I posted a question on the "New Efforts" forum and no one answered it so I'm going to post this is here to find some answers.
Once we have City of Heroes again are we still going continue developing City of Titans and other "spiritual successors"? Are we still going to use Unreal Engine 4? Are we still going to play those games when the projects are done? Or we're playing back to back?
CoH's return - which, mind you, still isn't a done deal - would not affect those projects any. They will have their own appeal, and there will be people who favor one over the other. There will also be people who play more than one back to back... to each his own.
In fact, City Of Titans developers have little choice but to deliver a finished product - remember the Kickstarter campaign they ran?
I only think CoT has the potential to see the light of day, and I'll leave it at that.
CoT is worked on by a different team I believe. Some people may prefer a fresh new game to the classic one, or perhaps it can serve as a good fallback option. I don't think either project will interfere with the other, only in competition post-release I suppose.
I think the other projects will keep on going, if only because they'll want to have a successor in place if CoH goes down again.
And I really can't believe (or, at least, I don't want to believe) that the MMO market can support dozens and dozens of generic elves-and-wizards-and-Holy-Trinity games but not two or three new superhero games.
As others have said the "successor" games are worked on by individuals, most of whom, so far as I know, are not attached to the efforts to purchase or open-source COH. Whether they would continue in the light of a reopened City of heroes is unknown except by those people involved. It's as possible that the lessons learned by Phoenix, Titans, etc, might be applied to City of Heroes itself instead, adding new content or gameplay mechanics in the coming years, or building a more directly-attached sequel.
that said, City of Titans has already had a massive and successful Kickstarter and a firm storytelling universe is in place. I imagine it would keep going on that momentum alone.
As others have said, CoT is it's own thing, and is still a long way off by any stretch of the imagination. Developing an entire game from scratch takes a long time, and especially so in the case of an MMO, and even more on top of that when it's one that's built to follow the spirit of a game that is rich with deep lore and an unbelievable amount of customization and character creation options. I fully expect to see it finished, but I don't count on seeing it up and running for at least a couple of years, maaaaaybe a year and a half if they really put the pedal to the metal, but that would seem rushed to me honestly.
I'm actually kind of hoping that the buyers of COH will be working on an updated sequel/COH2 once they get the classic game up and running again, and hopefully continuing to develop for it in the meantime to keep the game up to snuff and at least get us to a point of completing what is only part-way finished in it as is. If such is the case, it would likely take a couple of years as well to get such a project finished and running. Once both are live, considering the nature of CoT, I'd absolutely love it if the two games could work out some kind of partnership to include perhaps a cross-over event, or some kind of multiverse-traveling character that could appear in both games as a sign of good faith and friendship between the two. They needn't be enemies, even as competitors, and in the spirit of CoH/CoT, I think it would be great to have them working together from time to time, even cross-promoting. Of course, this entire block of text is nothing but conjecture and wishful thinking, but I like to dream of a better world. :)
I have two concerns:
One is the one I and several others have had. MMO's are expensive, eventually they will either need to raise more money or seek capital from a publishers.
Two is that the people who are volunteering their time are doing so because they loved CoH. Now some of them may have become convinced that CoH really did need fixing and that CoT or Valiance or Heroes and Villains is the way to go. But I suspect some of them will go back to CoH and just play that. At the very least I have to think that when/if the game relaunches there will a pretty hefty drop in productivity.
Quote from: TheDevilYouKnow on July 05, 2014, 05:06:09 PM
I have two concerns:
One is the one I and several others have had. MMO's are expensive, eventually they will either need to raise more money or seek capital from a publishers.
Two is that the people who are volunteering their time are doing so because they loved CoH. Now some of them may have become convinced that CoH really did need fixing and that CoT or Valiance or Heroes and Villains is the way to go. But I suspect some of them will go back to CoH and just play that. At the very least I have to think that when/if the game relaunches there will a pretty hefty drop in productivity.
Both are pretty good points. i will continue to back City of Titans and keep track of the other projects even if CoH does come back, but i think both points are pretty likely to be issues in the future regardless of whether CoH returns and having the game back would probably exacerbate the situation.
The OP's question about what "we" will do seems a bit odd since "we" are not a unified organism operating out of consensus. Significant portions of the "we" that would play a reborn CoH has little to no contact with the other parts of "we". There are people involved in CoT, H&V, and VO that have no real intersection with Titan Network or the other projects. At best "we" can only speak to what those of us in these forums would do on an individual basis.
Quote from: TheDevilYouKnow on July 05, 2014, 05:06:09 PM
I have two concerns:
One is the one I and several others have had. MMO's are expensive, eventually they will either need to raise more money or seek capital from a publishers.
Two is that the people who are volunteering their time are doing so because they loved CoH. Now some of them may have become convinced that CoH really did need fixing and that CoT or Valiance or Heroes and Villains is the way to go. But I suspect some of them will go back to CoH and just play that. At the very least I have to think that when/if the game relaunches there will a pretty hefty drop in productivity.
Perhaps they should schedule a week off for gameplay :) It might actually
help their productivity in the long run because 1) the "good ole' days" mentality that we all share now might get a good swift kick in the butt and reaffirm their vision and 2) they'll get a realistic reminder of what CoX did right and what it missed on the mark on, thereby further refining CoT's development goals.
Of course, in
my dream world, the CoT Team will collaborate with our mystery studio to turn CoT into CoH2. I don't mean changing the name to CoH2, but rather being able to use CoX's lore inside their current development, allowing us to play the game we already love while waiting for 2015/2016, plus also eliminating game competition. I do understand that this is just my dream, and that in the real world this would step on a LOT of toes! :P
Quote from: Fridgy Daiere on July 05, 2014, 07:31:40 PM
Perhaps they should schedule a week off for gameplay :) It might actually help their productivity in the long run because 1) the "good ole' days" mentality that we all share now might get a good swift kick in the butt and reaffirm their vision and 2) they'll get a realistic reminder of what CoX did right and what it missed on the mark on, thereby further refining CoT's development goals.
Of course, in my dream world, the CoT Team will collaborate with our mystery studio to turn CoT into CoH2. I don't mean changing the name to CoH2, but rather being able to use CoX's lore inside their current development, allowing us to play the game we already love while waiting for 2015/2016, plus also eliminating game competition. I do understand that this is just my dream, and that in the real world this would step on a LOT of toes! :P
You could be right but I will say this. I loved the game when i was playing, I loved when I got frustrated with it, I loved it warts and all. I don't think it is just rose colored glasses. It was a great game and I played as much as I could. I tried a bunch of other MMO's and they didn't work for me.
I am sure that everyone at CoT will certainly take time to play. It was actually one of the topics they discussed early on when I was working on it. Just about everyone said they would play again but then get back to work.
My concern is that's easy to say when all you have is the work and not the reality of the ability to log in to the very game that inspired the very existence of the game you are working on.
Quote from: TheDevilYouKnow on July 06, 2014, 05:12:12 AM
My concern is that's easy to say when all you have is the work and not the reality of the ability to log in to the very game that inspired the very existence of the game you are working on.
Very true.
I don't want to fill up the forums with a whole bunch of questions regarding the acquisition of City of Heroes. And I have tried to search through the threads for info, I just have limited time and can't seem to find the answers I'm looking for.
Anyone who has been following this closely want to talk to me in PM to answer a few questions? I would appreciate it.
PM Sent!