*peers through the dust and embers*

I really tried to reply to that.

I really did.

But then my head started hurting.

wut

Good god.

I'm not going to answer everything in that because there were just far too many words. I tend to skip through most walls of text, especially when they include things like "I'm just being me". Well of course you are. Who else would you be? Have a cracker.

Essentially though, I will admit to forming my opinions largely on what I saw on Twitter by the people posting on #SaveCoH. And I will also admit that originally, I was one of those people. A bit of satirical sideswiping at NCSoft was initially quite fun and a rather nice way of letting of steam. It was also a good way to keep up with the news about the efforts to save the game without wading through all the other stuff that I had largely no interest in.

Then there was a shift in the whole mood of things. It changed from light hearted digs into a full on smear campaign, and that's when I bowed out, because that emphasis isn't healthy (imo) doesn't reflect well on what SaveCoH is trying to achieve (again only from my point of view; others clearly have other agendas) and something I'd rather not be a part of.

My point is, if as a regularly contributing member to that campaign I found the taste in my mouth soured by the activities of what seemed to be a vocal majority, how is that going to be perceived by the people who's hearts you're trying to win? And for the record why is it not our place to criticise if we think something is heading in the wrong direction? Criticism, constructive criticism at least, is how things get improved. Ultimately of course, whether that criticism is taken on board and actioned upon is down to the people that make those kinds of decisions, but please don't tell me it's not my place to make it.

The only other thing the Titan forums seemed to be advocating in any volume was Plan Z. And as I've said in other threads, I do honestly wish the people involved the best of luck with it, but I've also seen similar efforts made before when support for a much loved game ends (for example back in the 90s a group had the idea to make an Interstate '82 mod for Battlefield 1942) and more or less without fail they get so far and fizzle into nothing. If in a couple of years something solid does come of it, all well and good, sign me up, but for now I won't be seeing this as any more than vapourware and will be placing my faith in something a little more solid.

I'm only talking about the thread that was deleted this evening. I guess because he's already tainted it's impossible to take individual threads on face value?

Why are posts like this even remotely necessary? Honestly.

That's sort of the point, mate.

The Electric-Knight ______ Malfaz _____ Zox'Oculox

@Zethustra

"Now at midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew come out
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan

www.pauldamonthomas.com - Original Music

Well, since you've shown me such respect there... TL/DR err err, haha.


So, people using Twitter in ways that you didn't like is what you're basing your grievances against the SaveCoH/Titan crowd on.
I was not following Twitter, so I have no idea what people were doing.
We're all different. Whatever. You didn't like it. That's cool.

As for Project Z, yeah, I have had zero to do with it and have placed zero interest in it so far.
I wish them all the best and, who knows, I may attempt to get involved in it, but as long as the game is running and as long as I believe there's the smallest chance of the game returning, I'm not interested in the giant mess of chefs in that kitchen (I don't say that with disrespect - just with understanding of what such an undertaking means).
Crazier things have indeed happened.

Anyway... I don't know where you pulled "no criticism" from, but yay?

The Electric-Knight ______ Malfaz _____ Zox'Oculox

@Zethustra

"Now at midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew come out
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan

www.pauldamonthomas.com - Original Music

Have to admit, I did miss that in the original read through, but noted.

To clarify the "one voice" comment I made was largely metaphorical. Sure the Titan FORUM was the place that voice was largely heard, certainly in the initial stages and before the other avenues to which it travelled like Twitter and Facebook.

To clarify again, my beef was never with TonyV and to be honest I don't have any kind of axe to grind with Titan as a whole. However I just feel the anti NCSoft sentiment has gotten a little out of control and gone a little too far. This is what I feel is detrimental to what SaveCoH set out to acheive. YMMV

The problem is that unless you're actively involved with the details of the Titan network, that clan mentality can come across when it's presented to you "in the wild" as it were. From that point of view, people can be forgiven for thinking that because it can come across as such a universal point of view, it's endorsed by the people that run it. Whether they are right or not is generally not the point, because by then the real message is lost.

I don't mean to offend (genuinely), but whilst such tenacity can be and often is admirable, doesn't there come a point where that's just blind ignorance? Granted, that mindset alone doesn't hurt anyone else but you can surely see the point of view of people that think it's a little ... "unrealistic"? (Not the best choice of words, but the only one that comes to mind)

I do get that, honestly. I think a lot of the negativity comes from the "give it up already" mentality because people want to shield themselves from further disappointment. Again.. I'm not saying it's right or wrong to do that, but if you are going to have that do or die mindset, you need to bear in mind that other people will not only share it, but do what they can to avoid it, including trying to persuade you that what you're doing is a little fruitless.

You're right, they can't. And in those instances you've just gotta take it on the chin and move on.

The thing is, even though I did take the p out of you for the gist of what you said there (for which I apologise), you're no different to me from that point of view. I don't say things to try and impress anyone, I just say things as I see them.


Agreed.. although from the PoV of tactical shifts, there was always that few who were itching to bring out both barrels and the larger community did rather well to keep those people reigned in. Unfortunately as time went on and the polite efforts were ignored there seemed to be the adoption of the "F**k it.. what have we got to lose?" mindset. And really, I think that's where it all got a bit out of hand.

Yup..

If we're both people who "say it as we see it", then why shouldn't we?

Like I say, I went on the Titan forums mainly just to keep tabs of the latest news. Once I "discovered" Twitter, I found that to be a much better summary of what was going on than wading through endless posts of things I really wasn't that interested in. My observations are therefore only what I saw from the goings on the #SaveCoH column. Perhaps I was wrong to assume that the two sources of information went hand in hand, but from what little time I spent on Titan, the same prominent faces appeared on the Twitter feed, so it seemed logical the two were linked.

As I said, I was never really that involved in the Titan forums other than browsing, so that "tiny voice" thing doesn't really apply to me.


Heh.. ironically, that's all I did too. Unfortunately that person was tagged as an undesirable, and so I was so tainted by association. But.. yanno.. I say things as I see 'em.

Bitter resentment? Maybe. However much I enjoyed playing the game over the years, the whole community thing I never really experienced, despite my efforts to take part. I dare say there'll be pictures of violins or tearful ponies or other some such ridicule, but the irony when people do that is it just fosters those feelings in the people that are affected by it.

In numerous entertainment-related debates that I've followed, it ALWAYS seemed like it was Twitter where the wars started, in some cases up to a year before the flames spread to other social networking sites (which until that time had been having somewhat more civilized discussions about it). And I don't just mean petty name-calling like we've seen here, but racial/ethnic/sexual harassment all the way up to death threats.

Don't know if that's what went on in this case, but I've had a phrase that I've used any times. "Why is it always Twitter that starts up the rage machine?" Reports and sightings of these extreme fights are the reason I still do not own a Twitter account.

That doesn't sound all that surprising, now that you mention it; All it takes is a #hashtag and you are connecting with anyone and everyone as opposed to the smaller confines of most other social medias... Huh... #nowseesthetruepotentialoftwitter... hahaha.

The Electric-Knight ______ Malfaz _____ Zox'Oculox

@Zethustra

"Now at midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew come out
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan

www.pauldamonthomas.com - Original Music

Here's the thing. I didn't set out to be nasty. From the get-go, I was nothing but polite and respectful. I remind everyone that I'm the guy who posted the "NCsoft is NOT our enemy" thread. My intention was to encourage nice, friendly conversation in the spirit of helping Paragon Studios to acquire the IP and rights to City of Heroes under its own banner. Early on in this ordeal, I had honestly planned on releasing a bunch of stuff to the press publicly lauding NCsoft for their foresight and caring of its community, highly encouraging people to support the company and its games, especially the new ones coming out. I was the guy who, when the idea of a protest rally was put forward, said, "Let's call it a Unity Rally instead."

However, I was clear up front that if they jerked us around as a community, they would suffer a PR black eye. It wasn't a threat, it was just a natural reaction to their actions. Truth be known, there were already a lot of people looking to wage war on NCsoft as early as August 31, and I was trying to be a positive force in telling people to hold off. In all of the interviews and media releases I did, I reiterated that I appreciated what NCsoft had done for the game and its community, and I was looking for a solution in which we all could win.

The personal turning point to me came down to two things. First, I got word from some insiders I trust that NCsoft was demanding outlandish terms for selling the IP. Second, they posted the "all options have been exhausted" communication two months before the game was due to be shut down. Even without the other info I had, this would have ticked me off because, as I said in my response, there are always options to make something like that happen. At that point, I realized that NCsoft was not only not honestly trying to negotiate releasing the IP, but they were doing their best to brush off the community and shut them up without giving any kind of serious thought to the issue.

So at that point, I felt that we had nothing to lose. I started encouraging people to post messages where NCsoft was publicly visible letting them know how they felt. Note that I've never said, "Hey, go out and trash them." I don't consider messages I've posted to be trollish. I don't post "NCsoft sux" messages. Everywhere I've personally posted messages, I've tried to explain that NCsoft has a history of killing off MMOs, which they do. I point out that they've killed off five now in the past five years, which they have. I express that as a gamer, this concerns me because the MMO genre is particularly conducive to players investing a disproportionate amount of time and money into the games within that genre, which I feel they do. Thus in my opinion, NCsoft and other MMO publishers have a moral obligation to players to do everything reasonably possible to protect those players' investments, which I feel that NCsoft is not doing.

Other players word it differently, but to be blunt, I see very few messages of the type of "NCsoft sux." I'm actually pretty proud of the SaveCoH crowd in that even the most venomous of posts I've seen have not been so trite--they've actually done a good job of conveying not only the message that they don't like NCsoft, but why they don't like NCsoft. This is important because they're not your standard trollish kind of posts; they're reaching out to other gamers to say, "Hey, you should be concerned about this," which I feel is an extremely valid message to convey.

There are those here who feel that no one should be making any negative comments, and I disagree. If NCsoft doesn't suffer any kind of PR black eye, then there is absolutely nothing stopping them--or any publisher observing events here--from doing the same thing over and over, which I think is wrong. There are also those who think that some people go too far in expressing their anger. Maybe some people do, but I think it's pretty much in line with what I expected. I don't see people threatening physical harm to NCsoft employees, illegal activities such as attempting to hack into the company and cause damage through that avenue (which I was genuinely afraid of, to be honest), or anything like that.

So to anyone who says, "Those Titan people are going TOO FAR!!!", I'm sorry but I think you need to get a little perspective. Would you rather people post nastygrams on Facebook pages and YouTube videos, or doing something truly asinine? I guess that "TOO FAR!" is totally subjective, but I think as a whole, we're doing just fine. We're exercising our freedom of speech to inform people of what's going on against a corporation that has a lot more resources than we do, and we're doing the best we can.

If NCsoft is unhappy with the negative attention they're getting... Well, they can't say I didn't warn them that there would be a backlash. I wish I could take credit for all of the shtuff going on as if I were some sort of coordination mastermind, but if you actually look at my communications you'll see that I'm actually not personally directing a lot of it. Most of this stuff is people taking their own initiative. While I might not condone every little thing that gets posted or done, I did foresee it and warn it would happen, and I'm sure not going to try to stop people from reaching out to other NCsoft customers and raise awareness of what's going on.

I also would be remiss in pointing out that even at this late date, NCsoft still holds the cards that could at any time make this pretty much a non-issue by reopening the possibility of selling the IP for reasonable terms. Yes, there will still be people who would hate them forever. Such is the price for being so dumb for two months. But the situation is still not irrevocably unsalvageable, and if they did reopen that possibility, I think that most of us--myself included--would be happy to just part ways amicably. They've pretty much passed up the opportunity to have me recommending their products barring something truly spectacular, but at least they won't have a bunch of scrappy people like me dogging them all the time.

Hope this clarifies,
--TonyV

With friends like these...

Originally Posted by Paladiamors I love you, I Burnt the Toast!

Very much this.

Tony whilst I do understand where you're coming from there are two things in your post that really stand out.

Firstly, the "Do a deal with us or else" stance is a bit.. well.. pompous. I mean honestly, who do you think you are? Whilst I do agree that CoH is / was a "venerable" title with a loyal playerbase, and the way they handled things wasn't ideal, ultimately it was a game that was in steady decline for a number of years. SaveCoH was harking on about how amazing 20,000 signatures was and what a powerful voice they had, but in the scheme of things 20,000 is nothing, really, less than nothing. GuildWars 2 sold 2 MILLION copies in its first MONTH.

Whilst they weren't very "nice" about the whole thing, ultimately what more did you expect from a company that already had and continues to have money worries. An example of this was yesterday when someone tweeted about a newspaper article in the Korean times explaining the CEOs sale of the majority of his shares and this being the primary reason for its stock market slump. I'm no market expert, but it was there in black and white that it was the reason, and yet seemingly this was lost on the majority of everyone else saying what an amazing job the Unity Rally did. City of Heroes, wasn't even MENTIONED.

Secondly, if you think the comments of the Anti-NCSoft movement is still all flowers and rainbows, you've seriously lost touch with what's going on. Again (and I realise that given it's my only source, my PoV is likely to be a little polarised) I was following #SaveCoH on Twitter until relatively recently. More or less without fail on a daily basis there were a handful of tweets linking to a news article and the tweeter encouraging everyone to comment bomb it. Not only that the stance of the posters was equally "listen to me or else". Honestly? I can almost imagine the NCSoft Christmas party being a round up of some of their favourites.

They don't have a Christmas party - NCsoft prefers it to be always winter, but never Christmas.

This is one of those things where I have trouble grapsing the depth of what is implied. If corporations have the right to push the envelope of lying to9 the max in order to fluff their products to infinity and beyond, then do customers NOT have the right to do the opposite? If they don't, then the implications of that are quire disturbing, and suggest that we live in some sort of dictatorship. Only the dictators are companies, not politicians.

I like winter.

It has more to do with timing than content.

Seeing something wrong and speaking out against it is admirable.

Seeing something wrong and virtually ignoring it until it effects you, then clamouring for attention by stating that you are now speaking for the rights of everyone in your chosen demographic? Not so admirable.

I think the bigger problem there isn't whether or not a game got axed. But while not being a perpetual gold mine, AFAIK CoH was the only one of the games that WAS still pulling its own weight. That makes things scary for pretty much every MMO in existence, because now we can't even base the long-term survivability of our games on the coldest known standard.

I was getting wary of new games already. Now... I have no idea what to think. What variable is there that still CAN be trusted?

I don't believe that is true. Pulling one's own weight is not even remotely the same as meeting expectations, much less maximizing return on investment.

Have we gotten any information on the why's of CoH closing down?

That said, it was a worry about all MMOs before this.