Going Rogue MIA?

I was thinking about Going Rogue, and how a lot of people are looking forward to it and realized the following:

1) Last info for it given to us was a general statement about video cards for the holiday season

2) The actual site which has profiles for Malestrom and Desmonda has not been updated since before HeroCon

3) No new teasers, no build is happening, but it is supposed to be out in Q2 as of last mentioning (HeroCon I do believe)

So the question is, am I just being paranoid that something happened and it has either been A) Delayed or B) Canceled, or does it seem really weird that we haven't gotten anything about it in months?

*puts on Tin Foil Hat*

Hard working devs are hard at work?

Just a thought..

They could have mean the 2nd financial quarter of the year, rather than the REAL quarter. Who knows?

Anyways, there has been no news on any future issues since Herocon, which is a bit of a shame. They wouldn't cancel GR, since that'll bring back people. Cancelling it would be a waste of money, with the devs actually working.

I'd just want to see some news of any issue release, not just this event stuff. Even updating with some GR news would be good.

I'd also considered as an argument against the whole 'canceling Going Rogue' idea is that another MMO I've followed very closely ( Star Wars: The Old Republic ) hasn't had any information updates or anything for quite a while ( however as I understand in an announcement for shareholders discussing what the next year had to offer they had said it would release in spring 2011 as opposed to it's previous 'second quarter of 2010' )

Point is, MMO's are notorious about not giving you much information and taking what seems like an eternity to do anything noteworthy. It is rather depressing and disheartening, though. For a person like me it starts to make me look at alternatives and grow tired and weary of the current choice in MMO. Especially when no new updates are released for a current product.

( In a moment of insanity I returned to Star Wars: Galaxies to get a taste of Star Wars in an MMO. That was.. A very poor choice.. )

No, marketing just sucks.

yeah it's just marketing, posi has told us before he wants to tell us more but they won't let him.

and I think that if it was canclled they would have said something. or at leats taken the ad off the front page :P

I'd prefer if they said something rather then keeping it hush-hush. Even something like "we cannot disclose any further details about Going Rogue at this time" but still unvieling what was at Herocon, because some people might not even know of the panel.

I would continue expecting it in Q2, and not at the beginning of the quarter, but at the end.

I mean, when was the last time a software project, let alone a game project, came in early?

So when we get a little closer to June we'll probably hear a few more rumblings about what they've got in the box.

Yes. Tyrants profile would be nice, so would some screenshots of the shiny new Praetorian designs. At the very least.

..and if marketing is responsible for the horrid pacing of information release, this is my thumbs down to them.

@Kyuu

Shecky, to put things into perspective... I have been following The Agency (yeah I know it's SOE, but I want to at least check out an espionage themed MMO) and they haven't had an update since some Twitter posts... in June. Yeah... 7 months.

I think they are just very hard at work on GR making sure everything is going to work the way it should before releasing any new info (at least feature-wise)... but yeah, they should at least add in Tyrant's background on the GR page.

Ashes to ashes,
Pheonyx

Having worked behind the scenes with another MMO in the past, I think I can offer some insight as to WHY MMO companies don't let more info out than they do, sooner than they do.

Let's say Posi posts some info tomorrow about some new powerset they have planned. He gives some general statements, and then makes it clear that things may be changing prior to release. Now let's say they decide they need to make some adjustments before it even goes into beta. Despite the fact that Posi made it clear that things were subject to change, there will be a lot of people who complain how they aren't delivering what they promised.

I know, from my own perspective, we couldn't even confirm patch dates or what would or would not be addressed in a given patch until that patch was ready to roll out on the servers. If we were to say to player, "Well, I am not sure, but we should be putting a patch out for that this Wednesday", the outcry if that did not turn out true would be how we had PROMISED to have something fixed by Wednesday.

A second reason they don't release information is because of competition. The longer they can keep something under their hat, the harder it is for someone else to roll out competing features in a different MMO ahead of them. Given the release of a certain MMO that which I don't even think deserves having its name mentioned here, this past fall, this is even more of an issue with Going Rogue than it has been in the past with the regularly released Issues of CoX.

Now to chime in on the debate as to whether or not Going Rogue will be delayed. I really can't say. I hope it's not, but on top of the regular issues that plague software releases, there is also the issue of a depressed economy which comes into play in any business.

As for the game being dated... perhaps, but I can't see them canceling GR because of that. With the new Ultra Graphics mode in Going Rogue, which will also upgrade graphics for the non-GR zones, it's going to go a long way to bring the game more up to date with modern MMOs and could well extend the life of the game considerably. As I understand it, CoX is still NC Soft's most successful MMO in the US (though I may be wrong here) with the strongest recurring income. It would be silly, as well as self-destructive, for NC Soft to let it die at this point.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frosty_Femme I said "ur" which is not a word. It's a sound dumb people make when you ask them to spell out "you are".

Although this is pure conjecture on my part, I truly believe there is something else going on rather than the "Going Rogue" expansion and additional issue development.

Point #1: If you look at the trend that our devs have done this past 2+ years, you will notice that they have come up with incredible efforts that we were not even aware of until near the end, key amongst those is power customization and VEATs. They've worked things in the background for years/months without our knowledge, well in advance, well planned out. Keep this in mind for the next few points...

Point #2: Staff has increased. New developers/assistance/team members have arrived since the Freem team's incredible efforts...

Point #3: Going Rogue expansion is coming. This is a perfect opportunity for new members of the development team to 'cut their teeth' on, get used to the system, standards and tools that had been utilized by the Freem team...maybe to be used on something else down the line...

Point #4: The Devs, NCSoft, MMO webzines and the entire player/forum base know that this game is starting to get old. Contents available since Issue 1 still permeate our screens, and age-old CoH Veterans, although content with the much of the game's offerings, have of course, made it known that new material, like changing zone facades, adding new storylines/zones, etc is needed. The devs/managers in charge of this game will NOT state publicly the game is getting old (bad for business), however, as mentioned, they know this...

Point #5: Competition is getting tough. Many of the new relevant sci-fi/comic/adventure based MMOs read the writing on the walls awhile back and saw the niche that CoH/V held was unchallenged. Since then, competition has come in, flags waiving in the wind, with all their new bells and whistles to draw you away from the aging CoH/V...

Point #6: The current game engine is dated and limited to rendering the types of things the player base/developers want to do. As mentioned in many discussions here on the forums, BAB, Posi, Castle and a cast of many have identified shortcomings of the game in regards to the game engine that will not allow them to do certain 'cool' and 'requested' functions. As time ticks on, the effects are felt more each day, especially, with new competition being able to use the latest and greatest to their ends. Even though our ability to bring in "ultra mode" graphics is still a fantastic forthcoming feature (ergo showing how flexible and dedicated our devs are), this unto itself is a stopgap that will help keep those excited about the graphics in the game from running off with the competition; a stopgap that probably is the last major magic they'll be able to do with the existing system requirements, settings and engine (again, conjecture in my part).

Point #7: The player base is eagerly awaiting content. Content that gets us better PvP, closing up the "Coming Storm" storyline, new storylines with new villains/heroes to mix it up with, new zones to 'mix it up' in with said heroes/villains, and more. As an MMO, there will always be a push for new and exciting content. City of Heroes/Villains has already set major antagonistic groups with the Rikti, the 5th Column, Arachnos, et al, however, new antagonists are always in high demand, especially ones that are a few degrees of separation from existing antagonists already in the game.

What does this all add up to? Again, in my opinion, I believe that the next major step for CoH/V has already been started: the next new version of City of Heroes!

Again, in my estimation, everything adds up with the provided points.

-This game is a solid performer.
-It will not be left in the dust by NCSoft.
-Paragon Studios and NC Soft are a business, not a fly-by-night throw together.
-They're still developing material that can fill up the next couple years on CoH/V.

We all know it takes YEARS to get a new game put out there, but if you add it all up, let's think about it:

· The devs are dedicated to the game; they love this game, and this community; they will not allow the game to die
· Increased number of new employees to take on the task of heralding in a new version of the game
· The newbie developers will come into this new game version with skills learned from "Going Rogue"
· The desire to perpetuate CoH/V is across the board; players, managers, devs, techs and more. The community continues to perpetuate the love of this game.
· It's time to 'up the ante' on the competition; take what we are already; add a few new things from the competition that people like, fix PvP, and WA-LA! A new version of the game that everyone will like.
· New game engine with higher spec requirements (and I’m sure graphics requirements) for all the new computers out now, allowing for greater flexibility of the devs over the coming several years beyond the new version's start-up. No more having to keep developing content to the 'lowest common denominator' of baseline equipment requirements of the existing game.
· All new, all shiny, all flashy wow-gotta-have-da-coolness-now feature unto itself (i.e., "I don't want to play an old game").

As such, NCSoft and Paragon Studios are looking at what the competition is doing, and have already added what they deemed 'worthy' into their growing 'what do we put into the next version of the game" list. With the smart and dedicated folks I have seen at Paragon Studios, I believe this list has already been streamlined, reviewed and approved for content for the next version of the game.

What I believe is happening now if the hard parts of inital design; make the game's world. What zones? What characters? What graphics? What game engine? What stories? What direction do I take this game - a war time period of good vs. evil; space travel, international, what? This is what I'm guessing is going on now; brainstorming session on details of the content for the new version.

Why don't I call the new game version something popularly stated like "World of Heroes", or "City of Heroes: the Next Generation" or the like? I don't know what they have in mind for their theme. I an a trend reader; not a mind reader. Whatever the new version's name is, I am most assuredly positive, again, in my own opinion that the foundation for the next version of the game is already in motion.

And after all that long, drawn out points and discussion, TL;DR version is:

The reason why the devs are keeping to themselves is they are working on Going Rogue, Booster Packs, Issue 17 and 18, and what I'm sure most already knew, but no one else in power at NCSoft or Paragon Studios can say, the initial creation of the highly-expected foundation of the next version of the game (again, in my opinion).

From twitter account:

Earthquake! Looks like half the people in the office didn't even notice. I guess they were too busy with GR to notice the cubes shaking
- Dark Watcher, January 7

So as of this month, GR was being worked on. [sarcasm]I'm sure this will end the consipiracy theories[/sarcasm].