The European Community

Yeah, and then there's that

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

You mean to tell me you prefer empty zones in prime time?
Im sure this is fine if you're a solo character, but for the team players under us, this isn't fine.

You're really talking to the wrong guy on that front. If by "on life support" you mean "few people are on," then I honestly wouldn't know. The US servers could have no-one on them and it'd probably take me a year before I noticed. I didn't stick to the US servers because of the population. I stuck with them because I never saw a POINT in having an EU version in the first place, and I still don't. I don't know why WoW has an EU version, either. I just don't get it.

Unless I REALLY wanted to take part in contests (which I don't) or had to have items mailed to me (and... why would I?), what's the difference what version it says on the box? You can buy the game online (you always could), you can register online, you can download it online, you can play it online. Why should actual location even matter, outside of irritating me with pointless localisation that causes me to spend money on items I can't use?

Look, I'm right there with you - I want to see the EU servers added to the list right along with the US ones. Considering both games run the exact same client, I don't see why this complete incompatibility even exists.

*edit*
And, yeah. Ideally, I do.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I hear you.
This is where the problem lies, neither do most of the european community.

With the technology having been proved during a US->Eu server transfer in the past, a lot of people are wondering why they cant reverse the process.

I, for myself, feel that I was lured to the EU under the promise of a identical gaming expirience, something that certainly changed since.

I see that I should have never moved to the EU servers, it is something I have regretted for a long time now.

If you predominatly a Solo player...then you really can't speak up about it, as you said the servers could be barren of anyone but you and you wouldn't really care. Since it doesn't really affect you then what's the point in you speaking out against it because you could be the only person playing this and that would be fine.

Sorry got a bit ranty there.

ANYWAY...yes the EU servers aren't what they were when I joined some three years ago unfortunately there's this big old thing called Going Rogue (1 month left til release) standing in the way, there's sweet FA that the devs can do since everything is focused on Going Rogue AND Issue 19 (which is essentially Going Rogue: Stuff we couldn't finish in time for release ala Issue 1 or Issue 7).

Once all this hooha is out the way then they'll be able to do something about the EU servers. Plus could you imagine what a dampener the news "Going Rogue release for City of Heroes" and just under it, "City of Heroes merges servers!" (which is how most gaming websites will abbreviate 'server list merger' because they like to get people clicking on their news) so while GR would be a big success, that success would have been tainted by 'bad news' as non-City of Heroes players would see it.

World of Warcraft EU edition makes sense not only are their staff support offices still located in mainland Europe but they all had a number of GMs who speak various European languages, yes you could get someone who had trained to answer in different languages in the USA but it's more cost effective to hire someone who speaks the lingo and put them in your support team in Europe.

The other thing that has peeved people off has been the variation in support. For example if you wanted a character you deleted back on the US servers the support staff were more than happy to reinstate said character as long as it was within a couple of days of deletion...the EU support staff would tell you to basically 'go [censored] yourself' and claim it was impossible, despite people routinely pointing to post on the US forums where people had their characters reinstated.

This along with other things kind of created a bit of illwill and when the Brighton offices closed down most people saw it as a sign that NCsoft cared little for the EU side of things in ANY of their games and once again more illwill was created.

I honestly have no idea how the French and German forum users feel because even though we English speaking part complain they got dumped on the most, the French and German went without a community moderator on their section of the forums for well over a year and a half infact I think they STILL don't have a forum moderator who speaks their language so any game announcements they're going to have to translate themselves or tough luck.

As I said I don't check in (because I don't speak the language) with the German or French, it's a shame we don't see any of their players here to see what they think of the current situation of their servers.

You'd have a leg to stand on if I were disagreeing that there is a problem with that. I don't. I freely admit that there probably is one, even if it's not one I personally care about. There's a problem and that's that. What I'm disagreeing with is the way to go about addressing it, and starting with stating all the reasons why you're entitled to it is just not something I find to be productive, and is something I would actually see as VERY counter-productive in general.

Maybe I'm a contrary person, but while I respond well to reasoned arguments, I have the tendency to see "You're a horrible person!" arguments and instinctively react with "Oh, yeah?!? You and what army!"

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

That argument would seem to suggest no form of list merger for years if ever... Even if GR was an unprecedented success, why would the devs want the over-simplified headlines to read and suggest otherwise?

You saved that quickly with the edit!

It would have been odd to suggest that Avatea posted on the German board but not the French section given that, iirc, she is of French (or at least native French speaking) background...

Looking at her recent post history though, it would appear that virtually all her posts (except the European Lounge ones) are the standard official ones: patch notes, maintenance announcements, event announcements etc

So it's a little unfair to claim that any language/section has more of her time... with the possible exception of the European Lounge. Ironic?

this is a constructive, rational and inviting way of handling issues. i can only expect that the developers are made as welcome and feel inclined to your viewpoint. you should definitely treat everyone with that level of respect, its a very adult way of acting.

Note, i actually have sympathy for the european community, so no snark there, just it always baffles me that people feel that the most constructive way to invite the developers into a friendly, constructive dialogue is to be as insulting and rude as this. does that work anywhere in the world? It's a bit like the paying customer nonsense, they know you are paying, just admit you are trying bald faced extortion and lets all be honest about things.

French, and Vigilance player here.

First of all, Avatea is french, and she does what she can for us, but since community moderator seems to vanish, just like players on EU servers, she doesn't seem to have as much time to give us (and US/UK) players as she'd like.
But we're not "abandoned" like we were a few months (or years) ago.

With that being said, here's my view of the situation, and what as been said by some members of the french community after discussing that subject on our big and empty forum.
First, Vigilance is pretty much empty. Not as much as Zukunft (I don't recall seeing more than 30 people over there, but I don't go often), but I was surprised last week when we hit the 100 players connected on blue side. Red side is about 60 I guess, long time not being there...

That's one conclusion everyone is agreeing on. Teaming has became difficult, doing TF/SF requires planning at least three days before if you want to find a team. PuG still exist, but not that common... No one on the server has any idea of what a sewer team is, and as I'm speaking (8:23 PM french time), there are 2 players at the Atlas Plaza.
PvP is non-existant, since the whole french PvP community left for Freedom a few weeks ago, to start over (that means leveling toons, building them, etc...), it seems that badgers are having a hard time doing badge that requires more than... one people, and I'm seriously asking myself how on earth we will do to play the "Incarnate System".

But obviously, not everyone on Vigilance speaks english. I don't have any numbers to show you, but on those that speak english, most of them wouldn't mind playing on the US side, and quite a lot would also like, very much, to be able to "transfer" over NA. Those opinions come from the french forum, so... 20 players maybe.

I also have some old friends, old players, that left because "server is dead", and that would be very, very happy to come back on a "real" server.
As for myself, I'd pay NC a whole lot of money to see all my toons transfered to Freedom.

As for the "slot" problem (limited on 36 per server), there hasn't been that much complaint about it. When we were limited at 8, and then 12, it was much worst. A lot of people had to delete 50's just to reroll, but now that they have tripled capacity...

As much as most of us would rather see Vigilance getting more players, some of us are also resigned, and we realize that's not going to happen with the decisions NC are taking.

On a personal level, I obviously understand your complaint, because our server may be "empty", but we have the game in our native language (not that I care that much, but that's my opinion). Oh, BTW, just to let you know that I17 is still partialy english/not translated for us, and that for... 2 weeks I think, the whole I17 text was just some "P1235487" kind of word, so imagine, with the new stories/Posi TF, you go on a mission that's named "P1635873", and the objective is "P21687556", and the PNJ is telling you "P54687652". Now try and guess what you have to do... good luck (thanks Paragon Wiki BTW). So, localisation is great, but in the past months, I was wondering if they were not preparing us for a merge (j/k).
But you pay as much (maybe more) than the US, and as you, I can hardly see one thing that's not better on the NA than on our side.
A few months ago, I saw an UK player saying "When a new player is coming, I tell him to go on the NA side, I don't see no reason to tell him to go EU". When we have the localisation as a factor, you have... nothing.

So, given all the objectives facts you can get while playing EU side, meaning low population, low quality of service (oh, I didn't tell you about french GMs, it's fun too... well, not that fun, but I'd rather laugh about that), etc... I wonder how no one at NC / Paragon Studios didn't think it was time to do something.

So now, do something.

I totally agree with this....but:

When invites to a friendly constructive dialogue are met only with what increasingly seem to be empty placation, some people just feel the need to vent.

Huh? The servers I play don't usually have this many, and you say this is "empty?" Either I REALLY don't have a good eye for population or there's something more going on here, because I don't recall seeing more than 50 people villain-side the last few times I've searched, and I tend to search Victory and Pinnacle.

Of course, being that I live in Europe (and Eastern Europe, at that), this puts me 7-10 hours behind the US, so it's likely I'm just hitting dead spots every time I search (say, 6 PM EET), but man... This much is empty? Yikes!

*edit*
Point of fact: There are 85 people on Victory hero-side. I just checked.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Then you resort to throwing rotten eggs at their houses and toilet-papering their cars.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Yeah...someone being surprised that there is 100 players on Blueside during their primetime is definitely 'empty'.

You're playing on the US servers 'downtime' as it were, when people are asleep in the early hours of the morning on one of the quieter servers and Victory or Pinnacle manage to match the French server at what should be its highest.

That shows that there is pretty much a problem with atleast the French server and according to said Beber the German server is actually even worse of. So even if there's not a problem for the English Speaking ones (usually Union can just about match the quieter US servers primetime for primetime (200-300 players blueside, 60-100 players Redside and Union is apparently the busy server).

So yes Sam, no insult meant but I'd honestly say you don't have a good eye for population.

No insult taken, but again - I'm checking RIGHT NOW and the server has gone down from 85 people blue-side to 84. Is now still too early?

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

That's what I'd do!

Hmm right now, if I remember my US times correctly it's between 1pm and 2pm, so people are still at work/school so yeah little early, give it another 4 hours and you'll be hitting 5pm/6pm which is when people have gotten home from work/school and are just starting to play.

Like I said, it's 100 at peak time. From 7PM to 1AM (local time, obviously), it's more like 70 than 100. When I wrote my message, around 8:30PM (IIRC), there was 68 people.
If you play on other hours, it will never go over 30 people (blueside obviously, I know redside in the morning is around 5 to 10 players).
And I imagine that it's not "peak time" yet for you, so maybe you'll go over 85 later.

And an important fact, is that if you don't like playing on your server, because it's too "empty" (it's not your case, but it could), you can easily go play on Freedom or Virtue. In my case, I just can go to Union, which is better than nothing, but I'd much rather go on Freedom (in fact, I used to play redside quite a lot on Union when I had my 12 toons... was already muuuuuch better than Vigilance at this time, I was surprised seeing how easy it was to find a team).

Yeah, another four hours will put it at 4 AM And I need to monitor an exam in... Less than eight hours, actually.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I actually tried playing on Virtue once, but being that it's a West Coast server, and assumedly because it's so crowded, it just lag FAR too much. Is Freedom East Coast?

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

My favorite band is from England. They're not horribly popular, so they no longer play to big stadiums. And they were never very popular on this side of the Atlantic. Still, I pay my money when they release new music. I should have just as much opportunity to see them live as someone living in England. But no. If I'm lucky they come a couple of times a decade, usually to someplace like Montreal. Mind you, that's about a 25 hour drive from here. That's hardly fair, now is it?

Unfortunately, life is rarely fair.

Bah all you need to do is monitor...tough it out, go the full 24 hour period awake running on nothing but coffee so thick you can stand a spoon in it aka my 'WoW expansion release pickmeup' and yes it was like syrup but it kept me awake for three days solid while I burned through and levelled my character...

Actually don't drink it like that...I actually use to drink coffee like that as normal and I dread to think what the five years of drinking it did to my body...

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

This is the first time I have read such an explination for not releasing a box in the EU

Quote:

Most MMO gamers in the EU are very net savvy and comfortable purchasing/downloading online. QUOTE] QUOTE]

This is nothing more than Bull and PR flattery and to me implies the Americans are incapable of entering a few details and clicking ok otherwise why would they need a box?

From my experience most games retailers (employees/management) Weather due to ignorance/misinformation/poor taste in MMOs (if they play any at all...) all believe that CoX had closed its servers!

I have spent more time than I should have (the right amount being zero) explaining that it was alive and well with its second major expansion on it's way!

The real reason is touched on here... That it simply costs too much to advertise the game outside the US for little (projected) return. Therefore EU box projected sales figures are low hence logically it's cheaper to stick to electronic distribution.

However I have been finding it difficult to get people who actively express intrest in the game to sign up due to the lack of an available box on the shelves.

So while I firmly believe that the game will benefit greatly from an EU box release, or at least some games magazine/website advertising as was mentioned earlier in the thread (looking at EVE here! Can't open a games website without an add for it somwhere) I fully understand the real reasons why...

A better statement would have been.. "Due to poor projected sales figures in the EU we have decided not to release a box in european stores as you're not worth the financial risk. You can however still purchase a downloadable copy online."

Maybe not quite as direct as that, as i imagine it would cause some upset.

At least send the major retailers a memo... just a wee hello! Were not dead