The statement they have put out will more than likely end up backfiring, due to some obvious questions - if it was so special, why was it murdered?
My thought exactly.
Shut down Paragon Studios without a second's warning, claim the decision was hard, try to make it look like negotiations failed because of someone else's position rather than yours...and then throw out this line to us about how much the game meant to you, and how you want us to toe the line and help you remember it fondly?
Nuh-uh, I don't think so, my corporate chum.
When NCSoft closed Tabula Rasa, there was
never a mention of negotiations, nor of selling any IP. They just steamrollered over everyone - including Richard Garriott himself of course, with a fabricated resignation letter which they tried to fob off as being his words.
This time, things are different. They tried the silent approach, but every time they opened their mailbag, every time they checked their email, there we were. On Twitter, in blogs, in the gaming press, even in CNN's iReport - there we were.
And we weren't going away.
This time, it gradually began to dawn on them that
City of Heroes is not
Tabula Rasa...or
Dungeon Runners, Exteel, or
Auto Assault either, and giving CoH players the silent approach wasn't working. The more silent they were, the louder we became.
So they caved and issued a statement. A statement intended to say how lovely they were, how hard this decision was, and how with the end looming, and...can't we all just...get along?
Here's the kicker though - they folded because we're the aggrieved party here. In the eyes of observers we're the good guys and they're the bad guys, the cruel corporation with a heart of stone. So we
have to keep being the good guys. If we stoop to their level, then history will mark us down as being just as bad as they are. We have an opportunity here, perhaps unprecedented in videogame history - all we have to do is keep doing what we've been doing.
They can wait.
And wait.
And wait some more.
...but we won't go away.
