NCsoft Response to City of Heroes player and fan suggestions
By
Adar_ICT,
Posted on: 2012-10-02 13:46 in News, Events and Announcement Discussion
Crap, wrong thread.
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Originally Posted by Another_Fan
You win the game Hamster.
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Put the game hamster back - its needed to power the servers.
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Do you even read Arcanaville's posts? |
Originally Posted by Evil_Legacy
Very serious.
People like Arcanaville: "Waaaaahhhhhhhhh they killed my game!! Waaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!" Get over it. I think even 3rd graders dont carry on like that when their favorite toy is taken away. |
Why so many drama posts in a row? Can't the drama just gtfo?
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One motivation such a person may have is that they are hurting but don't want to admit it and want to hurt anyone reminding them of their hurt thinking that will reduce their pain.|
Originally Posted by Tethers
I understand people wanting to move on. I understand not wanting to. I don't understand the lets-rub-salt-in-open-wounds mentality some people seem to have.
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Another possibility is a sociopath who has no concept of the feelings of others.
And there is always the possibility of sadism where they enjoy inflicting pain.
total kick to the gut
This is like having Ra's Al Ghul show up at your birthday party.
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If you believe all of this about NCSoft, why do you think they would play ball and sell the IP, or do anything to save the game? If you're claiming that they don't know how to run a business, why would they do anything that makes sense in a normal business environment? And more importantly, why would you get mad at that when it's what you should expect from a company you already believe doesn't know what they're doing?
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Originally Posted by Robin_Everheart
Trying to save the game is only a portion of the bigger picture. NCsoft is a horribly mismanaged company with little to no focus that isn't above forging resignations just to close down a game and they even admitted to doing it (see: Richard Garriott's Tabula Rasa). The quality or appeal of that game is irrelevant to the point, they were justly sued for their infraction and lost.
They don't know what they want to offer and they always expect to do the same numbers as World of Warcraft with cookie-cutter Korean clones which is unrealistic and irresponsible. No one else can do those numbers, Blizzard were just at the right place at the right time. A strong possibility that led to the cutting of CoH was Nexon becoming a majority shareholder in NCsoft and pressuring their brass to make some cuts (without stating CoH specifically). Their refocusing back to the East obviously made CoH the perfect choice since Guild Wars 2 was positioned to be a newer, higher profile release here. They were very much upset that "City of Hero" didn't take off in their homeland and that standard CoH didn't catch on either but that should have been a given because Western comic book superheroes are not part of the norm in their culture. It's easier to single out the game that isn't pulling it's weight in only half of the markets you operate in. But even with their strong Guild Wars 2 launch, NCsoft stocks continue to fall. That initial $60 retail price for the game will only go so far once the initial wave of interest wanes and they'll be hard-pressed to maintain it solely on micro-transactions. Not saying they can't do it, but the GW2 players should be asking themselves where they'll be when NCsoft's next fiscal year ends if the company is still in the red. You can even see many negative reviews of the company from the inside from current and former employees over the last several years here: http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/NCs...-E23242_P3.htm |
Loose --> not tight.
Lose --> Did not win, misplace, cannot find, subtract.
One extra 'o' makes a big difference.
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I see your point. I guess fundementally I saw this game as more like a bar/arcade/social hang-out. I knew it would be a temporary thing (all things are I guess): places close, people move, there is change. I do agree that it could have be done better, but I am not convinced that it's going to be. Ever. Just like you stated: this is a niche game for a nich population. I don't know that a *publisher* ever forge the connection that a *producer/developer* would. The comodity is basically light and sound, which was taylored so well to a specific population that I'm not sure stopping the product in anyway would have made for less of a reaction. Not to metion we're asked to pay for it, too! Emotional, financial, temporal investments... this really is a sad commentary on how some "people" "earn" money. It's like the miracle fishing lure - them thar fish have to bite!!
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
[LOTS OF APPROPRIATE POINTS WITH REGUARD TO MY PRIOR STATEMENT]
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Miss Arc #147491: Rise of Bedlam
AKA Iron Smoke @Champion Server
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That's true: the community in general would not likely have reacted well to the knowledge the game was being shut down regardless of circumstances. But that isn't the question here. The question is whether the publisher had any responsibility whatsoever to the community to gracefully shut the game down. Even NCSoft believes that responsibility isn't zero, or they could have simply shut the game down on September 1. It is their game, and they are making no more money on it, so from a purely quantitative business perspective its illogical to allow the game to run until November 30. Clearly, they either believe that outside observers would judge them harshly if they shut the game down abruptly, or they themselves believe that act would be wrong. Either one acknowledges either that they are aware of a social responsibility to the game, or they recognize everyone else believes they have one whether they agree or not.|
Originally Posted by Kractis_Sky
I see your point. I guess fundementally I saw this game as more like a bar/arcade/social hang-out. I knew it would be a temporary thing (all things are I guess): places close, people move, there is change. I do agree that it could have be done better, but I am not convinced that it's going to be. Ever. Just like you stated: this is a niche game for a nich population. I don't know that a *publisher* ever forge the connection that a *producer/developer* would. The comodity is basically light and sound, which was taylored so well to a specific population that I'm not sure stopping the product in anyway would have made for less of a reaction.
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But beyond that, there's lots NCSoft could have allowed to happen that would have cost them nothing but would have allowed the community more consideration. They could have allowed the developers to craft a better ending to the game. They wouldn't have had to pay any more for one, as we know the devs are still (unless they've resigned to take other jobs) actually on the payroll until October 31 in accordance with California law. They could have allowed players to rejoin the game to say goodbye which would have cost them trivially, but they froze account creation. They also froze out the ability to grant VIP status and offered no direct means of unlocking premium character slots (separate from using existing slot tokens), again interfering with players' ability to say goodbye to the game in a way that required essentially no material cost.
They did not even have prepared messaging for precisely how the game would end, how refunds would be handled, what parts of the game and support systems would and would not be functioning. They announced the *decision* to terminate the game before even thinking through *how* they were going to terminate the game.
These acts exist outside the realm of "business decisions." There's little or no material consideration here (meaning: they aren't about costs, revenue, or money in general). Even presuming the material requirement to shut the game down, there's no evidence NCSoft particularly cared about the community it was shutting down even to the extent of offering courtesies that would have cost them essentially nothing to provide.
Offering them probably would not have made people care less about the game shutting down, but it might have caused people to be more willing to accept NCSoft's assertion that the shutdown was the result of careful consideration. Instead many have the justified sense that it was a callous act, and calls for boycotting all NCSoft games are only the most extreme instances of what is almost certainly a more widespread sense that games such as this should be kept at a distance.
It may be in a manner impossible to measure, but it does seem to me to be an act of poisoning the well.
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Are you implying that NCSoft's hand was forced? I had speculated a scorched earth policy toward ending the game this way due to Nexon and Prefect World Champion Online.
Miss Arc #147491: Rise of Bedlam
AKA Iron Smoke @Champion Server
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Originally Posted by Kractis_Sky
Are you implying that NCSoft's hand was forced? I had speculated a scorched earth policy toward ending the game this way due to Nexon and Prefect World Champion Online.
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OK this one's easy. MC Soft posted a big loss last quarter. Nexon who owns a significant chunk of controlling interest says to NCSoft: "Cut Operating Costs to XXX amount." (This has nothing to do with actual profit Margins etc. This is about Operating costs in general.) Paragon Studios and City of Heroes Qualified to get the axe because of these reasons:
1. The Game did terribly in NCSoft's target market (Asia) and was shut down a couple of months after starting there.
2. CoH is the oldest game in NCSofts current Portfolio of offerings, meaning it's past it's prime, and while it's still profitable, there's not a lot of life left in the game and the operating costs can fund both Wildstar and the NA/EU port of Blade & Soul.
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If you want my personal opinion, based on what I know and what I've been told, I think this situation is a lot more complicated and messy than we're ever likely to know. There's just more moving pieces on the board than I can really account for, is all I can say about that.|
Originally Posted by Kractis_Sky
Are you implying that NCSoft's hand was forced? I had speculated a scorched earth policy toward ending the game this way due to Nexon and Prefect World Champion Online.
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To address your specific question, I don't believe NCSoft was forced to shut down the game in that sense.
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I have a feeling operating costs were not the critical issue. If it were, your point #2 would be a contradiction: shifting that cash from CoH to Wildstar and B&S would not reduce net operating costs.|
Originally Posted by Dr_Illuminatis
OK this one's easy. MC Soft posted a big loss last quarter. Nexon who owns a significant chunk of controlling interest says to NCSoft: "Cut Operating Costs to XXX amount." (This has nothing to do with actual profit Margins etc. This is about Operating costs in general.) Paragon Studios and City of Heroes Qualified to get the axe because of these reasons:
1. The Game did terribly in NCSoft's target market (Asia) and was shut down a couple of months after starting there. 2. CoH is the oldest game in NCSofts current Portfolio of offerings, meaning it's past it's prime, and while it's still profitable, there's not a lot of life left in the game and the operating costs can fund both Wildstar and the NA/EU port of Blade & Soul. |
If NCSoft wasn't sitting on a large pile of cash, ROI could be a factor but money is fungible: if CoH was operating at a net profit, NCSoft can't simultaneously have a cash flow problem and be sitting on a lot of cash.
If there even is a singular trigger, I suspect its more likely to be a "focusing" issue rather than a profitability issue. A lot of people think businesses operate purely on the basis of what will make them money. But in reality, I know of few businesses that actually operate that way. Business leaders, in particular, are like MMO designers in that they have a vision for the company. That vision includes certain things and excludes others. In the past I've used the example of my company. Its an IT company, but what if I could sell pizzas and make net profit from it. Would I do it? Nope. I'm not a pizza company, and I don't want to own or run a pizza company. That its a business opportunity to make money is really irrelevant to me.
I've seen businesses decide to branch out into new things or stop doing things solely on the basis that they simply don't want to do them anymore, or alternatively that they rather do something else instead. Its entirely possible that short of City of Heroes making hundreds of millions of dollars, NCSoft simply decided, perhaps under pressure due to its poor quarterly performance, to "refocus" and decide what it wanted to be doing and what it no longer wanted to be doing, and Paragon Studios and City of Heroes were no longer what NCSoft wanted to be doing.
Because of that, we may never find a smoking gun that points to the root cause of the shutdown. There may be no direct cause and effect line from the root cause to the decision you'll ever be able to prove without a direct admission from the decision makers.
There are other possibilities, but this is a reasonably possible one that isn't given much consideration.
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I find this to be the most likely scenario, too. You know how cube farmers try to make sure we-- er, they "look busy" so they don't get fired? Corporate executives feel the same pressure from their boards/shareholders. Take a big loss? Rearrange some deck chairs so it looks like you've got the situation under control. Put together a Powerpoint about "renewed focus" and "re-emphasizing the core business" and "becoming lean and agile" and as many other buzzwords as you can fit on a slide, then lay off a bunch of people. I've seen it happen over and over.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
If there even is a singular trigger, I suspect its more likely to be a "focusing" issue rather than a profitability issue. A lot of people think businesses operate purely on the basis of what will make them money. But in reality, I know of few businesses that actually operate that way. Business leaders, in particular, are like MMO designers in that they have a vision for the company. That vision includes certain things and excludes others. In the past I've used the example of my company. Its an IT company, but what if I could sell pizzas and make net profit from it. Would I do it? Nope. I'm not a pizza company, and I don't want to own or run a pizza company. That its a business opportunity to make money is really irrelevant to me.
I've seen businesses decide to branch out into new things or stop doing things solely on the basis that they simply don't want to do them anymore, or alternatively that they rather do something else instead. Its entirely possible that short of City of Heroes making hundreds of millions of dollars, NCSoft simply decided, perhaps under pressure due to its poor quarterly performance, to "refocus" and decide what it wanted to be doing and what it no longer wanted to be doing, and Paragon Studios and City of Heroes were no longer what NCSoft wanted to be doing. |
I don't think we'll ever know the truth, because it's not in anyone's best interest to tell the truth.
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Though nothing will drive them away
We can beat them, just for one day
We can be heroes, just for one day
So let me get this strait. With all this outpouring of support from the CoH community they couldn't figure out how to sell it to the fans UHF style?
I agree with everything in your post, except possibly this which was a bit unclear to me.
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Unlike NCSoft, I would suggest that Paramount continued to support the fan base of Star Trek in the same manner that CoH fans at a minimum deserve. They did the equivalent of gamings "maintenance mode" (keeping the servers running but producing no new content.) In 60's TV land this was known as "Reruns" and in both MMORPGS and TV it allows fans to still enjoy their favorite characters doing the same missions from the past. |
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Social communities spring up all the time surrounding things like television shows: Star Trek at one point existed almost solely *as* a fan community for almost a decade. But while CBS and Paramount could and did stop making Star Trek the show, and its obvious they couldn't be compelled to continue doing so just to serve a community, conversely they did not provide nor did they revoke the infrastructure of the fan community that sprung up around the show.
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NCSoft's actions are the equivalent of canceling "Star Trek", refusing to license or resell the rights, refusing to rerun any episodes, and if NCSoft's past history is any indication they will try to take legal action against any fan clever enough to have recorded StarTrek on a VTR*.
Paramount by placing Star Trek into TV's "maintenance mode", instead of doing an NCSoft, allowed the Star Trek community to grow. In return Paramount profited to the tune of billions of dollars and now holds the rights to an IP that will last a 100 years.
*A VTR is a pre 70's VCR, a pre 90's DvD recorder or a Pre 2010 Hulu. Now get off my lawn you damn kids!
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To sell something you have to find a buyer that would pay you the right price and contrary to the popular belief i believe that they would be happy to sell CoH if someone would put forward a serious offer for it
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Originally Posted by Nericus
Anyone else think they could have managed to sell the game?
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Originally Posted by Hit Streak
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Seems suspect to me. I guess we commence with the final letting go ...
Sign It : http://www.change.org/petitions/ncso...city-of-heroes
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This post cut to the heart of the matter so well that I exported it to word and saved it. It ought to make its way into textbooks on management science and workplace psychology.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
No one cow destroys the field, and no one shutdown destroys MMOs. But if MMO publishers refuse to honor their social contract with their players, or even acknowledge there is one in the first place, they must all take collective responsibility for the consequences of that collective decision, whatever that turns out to be. And people are highly unpredictable when it comes to such things on long time scales.
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My postings to this forum are not to be used as data in any research study without my express written consent.
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Absolutely. They want us to shut up. Don't.
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Originally Posted by Sith_Rose
Everything I have heard indicates that your second example is likely the correct one.
This is PR fluff to get us to shut up. Don't fall for and do NOT give up the pressure. It's not yet time to bring the rain...but lock and load. It's two months to server shut down and they're saying this now? When they haven't even acknowledged contact from some investor inquiries? Uh-uh. Keep the pressure up. We're making them look bad. They want us to give up. Don't. |
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I don't know HOW to shutup!
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Originally Posted by CodeJunkie
Absolutely. They want us to shut up. Don't.
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Ignoring anyone is a mistake. You might miss something viral to your cause.
There has been some info out of Titan that explains why buyout talks failed.
Do a little digging on Titan and you can probably find the info in question.
The Cliffs Notes version is that price was never a problem. Certain other requirements set by NC$hit made buying the IP a very unwise and high risk financial/legal decision.
After learning of the above requirements, I can't blame anyone for not being willing to sign on the dotted line.
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I doubt it would be a problem to just link it.
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Originally Posted by TamRael
There has been some info out of Titan that explains why buyout talks failed.
Do a little digging on Titan and you can probably find the info in question. The Cliffs Notes version is that price was never a problem. Certain other requirements set by NC$hit made buying the IP a very unwise and high risk financial/legal decision. After learning of the above requirements, I can't blame anyone for not being willing to sign on the dotted line. |
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When push comes to shove the game belongs to NcSoft to do with what they will. No amount of coercion or pleading on our part is going to make the slightest bit of difference imo.
Just be thankful (as I am) that CoX was born, that we were all given the chance to be part of an exceptional community of game players and that it lasted as long as it did.
I wish you all well for your gaming futures. Good luck! Take care! and may your gods go with you.
There is always a lot to be thankful for, if you take the time to look. For example, I'm sitting here thinking how nice it is that wrinkles don't hurt. ~Author Unknown
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Well, you've got the right to your opinion, and what you choose to take away from it, but I don't buy it. This isn't about pleading - this is about convincing NCsoft to step away from the mutually assured destruction. The point isn't to appeal to NCsoft's good nature, but to demonstrate that, if they do close the game, it will take them years, if that, to detach that particular shark from their ***.
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Originally Posted by Warbaby
When push comes to shove the game belongs to NcSoft to do with what they will. No amount of coercion or pleading on our part is going to make the slightest bit of difference imo.
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The mad ranter is back I did not leave I was checking out competition including GW2. I grabbed my chest like yoda losing Mace Windu when I felt a dark shift in wind the only game to make me a pc gamer, mmo love, I friggin left console games since CoH, I found there is No I repeat NO competition . CAPS ON - GUYS I LOVE YOU ALL WHO I'VE GAMED WITH OR CHAT ON CoH/CoV/, ETC... WE ARE THE BEST FOR OUR GAME TYPE HANDS DOWN. I want to thank all our Devs. , old or new. Its bitter sweet I remember rage ranting at devs for being lazy, I told you guys we should have all thrown cake at em that day lol. Our devs we're the greatest they responded and, acted on our cries, compared to the 10 other mmo's I ran through this past year only prepping to support NCSOFT'S GW2. I apologize brothers and sisters if my missing logging in could have played roll in our demise even trying the population thief due to hype n money WoW decent but, not our CoH. Forgive me. I am lost for words my game is WHAT!!! Silklash Kraken will live.
Also to bone heads outside our forums saying AE kiled us no where near truth AE golden,silver, n bronze age had high population addictiveness, repeative but we we're here. My OP what would have fixed our low population
1. adding lvling to 100 shut up everybody lol
2. get there from 50 in the newer cities to which they made pointless kinda n dumbed down for nothing.
3. we had tired giant monsters,alien, & zombie invasions, that lost there call for our own and best dynamic events but dont axe em add more doh too late.
4.power sets should have never gone for sell that was our bread n butter next to costume building.
5. we just got vehicles like a hover board n they quit now grrrr. we we're missing travel powers out the wazoo ive played Champions they win with teleport lose everywhere else lol.
6.they couldve combined unused cities to kill loading from zone to zone.
I can only hope CoH2 does all these if I know its not, but if honor us by rezzing all our toons who reached 50 to keep our old powers at the lvl strength or use the newer purely beautiful new powers for the lvl n graphics, after 50 getting new powers anyways.
Sorry for wall of text its my last I can go cry now waaaaaaaaaaaaa oh n whhhhhhhyyyyyyyy. wait last ditch effort help Devs my toon is stuck after shut down day can you fix my log-in issue and everyone else's while at it.
I understand people wanting to move on. I understand not wanting to. I don't understand the lets-rub-salt-in-open-wounds mentality some people seem to have.
If you're here, reading this, then this experience has been hard for you so far. You may be processing that by feeling anger. That's human. I know it is hard to handle anger well, but please try to do so in a way that isn't hurtful to the other players here. As a human being, I entreat you.
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The subject of the thread: I know nothing about corporate workings. I can't rightly speculate or infer. I'm glad there was some word from NCSoft, but I do not believe, on a human level, that they have communicated with earnest feeling to the community at all. I believe that such communication is respectful, and would be willing to argue it is an ethical responsiblity in this setting.
I am disappointed by NCSoft. Specifically, that they cannot have an open and respectful communication with the players when that would cost them so little.
Maybe they are not constructed in such a way that this is even possible without some rogue effort. I hope that other companies may notice this problem and prepare themselves so that they will not make the same mistakes, that they will be structured to have the ability to give propper diligence and grace to their community members in such an unfortunate situation.
Philip