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Community => City of Heroes => Topic started by: pewlagon on December 05, 2012, 05:47:57 AM

Title: What the City Did for Me
Post by: pewlagon on December 05, 2012, 05:47:57 AM
On August 28th, not long before Black Friday, I was removed from my job. Soon after the other shoe hit the floor. Many of you don't know me because I let my YouTube partner speak on the forums because she had a bulk of the play time on the account. When I did play it was to film for YouTube and support my fledgling channel, our goal was to make something akin to TotalBiscuit's Azeroth Daily. We had actually relaunched the channel for the new format the week of the announcement. I was going to buy a secondary account and let my partner retain the other because I was feeling renewed with the oncoming Issue 24: Resurgence. Saldy, we were cut short.

For me City of Heroes was a creative outlet, one I shall sorely miss and hope it gets into someone's hands (if not Disney I say pester Activision because heck, then they'd have BOTH 8year games in one house.) However, more recently, I discovered I have not only Aspergers, but Bipolar Depression. It is a nasty mental disorder combination. If you ever watched the show Monk, that's me in a nutshell. I even have a 190 IQ with extremely high spatial correlation skills. I have been told it is a wonder I am functioning as well as I am.

My parental figures were too busy to understand that my future would need to be directed and maintained. My father ignored stress inducing issues and my mother refused to acknowledge anything that might be an embarassment to her. My role models, growing up, came from comic books. In 2004 along comes a game where I could be just that. I loved it! The game inspired me to create my own world, something people with Aspergers usually feel is way outside their comfort zone. Every time I would log in I would get new ideas and write them down as I played until I realized I had a fully functioning dynamic world in my noggin. City of Heroes brought me to life and gave me purpose.

Now granted, I'm trying the self-publishing bit at the moment, but my creations are still my children, as any author will tell you. I love them and I loved the game that gave me a reason to create this new world. However, my inspiration was stripped away from you like it has everyone else. On top of that I lost my bill paying job and now, it seems, I'm compounded with depression that years of trying to mask what's really going on has induced.

With that I am stating, please fight the good fight, but be mindful of casualties along the way. NcSoft deserves a kharmic backlash, true, but remember the higher ups will take it out on others before taking blame themselves. Thank you, my City of Heroes community, for helping me shake away from my comfort zone. Thank you for continuing to prove you are the heroes I know you to be. Thank you, everyone for your future support as I struggle with what is really happening to me. Thank you and I will see you all, "...in the near future."

Title: Re: What the City Did for Me
Post by: pewlagon on December 05, 2012, 06:14:47 AM
Since i felt it tacky to include the links in the actual post, I wanted the post to have meaning, here are the links to my YouTube channel and Blog. Both are on haitus until I can find a way to not be on the street come January 1st. The YouTube channel's Misc section has how we relaunched. The blog is a side story leading into the Self Publishing in September.

YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/pewlagon?feature=mhee
Blogger: http://walkersofthestorm.blogspot.com/
Title: Re: What the City Did for Me
Post by: johnrobey on December 05, 2012, 06:27:23 AM
I'm glad the City  (the community) was here for you.  Any number of people with disabilities (or if preferred Differently Abled) including myself got not only enjoyment but benefited in other ways.  Some have written about their children having improved math and reading skills as a result.  The comradeship was awesome!  While I could and did enjoy playing CoH solo, the teams, the leagues, the SG's, the global channels made all the difference.

Back in my first months of play, I had a night of insomnia and so logged in, and via the global channels discovered not only all the players playing on the other side of the globe (hello Australia, Japan, Singapore, among others) but that this was also where those having sleepless nights hung out.  My SG leader on Victory posted a quote from Capt Kirk in our MotD that seemed apt, "It was...  fun."  It sure was.  Hoping our City is soon back.   :)