NCSOFT & Homecoming License Announcement

[Hyperstrike]

3 hours ago, Bodai said:

I don't believe this for a second, the data exists, someone has it, or a copy could be found. (and how would you know?  Or is this just "what you heard"?)

More likely there is some BS legalese reason it can't be used, or indeed even acknowledged that it exists.

I think I remember something along those lines in the original conversations, maybe something like they were worried about privacy of the data.

 

I don't see a problem (especially if you now have a license).  If you still have the original e-mail address or whatever identifying information, get your character data back and imported into your account, same way it was done on the original "underground" server (the guy who ran that was uber paranoid the SWAT team was going to bust down his door at any second).

 

This is probably the biggest hesitation I have about coming back.  I really enjoyed playing all those characters, and they took a long time to build.  I do not have nearly as much disposable time now as I did then, so it is impractical to rebuild them.  As I mentioned previously, I only rebuilt the one character and that took a long time.  I might build some new characters and play with my kids a bit, but I probably won't get into the 20B INF super-incarnate builds that are tweaked to the N^th degree.  Who knows, maybe you don't even need that as much, even with the higher level content.  My playstyle was more play a handful of really well-built characters vs. building dozens of mediocre one's.

 

All that being said, I am not holding out any hope that we will get the original character data back.  This is great news with the license, but the universe is never so kind that we would get everything back like that, nothing I know of is ever that good.  But it never hurts to ask in any case.

 

-Bodai

You're free to believe what you wish.

Ask the people running HC.  They will tell you the same thing..

There are multiple reasons (some logistical, some legal) why this data was purged.
If the devs wish to answer the question, take it up with them.

[Hyperstrike]

4 hours ago, Grey-Ghost said:

Aw man, 3/4 of the people in that poster are dead.

LOL

[ZeeHero]

On 1/4/2024 at 12:49 PM, TauntingMonk said:

 

To me... any legal agreement with NCSoft is a horrible idea. This saves NCSoft from trying to take HC to court to be shut down. They can now just say, "Shut it down."

 

NCsoft didn't shut down the original city of heroes just to be mean. They simply were an out of touch company that didn't understand the popularity and wanted to make way for something they thought would make more money.

 

If it costs them nothing, they have no reason to want to shut down HC.

[Bodai]

52 minutes ago, Hyperstrike said:

You're free to believe what you wish.

Ask the people running HC.  They will tell you the same thing..

There are multiple reasons (some logistical, some legal) why this data was purged.
If the devs wish to answer the question, take it up with them.

If NCSOFT were to give permission to use the data, it would magically reappear.  Oooooh, you mean this data?

[Bodai]

42 minutes ago, ZeeHero said:

NCsoft didn't shut down the original city of heroes just to be mean. They simply were an out of touch company that didn't understand the popularity and wanted to make way for something they thought would make more money.

 

If it costs them nothing, they have no reason to want to shut down HC.

Yeah, I think they were used to things like Lineage II fitting into the obsessed farming min/maxers fanbase in S. Korea, and then looked at Coh and they really didn't get it, or it just didn't take off the same way.

 

I saw the way people played Lineage II, you pretty much had to pay-to-win with farmers to get the best weapons, and the endless grind.  We had some of that in COH but not as much.  The art is beautiful in Lineage II but it is a completely different engine and feel.  I tried to play with some of my friends for awhile but just couldn't get into it.  I am wondering if the reverse was true for people in S. Korea.

 

That being said, it was making a decent profit, they could have just let it be so long as it was at least self-sustaining, or at least sold it off to someone.  I Dunno, maybe shutting it down gave them a tax write off like what Disney does today?

 

We will never really know.

 

[Bodai]

1 hour ago, Excraft said:

I think it more having to do with not wanting to bother with trying to fight an endless legal battle on multiple fronts.  NCSoft turned this into a future money making opportunity for themselves without needing to type a line of code or maintain anything.  Win win and smart business decision on their part. 

I don't disagree, I wonder how much money they will realistically make from it, especially if HC is not allowed to run as a for-profit entity.  Honestly I would have expected them to be able to make a profit, and NCSOFT gets 20% or something, for doing nothing but owning the IP.

 

There is also the Streisand effect.  The code is out there and there is a smattering of servers, going after them would probably make even more crop up.  Ask the MPAA/RIAA how things worked out for them, and today I think they are on a relatively short list of some of the most hated organizations.

[VULCAN]

INCREDIBLE ! But so well deserved.

An adventure of a decade to preserve Paragon and its heroes.
All my gratitude to all the people who allowed that, and finally thanks to NCSOFT, I must admit that their position today worth it.

Since its creation this game give us goosebumps, and its a neverending feeling. Woooo !!!

[Crystal Dragon]

On the note of donations for the server: Homecoming staff has been quite transparent on where the funds are going, and how it's split up for the server maintenance hosting and other services that we require to maintain the server stability. To say that they operate in the shadows in regards to funding isn't quite correct, even prior to the LLC, they were quite transparent with us as donating players in this regard. But now, they can provide more transparency on what the upcoming adjustments in the donations required, as well as how the funds will be channeled to them through more legal and secured ways. 🙂 But something to keep in mind, unless the server start taking funds and putting it to profit for the team, NCsoft and the lawyer brigade likely won't take action, or say anything of it.

[Hyperstrike]

3 hours ago, Bodai said:

If NCSOFT were to give permission to use the data, it would magically reappear.  Oooooh, you mean this data?

No they cannot.

There are data privacy and data protection laws involved.

Read through COPPA, GDPR and CCPA.

If you want to know why these would affect us, please ask the devs.

[Ulysses Dare]

11 hours ago, Bodai said:

If you still have the original e-mail address or whatever identifying information, get your character data back and imported into your account, same way it was done on the original "underground" server (the guy who ran that was uber paranoid the SWAT team was going to bust down his door at any second).

Here's the problem with that, as I understand it. The character database was just that: a data base of characters. It didn't contain any account information because it came from Paragon Studios, who never had access to that info. Instead, when you logged in the NCSloft account server verified your ID then passed along a token to Paragon saying, essentially, "this is legitimate user XYZ".

 

The secret squirrel server could figure out whose account was whose by simply looking up the character names. Something you can do when you run a tiny private shard full of people you've personally vetted. It's not a process you can scale up to a public server the size of Rebirth or Thunderspy, much less Homecoming. Even if the data base did still exist, there's no quick and simple way to just hand everyone back their characters.

[Bodai]

4 hours ago, Hyperstrike said:

No they cannot.

There are data privacy and data protection laws involved.

Read through COPPA, GDPR and CCPA.

If you want to know why these would affect us, please ask the devs.

Yeah, so I work in IT and deal with PII, PCI, PHI, etc.  The legal team would have to draw it up, but it would likely behave much like a company merger or acquisition, transferred to I guess this now licensed agent and non-profit or whatever, and then HC would be legally responsible for it just like they would for any such data under their control now.  It could be done if the parties involved wanted it to happen.  But, it would likely be tedious and expensive, assuming they could get permission at all.  That's why this is really irrelevant either way.

 

I am only saying, don't try to tell me it's impossible or the data doesn't exist or some issue like that.  A much better and more likely reason is that NCSOFT wouldn't allow it / bother with it / it would be too expensive to do.  Regardless, we will probably never know either way so again a pointless argument.  Right?

 

[Bodai]

1 hour ago, Ulysses Dare said:

Here's the problem with that, as I understand it. The character database was just that: a data base of characters. It didn't contain any account information because it came from Paragon Studios, who never had access to that info. Instead, when you logged in the NCSloft account server verified your ID then passed along a token to Paragon saying, essentially, "this is legitimate user XYZ".

 

The secret squirrel server could figure out whose account was whose by simply looking up the character names. Something you can do when you run a tiny private shard full of people you've personally vetted. It's not a process you can scale up to a public server the size of Rebirth or Thunderspy, much less Homecoming. Even if the data base did still exist, there's no quick and simple way to just hand everyone back their characters.

You might be right, we haven't seen the data or the format and the data objects that are available, so this is conjecture.

I could easily imagine between having the data and maybe some other information NCSOFT has, such as a token or ID as you mention, that a script could be written to match the accounts and characters in the database with your e-mail address, which is all you would need.

 

Also, if you are right and it is just accounts and characters, then there is no legally risky personal information, because if there were, you would be able to match it to the people who owned the characters.

 

For me personally and many others that I know, I exported all the data on the characters such as the costume, took screenshots of everything, a bunch of things that only I would have access to that would prove I have the characters.  And you would only need to verify one or two to know the rest on the same account are yours.

 

And, as you say, if it turned out to be a daunting task to retrieve and match up all those characters, fair enough.  Charge a $100 fee or something to get your characters back, so only the people who really wanted them badly would do it.  The would drastically reduce the number of requests.  Doesn't need to be quick or simple, databases are made to be searchable.

 

Not saying any of this will ever happen, just that if the will were there to do it, it could be done.

 

But, I guess it is more fun and dramatic to talk about all the ways something is impossible right?

[Troo]

hypothetical banter aside..

 

Congratulations Homecoming team!

 

[SwitchFade]

Let's get back to nerfing Regen.

[Jimmy]

This was getting a bit personal. I've had to hide some posts.

 

I think we'll all be better off if we stop trying to explain to each-other how software licensing and privacy laws work 🙂

[Bionic_Flea]

But Jimmy, it's just business, nothing personal.

[Excraft]

14 hours ago, Bodai said:

I don't disagree, I wonder how much money they will realistically make from it, especially if HC is not allowed to run as a for-profit entity.  Honestly I would have expected them to be able to make a profit, and NCSOFT gets 20% or something, for doing nothing but owning the IP.

 

There is also the Streisand effect.  The code is out there and there is a smattering of servers, going after them would probably make even more crop up.  Ask the MPAA/RIAA how things worked out for them, and today I think they are on a relatively short list of some of the most hated organizations.

 

HC operating as a non-profit doesn't mean NCSoft can't make money.  NCSoft doesn't have to take a cut of any profit.  Their "license" could be a flat dollar amount based on number of servers in operation or whatever.  That cost would then get passed down to the people making the donations to cover along with other expenses.  It wouldn't be any different than what HC is doing now.  Like I said, NCSoft is smart.  They've made this into a money making opportunity for themselves instead of a legal expense in chasing after servers all over the place. 

[ZeeHero]

Yes nerf regen! it's not nerfed enough until it depletes your health instead of regenerating it! 🤣

[lemming]

On the issue of past characters hiding out in some database elsewhere.

It takes so little time to rebuild a character into frankly better than what was on live.

If you have your past costume files, you can upload them.  Usually needing some tweaks, but you'll want to do that anyway. There's new cool stuff.

AE files are also mostly compatible.

[Derek Icelord]

At the risk of a warning for repeating my question in a previous post:

 

What does Homecoming gain from this, besides the hope that NCSoft demanding a shutdown is less likely and possibly more hosting options?

 

Jimmy answered the other 2 questions I had, but I consider this one to be the more important one.

[Jimmy]

4 minutes ago, Derek Icelord said:

Jimmy answered the other 2 questions I had, but I consider this one to be the more important one.

On 1/5/2024 at 3:51 PM, Jimmy said:

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.

[Hyperstrike]

6 hours ago, Jimmy said:

This was getting a bit personal. I've had to hide some posts.

 

I think we'll all be better off if we stop trying to explain to each-other how software licensing and privacy laws work 🙂

Very well.  Just about reached the end of productive discussion anyhow.

Wasn't looking forward to bouts of "NUH UH!"

[Hyperstrike]

2 hours ago, Derek Icelord said:

At the risk of a warning for repeating my question in a previous post:

 

What does Homecoming gain from this, besides the hope that NCSoft demanding a shutdown is less likely and possibly more hosting options?

 

Jimmy answered the other 2 questions I had, but I consider this one to be the more important one.

Basically this gives them legal standing to continue the game.
Sure, the resources and technical expertise are 90% of it.

But the permission from the rights-holder is what'll stop them from just getting summarily take offline on a random whim.

As I'm not privy to the actual agreement, I can't tell if it's just an open ended permission, or if it's time limited "You have X years to do a thing".
Fairly certain it's more of an open-ended "So long as you're not trying to grift, you can keep it going."

[Bodai]

2 hours ago, Derek Icelord said:

At the risk of a warning for repeating my question in a previous post:

 

What does Homecoming gain from this, besides the hope that NCSoft demanding a shutdown is less likely and possibly more hosting options?

 

Jimmy answered the other 2 questions I had, but I consider this one to be the more important one.

Is this not enough to be worth it?  I think it is.

[The Demon Hunter]

Congratulations to everyone on the Homecoming team who has worked for the last few years to make this moment a reality.

 

Kudos to all, and best wishes for a very long life for our favorite City!