped on board. None of those obligations was the sale or impending sell of City of. If it were there would already be news of the merger. It may happen that someday Marvel does put out a City of comic, because when you run a comicbook based game and are working closely with a publishing giant like DC or Marvel you may actually make a good contact in the proccess. Maybe it will never happen, but it could.
The death of the City of comic is because sales could not sapport Cryptic giving it to all of it's player base for free. So the introduced the online download. The sales have never really been sapported by non-players and so the capital was still not there to keep the comic alive, this isn't a judgement on the comic it's just a fact. Money has to come in for money to go out and when you don't meet your profit goals you reavaluate how you're doing things and if you can continue. In this case it was a no.
We can guess why all we want but the fact remains that the City of comic was never popular enough to be pushed out by some lame strong arm tactic. If anything Marvel would look at as a great way to generate intrest in what they're doing with their partner Cryptic. I personaly think the comic didn't make it because it was static boring read that failed to bring in out-side readership in numbers big enought to saport it's self.
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when we evaluate the production and distribution of the Comic, our current feeling is that the needed time and energy can be more wisely spent and net a more direct impact to the game. This includes things such as organizing more player meet and greets, additional in-game events, focusing on great in-game content like the recently released 9th free expansion, Issue 9: Breakthrough, more contests and promotions such as the Comic Book Creator Contest and more support of quality player initiatives like the PvPEC and City Scoop.
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Okay, so I have the majority of the CoH issues, but I admit I haven't even read one of them... but is LH saying that the comic was produced directly by people who have a big impact on game mechanics, community events, etc.?
If so... no wonder it never had a chance, quality-wise and sale-wise, against more popular titles. Our devs and reps were making a comic? lolz. Even if it is just a money thing, that should have NO impact in the amount of effort set forth by our community reps to make player events. I don't see how canceling a comic would make more things happen, other than hiring more people with the money they save on a comic... doesn't make sense to me though.
I also initially shared the opinion with a poster above me wondering if Cryptic's partnership with Marvel influenced the end of the Top Cow (imprint of Image Comics) series. Most likely, though, the comic wasn't selling enough to continue throwing money at it. I still don't see the end of the comic benefitting players in some other aspect though.
Pinnacle
@Mr.Catastrophe
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We have a great many fledgling (and not so fledgling) artists here, some of which I'm sure would love a wider audience than the art forums. Why not toss in an offer to publish people's actual comics as downloadable PDFs through the main website as part of an 'official' anthology? As a derivative work of COH, it should be nicely covered by the EULA's 'non-exclusive rights' clause. That way you could at least claim there'd still be a COH comic.
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I will make an entire comic devoted to Statesman on the can, or "Claiming the Throne of Zeus" as he calls it.
/beginsarcasm
There was a comic?
/endsarcasm
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day, SET a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Incarnates: K'lir(Fire/Dark Corr):Hot-House Flower(Plant/Fire Dom):Kinrad X(Kin/Rad Def):Itsy-Bitsy Spider(Crab):Two Ton Tony(Mace/WP Broot):Teeny Weeny Widow(Fortunata/Widow) : Zeroth Law (Ice/Fire Tank)
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The comic has had a great run. It has always served as an ambassador for the game; showing comic readers the potential that can be found in City of Heroes or City of Villains to set their imagination free! However, when we evaluate the production and distribution of the Comic, our current feeling is that the needed time and energy can be more wisely spent and net a more direct impact to the game. This includes things such as organizing more player meet and greets, additional in-game events, focusing on great in-game content like the recently released 9th free expansion, Issue 9: Breakthrough, more contests and promotions such as the Comic Book Creator Contest and more support of quality player initiatives like the PvPEC and City Scoop.
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In other words; "we are giving up essentially the only marketing tool for reaching new audiences we have in favor of turning inward".
This isn't a positive development.
http://derekl1963.livejournal.com/
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crap crap crap......they just keep on showing they really don't give a crap about us.
[/ QUOTE ]I'd like to contend that they do. The makers of this game and the community coordinators have been working on multiple projects, including the City Scoop and the PvPEC.
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OK, so they've added two things - one for a minority (PvPEC) and which has players doing 90% of the work, and one where the players do 90% of the work (City Scoop).
Meanwhile they've _dropped_ a much longer list of things that they did for the community.
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There are several projects in the works, and there always will be.
Just recently (as in earlier this week), we were asked about what we, the fanbase, would like to see next in the game. The options we were given were taken from across the message boards, which they read constantly.
There is an entire thread based on giving us what costumes we want, and the Suggestions section is a constant source of inspiration to the makers of this game.
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They were doing those thing before they started dropping things _they_ provided to community.
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The inner workings of this company, such as any company, are too complex to judge solely on what we see on the outside.
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Nonsense. What we see on the outside is what the company delivers, it's what you judge a company on by definition. When what they are providing is dropping - the conclusion is obvious.
http://derekl1963.livejournal.com/
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The comic has had a great run. It has always served as an ambassador for the game; showing comic readers the potential that can be found in City of Heroes or City of Villains to set their imagination free! However, when we evaluate the production and distribution of the Comic, our current feeling is that the needed time and energy can be more wisely spent and net a more direct impact to the game. This includes things such as organizing more player meet and greets, additional in-game events, focusing on great in-game content like the recently released 9th free expansion, Issue 9: Breakthrough, more contests and promotions such as the Comic Book Creator Contest and more support of quality player initiatives like the PvPEC and City Scoop.
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In other words; "we are giving up essentially the only marketing tool for reaching new audiences we have in favor of turning inward".
This isn't a positive development.
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What I find (well, one of the things I find) alternately amusing or insulting about the announcement is that they're listing the *issues* as one of the things they're doing instead of the comic.
And as far as their other initiatives that, frankly, they've wasted money on, or that they've given an ADHD, "OK, we're bored with it now" attitude with -
Remember the COH RPG? No, I don't remember seeing it in stores either. I did see a PDF of it once, but I never remember seeing it in stores despite their hype of it. Wait, the PDF was a quickstart pack which typically isnt' the full book... which was, as far as I can tell, never finished. (Last update 6/5/06, and it's not listed in their store.)
How about that trading card game! Wait, I think I saw three packs on clearance a year and a half ago.
Yay for the Prima binder... that they dropped after the issue 7 update. After it was released for issue 6.
To this we can now add the end of the second publisher's comic run!
While I shall miss the comic book edition, it brings to mind many things that have either come to a close or faded away. After enjoying a great deal the first CoH novel, and still trying to find time to read the second, I'm saddened to know that the third novel has gone missing. The eventual RPG gaming book for CoH too, vanished. The comic book was always something that brought the game to life, and honestly, if CoH's name was on it I was probably going to get it anyhow. I am happy to know that efforts will be put into the continued support of the CoX games, but I still long for another novel, for game books, and anything else that may come to be that feature CoX. Rikti Monkey plushies too 
Lets not let go of the ideas and all the work that had been done...we still want to see the game and story flourish in other mediums too!
Just another voice...
Hero High: Just Around the Darkness
Arc# 131046
Angel Boy, lvl 50 Def
Alys, lvl 50 MM
Angelium, lvl 50 Troller
Kid-Q, lvl 50 Troller
Psi-kid, lvl 50 Blaster
Ice Blocked, lvl 41 Tanker
Possession, lvl 43 Dom
...and various others
Slightly off topic, but...
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Anyway.... here we go Marvel MMO, and I know for one, I would play it if they had a PC client, but I'm not buying an X-Box to play an MMO, as the interface is too clunky for RP-style gaming.
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Unless something has changed, I think you've been misinformed. MUO will in fact be on the PC, granted, from what we've been told only on Vista, but on PC nonetheless.
Well I for one have every issue of the Blue King Comic Run <begin shameless plug>(my character was in issue 8 <end shameless plug> And I have really enjoyed the Top Cow series. It's a shame to see it come to an end but if d/cing the comic series means that Cryptic will be devoting more resources to the Game content, then I'm all for the plan.
Instead of cancelling altogether, we could just go back to Blue King...
That comic may not have had all the dramatic flair, but it was at least something CoX players could identify with. Which was the whole point. I miss it. Top Cow's comic has been interesting, but reading through its run leaves a feeling of disjointed wierdness. I would rather have the characters and writing Blue King put forth, than the sarcastic and downright irresponsible ones Top Cow did.
Maybe with the savings in money from going back to Blue King, we could keep our comic.
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Yay for the Prima binder... that they dropped after the issue 7 update. After it was released for issue 6.
To this we can now add the end of the second publisher's comic run!
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They discontinued the binders?! I bought both, just figured they were slow with them. Glad they were professional enough to let the customers know we'd wasted our money on the "updatable" game guide.
Wow. Very few companies make me feel like a sucker. If this is true and the binders have been cancelled, rather than Cryptic just being their typically slow as hell selves, then I can save myself some time and stop participating in this community.
What would be the point? The reason I never went back to SOE is because their people lacked the spirit of the gamer. Cryptic always seemed to be a company of gamers. If that's changed, which cancelling supposedly continuous products without announcment would indicate, then they just lost not only my support, but my respect as well.
Those Prima binders weren't cheap. Updated content was the promise. How else can you regard people who don't keep their promises?
I don't want to jump up and bellow DOOOOOOOOOOOM!, but let's look at the evidence...
-Poor handling of the CoH comic, causing delays in both the paper and PDF versions.
-A tabletop RPG that looked great but didn't get off the ground (more like exploded inside the hangar)
-A CCG that launched, wavered, and crashed before it could even cover the full range of powersets, let alone add CoV content
-A positively HUGE thread for merchendise suggestions ranging from an original soundtrack to"Kill Skuls" shirts to plush Rikti monkies, that was totally ignored (and now deleted)
-The Paragon Times getting scrapped
-The removal of fan-submitted screenshots from the site
-A novel series that's been horridly delayed and cancelled (I still can't find a copy of Freedom Phalanx anywhere in my city)
-Two rather expensive Prima binders that promised to feature exclusive updateable content, only to be cancelled almost right away.
-Official fan art and fan fiction sections here on the site that haven't been updated in years
-And to cap it off, a MMO based on comic books is cancelling its own comic.
It's stuff like this that make me wonder about the direction this franchise is going. It seems like the immersive elements of the game, community, and franchise are being ignored and cancelled for the sake of shiny new content that's rushed and glitchy. I'm not giving up on the game or anything, but to the devs I say: Jeez you guys, what gives?
"Take the Yuan-Ti, bash them with a club made of frozen stupidity, then rip out their sense of subtlety with a rusty spoon, and then you have the Snakes of Mercy Isle" -Taltha Widowfang, drow stalker
Now playing at an MA near you: Dragonslayers #335375
^
The above list is a very sad read. It suggests that the City of Heroes/City of Villains brand is weak and hasn't got enough of a following to make these products go, and that's sad precisely because it isn't so. There have absolutely been problems with the way a number of those licensing and merchandising concerns were handled; when you're trying to divide resources between satisfying current subscribers and reaching out to the world at large, it's never going to be easy to find the happy medium, even for the experienced. The appeal and the community of Cities remain strong and capable of assuring continued success, and it's the details of how to tap it correctly that remain a work in progress.
While things aren't quite as dire as they may seem from a glance at said list, the comic was undoubtedly one of the most visible symbols of the game's place in the MMO world and its coming to an end, good business sense or not, is very unfortunate. I know that players appreciate the contributions of everyone involved with the comic, and it will be missed.
all i have to add:
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What are we waiting for? Looks like all we need now are for comics to start getting submitted.
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You're absolutely right. I guess if the people getting paid to do community work aren't doing their job we should.
Anybody wanna set up a website? If we submit stuff to these guy's it'll take 6 months to get on the freakin website...
Also the problem is finding reliable artists and enough artists...most of the good artists won't do anything for free anymore now that they've got community people willing to pay to have their toons drawn...