NCSOFT & Homecoming License Announcement

[Bionic_Flea]

14 minutes ago, Jimmy said:

 

Just so you know, I'm keeping a list.

But Jimmy, will you check it twice, like the Sanity Clause?

[dumps]

I don't know if I've posted here, but I will do so to add to the celebration.

Thanners

[gameboy1234]

And Kotaku has an article about the new license.

 

https://kotaku.com/homecoming-city-of-heroes-mmo-fan-server-ncsoft-license-1851141864

 

[ThePhlebotomist]

23 hours ago, Homecoming said:

 

 

What does this mean for development? Will Homecoming be able to go open source?
Development will continue, and we will be expanding the development team under the terms of the license agreement. We do not anticipate moving away from a closed-source development model. 

 

 

This announcement is such a huge step! Thank you for all your efforts through this!

 

The staying closed-source seems to continue to drive division between the City of Heroes community, though, and between it and the other terms of the license, it does still make me worry it could all be taken away again. 

 

Please consider open sourcing.

 

[TsukiSumarasu]

Woah this is huge :O

[Seed22]

13 hours ago, Derek Icelord said:

This is great(?) news.

But, the cynic in me has some questions.

1. What does Homecoming gain from this, besides the hope that NCSoft demanding a shutdown is less likely and possibly more hosting options?
2. You said the license had no up front or on-going cost, but the operating costs will increase to "keep up with our commitments as a licensee." Can you elaborate on what those commitments are?
3. "This agreement provides a framework under which Homecoming can operate the game in a way that complies with NCSOFT’s wishes..." I'll be honest, this concerns me. This implies Homecoming will be changing the way it operates, at least in some way. Can you expand on what that entails?

Very good questions. 

[Lakitty]

1 hour ago, Jimmy said:

 

Just so you know, I'm keeping a list.

What if one don't like Peperoni OR Pinapple? 😛

[Jimmy]

Here's some answers to a few questions that got missed. Everything in the thread has been read, but as we mentioned in the announcement, we can't answer every question that gets asked.

 

21 hours ago, Arcalian said:

Tequila will not longer be supported?  I assume we'll get instructions on what to do instead?

 

Download the Homecoming Launcher. The Getting Started page should get you sorted.

 

20 hours ago, starro said:

Will HC see any additional options for collecting funding?  While I appreciate the current monthly method with the open/close window, I miss out sometimes.   I do not always get back here on the last Saturday of the month.

 

Can we have a subscription process?  I have always liked the sub process and paid for two accounts all the years the game was live. 

 

We're not considering any changes to the funding model. We understand it can sometimes be frustrating if you miss the window, but I would try to look on the bright side and appreciate that it means the community is thriving 🙂

 

19 hours ago, Snarky said:

But seriously….what took so long?

 

We couldn't agree on how to best nerf Regen.

 

18 hours ago, MattBold said:

This is an industry first right?  Has any company EVER granted an official license to a rogue private server community?

 

I believe this might be the first time a sunsetted game has been officially brought back by community group, but I could be wrong. Project 1999 is probably the closest example, but the original game (Everquest) is still running.

 

14 hours ago, Derek Icelord said:

You said the license had no up front or on-going cost, but the operating costs will increase to "keep up with our commitments as a licensee." Can you elaborate on what those commitments are?

 

Primarily administrative and security related costs, just keeping us above board really. Very boring in reality, and the amounts we're talking are quite minimal and probably wouldn't have even been noticed had we not called them out here (despite the fact we detail all non-security related expenses in the monthly financial breakdowns).

 

14 hours ago, Derek Icelord said:

This implies Homecoming will be changing the way it operates, at least in some way. Can you expand on what that entails?

 

There's won't really be any noticeable changes which aren't called out in the FAQ. All of our policy and administrative decisions over the past 4.5 years were made for a reason 🙂

 

11 hours ago, Sanguinesun said:

The 30% donation increase needs [...]

 

To clarify, this is one-time thing to build up a contingency / disaster recovery fund. There will only be minor changes to our ongoing expenses.

 

11 hours ago, Sanguinesun said:

There is concerns this will affect transparency regarding the project in a direction of becoming less transparent (as this has been a contention even as it was in the past too).

 

There shouldn't be any changes to make anything less transparent. If anything, you may notice us start being a bit more open - where possible, of course.

 

11 hours ago, Sanguinesun said:

With the statements of a City Council to be made and Cipher being lead.  Will the structure of decisions regarding them be transparent?

 

The transparency here for example likely won't change much. I would say our management structure has worked pretty well thus far (*gestures to the top of this thread*), all things considered. We are open and transparent when it makes sense to do so.

 

9 hours ago, BurtHutt said:

I also note I can't see how many people are on the various servers. This is the same old non-sense that the Live game used. It's an archaic way to operate. Or did I miss where this data may have been moved to?

 

We wanted to make room on the nav bar for the "Getting Started" page, and the Server Status link was an unfortunate casualty. RIP.

 

As others have pointed out, you can find it under "Browse" or by going to https://forums.homecomingservers.com/status/

 

1 hour ago, Bionic_Flea said:

But Jimmy, will you check it twice, like the Sanity Clause?

 

Watch it, pineapple lover.

 

2 minutes ago, Lakitty said:

What if one don't like Peperoni OR Pinapple? 😛

 

Acceptable.

[jtaega]

Does this mean we would have access to our old builds from NCSOFT?

[Thraxen]

Damn it. My excuse for not badging on my main cause it’s unofficial is gone. Thanks a lot. 

[Esau]

Good work. Those negotiations were complicated, I'm sure. Thank YOU!

[Frostbiter]

This is great news. Thank you to the Homecoming Team for all the hard work you put in!

[ILIWAPCT]

 discontinuing support for Tequila

 

My only concern is that Tequila is being dropped. Currently Tequila links to steam which fully enables my Steam Controller. The Steam Controller is unique because unlike other controllers it has a mouse pad built in. 

[High_Beam]

Here's the thing I have been thinking about after the initial news glow.

 

Will it bring new players and thus higher volume to HC.  I have seen scores (as opposed to SCoRE 🙂 ) of web sites announcing this and talking the talk about coming back.  Thus the natural flow of that question would be can the servers handle it.  I have to assume that there will be some more powerful whatever's procured if the number bear a surge in player base (if it happens) and the statements made throughout this seem to corroborate that.

 

But I think what should be most prescient to THE PLAYERS already on HC is to continue to be a welcoming group.  Sure there may be old players coming back but there will be new players, ones who never played the game on live and those are the ones we need to be extra friendly with.  But there are players in the game and in these forums who often, even if its unintentional come off as being elitist (myself included at times) and while they may well be elite (in play experience or simple time on earth), that means zero to a new player or one that was casual on live.

 

They are going to come in and they will have demands and expectations, a lot of which may have been expressed time and again but to them are new.  I started on HC in Jan of 2020, I know players who have been on longer.  hen there are the OGs of HC before it was HC.  But Now its public for real and there will be at least an initial rush.  CoH players and the fanbase is constantly getting its balls massaged over how welcoming they are but listen to chat and you start to realize that there are a lot of J-O's as well as nice ones.  You cannot dismiss that because it is what is seen at that moment.  These forums . . . time allows for some to think before they speak so there is less bad chatter, but it does show up as well.

 

We will also have to be extra vigilant on IP infringement and reporting it because with legitimacy often comes litigation.  We could very well still lose our server if a C&D gets dropped on HC by Disney or Warner Brothers because some clown makes "The Bulk" with Green skin and purple pants (wretched color for pants btw).  I hazard to guess donations aren't going to pay for a capable legal defense staff.

 

I'm excited not just for myself but for the possibility of new blood and perhaps new ideas coming in.

[Galaxar]

This is great news! Congratulations! I am very happy!

[MrAxe]

Who would have thought it all those years ago. Well done people! 🤘

[Demobot]

Never thought I'd see the day. Thank you guys so much for keeping the game alive! 

[Ergonyos]

Congratulations :)

[JoeMage]

Great news!!

 

[vaz20190501]

Congratulations! This is a fascinating thing in MMO history, and hopefully it will pave the way for other resurrected games to gain legitimacy.

 

The only similar case I can think of is Myst Online: Uru Live, which, after being shut down the first time (by Ubisoft), survived as a community of private servers dubbed Until Uru. If I remember correctly, that had the informal approval of Cyan Worlds. They, too, cared deeply about the game and wanted to see it continue in any form possible. The private servers also demonstrated interest in the game, helping it get a new publisher (GameTap, a now-defunct service that was sort of trying to be Game Pass long before Game Pass came into existence).

 

After that second shutdown, Cyan decided to take on the donation-assisted cost of hosting MO:UL themselves. They open-sourced it and have since then accepted bug fixes and some new content from the community. I don't think they ever prohibited the private servers.

[starro]

Thank you for the updates.  Will the next update be ....Issue 28???

 

FYI MassivelyOP posted a new article.  For those unfamiliar with Massively, they have covered COH related news with a positive light for what seems like forever!  

 

City of Heroes Homecoming talks funding, the City Council, and the impending content drop | Massively Overpowered (massivelyop.com)

 

Another article posted just now.

Into the Super-Verse: Reflecting on City of Heroes, back officially at long last | Massively Overpowered (massivelyop.com)

 

 

 

Edited January 5 by starro
added a second link

[Drakwatch]

This is awesome news, I'm so happy that NCSoft has been able to work with the team on this. Congrats and well done to everyone sticking through all the legal shenanigans. I'm sure working with a huge company like that was a challenge.

 

One thing I am wondering - could this new agreement allow some help from NCSoft for development? Would they be able to release some older builds of the game to the dev team or animation files or support tools that were used in live? I'm kind of doubting it since the dev team from live has been long disbanded. But just curious if it's even possible that NCSoft has been holding onto some old files.

[Gilliam COH]

Just awesome news glad NCsoft finaly building bridges ,  Thank you Homecomming team  The future Looks Amazing.

[Azari]

On 1/4/2024 at 12:25 PM, USCI said:

I wonder how much involvement NCSoft will have in the development decisions of Homecoming.  Does this new City Council have to have any development that involves a change to the IP submitted to NCSoft for pre-approval?  For example, for some crazy reason our developers will come up with an idea (like killing off a major character) will NCSoft have veto power over that decision?  

I really hope they don’t senselessly kill off any more characters. I still think killing Statesman was kinda a bad idea. What next? Killing Ms Liberty? Yikes.

[catsi563]

Congrats on the license folks its been a lot of fun being back, and knowing its now recognized and legit makes it all the sweeter

 

please keep up the good work and thanks again for all you do.