Acceptance: The Final Stage

With less than 2 weeks until the lights go out, I've reluctantly come to terms with the imminent demise of my first (and only) online game. I'm still hoping for a miracle, but not really expecting one.

In light of this, I've changed my plans for how I'm going to spend my remaining time in game. Initially, I was planning to race the clock in order to get a villain to 50 so that he could join my only 50-level hero among the greats. I had a change of heart however, when I started to miss some of my other creations.

Now, I'm spending time with some of my favorites to enjoy them while I still can. It's kind of like visiting a friend that you may never see again. In the process, I've rediscovered why this game is so special - it gives life to the daydreams of the 11-year old fanboy still inside me.

So, with a nostalgic tip of the hat, I salute some of my departing favorites:

Nova Knight: energy/devices blaster and my only 50. My sneaky strategist.

Helldragon: spines/FA scrapper. I wanted a character who could wade into a horde of bad guys and leave them a charred, smoking pile of body parts; he more than delivered.

Green Gladiator: BS/regen scrapper. What’s more iconic than a lone swordsman coming to the rescue?

Shadowbrand: dark/dark scrapper. Inspired by Batman; literally strikes fear into the hearts of bad guys. Showed me what a “scraptroller” could do.

Helldrake: fire/WP brute. A blazing engine of destruction and Helldragon’s evil twin. Showed me how much fun it is to be bad.

Emerald Executioner: nin/nin stalker. Quiet, invisible, deadly.

OK, this has detoured from the topic of coping to an exercise in full-blown self-indulgence. I’ll stop now. We now return you to your regularly scheduled program. What’s that? Oh, nothing… I just have something in my eye… Move it along, move it along… nothing to see here…

The campagin to get our game back will continue after December 1st.

Final stage, indeed.

I think I can admit I really came to this particular point a little while earlier. It's at the point now where it's difficult to log into City now, even though there's still things I want to do: whether it be take last screenshots or do the Sentinel+ thing or hopefully get a last 50 with a mastermind. (I'll be trying again tonight, though.) My life situation and the fact that I'm somewhat enjoying a competition game doesn't help, really, but people have to do whatever they find fun and the fact is that the NCsoft bomb sucked all the enjoyment out of things here: friends have essentially moved on and set up their shops elsewhere, RP feels pointless, trying to be responsible for a group is difficult.

The campaign to save or avenge the game from whatever parties that want to do so aside, right now the situation is what it is for me: there's going to be a formal finality and that isn't changing. What happens beyond that is... well, we'll see when we get there.

I'm gonna hope against hope. I'll worry about December the 1st on December 1st

"You got to dig it to dig it, you dig?"
Thelonious Monk

Stage 1 – Denial: “This can’t be happening. They just introduced new powersets, they were beefing up Blasters, creating new content and making all kinds of quality-of-life improvements. There must be some mistake.”

Stage 2 – Anger: “NCSoft, you’ve made a powerful enemy. From hell’s heart I stab at thee; for hate’s sake I spit my last breath at thee.”

Stage 3 – Bargaining: “How ‘bout if you increase the subscription fee? No? Then take my first-born; he’s strong and he’ll work hard... How ‘bout a kidney? I’ve got two of those… just keep the game up and running.”

Stage 4 – Depression: “Can’t bring myself to play… it’s too painful, like rubbing salt into an open wound. Where’s the damn Ben and Jerry’s?”

Stage 5 – Acceptance: (sigh) “Guess I’ll log on while I still can. November 30th is coming fast.”

I don't really remember stages 3 and 4, but I reached stage 5 a couple of weeks ago. I think it's far better to concentrate on the positive experience I had in game than to bemoan something that I can't do anything about, or put my faith in something that has very little chance of success in the immediate future (Titan Network, I'm looking at you).

I'm enjoying The Secret World at the moment (very similar feel to CoH, and whilst not a perfect replacement for it, there are many key things I personally think it does better). Also playing MechWarrior Online and keeping a close eye on Otherland.

Look forward, rather than back. Stay pessimistic about possible plans for reprieve and that way you avoid disappointment.

I'm going through all five simultaneously.

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

for me i think it was:

stage 1: depression
stage 2: anger

and thats about it, when i start hating something, theres basically no end to it, ncsoft will not ever see money from me again, regardless if the game can stay alive

ill only continue to be depressed if the games original IP cannot be saved, although then it will just harden the grudge i already have for ncsoft

We're not done yet. I kinda figured we'd end up seeing the game closed on the 30th but I think City of Heroes could still rise like a phoenix again. APB made a return, after all.

Right now I'm at a mixture of Depression and Acceptance. Leaning more towards the latter. I don't want to log on because it makes me sad, but I'm ready to move on, even if I haven't found a new home yet.

As indicated in my original post, I've reached Stage 5 - Acceptance. Admittedly, it's mixed with a fair amount of confusion. It just boggles my mind how a well-designed, fully developed game with an avid, enthusiastic player base can go belly-up. How many MMOs would happily trade places with CoH for that kind of brand loyalty and market? It makes no sense to me.

I don't have the energy to carry a lifelong grudge against NCSoft, but my inclination is take my business elsewhere since they don't seem to value their customers.

I'm around stage 5, acceptance.

No king rules forever, a NPC once said in another game. They can take the game, but they will never take my memories, my old gamemate used to say (he died in a car accident few years ago, only 3 months before that game was shut down).

All i now need is time to gather as much info about all my characters, make a few recordings that if i want to see it, i just play the demorecord (that doenst require connection isit?).

But, every day when i see Samuraiko's movie..
I go into stage 6, defeated. But once the rotating view at Atlas comes up, i feel kinda feel happy again, that all these years i've been part of the best game-community in _any_ game i've played (trust me, that are alot of games).

I still have hope one of the European publishers will still pick it up, they got a few good companies out there, that might give a go at relaunching. But then again.. its NCsoft.. and they are.. ya well, they are NCsoft.

I dont have a grudge against them, i just hope their B&S, Starstuff and GW2 will be worst then expected, leaving them feeling only regret they killed off one of the few games that they had that actualy made succes.

But whatever campaign they decide to continue after shutdown, i will back it up.
I am a hero, this is what i do.

im prob at 4 leaning on 5 but im finding it hard to log on

when i do i just stand in my base and chat....just knowing they wont be there to play at the end of the month i just cant be ***** to put time in
i did blow my money and villain points on my main hopefully ill be playing my widow when the lights go out

it wasnt antill the announcement that i realized id turned my game into a job
id log on everyday and get my 1 DA mission for 10 threads on x amount of villains i was working up the incarn chain
friday's id log on all my villains and run them thru the villain who will die part 1

*sigh* fun at the time but wasted now

ill see what happens after the closing in terms of the ip
i doubt even if restarted id be back just cause i was looking forward to getting the 10 year badge that dream/hopes out the window
and
some odd reason thats never happened before nc-soft have managed to change my view of paying a sub each month to play

no i dont hate nc-soft i tip my hat to them for saving the game and buying it from cryptic creating paragon and me getting 8+ years of fun
i just lost trust in the sub system

*loads up gw2*
goes looking for his daily 5 rare ore nodes and 5 ancient rare tree nodes

yeah i noticed i turn all games into jobs now

September 1 stage 5

Only conflict, surprise they hadn't either acted to the turn the studio around sooner, or slice it into a low cost / maintenance mode.

Not pursuing a maintenance mode is understandable when you think about it. It is one thing to be a company that closes bad games it's another to be one that pushes them on their customers.