It's great to see all the efforts made by our community to save City of Heroes. I happen to have a business relationship with Sun Hyunsun Cho, Director of Business Development for Aeria Games. He and I discussed business for my personal MMO project before I decided on a self-publishing path. Aeria Games is always open to acquiring profitable products, but the issue in this case isn't really about Aeria Games acquiring CoH, it's about NCSoft's willingness to sell.
For those not familiar with my older posts around the different CoH social outreaches, and here on the Titan Network forums, I have a sister who's a well-connected business manager. She revealed some of her findings to me a few months ago that put so much into perspective for me and shed some light on this matter. For the sake of not compromising my sister or her business relations, I'll point out a few things that should help everyone put this into perspective. This will take a bit of research on behalf of anyone that wants to be more informed. Investigate these conditions and I'm sure you'll have an idea of what I was told:
1) Find information on NC Interactive and their location
2) Investigate new business taxes in that state and when they were set to take effect
3) Investigate what businesses that were still active during that window would owe, in regards to taxes
4) Compare the relationship between Paragon Studios and NC Interactive and gain an understanding of their subsidiary policy
Once you combine all your findings, you'll have a broader understand exactly what is going on here. There is a reason why City of Heroes wasn't sold and a reason why the studio close at precisely the time it did. Remember how suddenly we all got the shutdown warning, with no explanation, and how quickly things progressed? That's just not how MMORPGs come to a close. Another thing I didn't point out is that you must also recognize the "fiscal year" in your conclusion. So much could be said here, but I'll just let you all come up with your own conclusion. Based on what I was told, I have no doubt in my mind that NCSoft plans to reestablish NC Interactive, and reboot City of Heroes. I was even told that a fully playable version of City of Heroes' second iteration was in there possession, and I believe in my sources. If you dig deep enough, you'll find information from various businesses that offered NCSoft outrageous amounts of money to obtain the IP, but it was never sold. As much as a lot of us hate NCSoft for its abrupt closing of CoH, I honestly believe that a strong majority of us would jump right back in if they opened it up again; I can say that I would, though I'd only play for free this time around based on principle. I'm sure they feel this way as well, and sadly, that's their advantage. Countless friends of mine that played told me they would join again even if it was under NCSoft.
It sucks, but to many of us it was more than just a game and definitely not something worth side-stepping due to it's publishing entity. I would definitely have reserved concerns regarding to dedication, but I'd still be an active participant.
Sorry, I didn't mean to ramble on so much, but I thought I'd at least share information I'd acquired over the last few months in regards to CoH's potential selling. I'll message Mr. Cho, to share my opinion, but I'm certain NCSoft is holding on to their product with plans to relaunch it in the near future.