I'm just going to throw this in here: If the CoX i23 image ever does get rezzed, whomever is running it is going to need to run it on a shoestring budget to keep it running at all. There will be no full CS team "restoring" this, "compiling lists" of that, or working on "petitions" for much of anything. Even some people on these boards have stated they will only play if it's free because they're broke etc. and here resides the last bastion of CoX fandom by far, let's face it. And If there are 100 active users currently posting on CoH Titan I'd be surprised.
Perhaps there were 60,000 people playing at the time of shutdown, with maybe half of those either paying for subs, or for cash shop items, or both. That number will likely be even lower once the CoX image comes back. There isn't going to be character or account info available for many reasons that have already been detailed multiple times on these forums. There will be no code changes because there is no code. The engine is dated now.
I'll be the first in line to pay and play, believe me, but I think we need to be realistic about our expectations. I wouldn't be surprised if the CoX i23 team winds up volunteering much of their work time as it is. People just need to be more reasonable in their expectations and accept a....more streamlined experience. And that's if NCSoft just doesn't politely say no and walk away, of course. And I still say if they'd wanted to sell, CoX would have already been long gone to Paragon Studios back at the end of 2012.
I think that City of Heroes for its last couple of years received almost no advertizing, and almost no publicity.
I also think that a revival of CoH is going to get an internet ton of free publicity just because of the story of its revival. This will bring in a lot of former players who aren't aware of Titan network, and it will also get a lot of other MMORPG players who didn't know about it, to check it out on the basis of "Hey, there must be something interesting in this game if people were fighting for years to bring it back".
I think that it will hit a lot higher than it had at the end, and that number will go up if the dev team can find a way to add new powers and new powersets (even without new artwork). You can easily subcontract someone to create new powersets for a while, and that would be cheaper than running a development team, while giving a vibe saying that the game is not just going to be kept alive as a zombie, that there will be new updates.
I'm a lot more worried about the deal actually closing, than about having a fizzle of a launch if it does close.
