[Apologies if there are multiple postings of this. This is the 2nd Reply I've posted but neither appears here, and having felt strongly enough to write, I want to see it, LOL]
NCSoft,
We wanted to let you know that your message has been heard and your concerns have been taken into serious considertion. We appreciate your response and acknowledgement of our emails, notes and packages we've sent in support of the game. Closing Paragon Studios and shutting down City of Heroes should not have been easy. Bad decisions never should be, and this was a monumentally bad decision. Bad for your creative teams, who now operate under the uncertainty of an overseer that doesn't seem rational or consistent. Bad for your shareholders, who have been deprived a positive revenue source, both current and future. Bad for your players, who have entrusted you with the custodianship of the social network. Bad for your reputation, which continues to be tarnished by your demonstrated lack of the consistent and stable behavior a successful service provider must offer. Bad for the individual players who have brought our own creations to life within this online world. You have been given options that would dissolve your relationship with City of Heroes and Paragon Studios in a way that preserves that community, reassembles as much of the development team as possible, leaves our creative contributions intact, and possibly even provides compensation for your shareholders. You have continued to make bad decisions by rejecting those options.
You say your options are exhausted.
We have not exhausted all our options. We will provide opportunities to save yourselves from your own folly. We will celebrate the work of the development studio you so abruptly dissolved. We will demonstrate the value and strength of the community you are working to destroy. Should NCSoft come around and find an amicable resolution, we will recognize the merits of your actions. Should you not, we will warn everyone we know everywhere we go of the hazards of placing any trust in NCSoft, protecting others as best we can.
We are heroes. This is what we do.
(at least, this is what I was going to post.... not sure if I should use TonyV's signature line.)
I very much like what you said in your post, ChaseArcanum. While NCSoft may be all business, so are we!! And our motivation is not maximizing our portfolios or profits but the love all enthusiasts have for their chosen hobby. (Note, one definition of "hobby" is "obsession".) I imagine NCSoft did NOT anticipate this reaction to their decision to "sunset" City of Heroes, and callously laying off the Paragon Studios development team late Friday afternoon of Labor Day Weekend (U.S.) with no warning probably made sense to bean-counters (accountants) with no vision or thought to the harm NCSoft is doing to its reputation as a MMO publisher, nor what impact this decision and how they handle the on-going situation may make to their future financial prospects in this industry.
As others have pointed out, NCSoft upper managment did NOT work with Paragon Studios; there was no hint that anything was amiss, or that NCSoft needed more profit from CoH (if in fact that's the issue). Nor were steps taken or even explored that I know of to work with the CoH Community to make CoH a product still considered viable by NCSoft. As we all know, new Powersets and other market items were released just 10 days prior to the shutdown notice. Maybe I'm naive, but this seems a very strange way to run a business. I've worked for and gotten laid off from companies that went out of business, but always we employees knew/were told by management that things weren't looking good, and everyone worked harder to save our jobs and the business. Steps could have been taken. Certainly the dev team should have been in the loop that their jobs were on the line. NCSoft and the Studio could/should have explored via Community Relations ways to reach NCSoft's goals. But no one with enough clout at NCSoft did this. I hope NCSoft gets a clue, quickly, that stonewalling us with silence is counter-productive since it leads only to speculation (some quite unflattering) in how this business decision was reached. They also should clue in that their recent actions are opposite to and fly in the face of their stated Core Values:
http://global.ncsoft.com/global/aboutus/visiongoals.aspx Rather than promoting Happiness (or even mere Enjoyment) what NCSoft did and HOW they did this has provoked Grief reactions ranging from sorrow to anger, and turned the
publisher into the biggest Arch-Villain ever to menace Paragon City. Joy-killers! Sorrow-bringers! are epithets NCSoft is earning by its actions. Yet, they still have a chance to turn this around and salvage this debacle, if only they have the wisdom to do so, and demonstrate with integrity the values they profess.
Pessimistically, I expect NCSoft to revert to more silent stonewalling, especially now when today's PR tactic has backfired and encourages us to continue our efforts to save City of Heroes. Stonewalling would be a mistake typical of Top-down management. Despite the fact that we fans are remain upset, NCSoft still has a Golden Opportunity to reach out to us, to work with us, to craft a Win-Win scenario so that we CoH enthusiasts can continue what we love in a way that helps NCSoft reach corporate objectives.
I can imagine articles published months from now about this our "darkest hour", about the creative and constructive Community response (in addition to our fan outrage and unhappiness), and how NCSoft rose to the challenge courageously and worked WITH the Community of fans (and previously loyal customers!) If NCSoft has the vision and foresight to do this, I can imagine them coming out better than ever, re-establishing trust, and adding a layer of patina rather than deeper tarnish to their corporation.
Meanwhile, the pessimist in me believes they'll "raise the drawbridge" and retreat further into their corporate castle of isolation. That said, What are the next steps Tony and Mr W for figuratively storming the castle walls? I was rather impressed with the CNN iReporting and Cresting Twitter Trends, as well as other suggestions on these forums--but then, I may be easily impressed. ;-)
