I'm not currently playing CoH/CoV but, I played it when both first came out - I enjoyed it each time and so did my friends. Although I have to say even though it's super fun it seems that the end game is lacking a bit. So I would max a char and not get enough satisfaction end game. Now, it has been about half a year since I last played and things could be different now. I can't imagine that I won't come back and try this again as it was super fun each time I played it.

Why it isn't super big lately:

Issue 12's sync bug that left thousands of players unable to interact with anything in the game (no movement, no combat, no crafting, selling, opening doors etc.) for about a month straight.  The bug was reported in beta testing, and allowed to go live anyways.

Issue 13's promise of a mission creator for players, then the announcement that this is being delayed, and that we are getting a pve and pvp game revamp instead.  We're told that putting customized bosses in the mission creator will take too long.  Apparently a game revamp takes less time...

Issue 13's hated pvp revamp.  Melee toons lose their mez protection, completely.  This leaves them completely vulnerable to holds, stuns etc..  Tanks lose teleport.  This leaves stone tanks unable to move without dropping their best protective power.  All heroes and villains have movement suppressed in the pvp zones.  Flying, ranged toons with mez will reign supreme.  Imagine a held melee toon, with no mez protection on the receiving end of spam holds by flying dominators.  All builds with powers that will be disabled or supressed will become junk, with all of their expensive crafted enhancements sets rendered useless.

The reason for the hated pvp revamp--appeal to new players.  Miller has said he's aware that current players won't like the changes, but they're making them anyways.  Lighthouse said the changes were not made based on current player input.  When criticized for this, he then said that they were.  One of these statements is obviously untrue.  Players feel lied to on top of being given an unwanted revamp.

Why it wasn't super big before:

 Initially because of repetitive gameplay: enter instanced missions, kill all bad guys, click glowie (sometimes), rinse and repeat.  Some variety was introduced in the new villain/hero co-op zones.  This was nice.

Lack of crafting, buying, selling: fixed with the introduction of the invention system and auction house.

Lack of open world exploration.  The game is heavily instanced, which isn't all bad, but doesn't have a balance of open world exploration in it.  Each zone feels like a limited box that can be crossed very quickly with little interesting things to see or discover along the way.

Lack of social elements.  The game is very action oriented, which is nice, but lacks any mechanisms that promote social connection during down time.  There is a dance club, but it's been empty for years, with no reason to go in, apart from arena combat in a small section.

Recent performance and treatment of players (Issue 12 and 13) has been poor, and issues like exploration and socialization remain unaddressed.

ArcAngel3, given that your first paragraph (regarding Issue 12's sync bug), is 95% exageration,  the credibility for your analysis is blown out of the water.

The sync bug was cleared before 12 went live, but a patch reintroduced it into the game. For most people, it only interfered with UI screens where they displayed real-time changes in influence, salvage counts, prestige amounts, xp totals and so on. These defecits were especially noticeable at the Auction Houses, the Tailor Shops, and while in Base Edit mode in your SuperGroup or VillainGroup Bases. Other people reported visual discrepancies on their screens, particularly those with less acute video cards. A toon might have been teleported away, for instance, but still visable standing in place on your monitor.  And all of this occurred for THREE WHOLE DAYS. As soon as the bug was detected, a system message was issued by the devs in all channels, and repeated at log-ins, with a command code to correct the problem on a case by case basis until they could wipe it from the game.

I agree with several of the first respondants. City of Heroes/City of Villains is not as huge in popularity as some of the other games out there because it is a sub-genere, a secialized niche, and it was never heavily markeeted. I think many adults see the comcic-book look and perceive it as a kids toy. And while it is true that Cryptic cum NCSoft struggles with strength of content, that area of the game gets better by leaps and bounds with every new release. To say that the game is not what it could be because of WoW however is not entirely accurate. They are very different games and seem to attract a different caliber of player.

I don't know.  There are always different reasons.  However, I would have to guess that not everyone is attracted to the setting of this game.

Some people still like the idea of Heros and Villians, however the trend lately is straying toward uncommon heros and villians that isn't even villians.  This points to the direction of more generic type of world where it is easier to express those ideals.  This is really just a guess however, I am sure there are other reasons.

If I said to you..  "hey lets make a game with no loot, no pvp, and no endgame," well I image that you'd tell me it would never work.  If I told you that I was rebalance the game a couple months after release and piss everyone off.. you'd probably tell me that its doomed.

I've played CoX on and off for close to 3 years now, and I love the feel of combat in the game.  I think its fun, but it loses my interest after a month or so, and leaves me feeling like there should be more to it.

I think that if the game that you see now had been the game that launched.. it would have done a lot better.  A lot of things were too little too late when they were finally added into the game.  I think that the game still lacks meaningful pvp and endgame.

Originally posted by ebonfire

If I said to you..  "hey lets make a game with no loot, no pvp, and no endgame," well I image that you'd tell me it would never work.  If I told you that I was rebalance the game a couple months after release and piss everyone off.. you'd probably tell me that its doomed.

I've played CoX on and off for close to 3 years now, and I love the feel of combat in the game.  I think its fun, but it loses my interest after a month or so, and leaves me feeling like there should be more to it.

I think that if the game that you see now had been the game that launched.. it would have done a lot better.  A lot of things were too little too late when they were finally added into the game.  I think that the game still lacks meaningful pvp and endgame.

If Cryptic had held CoH in the barn until it was the game we see now, would you be willing to pay a subscription fee equal to the 4 yrs of missed revenue when it was perfectly playable and capable of earning income for the company? Or maybe now that it is a better game, are you willing to pay more?

All MMORPGs are a work in progress. If you find one that  seems to come out of the gate better than others of equal caliber, it is most likely because those devs share the same priorities that happen to meet your specific style of play. That doesn't mean all the other games suck, only that they aren't a good match for you.

Originally posted by TheRedPill

Originally posted by ebonfire

If I said to you..  "hey lets make a game with no loot, no pvp, and no endgame," well I image that you'd tell me it would never work.  If I told you that I was rebalance the game a couple months after release and piss everyone off.. you'd probably tell me that its doomed.

I've played CoX on and off for close to 3 years now, and I love the feel of combat in the game.  I think its fun, but it loses my interest after a month or so, and leaves me feeling like there should be more to it.

I think that if the game that you see now had been the game that launched.. it would have done a lot better.  A lot of things were too little too late when they were finally added into the game.  I think that the game still lacks meaningful pvp and endgame.

 

If Cryptic had held CoH in the barn until it was the game we see now, would you be willing to pay a subscription fee equal to the 4 yrs of missed revenue when it was perfectly playable and capable of earning income for the company? Or maybe now that it is a better game, are you willing to pay more?

All MMORPGs are a work in progress. If you find one that  seems to come out of the gate better than others of equal caliber, it is most likely because those devs share the same priorities that happen to meet your specific style of play. That doesn't mean all the other games suck, only that they aren't a good match for you.

Pfffttt the agruement about subscription fees is not even close to being rational.  The question was asked as to why this game isn't super big, and I answered it as accuratly as possible.   I agree that MMOs are a work in progress, but the features in the game had little appeal outside of the niche market, and the ones that make a game competitve came too late.

If I had a nickle for everytime I've heard someone respond to criticism on the CoX forums with the statement "this game is not for you" .. I'd be rich.  Apperantly its not for a lot of people, and it doesn't make it a bad game, but its certainly nowhere near as successful as it could have been if they would have had a little broader vision with gameplay features.

Originally posted by TheRedPill

ArcAngel3, given that your first paragraph (regarding Issue 12's sync bug), is 95% exageration,  the credibility for your analysis is blown out of the water.

The sync bug was cleared before 12 went live, but a patch reintroduced it into the game. For most people, it only interfered with UI screens where they displayed real-time changes in influence, salvage counts, prestige amounts, xp totals and so on. These defecits were especially noticeable at the Auction Houses, the Tailor Shops, and while in Base Edit mode in your SuperGroup or VillainGroup Bases. Other people reported visual discrepancies on their screens, particularly those with less acute video cards. A toon might have been teleported away, for instance, but still visable standing in place on your monitor.  And all of this occurred for THREE WHOLE DAYS. As soon as the bug was detected, a system message was issued by the devs in all channels, and repeated at log-ins, with a command code to correct the problem on a case by case basis until they could wipe it from the game.

I agree with several of the first respondants. City of Heroes/City of Villains is not as huge in popularity as some of the other games out there because it is a sub-genere, a secialized niche, and it was never heavily markeeted. I think many adults see the comcic-book look and perceive it as a kids toy. And while it is true that Cryptic cum NCSoft struggles with strength of content, that area of the game gets better by leaps and bounds with every new release. To say that the game is not what it could be because of WoW however is not entirely accurate. They are very different games and seem to attract a different caliber of player.

My points about sync bug are accurate.  I'm not sure where you were, or why you would even think to say the bug lasted only 3 days.  Also, read the hundreds of posts on the official boards where people are completely unable to interact with the map.  They couldn't move or do anything.  This is just the way it was for many people.  It was in fact players that discovered a work around for the sync bug.  If you had teleport self, it would get you back in sync with the map--but only temporarily.  It took a couple of weeks for the devs to get something like that on test.  If you'd remember correctly, it was called the "/sync" command.  This then went live after it was tested successfully, and the code was further modified to make the use of /sync less necessary.  This was a long drawn out process, that I helped troubleshoot, along with many of my friends who were affected by it. 

In fact it was so serious that the friends of mine who were directly affected received a month's worth of subscription time reimbursed.  Why would they get a month of time refunded if the bug only lasted 3 days?  The refund was a nice idea, I'll give them that, but it came too late for some players.  Also, those that had multiple accounts affected for the full month, only got one account refunded, which was not so helpful.

So, you can say it's inaccurate if you like, but you're simply wrong.  It was a serious bug that rendered people out of "sync" with the map server, and it lasted a month's time.  These are all just statements of fact.  I'm sorry if you're not aware of them, but that doesn't change their reality.

The rest of my analysis is equally factual.  If you don't believe that, check the forums now again regarding the pvp revamp, and check the server populations.  Friday night and all of them light, exept for one on medium.  That's the first time I've ever seen that on a Friday night.  If you don't believe that, check the damage control interviews being done by Miller to try to stop the exodus.

The first step to correcting a problem is admitting it exists.  Unfortuntely, it's this first step that seems to prove most difficult for some.

Originally posted by ArcAngel3

My points about sync bug are accurate.  I'm not sure where you were, or why you would even think to say the bug lasted only 3 days.  Also, read the hundreds of posts on the official boards where people are completely unable to interact with the map.  They couldn't move or do anything.  This is just the way it was for many people.  It was in fact players that discovered a work around for the sync bug.  If you had teleport self, it would get you back in sync with the map--but only temporarily.  It took a couple of weeks for the devs to get something like that on test.  If you'd remember correctly, it was called the "/sync" command.  This then went live after it was tested successfully, and the code was further modified to make the use of /sync less necessary.  This was a long drawn out process, that I helped troubleshoot, along with many of my friends who were affected by it. 

In fact it was so serious that the friends of mine who were directly affected received a month's worth of subscription time reimbursed.  Why would they get a month of time refunded if the bug only lasted 3 days?  The refund was a nice idea, I'll give them that, but it came too late for some players.  Also, those that had multiple accounts affected for the full month, only got one account refunded, which was not so helpful.

So, you can say it's inaccurate if you like, but you're simply wrong.  It was a serious bug that rendered people out of "sync" with the map server, and it lasted a month's time.  These are all just statements of fact.  I'm sorry if you're not aware of them, but that doesn't change their reality.

The rest of my analysis is equally factual.  If you don't believe that, check the forums now again regarding the pvp revamp, and check the server populations.  Friday night and all of them light, exept for one on medium.  That's the first time I've ever seen that on a Friday night.  If you don't believe that, check the damage control interviews being done by Miller to try to stop the exodus.

The first step to correcting a problem is admitting it exists.  Unfortuntely, it's this first step that seems to prove most difficult for some.

Dunno arc,

I looked at the CoX forums and I don't see anyone talking about this stuff at all, at least not to the extent you are making it out to be, I might have missed something.

boards.cityofheroes.com/ubbthreads.php

I also looked at NCSofts Q3 report and CoX is down slightly in subs but its been sorta dropping for the last 2 years. Q3 124k vs Q2 137k. (peak of 172k in Sept 2006) Concurrency of users is down slightly. (17k down to 13k) but last quarter (Q2) they had a bunch of "open weekends"

ncsoft.net/global/ir/quarterly.aspx

They publish everything. I don't see any "mass exodus" post, I don't see anyone complaining about the PvP changes just business as usual.

Originally posted by Torak

Originally posted by ArcAngel3

My points about sync bug are accurate.  I'm not sure where you were, or why you would even think to say the bug lasted only 3 days.  Also, read the hundreds of posts on the official boards where people are completely unable to interact with the map.  They couldn't move or do anything.  This is just the way it was for many people.  It was in fact players that discovered a work around for the sync bug.  If you had teleport self, it would get you back in sync with the map--but only temporarily.  It took a couple of weeks for the devs to get something like that on test.  If you'd remember correctly, it was called the "/sync" command.  This then went live after it was tested successfully, and the code was further modified to make the use of /sync less necessary.  This was a long drawn out process, that I helped troubleshoot, along with many of my friends who were affected by it. 

In fact it was so serious that the friends of mine who were directly affected received a month's worth of subscription time reimbursed.  Why would they get a month of time refunded if the bug only lasted 3 days?  The refund was a nice idea, I'll give them that, but it came too late for some players.  Also, those that had multiple accounts affected for the full month, only got one account refunded, which was not so helpful.

So, you can say it's inaccurate if you like, but you're simply wrong.  It was a serious bug that rendered people out of "sync" with the map server, and it lasted a month's time.  These are all just statements of fact.  I'm sorry if you're not aware of them, but that doesn't change their reality.

The rest of my analysis is equally factual.  If you don't believe that, check the forums now again regarding the pvp revamp, and check the server populations.  Friday night and all of them light, exept for one on medium.  That's the first time I've ever seen that on a Friday night.  If you don't believe that, check the damage control interviews being done by Miller to try to stop the exodus.

The first step to correcting a problem is admitting it exists.  Unfortuntely, it's this first step that seems to prove most difficult for some.

 

Dunno arc,

I looked at the CoX forums and I don't see anyone talking about this stuff at all, at least not to the extent you are making it out to be, I might have missed something.

boards.cityofheroes.com/ubbthreads.php

I also looked at NCSofts Q3 report and CoX is down slightly in subs but its been sorta dropping for the last 2 years. Q3 124k vs Q2 137k. (peak of 172k in Sept 2006) Concurrency of users is down slightly. (17k down to 13k) but last quarter (Q2) they had a bunch of "open weekends"

ncsoft.net/global/ir/quarterly.aspx

They publish everything. I don't see any "mass exodus" post, I don't see anyone complaining about the PvP changes just business as usual.

 

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=12521711&page=0&fpart=1&vc=1&nt=14

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=12421739&an=0&page=16#Post12421739

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=12440173&an=0&page=13#Post12440173

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=12477845&an=0&page=8#Post12477845

For your reading pleasure, just a very small sample of all the wth are you doing to our game threads regarding Issue 13.

Also, you won't the sub hit in quarterly reports that have already been published.  People either just left in closed beta (many did) or are now leaving in open beta.  You may see the numbers next report.

People aren't leaving because of change though.  People are leaving because the devs asked for feedback, ignored it, then said they are making these changes to appeal to new players and don't really care if current players have their game ruined.

Regarding the sync bug, you'll have to look months back in the forums to see the posts about that.  It has been many months since the last content patch.  Another complaint.  This is one of the longest times the game has gone without a content patch, and it's a quest-based linear game.  Now that a patch is finally coming, the anticipated content is being pushed back, and an unwanted revamp is being pushed through.

P.S. Almost missed the largest thread on the PvP revamp, is around 300 PAGES long at this point.  You'll find most of your shocked and angry, WTH!?! posts here:

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Board=Dev&Number=12263971&Searchpage=3&Main=12221755&Words=Castle&topic=&Search=true#Post12263971

For those that don't want to take the time to sift through the linked threads, here are some samples:

1) I have just returned to the game after a couple of month’s illness to find many of my online friends (PVE and PVP alike) who have closed their accounts and left the game for good. Every time I asked why someone has left, I get more or less the same answer 'issue 13 and the many changes to the game' and after I read them I can fully understand why now.

To be honest my jaw dropped when I was reading the issue 13 changes, and I cannot believe that NcSoft are going to carry some of the proposed changes that they call PVP 2 and against the wishes of many long time players of this game.

I know that many people only play PVE and don't want to know or care about PVP in this game, but what you all fail to grasp is that if they are going to do this to the PVP community in this game, then do you really think that they care about the PVE community? I really wonder if many of you will turn around and say that it is acceptable and I will get the usual response 'Well if your not happy just quit!' I don't think so. Whether most of you like it, we are part of this community and love this game as much as you guys, but for different reasons.

I find it strange that before there was pvp in this game I actually hated the thought of it being part of COH. I never fought in the arena or in the zones until I went badge hunting. Omg I got my [censored] kicked from the second I went into Sirens to the minute I left, and I hated every moment of it. If it hadn't been for a stalker on Infinity I wouldn't have gone back either. He sent me a ‘tell’ explaining why and what and actually helped to understand what pvp was about, and how to actually play and survive for a little longer. Many people on infinity will know me as Shana Storm, the noob stormie that took ‘energy’ as her secondary and got her butt kicked daily. I just took the time to learn how to pvp and to stay alive in these zones. Most importantly it became fun to play.

I found most of the pvp community were only too happy to help with my builds or pvp tactics. (People like Stasis, Josef, barbs and many more). I find it sad that good helpful players like them are leaving or have left and it seems like no one from NcSoft actually seems to care.

I urge and plead with you Castle to reconsider the changes to PVP you are making for issue 13. To sit down and listen to all the community regarding the wish list that you asked for the pvp community and discusses the future of PVP so that everyone can enjoy pvp at some level within the game. I just don’t understand why you would ask the community for their input and completely ignore them.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I hereby ask the developers to delay the proposed release date of issue 13 to discuss many of the issue that many players are unhappy with and hopefully come to some agreement that could only be good for all the COX community. Please! : )

Signed

Miss De’Stalker"

2) "Here is the deal, I believe that LH's post was 100 percent the truth, these changes were never intended to be accepted by any of us nor to be made to address any of the things in the PvP wishlist which we were told to come up with so the Devs would have somewhere to look for what changes need to be made to make PvP better in this game and how to maybe entice some of the PvE only players into PvP. 100's of hours went into making that list and voting on which ones needed to be on it and so forth. Now with these changes, of which only 1 was taken from the wishlist, it pretty much shows us that getting us to make the list and telling us those are what would be looked at when they got around to looking at PvP was all just a way to placate us at that time. Heck there was even a ventrillo meeting where many of the Test PvP SG/VG leaders and LH were there and he "wrote" down the concerns that we had about the changes that were being implemented in this issue, again seemingly he took back a blank paper.
No matter what excellent suggestions or feedback anyone from the PvP community has for these changes they are worthless because we were not the targetted group for the PvP changes and damn us for not agreeing with these changes no matter how more broken this system is going to be compared to the pre-i13 system. Also most of these changes even though it was stated they were looking at arena PvP seem to cater towards the fightclub zone type PvPr's with the movement suppression, heal decay, the anti gank code(thank god that was removed) DR etc. In the test arena 8v8 scene, you didn't hear people whining that someone was running and not standing and fighting it out, or that purple sets caused the other team to win. If you were the "target" you are supposed to run(evade) break LOS, do what you can to stay alive, or any of the other things you read in broadcast in the zones which most of the changes seem to address. I could go on and on but this has gone on for too long and it is nothing that has not been said before. "

Both of these examples provide good summaries of what's currently going on in CoH/CoV regarding Issue 13.  Anything that fails to acknowledge this reality is likely p.r. spin, outright denial or genuine ignorance (which is understandable, since this is "breaking news" if you will--happening as I type this.  It takes time for awareness to spread.)

P.S.  Sync bug was a pain in the arse, but it's forgiveable, especially with the refund offer.  Delay of mission architect is also understandable, but getting an unwanted revamp instead of the architect is not.  I'm sure people would have been much happier to have them get custom bosses into the game instead of the revamps.  Also, having players compile a list about how to improve pvp, take 100s of hours to do it, and then say it's irrelevant, well that's just asking for trouble.  Tell current players that new potential players are more important than them?  That's just self-destructive.  With the revamp, it's not too late to turn the game back to a path that treats current players and their progress as valuable.  Hopefully the dev and management teams will recognize this, and rethink their current direction.  Work with current players, not against them.

Archangel, everytime a new release comes, there are changes, and every time there are changes, there are people who whine and cry. Some of them for good reason. But the very fact that they are in the forums whining shows that they are still in the game. Nonetheless they are entitled to vent. If enough people vent about the same narrowly focused complaint in a polite manner in the appropriate venue, the devs are prone to listen and might consider it a seious flaw. The begging of one player is not going to change the game. One very well written letter sent inadvertantly at just the right time might be a catalyst for such change. The game is after all a business, meant in the end to turn a profit --- some profit even if its not enough profit to please you --- and not given to intentionally piss off its clientelle. However there are no doubt a multitude of factors which play into these decisions that you and I will never know a thing about. NCSoft is after all not a publically held company and we are not on the board of directors. With all of your discontent, are YOU still playing the game?

PS. Synchbug - I had it - for three days. I play every single darn day, and I noticed the thing interferring my game for three whole days. Sorry you were sick for longer. <Shrugs>

Originally posted by TheRedPill

Archangel, everytime a new release comes, there are changes, and every time there are changes, there are people who whine and cry. Some of them for good reason. But the very fact that they are in the forums whining shows that they are still in the game. Nonetheless they are entitled to vent. If enough people vent about the same narrowly focused complaint in a polite manner in the appropriate venue, the devs are prone to listen and might consider it a seious flaw. The begging of one player is not going to change the game. One very well written letter sent inadvertantly at just the right time might be a catalyst for such change. The game is after all a business, meant in the end to turn a profit --- some profit even if its not enough profit to please you --- and not given to intentionally piss off its clientelle. However there are no doubt a multitude of factors which play into these decisions that you and I will never know a thing about. NCSoft is after all not a publically held company and we are not on the board of directors. With all of your discontent, are YOU still playing the game?

PS. Synchbug - I had it - for three days. I play every single darn day, and I noticed the thing interferring my game for three whole days. Sorry you were sick for longer. <Shrugs>

Sync bug affected thousands of players for the month long period until the /sync command went live, and until code modifications after this addressed server side issues.  I was not affected by the sync bug; many of my friends including our supergroup leader was.  I appreciate your empathy, and I take it as genuine; thank you.  Some people did not experience sync issues to this magnitude.  I consider them lucky, and apparently you're among this group.  Really I'm glad for you, and thank you for recognizing that the problem was much more serious and went on for a long time for others.
 

If you'll look at the post before I included the well-written letter, it includes links to threads protesting I13.  These are just a small sample of many I could have chosen.  One is about 300 PAGES long and filled with letters just as well written, or filled with a lot of confusion and frustration. 

There have been many modifications to the current game that I--and most other players--have been fine with.  These have included nerfs to powers and to Invention sets.  Issue 13 is not a change of this magnitude.  It is, in the words of the powers dev, "drastic."  It is a complete dismantling of the pvp game, and a rebuilding of it from scratch. 

The problems with this are many.  PvP 2.0 as it's called is being done in less time than PvP 1.0.  It is more buggy, unbalanced and incomplete than PvP 1.0 ever was.  PvP players were asked by Lighthouse to do ingame research and provide detailed feedback regarding how to enhance the PvP game.  We complied with this, provided a document from the community and had ventrilo chat with Lighthouse.  All of the recommendations, except one (dual builds for each character--one for pve and one for pvp) were utterly disregarded.  Most of the real issues in PvP 1.0 are not being solved by the unwanted revamp.  It is in fact dismantling things that work and that people enjoy.  So, it doesn't address the real problems, it adds many new problems, and it disregards current players and their ingame progress.  This is unlike any game modification that has occured in the last two and a half years.

You may be aware that you can play this game by time card.  If you choose to pay in this manner, you do not have a "cancel account" option in your account management screen.  You can stop playing anytime you like of course.  Since Issue 13 is still in open beta, and since I'm paid up until December, I and many of my pvp friends are enjoying our game until our sub time runs out, or Issue 13 goes live, whichever comes first.  I have stopped beta testing.  I did a ton of beta testing, and my feedback, along with most of the other feedback from current players is irrelevant.  Decision have already been made that NCsoft is apparently not interested in looking at.  If that's the way they want it, they really will have to count on an influx of new players to populate the game after this issue goes live.  I don't anticipate success for them.

Guess what? The game is a business. If they're breaking status quo to bring new peeps into the game, then somewhere along the line it was decided that is what must be done. We are not privy to that information. They would like us to think we have a say in what goes on and in some cases we do, but only out of their generosity. It is not OUR game but THEIRS. They do not answer to us except when it comes to whether or not we subscribe to the game. Whatever truths you might be repeating (until we are all so numb no one is paying attention anymore), I personally am just not one to cling to the doomsday negativity that you're feeding on. I play to escape real life, to have fun, to explore the new and different. Maybe its not new enough and different enough for you, but you know what? I've been in the game four years, and I'm not having a problem with that angle. Nonetheless you are different from me. If you want to be unhappy, and spend hours venting about the same thing adnauseum, you go right ahead.

Imma gonna go play.

Originally posted by TheRedPill

Guess what? The game is a business. If they're breaking status quo to bring new peeps into the game, then somewhere along the line it was decided that is what must be done. We are not privy to that information. They would like us to think we have a say in what goes on and in some cases we do, but only out of their generosity. It is not OUR game but THEIRS. They do not answer to us except when it comes to whether or not we subscribe to the game. Whatever truths you might be repeating (until we are all so numb no one is paying attention anymore), I personally am just not one to cling to the doomsday negativity that you're feeding on. I play to escape real life, to have fun, to explore the new and different. Maybe its not new enough and different enough for you, but you know what? I've been in the game four years, and I'm not having a problem with that angle. Nonetheless you are different from me. If you want to be unhappy, and spend hours venting about the same thing adnauseum, you go right ahead.

Imma gonna go play.

A few posts ago, you claimed that what I am saying is untrue.  Now that I've posted evidence to support my statements, you say I'm venting ad nauseum.  Hopefully you can see the contradiction here.
 

The last time I heard people take this track: "It's their game, they can do what they want, player's opinions are really not important," was in an MMO that is now empty and almost universally despised.  The company, SOE, is also nearly universally mistrusted.

Can they do what they like to "their" game?  Yes, of course they can.  Is it wise business to get your players to participate in a feedback campaign, then ignore the feedback, then say that new players are more of a priority?  No, I think not.

You can say I'm venting ad nauseum if you like.  I am in fact just providing evidence to support the views that you seemed to dismiss.  I did some venting when this all first came about, but I've been done that for some time now.  At this point, I'm information sharing--hence the statements, now supported with evidence.

By all means, go play, and I hope you enjoy yourself.  I may also enjoy myself right along with you, until issue 13 goes live.  Then my time will be done.  I'll have many happy memories to be thankful for, and a conviction that NCsoft is no longer a company I want to do business with.  That's fine.  I'm looking at a game by Turbine to play over Christmas, and I have my eye on StarTrek online and Champions for the future.

Any changes they can make to bring more people to the game is great. If it chases some away, that is fine too.  They are certainly taking a risk, but it could pay off.

They have a couple of other super hero mmorpgs to worry about and they know that people are going to bail when they come out.

honestly, it probably boils down to the same issue which plagues many mmo games out today -- the (perceived?) honesty and forthrightness of developers to the paying customer.

sure, they have bosses to answer to and some company suits supposedly run the operation; BUT, when it boils down to it... do ANY of those people have a job and raises/promotions without we peon customers?

i'd say its the fact that from the start, it never tries to hide the grind.  sure i had a blast with new powers and awesome new enemies...but it ended up being the same damn buildings with the same damn monsters doing the same damn thing...and this starts as soon as the tutorial is over.

Originally posted by Death1942

i'd say its the fact that from the start, it never tries to hide the grind.  sure i had a blast with new powers and awesome new enemies...but it ended up being the same damn buildings with the same damn monsters doing the same damn thing...and this starts as soon as the tutorial is over.

You nailed down my problem there exactly.

And it doesn't help that the buildings are kinda ugly either, only the avatars look good.

Originally posted by ArcAngel3

Originally posted by Torak

 

Dunno arc,

I looked at the CoX forums and I don't see anyone talking about this stuff at all, at least not to the extent you are making it out to be, I might have missed something.

boards.cityofheroes.com/ubbthreads.php

I also looked at NCSofts Q3 report and CoX is down slightly in subs but its been sorta dropping for the last 2 years. Q3 124k vs Q2 137k. (peak of 172k in Sept 2006) Concurrency of users is down slightly. (17k down to 13k) but last quarter (Q2) they had a bunch of "open weekends"

ncsoft.net/global/ir/quarterly.aspx

They publish everything. I don't see any "mass exodus" post, I don't see anyone complaining about the PvP changes just business as usual.

 

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=12521711&page=0&fpart=1&vc=1&nt=14

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=12421739&an=0&page=16#Post12421739

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=12440173&an=0&page=13#Post12440173

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=12477845&an=0&page=8#Post12477845

For your reading pleasure, just a very small sample of all the wth are you doing to our game threads regarding Issue 13.

Also, you won't the sub hit in quarterly reports that have already been published.  People either just left in closed beta (many did) or are now leaving in open beta.  You may see the numbers next report.

People aren't leaving because of change though.  People are leaving because the devs asked for feedback, ignored it, then said they are making these changes to appeal to new players and don't really care if current players have their game ruined.

Regarding the sync bug, you'll have to look months back in the forums to see the posts about that.  It has been many months since the last content patch.  Another complaint.  This is one of the longest times the game has gone without a content patch, and it's a quest-based linear game.  Now that a patch is finally coming, the anticipated content is being pushed back, and an unwanted revamp is being pushed through.

P.S. Almost missed the largest thread on the PvP revamp, is around 300 PAGES long at this point.  You'll find most of your shocked and angry, WTH!?! posts here:

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Board=Dev&Number=12263971&Searchpage=3&Main=12221755&Words=Castle&topic=&Search=true#Post12263971

 

 

Well those threads are a mixed reaction at best, I only skimmed the first page though I sure they degenerate into the usual "my opinion is right, yours is wrong" nonsense.

You know why people are leaving? Its an old game and that happens. There is a lot of competition out there and a lot more coming in the near future.

You better get in there and have some fun now while there are still people playing because changes or not Champions and DCU are gonna steamroller this game if they have solid launches.