How are you handling the loss?

[Undercat]

Wow.

[Knightslayer]

I'm better today because of two things.

That the Korean journalist seems to have put the salient points of my interview into a well-balanced article on the Money page of the Korean Times.  And suddenly NCSoft is doing a slow about-face: NCsoft's Seoul-based spokesman Kim Yo-han said that terminating the service was a "strategic decision," adding that "nothing had been decided on selling the game or other action afterwards."

That part made me laugh and smile a bit, it shows very clearly that they never expected this to make it onto their home turf, further soiling their name there.
Then again, in the whole "benefit of the doubt" spirit... they never did announce anything about what they'd do post shutdown - though judging by previous MMO's they've shut down...
Here's to hoping that they announce some kind of sale around the holiday period, sure there'd still be people angry over how it all went down, but I think it'd show a lot of goodwill.

[Atlantea]

How am I handling the loss?

In March, my kitty, Ninja, who was my constant companion for nearly 17 years and was essentially a surrogate child to me, died of cancer.

In June, my roommate and best friend Dorian died suddenly in the hospital.  She apparently neglected to prepare a fully notarized will.  The county took her away, cremated her, and won't even tell us where she's buried, citing "confidentiality reasons."  She was disabled and CoH was a major part of her life as she could only leave the house in a wheelchair with medical transport.  If she wasn't already dead, this would have killed her; she loved her Claw and Broadsword Regen Scrappers (signature class for her).  She was also a big Mercedes Lackey fan and owned many of her books.

In August, they announced the closure of my 2nd home – City of Heroes.  Then in November, they did it.

How am I handling the loss?  There's not much left in life that I care about.  My entire household is dead.  My home is gone.  In the course of one year most of what I cared about in life is gone.  A year ago at this time I had a good life – now all I see are its ashes.

*hugs* I'm very sorry for your losses.

Outside of my job, I have nothing left to care about now but the fight against NCSoft – and if that takes all my spare time every day for the rest of my life, well then so be it, my calendar is clear.  As far as I'm concerned, that's my 2nd job now.  I'm 41 and longevity seems to run in my family – I've probably got another good 4 decades to devote to this fight, even if I end up the last person on earth doing it.  My hatred for NCSoft knows no limit – this is my personal crusade now and I have nothing left to lose.  Sacrificing the rest of my life to it is a price I'm willing to pay.

Like Tony and the others, I want to gently urge you to see if you can talk to someone about this. Staying focused on the fight is one thing. And I can understand the hurt and the rage. Particularly considering the losses you've endured the last year. But this intensity appears to be bordering on self-destructive. I hope you'll forgive this near stranger if I'm reading too much into things. But that's how it appears. Don't feel ashamed to ask for help. We all need help sometimes.

As for switching to another MMO – that's not an option for me.  I understand that other people may be moving on to other games – and I support their choice to do so (as long as it's not to an NCSoft game as that is real treason) – but for me, that would be a betrayal of CoH, and I will not do it.  I've heard people discussing other games and I've even briefly looked at a few, but I always remind myself – do NOT betray City of Heroes.  The new replacement toys may be shiny and look cool, but I remember where my real loyalties lie.  If that means never being able to play another MMO again for the rest of my life, so be it.

And really, I don't expect that I ever will play another MMO again.  Why should I?  I devoted 4 and half years of my life to CoH.  I spent over $2,000 on it, probably closer to $3,000.  I poured blood, sweat, and tears into it.  And then one day someone flipped a switch and took it all away from me.  Give me one good reason why I should ever put myself in that position again?  You can't – there isn't one.  I won't let someone do that to me again.

I would only make the suggestion - keep your options open. At this point attempting to get into another superhero game may not be the best thing. Playing any MMO might be too painful right now. But you know the saying, "Never say never." Right now stepping back and doing something else may indeed be the best thing. Catch up on reading, say. But give it time and see if maybe something sparks any interest. Keep up with your friends as much as possible via messaging and email and the forums, and if something intersects with your interests, you might consider giving it a try. If nothing else, remember that for many people, it's not so much the game as the community. A good community can make even a mediocre game fun.

Someone on EGM Now pointed out that NCSoft has poisoned the well for all MMOs by driving home this point, in the most brutal and public fashion they could imagine, that players of MMOs own nothing and have no rights.  When that attitude really starts making the rounds, what does it say for the future of MMOs in general?  Why should anyone spend money on them?  I'm Exhibit A – I won't switch to another MMO as I now have no trust in any other company that they won't do the exact same thing to me.

Wow! That was MY post! Those were very nearly my exact words! I believe I posted that reply to the EGM article under the name Logan there.

So it's time to make NCSoft pay.  It's after November 30th, and the gloves are off - the time for playing nice with them is over.  We have been heard by them – and dismissed as irrelevant and unworthy of their attention.  So we must not let up on the campaign of negative publicity.  They want us to dry up and go away now that the game is closed – we must not let that happen, we must not hand them that victory.  We need to make this worse than ever for them.  Every place an NCSoft game is reviewed (or has been reviewed and is still online), we need to be there, in force, reminding people of just how NCSoft treats their customers and how what happened to us will eventually happen to them as well if they continue to support NCSoft's games.  We must similarly hound anyone associated with them – relentlessly.  The very label of NCSoft must be thoroughly tarred as poison, and we need to figure out how to hit them in Korea and Japan as well, where it will hurt more.  Getting their senior executives fired over their bungling of this should be a real goal we work towards as we do our best to hurt their stock prices and taint their public image.

To NCSoft – Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering MMO Killer; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee!  I'm not going anywhere, and I will not stop – you took away the only place I had to go away to and I have nothing else in life left to look forward to.

TonyV has said "We are heroes.  This is what we do."  Well, I'm not.  Hero was never my preferred alignment.  I'm a Vigilante – and this is what I do.

*nod* I get it. And truly, they've earned our ire in spades.

Yet - I would caution - try not to really make this too much the singular focus of your life. This is how you feel NOW. Don't hold onto this intensity too much and for too long. I only say that because you should be able to look back on City of Heroes and remember the GOOD times and memories and not be consumed with how it ended. I wouldn't ask you to forget NCsoft's role and we can certainly use the help in the fight against them. But don't let it poison you.

Someday you want to be able to look back on the time you spent with City of Heroes - and your friend - and your cat - and be able to smile, however wistfully. Don't let what could be good memories turn into something painful to think about.

And if we -can- get City of Heroes back, you may find that pain still there unexpectedly if you hold it too long. And then you would have won, only not to be able to enjoy it. And that would truly be tragic.

[Atlantea]

that image reminds me of the sun setting in sharkhead isle behind the hellforge (which if looked at from the right angle would look similar to the cryptic logo)

That's because that was intentional. It was a subtle joke of the map designers. You look at the old Cryptic logo, and then compare it with a particular angle view of the hell forge and it really is the exact same image down to the proportions.

I did a double-take myself when I saw it. Later I had it confirmed. I think a dev mentioned it in passing in a post on the old forums.

[Atlantea]

I hope you'll all forgive me, this thread is interesting from a psychological and a spiritual point of view.

The things you're all writing about here are not the tantrum of a child for a lost toy, or the pain of an addict in withdrawal. It seems to me the symbolic loss of characters we've all invested in reminds us all uncomfortably of our own mortality. One poster here called midnight the hour "reserved for executions." We know we all must die... someday. But this experience of "virtual death" has forced us to confront our mortality in a frightfully visceral way.

Moreover, we together experienced "the end of the world." A poster here mentioned "On the Beach," and I think we have together endured something that, at least emotionally, makes us feel very much like what the characters in that story must have experienced. I myself had no desire to remain for the final shutdown; is this so different from those in the book who, pointlessly, committed suicide rather than naturally perish?

What a dreadful trauma we have endured together! The catastrophe is virtual, but the grief is real.

But if I may... suppose we succeed in prying "the world" from the clutches of "the devil?" Suppose one day, the torches re-ignite in the now pitch-black Atlas Park. Will we not, together, have emotionally experienced the "resurrection" of our virtual selves and restoration of the world in something very like the visions and prophesies of the world's faiths? I expect more than one "hallelujah!" would be heard over the broadcast channels.

The eu-catastrophe would be virtual, but the joy would be real. That... oh, that would be something to experience, now wouldn't it?

"It goes like this, the fourth, the fifth...."

Very nicely said. And yes - I want desperately to be able to log in and see Atlas holding up the world again in front of City Hall. Even if I had to do it all over again at level 1, I'd still love it.

[Atlantea]

As for myself, it hit me harder initially than I thought it would.

I'd been holding the emotion at bay ever since about 3-4 days after the announcement by the simple fact of buckling down and doing as much of the content as possible. I had slacked off and been away from the game for 3-4 month stretches twice in the last year. And I had been missing out on content. In fact I'd been kind of casual about experiencing everything in terms of the important lore arcs since I always figured "there's time". But now there wasn't.

So I shoved it all aside and with the singular purpose of experiencing as much of the game's lore and content as possible and to get as many badges for my mains as possible, started playing the HELL out of the game. On it several hours per day more than I ever used to do. Taking so many screenshots and demorecords that I swear I must have added nearly 3-4 gigs of filespace just in my screenshots and demorecord folders alone in the 3 months between announcement and shutdown.

I regret that because of that I didn't have as much time to spend on the Beta server as I would've liked. I would've liked to try out more of the new powersets and costume options. But I did the -most- important parts to me. And those important parts were - running the Brickstown/New Praetorian arc with my original Praetorian former Loyalist. And running the final Praetorian Arc of the incarnate series with Cyberman 8.

All told I think I added somewhere around 300+ badges, mainly to C8, but also some to my other mains as well. And I at least successfully completed all the I-Trials and almost maxed out C8's incarnate slots. (And oh my god was he RIDICULOUS at that power level!)

And all of it came to a crashing halt at 2:04AM Central time Dec 1st. And... I've posted how that went over here -

http://www.cohtitan.com/forum/index.php/topic,6493.0.html

Saturday and Sunday... very bad.

Monday... Well, not -good-. But I felt like I needed to help my SG mates who were mostly over into CO.

In fact, not to say I've been -boosting- CO. But I recognized early on that it was the closest thing to COH for many people. And I liked it and had been playing it off and on since it launched. It's not COH. It never will be. But I KNEW it. Knew it well enough to help people acclimate. Understood how to make the process of learning it's quirks go easier.

So on Monday I started resuming helping people around over there. The Cape Radio is there. A lot of friends are there.

It helps. A lot. As I said earlier - a good community can make even a mediocre game a good place to be. And CO is inheriting a good chunk of the COH community.

And I can help.

And in so doing, I find my pain eased a bit. I can help. And in some small way, I can live up to the ideal of the hero in that way.

So... that's how I'm coping. I can't just deal with it on my own. But I can by helping others.

It's not the fate I would have asked for, but it will do.

[Samuraiko]

I'm not taking it well at all.

But at least I got 1 (2, sort of) more videos done. :)

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

[Colette]

"Someone on EGM pointed out that NCSoft has poisoned the well for all MMOs by driving home this point, in the most brutal and public fashion they could imagine, that players of MMOs own nothing and have no rights."

That is important! It means the gaming journalists, and inevitably the providing companies, get it. We will now, inevitably, see modifications to new and even existing MMO contracts. They'll guard their absolute right to make a profit, of course, (and had CoH been running at a loss I'd shut my mouth and let go,) but I think we'll see many fewer arbitrary shutdowns.

Already it may be said some good has come out of this. The Superheroes have taken a bullet for the entire MMO playerbase. That is symbolically so very right, isn't it?

Moving on...

Y'know what I love about this community? Sunday we were all grieving and blue. By tuesday we were celebrating our impressive one-two-three punch of NC's execrably timed Seattle shutdown, the NY Times article, and the Korea Times article. Now morale is high and the stockwatch shows the enemy's reeling. We're all primed to seize the initiative and continue the fight.

God in heaven, we may win this yet!

[johnrobey]

I'm feeling encouraged tho I hope not unduly so.

[Perfidus]

I really don't want to get my hopes up, but at times like now it's kind of hard not to. Even if we don't win, it's very clear to me as it should be to all of you, that we didn't lose, either. Our voices were heard. We made a difference.

As for how I'm taking it? Not well. I barely slept last night, and have been wandering through my days aimlessly. I don't -want- to do anything, so I do nothing. There's just this strange emptiness that I've felt since the last minutes - I know it'll wear off. But in the meantime I'm having a very difficult time carrying on. I'm following all this more than I should. The healthy thing to do would be to put all this away for awhile and get my head on straight. But I'm not willing to do that, this game is my family. So, I'll try and balance things. Do things to help myself, while still poking in here to keep up to date.

[Colette]

"I don't -want- to do anything, so I do nothing. There's just this strange emptiness."

Anhedonia, an aversion to anything fun. Standard with depression or post-trauma. Been there. Be patient and gentle with yourself.

[johnrobey]

I hope you'll all forgive me, this thread is interesting from a psychological and a spiritual point of view.

The things you're all writing about here are not the tantrum of a child for a lost toy, or the pain of an addict in withdrawal. It seems to me the symbolic loss of characters we've all invested in reminds us all uncomfortably of our own mortality. One poster here called midnight the hour "reserved for executions." We know we all must die... someday. But this experience of "virtual death" has forced us to confront our mortality in a frightfully visceral way.

Moreover, we together experienced "the end of the world." A poster here mentioned "On the Beach," and I think we have together endured something that, at least emotionally, makes us feel very much like what the characters in that story must have experienced. I myself had no desire to remain for the final shutdown; is this so different from those in the book who, pointlessly, committed suicide rather than naturally perish?

What a dreadful trauma we have endured together! The catastrophe is virtual, but the grief is real.

But if I may... suppose we succeed in prying "the world" from the clutches of "the devil?" Suppose one day, the torches re-ignite in the now pitch-black Atlas Park. Will we not, together, have emotionally experienced the "resurrection" of our virtual selves and restoration of the world in something very like the visions and prophesies of the world's faiths? I expect more than one "hallelujah!" would be heard over the broadcast channels.

The eu-catastrophe would be virtual, but the joy would be real. That... oh, that would be something to experience, now wouldn't it?

"It goes like this, the fourth, the fifth...."

The first 3-4 days after a few minutes past midnight PST 11/30 have felt like a memorial service, at least such were my feelings and those of others.  If CoH is rezzed, how I'd feel is best described by Beethoven's 9th Symphony, 4th movement "Ode to Joy" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=paH0V6JLxSI

[Colette]

We'll start up a playlist for CapeRadio.  ;D

[srmalloy]

We'll start up a playlist for CapeRadio.  ;D

If you want contributions for the 'rail against NCSoft' period, I would suggest Heather Alexander's "March of Cambreath".

[Cryfire]

Yesterday I found myself running demorecord after demorecord (Have 638 saved) while listening to a bunch of City of Heroes music I'd downloaded, *sighs*

Been looking at a lot of games I use to play, Sims 3, Heroclix, Magic the Gathering and really just looking for something to fill my COX time now that it's gone.

[samfivedot]

Mostly I've just been spending time playing around with the downloadable character creator. Because, wouldn't you know, the day after it closes I immediately come up with two new characters.

[healix]

A few of these still apply as I feel the loss

https://i.imgur.com/E8fMY.jpg

..my City is unique. Other games just aren't going to quite do it for me

https://i.imgur.com/NXdH7.jpg

[Perfidus]

I like that image, but... Lineage 2? That's old too.  They should've made that dog be completely unrealistically shaped and had it say Blade and Soul beneath it.

[corvus1970]

Wow, that image sums things up pretty well for me.

[Sarge Morris]

..my City is unique. Other games just aren't going to quite do it for me

https://i.imgur.com/NXdH7.jpg

Aye, I'm with you on this one.  I have zero interest in the other games, NC Scum or not.  Truth be told, and I know its probably heresy to admit this here, I really wasn't all that interested in CoH when I started, either.  But a friend of mine from home, someone who represented normalcy in my life, got me into it. 

He was a power player, rapidly leveling toon after toon so fast it was only his global ID that let me know who he was.  I....Was not.  Preferred to put time into my characters, stick with something familiar yet different enough to take my mind off things. 

Found Virtue's community, called it my home away from my home away from home. 

I'm working on writing out exactly what CoX meant to me, how it stacks up against my mindset and the like...  I'm getting kind of personal with it, and its harder to write than I thought.  Never really explored these issues while sober before, much preferring to tearfully reminisce over entirely too much whiskey, rum or Guinness or lose myself in a fantasy world.  Now that the latter option's gone, and the other option is not one I'd like to take any more, I suppose its time to face myself, get my shit straight.  Maybe, I don't know, sooner or later walk into a real life club or whatever with the same confidence and feeling of safety I had in Pocket D instead of leaving my apartment basically only to go to work. 

But, dammit, I want my City.  Don't give me that bullshit and tell me its just as good.  Fuck you, NC Soft, for what you've done.