Because if they wanted to show their masters that the game is attracting new players due to it's F2P status telling the world it's on the verge of shutting down is one way to keep new blood away. The constant "look what's coming in Issue 24" also generated stories at MMO game sites which could draw in new blood.
Which wouldn't have had any affect on whether the game closed or not because NCSoft had already made its decision on the matter. So, all of the hype for Issue 24 could have been construed as false advertising for the new comer that just got the game.
And if the miracle did happen and the game was saved, you wouldn't want the news of it's potential closure to linger in the blogosphere. "Oh I heard CoH closed down, you mean it didn't? Well that's a shame because I'm now too caught up in fantasy genre MMO #23 to give it a try."
If that's the case, then we should all just give up on any efforts to bring back any semblance of the game (Not that I'm condoning that we do so). because the game was shut down and any successor will have to deal with "Oh I heard CoH closed down. Well that's a shame because I'm now too caught up in fantasy genre MMO #23 to give its successor a try." The only way we could have hooked
them into trying the successor would have been to have the successor ready for launch on Dec 1st 2012.
Having been on the short end of the stick concerning short notice terminations (on more than one occasion), I prefer having a little more notice. Keeping decisions like that a secret for weeks or months (although, I can understand the Paragon folks having to deal with NDAs and confidences) shows a profound lack of respect for the customers and employees. Of course, NCSoft has continued to show their lack of respect towards the CoX community(as well as Tabula Rasa, Exsteel, Auto Assualt, etc.) by not selling the IP to someone who would give it the care and attention that it deserves. No surprise there.