Community => City of Heroes => Topic started by: Flow-Vector on September 07, 2013, 07:46:35 AM
Title: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Flow-Vector on September 07, 2013, 07:46:35 AM
First off, it's late, and i've typed way too much today, please don't expect great grammar :) I also have no idea where to post this.
I was thinking. It's a long shot, but what if we got a quite famous first impressionist of video games that is quite popular on youtube who is also not against speaking out. I am talking about total biscuit (This is the part where you laugh and mock me :) ).
The Phoenix project's kickstarter is around the corner and i feel 300 grand is a streach for just the CoH community. TB kind of sounds like a rational option to publisize not just TPP, VO, or H&V, but us a whole. We are, in my own opinion, one of the most resilient communities ever. At the least, getting our story onto video from a credible dude with 1.1 million subscribers will really show the strength that a virtual community can have.
I can't type anymore, just too tired. also, emailing him on youtube doesn't work unless he has you set as a contact.
Here is the message i was going to send him. I'm 15, a little ambitious and probably stupid to try and send this, feel free to laugh about it, i wont be offended :)
Message in the spoiler:
Spoiler for Hidden:
Hello Total Biscuit, do not worry, this is not intended to be a request or advertisement, rather i feel that as a gamer, certian stories or events in gaming may strike my attention and really show the good side of gaming. I imagine this is at least somewhat true for you as well (Or perhaps i am just hoping). I am sending you this for that reason, you may find it.... something... Not the best descriptive word but hopefully you'll see my point later on in this message.
First off some backstory: The community i wish to bring to your attention is the City of Heroes community. As you may know, City of Heroes was announced by NCsoft to shut down servers after eight years of being prosperous (And rumors say that it was growing at the time of the announcement). This shutdown shocked almost everyone, including many at Paragon Studios. As a response many players took into action. Their actions involved such things as starting a petition to stop the shutdown and fundraising to send the devs to dinner (the money was raised in a matter of hours).
Another movement to stop the death of CoH is known as Taskforce Hail Mary (TFHM for short). TFHM is trying to motivate companies (big ones such as Google) to buy the CoH IP from NCsoft. These are no "plz buy this for me pls" letters. These are serious lengthy documents that take months to write and edit.
The most famous reactions to the shutdown announcement is the successor MMOs that are going to be built from the community. Obviously this is no small feat and the three MMOs being built with CoH in mind (Not a rebuild, a new game, similar feel, updated) and the people building these projects are not taking it as such.
Here are several links that, if i have interested you at all, you may want to check out: The Phoenix Project:
Thank you very much for taking the time to read this Mr. Biscuit.
P.S. I am under the impression that you are a WoW veteran. I hope you can imagine the feeling of having a game you've made friends, family, etc. on over many years of play and then having it ripped away from you right before a massive content update for no apparent reason that seems to contradict all logic (On the 1 year anniversary of CoH's shutdown NCsoft's stock was 36% below what it was before shutdown, massive drops coincide with when the announcement was and when the servers went offline)
P.P.S. I'm not affiliated with any of these projects, i just figured you may be interested in learning of the stories of CoH's Community.
Have a nice day :)
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: The Fifth Horseman on September 07, 2013, 09:09:07 AM
You should have no problem PMing him on YouTube though.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: FlyingCarcass on September 07, 2013, 02:25:40 PM
I think your best bet would be to include a few paragraphs about CoH's options menus and how the kickstarters will support the options menus of the successor projects, since anyone who has seen any of his reviews can tell TB has a fetish for options menus, especially if they have FOV sliders. :P
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Triplash on September 07, 2013, 03:13:46 PM
I think he'd be a great route to try. From what I know of him, he has a thing against big game companies walking over the consumer, and he's very supportive of indie developers. Unless I miss my guess, an MMO being entirely developed by the players themselves is exactly the kind of story that would interest him. Especially with the backstory - a big developer pushes its players too far and they decide to stand up for themselves and make their own game instead of just coming back for more. Doesn't get more indie than that. Plus it's groundbreaking in the MMO field - as someone who deals in game news that part alone would make good coverage.
Actually it wouldn't surprise me to hear he's following this story already, whether or not he's mentioned it in a video yet. If the MWM team were to contact him and offer him an exclusive first look, maybe first rights at showing beta footage, I suspect he'd take them up on it. And TB is definitely someone you want saying good things about your game.
Although to be honest, with as much email as he probably gets he might respond to the MWM team themselves quicker than an individual. I wouldn't take it personally if you don't get a response or if it takes a while, he's a busy guy. Doesn't mean he didn't like the idea. He might just want to do his own research before saying anything about it.
Long story short - I think it's well worth a try. But if it were me, I'd wait and see how the Kickstarter goes first. That might influence his level of interest quite a bit.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Flow-Vector on September 07, 2013, 05:17:16 PM
Long story short - I think it's well worth a try. But if it were me, I'd wait and see how the Kickstarter goes first. That might influence his level of interest quite a bit.
Well i was thinking after the kickstarter goes live, that way MWM might get more backers. Two birds with one stone.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Triplash on September 07, 2013, 07:44:38 PM
I was thinking. It's a long shot, but what if we got a quite famous first impressionist of video games that is quite popular on youtube who is also not against speaking out. I am talking about total biscuit (This is the part where you laugh and mock me :) ).
The Phoenix project's kickstarter is around the corner and i feel 300 grand is a streach for just the CoH community. TB kind of sounds like a rational option to publisize not just TPP, VO, or H&V, but us a whole. We are, in my own opinion, one of the most resilient communities ever. At the least, getting our story onto video from a credible dude with 1.1 million subscribers will really show the strength that a virtual community can have.
I can't type anymore, just too tired. also, emailing him on youtube doesn't work unless he has you set as a contact.
Here is the message i was going to send him. I'm 15, a little ambitious and probably stupid to try and send this, feel free to laugh about it, i wont be offended :)
Message in the spoiler:
Spoiler for Hidden:
Hello Total Biscuit, do not worry, this is not intended to be a request or advertisement, rather i feel that as a gamer, certian stories or events in gaming may strike my attention and really show the good side of gaming. I imagine this is at least somewhat true for you as well (Or perhaps i am just hoping). I am sending you this for that reason, you may find it.... something... Not the best descriptive word but hopefully you'll see my point later on in this message.
First off some backstory: The community i wish to bring to your attention is the City of Heroes community. As you may know, City of Heroes was announced by NCsoft to shut down servers after eight years of being prosperous (And rumors say that it was growing at the time of the announcement). This shutdown shocked almost everyone, including many at Paragon Studios. As a response many players took into action. Their actions involved such things as starting a petition to stop the shutdown and fundraising to send the devs to dinner (the money was raised in a matter of hours).
Another movement to stop the death of CoH is known as Taskforce Hail Mary (TFHM for short). TFHM is trying to motivate companies (big ones such as Google) to buy the CoH IP from NCsoft. These are no "plz buy this for me pls" letters. These are serious lengthy documents that take months to write and edit.
The most famous reactions to the shutdown announcement is the successor MMOs that are going to be built from the community. Obviously this is no small feat and the three MMOs being built with CoH in mind (Not a rebuild, a new game, similar feel, updated) and the people building these projects are not taking it as such.
Here are several links that, if i have interested you at all, you may want to check out: The Phoenix Project:
Thank you very much for taking the time to read this Mr. Biscuit.
P.S. I am under the impression that you are a WoW veteran. I hope you can imagine the feeling of having a game you've made friends, family, etc. on over many years of play and then having it ripped away from you right before a massive content update for no apparent reason that seems to contradict all logic (On the 1 year anniversary of CoH's shutdown NCsoft's stock was 36% below what it was before shutdown, massive drops coincide with when the announcement was and when the servers went offline)
P.P.S. I'm not affiliated with any of these projects, i just figured you may be interested in learning of the stories of CoH's Community.
Have a nice day :)
Thought they were going for 4 million?
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: dwturducken on September 07, 2013, 10:58:34 PM
The problem with this (the thread, not the idea) is that we have a group of very zealous individuals, here, not all of whom are actively posting. More than a few people here, many of them just lurkers, are going to see your post, latch onto the idea, and either copy and paste your message or write their own, and send it off to the listed "celebrity." The end result is just as likely to be an annoyed recipient, rather than a helpful voice.
I think it's a good idea, and I think you should send it. I don't think the rest of us should. It will stand or fall on its own merits. If we irritate him/her, it'll work against us.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: JaguarX on September 07, 2013, 11:20:32 PM
Quote from: dwturducken on September 07, 2013, 10:58:34 PM The problem with this (the thread, not the idea) is that we have a group of very zealous individuals, here, not all of whom are actively posting. More than a few people here, many of them just lurkers, are going to see your post, latch onto the idea, and either copy and paste your message or write their own, and send it off to the listed "celebrity." The end result is just as likely to be an annoyed recipient, rather than a helpful voice.
I think it's a good idea, and I think you should send it. I don't think the rest of us should. It will stand or fall on its own merits. If we irritate him/her, it'll work against us.
This is a good point.
May have been a thing that prevented the past mass emailing campaigns from having an effect or the desired effect.
It's like the difference between receiving one email from someone about a subject, and that person may read it and consider it and receiving tons on the same subject which then becomes an annoyance and inconvenience in which they may automatically ignore or delete anything that look like that subject.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Triplash on September 08, 2013, 12:06:10 AM
Quote from: dwturducken on September 07, 2013, 10:58:34 PM I think it's a good idea, and I think you should send it. I don't think the rest of us should. It will stand or fall on its own merits. If we irritate him/her, it'll work against us.
That is an excellent point. Let's not give the man a bad impression of us. Good call.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: JaguarX on September 08, 2013, 12:43:16 AM
Quote from: Triplash on September 07, 2013, 03:13:46 PM I think he'd be a great route to try. From what I know of him, he has a thing against big game companies walking over the consumer, and he's very supportive of indie developers. Unless I miss my guess, an MMO being entirely developed by the players themselves is exactly the kind of story that would interest him. Especially with the backstory - a big developer pushes its players too far and they decide to stand up for themselves and make their own game instead of just coming back for more. Doesn't get more indie than that. Plus it's groundbreaking in the MMO field - as someone who deals in game news that part alone would make good coverage.
Actually looking at kickstarter projects, seems like many of them say "they are developing a game that is outside the scope of the big corporations" or something of the varience. It seems more common for indie statements than I previously thought. Although how many stemmed from a game shutdown, might be a good story.
One thing I did forget to add though, the letter do seem to be a bit of an obvious plug for free advertisement based on his youtube status.
For example, the ncsoft stocks dropped after during and after the fiasco but there could be a bunch of factors involved and or could be because they merely was the realignment announcement and not the fact that they are closing a game or COX. Yet, the stock drop at that time is still assigned to the reason being because they closed down COX.
See, it's been one year, and now coincidence that as soon as one project is on the verge of going live on kickstarter and need money and publicity to help the kickstarter, here is a letter asking for support. Coincidence, which looks like an obvious plug for free advertisement. If one was a fan of TB and followed him all this time, why not mention it, the situation when it happened? Or mention COX when it was alive? Why now when something dire have happened and money and publicity is needed? Well we cant go back to the past so only thing to do now is go ahead and send the letter and hope for the best. Who knows what will happens. But in the opening line, lets not come off as obvious bs, when it is another way to get publicity as said in the post. Nothing is worse than someone BSing and then get caught. That kills credibility faster than just being straight up honest.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Flow-Vector on September 08, 2013, 04:18:09 AM
I can't actually PM him, only if you have him as a contact, which i don't.
I'll be honest, with TB the 'cynical brit' i feel a little in over my head. Do you guys think i should remove the message from the initial post to avoid the possibility of spamming TB?
Also JaguarX you make a really good point, i wouldn't have thought of it as a possibility for advertising from his perspective.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: thunderforce on September 09, 2013, 02:57:27 PM
Don't start like that. Starting like that practically telegraphs the fact that you are about to produce a request and/or advertisement, which you are; you're advertising the successor projects and implicitly requesting TB publicise them. That's not a bad thing to be doing, but be honest about it.
QuoteI imagine this is at least somewhat true for you as well (Or perhaps i am just hoping). I am sending you this for that reason, you may find it.... something... Not the best descriptive word but hopefully you'll see my point later on in this message.
Be coherent, and get straight to the point.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Ironwolf on September 09, 2013, 03:04:28 PM
Be straight and honest.
Hi TB from across the Atlantic, I am making a blatent attempt to raise awareness on a worthy project - or something like that.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Triplash on September 09, 2013, 04:10:19 PM
I gave it some more thought, and I can add a couple pointers I guess.
You want to keep things: - Short and to the point, 'cause he's a busy guy. - Casually formal, because he's a business owner and has a casually formal kind of personality so I think he'd appreciate it. - Somewhat deferential, because he's the one with the ability to help out and you both know it. - But not groveling, because not only would he probably immediately dismiss that, but it's also true that he might very well find the story both interesting and potentially beneficial.
Don't mention within the message itself that there are multiple efforts. It would dilute the focus, and the point of the message is specifically to alert him to the KickStarter, not to everything going on.
Also don't mention anything about how he could take advantage of it. He's a professional, and knows full well how to contact a game company and discuss such things himself.
Lastly, don't overstay your welcome. He's not your friend or one of us here. If he is still reading it's because the story interests him, not the speaker. Don't take it personally, he's not a jerk, he just doesn't have time to chat with a million plus people. So keep the comments focused on the topic, and keep them relevant to the parts he needs to know.
If it was me, this is how I'd put it:
QuoteHello, Mr. Bain. My name is _____, and I believe I have found a news item you may be interested in. You have probably heard the story of City of Heroes' untimely shutdown last year, and its core of diehard players who refuse to give up on it. Well a number of those players have taken things a step further than simple internet posting.
In short, a subset of the former City of Heroes playerbase have banded together to make a new, entirely player-created MMO intended to operate without publisher involvement. That group is now ready to launch a KickStarter campaign to purchase a set of development tools to make the process faster and more efficient. If you have a few minutes, you can find more information at the links below.
Even setting aside the events that inspired these actions, I believe that what this group is attempting would be groundbreaking if it were to succeed. I hope you will find their story as interesting as many folks who hear it, Mr. Bain. Thank you for taking the time to hear me out today, sir, and have a pleasant day.
Thank you, (Name)
Att: Here are those links I mentioned:
The volunteer project: http://www.missingworldsmedia.com/ Their KickStarter page: (KS link)
The story of City of Heroes: www.ourcityofheroes.com Active CoH community forums: http://www.cohtitan.com/forum/index.php
A second volunteer project: http://www.heroes-and-villains.com/ A third volunteer project: http://valiance.shogn.net/
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: dwturducken on September 09, 2013, 04:22:22 PM
In line with Triplash, I did a little copy editing. Aside from rephrasing a couple of things, I mostly cut, or rearranged to eliminate parentheses.
Hello Total Biscuit,
As a gamer, certian stories or events in gaming may strike my attention and really show the good side of gaming. I imagine this is at least somewhat true for you as well. I am sending you this for that reason. You may find it -- something... Not the best descriptive word, but hopefully you'll see my point.
The community I wish to bring to your attention is the City of Heroes community. As you may know, City of Heroes was announced by NCsoft to shut down servers after eight years of being prosperous, with rumors saying that it was growing at the time of the announcement. This shutdown shocked almost everyone, including many at Paragon Studios. As a response many players took into action. Their actions involved such things as starting a petition to stop the shutdown and fundraising to send the devs to dinner, which raised the money in a matter of hours.
Another movement to stop the death of CoH is known as Taskforce Hail Mary (TFHM for short). TFHM is trying to motivate companies, big ones such as Google, to buy the CoH intellectual property from NCsoft. These are no "plz buy this for me pls" letters. These are serious, fact-filled proposals that take months to write and edit.
The most famous reaction to the shutdown announcement is the successor MMOs that are going to be built from the community. Obviously this is no small feat and the three MMOs being built with CoH in mind, and the people building these projects, are not taking it as such. I'm not affiliated with any of these projects, i just figured you may be interested in learning of the stories of CoH's Community.
Here are several links that you may want to check out: The Phoenix Project:
I am under the impression that you are a WoW veteran. I hope you can imagine the feeling of having a game, that you've made friends, family, etc. on over many years of play, ripped away from you right before a massive content update for no apparent reason that would conform to logic.
Thank you very much for taking the time to read this Mr. Biscuit.
Have a nice day :)
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: General Idiot on September 09, 2013, 04:39:05 PM
I can't help but think this is something that should probably wait until they have more than just a website and an in progress kickstarter. Publicly accessible I mean, I know more than that exists behind the scenes already. But having watched many of those WTF is... videos I note they always feature games that are already released or at the very least in closed beta testing already. Showing any of the Plan Z projects to someone like this at this point has a notable chance of backfiring horribly as they look at it, go 'this is a crappy fan project that probably won't even see release' and move on. Now, you and I both know there's every chance that won't happen but these people mostly aren't us. They haven't been here since the shutdown and don't share the same sense of hope we do.
....now watch one of them crawl out of the woodwork right here and step up, just to prove me wrong. :p
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: The Fifth Horseman on September 09, 2013, 09:56:15 PM
Hope? Hope is passive. What you really mean is determination. :)
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: JaguarX on September 09, 2013, 10:04:36 PM
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Flow-Vector on September 09, 2013, 11:22:15 PM
Thanks for the replies! but the question still remians, how can i actually contact him? Youtube is off the list...
Also thank you for revising my letter, your version seems much more put together than mine, with your permission i'd rather that as the final copy.
I should probably mention the fact i am 15 years of age, currently in grade 11...
That being said... Here is my attachment to CoH, i literally grew up with it at my side, i've never been the partying type, i played from launch, aka i was 7 when i started. That's why i figured i'd give TB a try. Achieving TB to me would really show a bit of a safety cushun on the kickstarter side of things or more reenforcement rather.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: dwturducken on September 09, 2013, 11:51:15 PM
I don't know if you mean me or Trip, and I don't want to speak for him out of turn, but I wouldn't have posted it if I didn't want you to use it. ;)
Also, he has a website (http://totalbiscuit.com/#/906/contact) with a contact page. The email form says it's for media and developers only. You can take your chances and use it, anyway, but there's also a Snail Mail address. It's not as hyperlink-friendly, but it does show a little more resolve, since you took the time to write/print it, find a stamp, etc. It's what we were encouraged to do for all the write-ins to this point, and it might get around the annoyance factor: an inbox full would be annoying, but what about a mailbox full?
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Triplash on September 10, 2013, 01:07:24 AM
Yep, same as DW said, it's yours if you want to use it.
And I'll second the other stuff he said too. Good points :)
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: JaguarX on September 10, 2013, 01:13:03 AM
Also, he has a website (http://totalbiscuit.com/#/906/contact) with a contact page. The email form says it's for media and developers only. You can take your chances and use it, anyway, but there's also a Snail Mail address. It's not as hyperlink-friendly, but it does show a little more resolve, since you took the time to write/print it, find a stamp, etc. It's what we were encouraged to do for all the write-ins to this point, and it might get around the annoyance factor: an inbox full would be annoying, but what about a mailbox full?
I would mail it.
He probably labeled the email section dev and media only for a reason. Might be that lot of people tried contacting him for various stuff in the past and that can fill up boxes quickly not to mention look risky coming from various sources.
Or quite simply mailing it probably lessen the risk of being immediately spammed button and or deleted without it even being opened.
Title: Re: Just a uh.... Idea for some more community recognition.
Post by: Flow-Vector on September 10, 2013, 01:50:38 AM