http://na.cityofheroes.com/en/news/news_archive/thank_you.php
— Alan
I’m sad…I’ve played this game since the original beta. But on the other hand, I’ve got way too many other games sitting around that I’ve neglected while playing CoH.
Guess that F2P model wasn’t working out as well for them as they had hoped.
That’s really too bad. I stopped playing a while back, but I always enjoyed hopping in again from time to time to play it.
Not only did they do a great job of capturing the flavor of Superheroes vs. Supervillains, but it also had some really well thought out features and mechanics.
RIP
Well this will free up some space on my hard drive. It is kind of sad to see it go. I started right after it debuted and stayed for oh, like 8 or 9 months. What killed the game for me though was the issue of “debt”.
I freely admit that I was not a very good MMO player back then but man, my XP spent so much time going down or working off debt that leveling for me was just horrible. I think my highest character by the time I left was about 39.
That and the fact that every door took you to the same building layout and every cave looked exactly the same didn’t help at all.
I do remember being very excited when I was able actually get my cape.
While I did not care for the XP debt nor some of the sameness of environments in the early going, this game got far more right than wrong. In many ways they were ahead of other MMOs (and are still ahead) – Base building, badges, customization options, etc. No other game captured feeling as powerful as this game did. My Claws/SR scrapper could wipe out 15 foes at once (boss, couple of lts, rest minions).
Honestly in my mind it sits alongside UO as the best MMOs I’ve ever played. Sadly WoW captured me shortly after its launch just six months into CoH’s life (started in beta) but that was due to my community moving more than me wanting to move.
Really sad to see it go. Wish I was a billionaire and could just scoop it up.
Sad… came on board NCsoft as part of the new CoH team in 2004. Still remember the night it launched. Good times. Great team. End of an era for some of us…
Same. Although I didn’t play for long, I really got into a nice groove with my character and a small squad I’d formed based on Stormwatch: Team Achilles comic. Great memories.
A shame. CoH still has the best MMO combat, in my opinion. It also still, 8 years later, has the best character customization. I haven’t played in a while, but I’ve kept my subscription active, and I’m going to miss not being able to go back. Most of all, I’m going to miss my characters, from Inspectre to Totally Rad to Recessive Jean to Biff Kablam.
I had always held out hope for a complete 2.0 reboot with a more modern approach to content design.
First MMO for me that really clicked, partially for the reasons listed above. I remember being excited about WoW a bit later, firing up the beta and checking out the “customization” and … not bothering to play it (for a long, long time) because it was so nonexistent. CoH really got that part so, so very right.
Superjump is still my favorite ability in any game, ever.
And of course that wonderful responsive combat even in the early levels. You can knock bad guys around starting with sometimes your second power, even.
Much props for 799 hours of fun (according to Raptr, my highest in-game hours ever).
CoH went F2P last year, so that transition likely failed. Either that or the game was doing OK, but the cost of maintaining the mountain view studio didn’t make financial sense. But if the latter, why wouldn’t they just move those people and keep the game running?
Or your first! Storm defenders for the win! Ah, Eminence Front, I shall miss thee as well…and Force Nine…
RIP. Some very talented people coming to the end of a frequently rough and thankless road.
No word on the reasons behind the closing just yet. As an active player, I have to say that this came totally out of the blue. I spend more time than I should on the official forums, looking at the player-maintained wikis, checking out the plans for future updates, etc. Up until today, everything pointed toward the game chugging along as it has. They had plans for Issue 24, even beta-testing for some of it, and hints about more in the future. I imagine the folks in the studio were just as surprised as the rest of us. And it’s not for lack of an active community - there’s quite a few player-run sites and add-ons, including my own HeroStats.
Wow. That seems unexpected. I mean, I knew CoH wasn’t on the forefront of the general MMO audience’s minds but I didn’t realize they were strapped.
Edit: I wonder how Champions is doing?
Yeah, I don’t know why they would shutdown the game itself, rather than just Paragon, unless it wasn’t financially viable. They own the IP so it’s just a matter of keeping the servers running and a team churning out cash shop content.
What a sad day. I sunk more time into City of Heroes during it’s first few years than I care to admit. Had some great times with Jason Lutes’ group Guardians of the Golden Age. Some of the best times I’ve had in gaming.
Sad to hear it. COH was a groundbreaking MMO in a lot of ways - character customization (both visually and in terms of character builds), more action-oriented combat, content scaling and sidekicking etc. etc.
More importantly, it was a complete blast to play, apart from the XP debt in the early days.
I think it never quite got the credit it was due, both because it was a superhero title, and because it came along 6 months before the WOW deluge.
This is sad. Some of my fondest memories of any MMO are in CoH. Ill never forget the first time a friend of mine and I were playing hunting Circle of thorns in Kings Row. We were climbing ladders and jumping from roof top to roof top. We were new heroes who were too low level for any travel powers yet. It was an all new and fresh experience.
Unfortunately the game-play was fairly flat. There are only so many environments full of a random enemy type you can do before you get bored of it. Still though, it was a blast while it lasted. It is one of the least wow-like MMOs left on the market. This is a sad day.
Aww man, now that’s just sad. I always liked this game, and thought they brought a lot to the genre, but it also had some pretty big flaws I found it hard to get past. I didn’t realize they were doing so poorly. With all the newer Hero MMOs launching, crashing, and then burning, I figured it was because people were just sticking with CoH/CoV. It always seemed to me they had a pretty healthy (though capped out/top-heavy) niche of players.
I was hoping their transition to (an admittedly completely retarded implementation of) free to play would have helped to prop them up.
I’m sad to see this one go, I put many, many months into it off and on over the years.
Still my favorite travel systems in any MMO. And just had to adore the level of customization they offered.
I had a fantastic time with CoH right up until they introduced PvP. In order to balance it, they swung the nerf bat so hard at my favorite toons that they no longer felt super at all. I quit after that, but I had more fun with CoH pre-Issue 5 than any MMO I’ve played. Only LoTRO came close.