How did it happen?

[StoneColdJoker]

I’m sure this has been asked, but how is CoX coming back even possible? How did it happen? I honestly had no idea it had happened until I saw a random suggested video on YouTube. Don’t get me wrong, I was overjoyed to find out it was back. I guess I’m just still in shock because I love and have missed this game so much

[justicebeliever]

Enjoy the read...start at the bottom and work up to understand it chronologically -

 

https://massivelyop.com/tag/city-of-heroes-score-drama/

[Sidious]

Never underestimate what a devoted group of cultists and a virgin sacrifice can accomplish.

[Healix]

The man (and his helpers) who made all this possible love this game as much as all of us...this is how and why it happened. Years of hard work and sometimes frustration.

[Solarverse]

And like the game, we are back! Spread the news!  :)

[Skyhawke]

I’m sure this has been asked, but how is CoX coming back even possible? How did it happen? I honestly had no idea it had happened until I saw a random suggested video on YouTube. Don’t get me wrong, I was overjoyed to find out it was back. I guess I’m just still in shock because I love and have missed this game so much

 

It's all a Nemesis plot.

[StoneColdJoker]

Never underestimate what a devoted group of cultists and a virgin sacrifice can accomplish.

 

Cultists is probably not fat off the mark lol

[StoneColdJoker]

Enjoy the read...start at the bottom and work up to understand it chronologically -

 

https://massivelyop.com/tag/city-of-heroes-score-drama/

 

Perfect. Thanks for the info

[EggKookoo]

So I had a disquieting thought.

 

NCSoft seems to not know what to do with the CoH IP. They tried launching their own version with City of Hero and it was a dud. They closed down CoH because it's just not really their thing. They appear to be aware of this and the other private servers, but they're not (so far) doing anything about it. But Homecoming hit 100,000 players last week, which, IIRC, is 1/2 to 1/3 the size of the peak live playerbase. Superheroes are still big in Hollywood, and if there was ever a time for a AA superhero MMO to hit the market, it's now.

 

What if NCSoft is letting Homecoming run without harassment to build up the value of the IP so they can sell it to some other developer? Like I said, they don't seem to want it themselves. But if they could drop it for a few hundred mil or even a billion, they might do that. Then the new owner would almost certainly come down on these servers as infringing on their new investment.

 

I hope I'm way off base with this...

[jubakumbi]

So I had a disquieting thought.

 

...

 

I hope I'm way off base with this...

 

As I mentioned in another thread, if we are going to just start speculating, hold on to your hat, because I come up with 'worst case scenarios' all about 'business risk' for a living... :)

 

With no information available, the human psyche just starts inventing things, because we are puzzle seeking/solving creatures.

 

How about we just play the game and have fun?

 

:)

 

[MunkiLord]

So I had a disquieting thought.

 

NCSoft seems to not know what to do with the CoH IP. They tried launching their own version with City of Hero and it was a dud. They closed down CoH because it's just not really their thing. They appear to be aware of this and the other private servers, but they're not (so far) doing anything about it. But Homecoming hit 100,000 players last week, which, IIRC, is 1/2 to 1/3 the size of the peak live playerbase. Superheroes are still big in Hollywood, and if there was ever a time for a AA superhero MMO to hit the market, it's now.

 

What if NCSoft is letting Homecoming run without harassment to build up the value of the IP so they can sell it to some other developer? Like I said, they don't seem to want it themselves. But if they could drop it for a few hundred mil or even a billion, they might do that. Then the new owner would almost certainly come down on these servers as infringing on their new investment.

 

I hope I'm way off base with this...

 

If I was running NCSoft and had no soul, this is exactly what I would do. It would be a dick move, but financially smart.

[Radionuclide]

So I had a disquieting thought.

 

NCSoft seems to not know what to do with the CoH IP. They tried launching their own version with City of Hero and it was a dud. They closed down CoH because it's just not really their thing. They appear to be aware of this and the other private servers, but they're not (so far) doing anything about it. But Homecoming hit 100,000 players last week, which, IIRC, is 1/2 to 1/3 the size of the peak live playerbase. Superheroes are still big in Hollywood, and if there was ever a time for a AA superhero MMO to hit the market, it's now.

 

What if NCSoft is letting Homecoming run without harassment to build up the value of the IP so they can sell it to some other developer? Like I said, they don't seem to want it themselves. But if they could drop it for a few hundred mil or even a billion, they might do that. Then the new owner would almost certainly come down on these servers as infringing on their new investment.

 

I hope I'm way off base with this...

 

I don't know how much weight I give to the theory that City of Hero's failure (in 2005) related to City of Heroes shut down (in 2012). I say this considering it had no impact on on them purchasing the full rights in 2006 and doesn't seem to have an impact 6 years later when they shut the game down. It is clear the NCSoft was no longer interested in running the game. And they did claim at the time that they wanted to focus on the Asia market more.

 

As for letting Homecoming and the rest run in order to drum up business, I think they missed their opportunity to sell to anyone but the community at this point. The code base is out in the wild and we don't need a company to run it. What company would waste the money to the rights to a game they cannot control? The problem with cracking down is yeah there is only 5 known servers now. But, there is nothing preventing more from popping up. It would be playing whack-a-mole on that investment, and each pursuit would be more investment spent. It would not be worth it. I think they are doing nothing because it is not worth it financially to do it. Pure and simply, bottom-line motivation.

[Adeon Hawkwood]

What if NCSoft is letting Homecoming run without harassment to build up the value of the IP so they can sell it to some other developer? Like I said, they don't seem to want it themselves. But if they could drop it for a few hundred mil or even a billion, they might do that. Then the new owner would almost certainly come down on these servers as infringing on their new investment.

Anything is possible, however I would think that having lots of privately run servers and a code-base that is readily available on the internet would decrease the value of the IP, not increase it.

 

Most developers aren't going to want to buy an old video game where they have to keep sending out C&Ds to private servers that keep cropping up everywhere.

[EggKookoo]

*resumes breathing normally*

[jubakumbi]

How about n+1 of the (super) hero games about to hit the market do so and then band toegether to claim rouge servers directly impact thier market?

That's a nice expensive one right there to have to deal with from my PoV.

 

How about NCSoft waits a year or more, watching the freely available numbers, then sues for all of the 'lost subscription revenue'.

There is another financial torpedo.

 

Really, it's just idle speculation at this point based on few facts.

 

What we do know, as mentioned, is that the big corporation allows similar MMO rogue servers to stay running.

That is a precedent.

If they go after one, typically they have to go after all of them or get ripped apart in the legal process.

 

Trademarks are really what have to be zealously defended.

No one here is diluting the trademarks, we are celebrating them in the open for the most part, giving them fan advertising.

Until a rogue starts trying to dillute a coporate trademark for profit, there is little to defend.

 

So, we can speculate until the Rikti invade for realz, but the current data at hand says playing the game has better ROI, IMO, if that sort of thing interests you.

 

:)

 

[Shinobu]

 

I keep seeing the "they abandoned the CoH intellectual property" idea tossed out, and in fact they've protected it to some extent.  They had a mobile fight game of some kind out about two years ago that included Statesman, Ghost Widow, and several other CoH characters -- something the almost certainly did just to keep their hands on the IP.

 

Also, there are more than the five Homecoming servers out there.  ^_^  There are several other public and I believe a number of private servers running now.

[Adeon Hawkwood]

How about n+1 of the (super) hero games about to hit the market do so and then band toegether to claim rouge servers directly impact thier market?

That's a nice expensive one right there to have to deal with from my PoV.

I am not a lawyer but I can't see anyway that other publishers would have legal standing to bring that sort of case. It would be like Valve suing Blizzard on the grounds that Overwatch makes TF2 less valuable (or vice versa).

[jubakumbi]

How about n+1 of the (super) hero games about to hit the market do so and then band toegether to claim rouge servers directly impact thier market?

That's a nice expensive one right there to have to deal with from my PoV.

I am not a lawyer but I can't see anyway that other publishers would have legal standing to bring that sort of case. It would be like Valve suing Blizzard on the grounds that Overwatch makes TF2 less valuable (or vice versa).

 

'Frivolous lawsuits' can do plenty of damage, both reputationally and fiscally, and do not have to have much basis in reality to be harmful, that was my only point. :)

 

Still, the BS about loot boxes being gambling and 'preying on the children' has taken traction, so what do I know?

I thought that was totally frivolous...  :)

[justicebeliever]

There are three parts to IP here:

 

1.) Trademark - name, slogan, symbol, device used to market the product.  They are usually for 10 years, but you do have to proactively prove continued use of the Trademark for it to be renewed...It's quite possible that the Trademark has run out...But for City of Heroes, that's likely just the words "City of Heroes".  If they haven't lost the Trademark, which was last renewed in 2012, then they likely would need to make a move soon to protect it...

 

2.) Copyright - The actual source code as the game sunset in 2012.  These last for decades, and are automatic.  NCSoft doesn't have to do anything to defend it.  The own the Copyright free and clear.  And there is no way that HC could defend against a copyright suit, they know/admit that the software came from NCSoft, and it's certainly not been sufficiently modified since 2012 to claim it's a derivative work...

 

3.) Patent - you can patent software processes (maybe the Character Creator, Combat, Zone Rendering - I don't know if any specific patents were filed specifically, but I would be surprised if none were).  Patents run for 20 years and then move to the public domain.  That would mean that the earliest a patent would run out would be 2024.  Again, HC would have no defense for Patent Infringement if that's the case

 

As far as targets go, NCSosft doesn't have to sue every single private server in existence to make a case...It could just sue all the servers that are being so public.  And the fact they are so public makes them easy targets to find and file suit against.  It's the same thing that's happened with File Sharing and Music Sharing sites...They didn't sue everyone in existence, just key players to make the point...at that point a simple C&D letter does a pretty good job of scaring everyone else into making the idea of Homecoming (a big public server where anyone can join) into very small private servers were you would have to know someone to get on, and populations would be very low.

 

There is precedent - Blizzard went after Private Servers sometime back.  It's not exactly the same, but similar enough.

 

 

I keep seeing the "they abandoned the CoH intellectual property" idea tossed out, and in fact they've protected it to some extent.  They had a mobile fight game of some kind out about two years ago that included Statesman, Ghost Widow, and several other CoH characters -- something the almost certainly did just to keep their hands on the IP.

 

Also, there are more than the five Homecoming servers out there.  ^_^  There are several other public and I believe a number of private servers running now.

 

Abandonware only applies if the IP holder not longer exists (company dissolves, individual dies and has no heirs, etc).  I've heard it to, and it's bogus...

 

The threat is real...however

 

TL;DR - It's a real issue, but what have you got to lose by playing?  The game went away in 2012 and nobody's world went crashing down.  If it goes away tomorrow, then I can safely say I had a good two months with it that I would not have otherwise had.  Life is short, enjoy what you can while you can, and no amount of worry is going to change how this plays out...

[jack_nomind]

I'm not a lawyer, but I've worked in law and am currently going to law school.

 

My #1 piece of advice is, don't have public (or screen-shot-able) conversations about legal strategies or any acts that would, uh, invite legal strategizing.

[justicebeliever]

I'm not a lawyer, but I've worked in law and am currently going to law school.

 

My #1 piece of advice is, don't have public (or screen-shot-able) conversations about legal strategies or any acts that would, uh, invite legal strategizing.

 

Jack, that would suppose I would be a party to suit, and I would not be, I’m neither running a private server nor do I have any relationship to the IP holders.

 

And the above are tenets of the law, and almost certain outcomes, but none of which is a strategy.  Nothing here that NCSoft doesn’t know already

[Omnicron]

So I had a disquieting thought.

 

NCSoft seems to not know what to do with the CoH IP. They tried launching their own version with City of Hero and it was a dud. They closed down CoH because it's just not really their thing. They appear to be aware of this and the other private servers, but they're not (so far) doing anything about it. But Homecoming hit 100,000 players last week, which, IIRC, is 1/2 to 1/3 the size of the peak live playerbase. Superheroes are still big in Hollywood, and if there was ever a time for a AA superhero MMO to hit the market, it's now.

 

What if NCSoft is letting Homecoming run without harassment to build up the value of the IP so they can sell it to some other developer? Like I said, they don't seem to want it themselves. But if they could drop it for a few hundred mil or even a billion, they might do that. Then the new owner would almost certainly come down on these servers as infringing on their new investment.

 

I hope I'm way off base with this...

 

If I was running NCSoft and had no soul, this is exactly what I would do. It would be a dick move, but financially smart.

 

Not really.

 

CoH was almost certainly shut down for tax purposes: it was making a small amount of money, enough to pay for its servers and continuing development, but not much more. It wasn't hurting them, it wasn't a drain on their finances, but it wasn't generating much profit either. As such, its value to them became greatest as an asset they could claim a loss on to offset gains in other areas. So they shut it down, told the Korean government they had lost a game worth X, and got a nice chunk sliced off their tax bill. But in order to do that, they couldn't sell it, or it wouldn't have been a loss, it would have been break-even, which is not what they wanted.

[Without_Pause]

People behind Homecoming are starting a non-profit company. Add in they are talking to NCSoft, and my guess is the compromise is they can't make money off of CoH. So, create a non-profit business and then cap off funding to just cover what is needed. It isn't being said officially, but it is technically being done.

 

$339.00 to pay our cost of incorporation to form the LLC. Our Registered Agent is northwest in Delaware. Because of our situation at the time we needed to expedite the company formation which cost a little extra.

 

Our intention is still to move forward with opening and operating under a non-profit (501c3/4) in the near future but there were a few reasons we decided to open an LLC first (and this was after speaking with a business consultant): it gave us more flexibility to move funds and establish ourselves before operating under an NPO - we did not have the option of funding the NPO’s account ourselves and co-mingling funds under an NPO will cause you to lose all coverage from the corporation should an issue be brought up in court and can cause a lot of other problems.

 

As an SMLLC we were able to move funds (so long as they are tracked very carefully and thoroughly documented) to make sure we kept all of the bills paid - which we had to do multiple times because of PayPal. NPOs take more time to setup than LLCs - the time from submission to formation for our LLC was under 8 hours and we needed the entity up and running within a day due to our situation at the time. We will still be able to move all of Homecoming’s assets, and the LLC itself, under the NPO once we do have it setup.

 

As of the time of this post our donations will be open again at https://forums.homecomingservers.com/donate/ and will automatically close as soon as this month’s goal is met.

 

There's no real reason to start a LLC/non-profit if you think NCSoft is going to shut you down.

[justicebeliever]

People behind Homecoming are starting a non-profit company. Add in they are talking to NCSoft, and my guess is the compromise is they can't make money off of CoH. So, create a non-profit business and then cap off funding to just cover what is needed. It isn't being said officially, but it is technically being done.

 

There's no real reason to start a LLC/non-profit if you think NCSoft is going to shut you down.

 

They started the SMLLC so they could keep separate the Homecoming stuff from their own personal selves...Homecoming Servers LLC still keeps them anonymous to us, and it could, in theory shield the damages they would liable for. 

 

To my knowledge they haven't actually started a non-profit yet (It isn't as long, hard, or as expensive as they are making it sound), so "in the process" is pretty vague.

 

And to my knowledge, it was COH Titan that was talking to NCSoft about licensing or purchasing the IP, not Homecoming.

 

Now both of those preceeding statements are "to my knowledge"...you may know more that you are able to share, you may know more that you aren't able to share...so I'm not trying to argue about what they are/aren't doing.

 

I think what they are doing is without precedent, and as long as they feel shielded legally, then if the whole thing gets shut down tomorrow, they are right back where they were before with a secret server and a much smaller player base.

 

I'm not trying to be alarmist here, it is what it is...apart from not actually forming a non-profit yet, I think HC is doing a great job...I gave in the last round, and I think their strategy of capping the funding is the smartest play to not intentionally draw NCSoft's ire.  I just don't think anyone playing here should have their eyes closed or hearts broken.  Like I said, you might as well play now, since we have no idea what the future will bring...

[Solvernia]

I’m sure this has been asked, but how is CoX coming back even possible? How did it happen? I honestly had no idea it had happened until I saw a random suggested video on YouTube. Don’t get me wrong, I was overjoyed to find out it was back. I guess I’m just still in shock because I love and have missed this game so much

 

TL;DR: i24 beta code got leaked, a bunch of people made a single secret private server with it (for cool kids only; no plebs allowed) and six years later someone decided to blab to the news about it. After everyone got rightfully pissed off about not being told about the secret server, the code has been released (illegally) and everyone and their dog has a server now.