Star Power

[eabrace]

Has anyone actually considered Scott Kurtz of PvP? Considering he has written featured AE arcs, the whole CoH arc that PvP had and the fact that that arc was printed and came with the game for a good while should be a sign that there was some love of the game there for him.

Scott's been mentioning CoH over Twitter the last couple of days. 

[ROBOKiTTY]

Also - with regards to CoH in asian markets...it makes me wonder why they didn't consider Japan as a target rather than Korea and/or China. The superhero genre is a primarily western thing with the exception of Japan who love it to the point where they've incorporated so much of it into their own...

That was one thing that bothered me. NC never seemed really that interested in pushing CoX. I'm not sure they even tried the Chinese market. I don't recall hearing about anything other than City of Hero in Korea.

Wuxia has a comparable status in the Chinese-speaking world to superheroes in North America. Hong Kong in particular is pretty receptive to western influences. For example, Tony Yuk-Long Wong, aka Hong Kong's 'King of Comics', was the artist behind Batman: Hong Kong, and all other works of his are wuxia comics.

http://www.lambiek.net/artists/image/w/wong-yuk-long/tony-wong_1990.jpg

That looks pretty superheroish to me.

[Teege]

I know I probably don't need to post this but I feel compelled to anyway. Most of the major names that have been tossed around have already been contacted and are aware of what is going on. The ball is in their court whether or not they wish to respond publicly or otherwise and they're certainly not obligated to. One big thing it comes down to is respect. Always thank them for reading your e-mail (or other form of communication) and always thank them when/if they do respond in public.

The other thing is we don't all need to contact them. For an example, I can only imagine Felicia Day's e-mail inbox is flooded and we certainly do not want to annoy any celebrity, reporter, investor, what have you. As many of you know she did mention CoH on Twitter and for that we thank her! She's a great person and I truly feel she gets us, not to mention one of her project's The Guild deals with a group of friends playing an MMO. I'm actually friends with Robin Thorsen who plays Clara (and yes she is informed of this) but that's a story for another day.

Fight on folks!

[Victoria Victrix]

No word back from Jim Butcher, alas.  *Le sigh.*

However I am putting this on my Facebook page:  Also my webpage.

We had just checked into the hotel for DragonCon when we got the news: NCSoft, the parent company of "my" game, City of Heroes, had laid off all 80 employees and would shut the game down for good on November 30.  And for no good reason; City of was firmly in the black, and Paragon Studios was even pursuing new developments, developments that, literally up to the hour of the layoff were supported by NCSoft.

It was like hearing the diagnosis of terminal illness for a friend.

I am not exaggerating here.  Because of the community aspect of the City games (unique in MMORPGs as far as I have been able to determine), I get most of my social contact via the game.  We can play and hang out nightly with my father in law.  I have real world friends I met here, people I wrote fanfiction with, to whose homes I have been invited, and who I have had stay with us.  I have three co-writers I found in that game.  My new Baen series began its life with characters we created for that game.

I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt that my writing is the better for it.

Pretty much everyone I have talked to has said "Well, there is nothing like this.  I'm going to stop playing MMORPGs."  Of the few that have said they will continue gaming, none have agreed on a single game to take up.  My community is about to be shattered.  And I certainly have zero interest in playing another game at this point.  I have tried several, and none are this friendly or welcoming.

After I stopped crying...yes, I am not ashamed to say I have been crying over the impending loss of all my friends there...I discovered one of the many boards that is associated with the City games was doing something about it.  Tony Velasquez of CoH Titan wasn't going to just lie down and let the players and devs be walked on.

So, now I'm asking you, my readers; if you want to help me, if you want to do something for me, then do something for us.  Go to http://www.cohtitan.com/forum/index.php/board,134.0.html .  Find one of the actions.  Help us out.  Together we can save this game.  We are heroes.  This is what we do.

www.mercedeslackey.com

and for those of you too impatient to wait for a page to load:

[darkskye]

You're making me cry again, VV

Thank you!!

[Teege]

Thank you so much for everything you're doing. We have the best people on our side!

[zoser]

*runs out of Kleenex once more*

Thank you for everything you have done alreay as well as this heartfelt call out to all your fans, you are amazing.
f we manage to save the CITY, we should petition whoever runs it then for a Hall of Heroes with statues of all notable people of the 'Resistance'. I have at least 5 people from the top of my head that should be there!

Zos

[DrakeGrimm]

VV? I adore you, you wonderful woman, you. Keep up the awesome work, and thank you for all you do.

[emu265]

Thanks again, Miss Lackey.  You've done more than anyone could have asked for.

[unladenswallow]

I'm still in contact with some of the producers and other crew members so I'll run it by them first and see if it's something he may be interested in doing as some of them may have seen him recently. I'll post back here on what kind of response I get, If any.

I'll also contact Paige Davis she was the host for Trading Spaces. She wasn't a comic book fan but her husband is currently playing the Green Goblin in the Broadway play "Spiderman: Turn Off the Dark". She's on my friends list on facebook so I can contact her directly and give her some info and Tony V's e-mail address and see if she wouldn't mind passing it along to the cast and crew of the Broadway show.

I haven't spoken to either of them directly in years so I may get nothing but Ill give it a shot.

I sent a message to a couple of former producers of the show but I have as yet to hear from them. Their schedules usually keep them quite busy for days at a time if I hear anything I'll post an update.

[riff727]

Just a thought but being that we are trying to reach out to whomever we can, and someone may have already thought of this. But what about reaching out for some support from Mark Hamill. i know it may be a long shot, but it may be worth a try. And having the man most people consider to be the ultimate Joker couldn't hurt. Also reaching out to Kevin Smith might not be a bad idea either. Again I know these may be long shots and someone else may have already thought about it and tried, but I just was thinking about this at work and figured I should share. 

[Victoria Victrix]

My webpage message is going up on the Baen Books website.

[DrakeGrimm]

My webpage message is going up on the Baen Books website.

...so how many more times can I get away with saying "I love you" before it turns creepy/stalker?


Seriously though, THANK YOU for all your hard work on this, VV. You are an amazing member of this community.

[Victoria Victrix]

My friend Janis Ian (yes, THE Janis Ian for those of you old enough to remember "Society's Child," "At Seventeen" and "Jesse", Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Grammy winner told me this when I asked if she knew of anyone who might sign up with us or give us some support.

" unfortunately, I get 4-5 requests a week from people I barely know asking me to post things on my page for them, and I always decline. If I do this myself it's going to start a snowball and I'm going to piss off a ton of people, some of whom I really do know and value in my life!
Can you write something short - concentrating on why the game is important to you - and let me post it as coming from you?
I'll be happy to post it."

So as soon as I can (today) I am going to do just that.

[eabrace]

<- off to Google Janis Ian...

Edit:  Oh, OK.  I recognize her work, but never really had a name to put with it.

[dwturducken]

(old enough) 

[Zombie Hustler]

In response to Ms. Lackey's post (and thank you dearly for all that you've been doing and are doing for the community), one of the things that has struck me about all of this is the community aspect. Now, mind, I'm one who largely solos the game for various reasons, but I have been somewhat more active in the offline community via the forums for the last little while (year or so).

To me, the big thing here is that the game *is* a community, not just a game. The fact that it has generated such an interest, that this cancellation has caused such an uproar- something that I don't recall from any other MMO sunsetting- should in and of itself stand out as a pretty noteworthy thing.

In a modern, telecommunication oriented world where the increasing degree of disconnect caused by the developing techonologies is often lauded as one of the great emerging dangers to society, City of Heroes has in a lot of ways done the opposite. Here is a community that developed around an escapist pasttime- video gaming- and yet has become something much more. It has engendered a community of people whose boundaries extend past the game alone, past the virtual connection, and into the real world. Real life, real time get togethers; real life relationships- friendships, marriages (by some testimonials). Many of the developers who worked on the game were originally players themselves.

City of Heroes is certainly not unique in this, mind; World of Warcraft, notably, has engendered a similar community (and I'd expect an outcry like this if that game were to suddenly be cancelled as well); but it is among a very, very tiny group of MMOs that have done such a thing.

In many ways, in my opinion, CoH represents perhaps the "modern" or evolving community in an increasingly technological world- a hybrid of real and virtual. That alone makes it worth fighting for, IMO (not to discount the mass of code and story lore etc, by any means.)

[Vulpy]

I thought MovieBob might be interested in commenting on the Save Paragon City! efforts--after all, what could be weirder than a comics/videogame nerd culture not going into full-blown ragemode at the drop of a hat? I sent him an e-mail.

[emu265]

My friend Janis Ian (yes, THE Janis Ian for those of you old enough to remember "Society's Child," "At Seventeen" and "Jesse", Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Grammy winner told me this when I asked if she knew of anyone who might sign up with us or give us some support.

" unfortunately, I get 4-5 requests a week from people I barely know asking me to post things on my page for them, and I always decline. If I do this myself it's going to start a snowball and I'm going to piss off a ton of people, some of whom I really do know and value in my life!
Can you write something short - concentrating on why the game is important to you - and let me post it as coming from you?
I'll be happy to post it."

So as soon as I can (today) I am going to do just that.

While I am not very familiar with Janis Ian (sorry, only 21 y/o here), I do appreciate her supports, even if it's rather trivial.  Thanks again for the work, Miss Lackey.

[DrakeGrimm]

GU Comics and PvP have both thrown their hats in the rings, folks. Please take some time to thank Scott Kurtz(PvP) and Woody Hearn(GU Comics) for lending their voices and considerable reader bases to our cause.

www.gucomics.com

www.pvponline.com