Have we considered a lawsuit?

I am not a lawyer. All I'm doing is brainstorming. I also recognize that threatening a lawsuit might be overkill even if warranted -- and whether it is warranted or not is a big question.

That said, I see an interesting angle.

City of Heroes is a unique MMO. The game allows players to create character concepts with a graphic representation and an in-game text description. More importantly, CoH allows players to create their own content in the Architect system. The character names and costumes are listed in the Terms of Service as being licensed by NCSoft -- the players do not own those. All the items and badges that you ever found are just licensed to you to use. But the intellectual property in the character descriptions and in the mission architect arcs are irrevocably owned by the player.

Now, NCSoft lawyers have thought of that, and have this little block in the Terms of Service agreement:

Not only is this unreasonable - have you considered what raising the spectre of a lawsuit will do to people who might be interested in acquiring CoH?

I used to work as an editor at Lexis-Nexis. There are two things that determine your case: who the judge is and how much money you have. It is my considered opinion that a lawsuit of any kind is a non-starter.

I am not seeing grounds for a lawsuit. The 'rights grab' seems to me to be mostly chest-puffing. City of Heroes, like lots of other software, is useful and in fact used to create brand new 'intellectual property'.

Every character and bio you made in the game is a new IP that belongs to you. The EULA is basically saying that NCsoft gets to use your characters itself. Your character could have been added to a City of Heroes advertisement, movie, novel, or comic without your consent. It also says that if they had, for instance, lost the Marvel lawsuit, NCsoft could have sued players who made Wolverines and Hulks.

Before you could sue, you'd have to show damages. Specifically, you'd have to show a court how this particular provision in the EULA cost you money. Simply saying that NCsoft holds a perpetual license to all my characters won't get you anywhere unless you can also prove that this costs you something.

If, for instance, NCsoft developed a hit movie based on a player's City of Heroes character, that player might at least be able to claim that she had been harmed by the provision. She would likely lose, based on the contract provision: when she made a character in the creator, she gave that right to NCsoft. You and I can't even get that far.

<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison

Contrary to what others have said, I do believe we could obtain a temporary injunction against the shutdown. I'd rather not go into exactly why that is, because I also agree with some of the reasons why we shouldn't even start the process at this point. And in any case, an injunction won't save the game or help out Paragon Studios at all, and it would be very expensive and exhausting. Maybe in two months I'll reconsider.