New City of Heroes?

[dwturducken]

Here's the thing:
A) Domain registrars and hosts generally have a "document" that you "sign" when acquiring their services that prohibits you using their services to do illegal things (at least, the reputable ones do). I have requested that from Tucows, without any reference to specific websites.

B) You don't @#$% with an already disgruntled community, particularly one with some computer/internet savvy.

So, my question is this: is "policing" this person/organization/scammer in the best interest of the community, as a whole, even if it incidentally helps NCSoftcore?

(The IP address attached to that website appears to be owned by Tucows, as well, and they have ping response turned off. A trace route stops returning addresses after it passes a router at allstream.net. If fact, it passes through a total of 18 devices without returning a response before it "completes.")

[KnightHawk Prime]

I had an interesting "Discussion" on their facebook page last night. I asked them bluntly if they were operating legally, and was told to stop posting messages of that type on their site. ?!?

I followed up with I have a lot of friends that would *cheerfully* endorse their site, as would I, if it was a *legal* site.

I asked them point blank, "Are you licensed to use the CoH IP from NCSoft, and if so, can you put something up to prove it?

Four hours later when I went to bed, no response. Haven't checked today yet, about to.

Unfortunately, my gut reaction is this is a pile of players who have figured out how to run a server, and are doing so. They argued with me that what they are doing is legal, then state that they are charging subscriptions for the game. Not without NCSoft's permission it isn't.

It sounds like they have no real clue on IP laws and what they can or can't get away with, and are doing it anyway, which is *going* to get them a C&D at least, or outright sued if they're not careful.

It's sad too, I was really hoping this was legit.

2cp. ;]

[KnightHawk Prime]

There were a few more bits of information in chat:

1) No character transfer -- you have to start over.

Wouldn't have *too* much of a problem with this, as long as *everyone* was starting over.

Annoying, but about what we expected if they had sold off CoH to someone else.

2) No future development.

That's bad. It means the game *will* stagnate after a while, as people get bored and go play something that's new.

3) All features of the current client supported.

Okay, we'll see if that's true.

[quote author=saipaman
Which is a bit interesting, if someone walked off with the code, why wouldn't they have taken the beta code?  The new issue was essentially complete and definitely playable.
[/quote]

Actually, several people who know more than I do, have said that i24 was *not* ready to go live, it was a couple weeks work from it. It still needed tweaking before it was released, as some elements would break the game. IIRC it was mentioned on one of the coffee talks.

New City of Heroes might have actually *gotten* the i24 Beta code, but it sounds like they have no development staff that could make it playable, so even if they *do* have it, they can't *do* anything with it.

This is *all* speculation, as I have no real idea if they have it or if they have people that could work on it.

2cp. ;]

[downix]

More information on their website. They apparently are planning two servers, one requiring a monthly sub, the other free to play.

http://www.newcityofheroes.net/Server-Descriptions-.html

[Quinch]

That's assuming there's anything in the bag, I suspect. My best guess is that they're just hoping to round up as many minutes as they can and get as much money off them, if not their credit card information, while they can.

419 scam, MMO edition?

[TonyV]

Which is a bit interesting, if someone walked off with the code, why wouldn't they have taken the beta code?  The new issue was essentially complete and definitely playable.

Playing the devil's advocate, I've heard that while the Paragon Studios staff were in the meeting on the morning of Friday, August 31, NCsoft personnel were actually at the site disabling everyone's account.  It's feasible that someone might have had a copy of the codebase they were working on at home (that, incidentally, they most likely most certainly should NOT have had off-site, but when you have to put in such long hours...) but didn't have the time or access to get the latest and greatest copy of the code before they were cut off.

I have to emphasize that that is purely hypothetical, though.  To my knowledge, no one has leaked the source code, but when you have a studio of 80+ people, it's not entirely unfathomable that somebody had a copy lying around somewhere and sold it to someone else who is looking to capitalize on it.

But having said all that, it still screams scam to me.  I have to believe that if someone did take a copy of the codebase and wanted to distribute it, I honestly think they would have gone about it totally different than this.  I've said this before--out of pure intellectual curiosity, I might look into it after December 1, but I also feel I have the technical skill to prevent my machine from being hacked or my identity stolen, so that is most emphatically NOT an endorsement for other people to do so.  Also, just in case anyone thinks this is our attempt to do something clever, we at the Titan Network have absolutely zilch to do with this, and we are as surprised and curious as everyone else.  The first I heard of it was around a week or so ago, and to be honest, my first thought was, "Oh crap, I hope that no one thinks that this is a result of our reverse engineering efforts."  It most certainly is not; this is a third party that I neither know or, to my knowledge, have ever interacted with before.

[Aggelakis]

After all, if Titan Network had anything to do with this, I would be in there with a fine-toothed comb, weeding out all those atrocious spelling and grammar errors!

[The Fifth Horseman]

Ok if you want too know the truth here it is! My Brother (17) My uncle (who runs the security on the white house) and me (19) all we wanted to do was make a private server were the 3 of us could play on while still playing with other people but half the people we try and have come play all hate us. Were not scammers and the only reason were asking for money is because it cost a lot to keep 2 servers running. We have not launched our servers to everyone yet but right now we have spent over $1,400 to get a good server that will not lag to get the fastest internet we could get around here and to get the best software we could find to run our server on. Now go ahead keep calling us scammers. We have a good amount of people to get our server running. When all you haters realize that were not scammers and all we want is to have a decent server I hope to see you there!

It's full of red flags.
Make that BLINKING NEON RED FLAGS:

1. Reverse engineering a complete functional server in 12 days, by three people? Ya, R'LYEH.

2. Going by their alleged ages, two of the three are unlikely to have any serious programming skills, much less capacity to reverse engineer their way out of a wet paper bag. I might be unfair on that assessment, but I have some hands-on experience actually doing these things (both as a computer science student and as a hobbyist) - it's by far out of reach for a typical gamer.

3. The implication is some of those are screenshots from "their" server. They aren't - each of those images has been stolen from elsewhere on the net.

4. "To get the best software we could find to run our server on."... yeah, because there is no free OS such as Linux, there is no free database software such as MySQL, there are no free webservers such as Apache... </sarcasm> Anyhow. Getting commercial software for that purpose would be far more expensive than that $1400 they allege. That sum is unlikely to be paying for anything approaching a sufficient setup just hardware-wise in this regard. Two units running in parallel? And the marmot, it wraps them in alu foil.

5. They seem to have a complete lack of understanding as to how trademark and intellectual property laws function. That, or belief in their own immunity - either suggests that they are indeed kids, possibly quite younger than they allege. "We don't need a license were not stealing anything"? Cool story, bro.
Of course, the other possibility is that they don't need a license because there is no server.

[Aggelakis]

Hahaha, "My uncle (who runs the security on the white house)" - classic.

[Kaiser Tarantula]

Pretty safe bet these guys are about as legitimate as that guy behind the 7-11 who opens his coat and says "wanna buy a watch?"

[epawtows]

Even if they did get a real server running by whatever means, it wouldn't affect what is going on here with Titan.  A sketchy pirate server with no development and little support is NOT a replacement for CoH.  The best it would do is stretch out the death of the game by a bit.  Titan still needs to both work on getting the real IP sold to a real game company that can operate it on a long-term basis, and/or keep working on PlanZ and intermediate projects as a true successor if that doesn't work (i.e., keep doing what we've been doing). 

[pewlagon]

Hmmm Tucows sounds familiar and I'm almost certain I've seen that attached to RMT spam. Not trusting this at all and neither should anyone else. Had my friend, who actually does work internet security, take a look and before he even went to their site he said it looked fishy. Once their he stated some of what has been addressed here, the images are pulled off various spots on the web, their credentials are spotty, at the rerouting smacks of keylog scammers. Please, don't be taken in by this spam, it is, in fact, someone praying on on community hoping for personal gain, of what, no one is sure.

[The Fifth Horseman]

There is a tiny possibility these guys are working off the CoHemu/CoXemu/SEGS source. It turns out all of it is public, which I wasn't aware of before.

[saipaman]

I played through all the beta content except the unique rogue and vigilante missions.  I never saw anything that would have kept it from going live.   I was a bit disappointed with 'the Center' and now we'll never really know where that was going.

[jabiggers]

i can't wait to see this lawsuit...

[Turjan]

i can't wait to see this lawsuit...

Better keep your eyes locked on the site then, cos when that lawsuit does descend, it'll be so fast and heavy that if you blink you'll miss it!

[downix]

i can't wait to see this lawsuit...

It would be more interesting if someone could figure out where they are located.

Imagining them on SeaLand.

[SuperstarGroup]

If that's those Gagora sleezeballs, I may need to break out the flamethrower.

...what? They're legal to own in the US.

Just don't try to install them as a personal security system for your vehicle, so far that's not legal in the US, but it's totally legal in South Africa (Johannesburg). 

[Altoholic Monkey]

They're answering my questions on Facebook at the moment in response to their post:

Here my question to all you people who think were scammers. Our server is free. You don't have to pay us. In 6 days when our servers goes live you can come see what were really doing, and that would be trying to make a community where we could play the game we love because the real one is shutting down.

Alty Mo: You have not provided any information beyond "trust us" that would convince anyone to do the exact thing you're asking people to do. Even if it is free, that means I would connect my computer to your server, so how do I know your server is safe. What assurances do you provide beyond "trust me" would make me want log into your system? You don't have a name, or a location so if things go sideways, what happens then?

New City of Heroes:  well honestly this is my first time doing this. If you need more info to trust us please tell me what you would like

Alty Mo:  Explain to me how this works...How did you create a static server of COH? Where did the code come from? Why is this the first anyone has heard about you and your service? Also, show me what it looks like on your server, I'd like a video preview please. Also, I do not know who you are, if I'm going to spend money then I would want to know what entity I'm giving it to, even if you're not asking for it now, you do have the option to pay at some point.

New City of Heroes: I did not creat the code so I can't tell you much about it all I can say is that he recoded the server program to connect to our private server. We didn't really become very public with our server until we knew for a fact that we could launch it. Seeing now that my have been a mistake. If you would like a video I will do that right as I get home (updateing from my phone because i have faimly over) the way you connent to our server is you download a launcher we created its not much but it will have to work. It's simple all it has is a welcome sign and a connect botton to launch the game. As for me i play on virtue I have a supergroup named star of the night I have a 50+3 fire/kin trolley named hottie flames I have a few others but that's my main as for payment. You can play for free if you pay we will give you x2 xp, x5 purple enhance drops and x4 inf. if you need more info then that tell me and il post more. Oh and i forgot all payments are done in PayPal so your credit card info will be saf

Alty Mo: Well I'd need to know who created the code to at least have that person explain it. You have to understand that you're asking me to download a program to my computer from a still unknown source, so while my credit card information might be safe, my computer could still be in danger since I still don't really know much about the people providing this service. I don't mean gamer information, either. Where is the server located...What part of the world? When you do post a video, please show your launcher and your version of the COH environment.

New City of Heroes: The server is one i put together from my parents office. The server it's own Internet in my house. House is located in Randolph New Jersey

Alty Mo: Your parents? How old are you?

New City of Heroes: I'll talk to the person who wrote the code and ill have him explain how it works anymore you need to know?

Alty Mo: I'll have more questions once the person who wrote the code explains how it works and I see the video of the server and environment. Thank you for taking time to answer my questions

Link:  http://www.facebook.com/pages/New-City-of-Heroes/376748015741606

[The Fifth Horseman]

Trust rating: dropping into negatives.
Server software does not connect to itself.
Moreover, he seems to imply his compatriots having server-side code and "recoding" it... not unless it was written in an interpreted language to begin with, and that makes no sense from a performance standpoint.
MMO server on home internet, using a regular desktop machine... Epic lulz. Just epic.


Nobody link them to a copy of the NCSoft Cease & Desist sent to CoHEmu a few years ago. Please don't. This is hilarious.
If they are genuine, they have no bloody idea what they're trying to do.
This is going to crash and burn either way - I'll watch from the sidelines with a bag of popcorn.