Everyday things missing from Paragon City/The Rogue Isles/Praetoria.

[brass_eagle]

On 10/7/2025 at 9:50 AM, Darmian said:

Speaking of cinemas, maybe the signs could change every now and then?

 

There was a time on live where the team / company tried to implement real-world advertisements on the billboards around the cities. There was even an option in the menus to turn it off.

 

However, it didn't get fully implemented. A fair amount of balcklash at the time. So it is possible to have changing signs.

 

More on point, have you noticed some of the signs are for the movies in SBB you play in? 

[Rudra]

45 minutes ago, brass_eagle said:

There was a time on live where the team / company tried to implement real-world advertisements on the billboards around the cities. There was even an option in the menus to turn it off.

Are you sure that happened on live? Because the way I remember it, it was only discussed and the devs said "no" because they didn't want to turn the game into an ad stream and the players agreed because of how that worked in another game. (Edit: I don't recall ever seeing any real world ads in City of, and I never had to bother with any settings to disable that I can remember.)

 

Edited Tuesday at 04:54 AM by Rudra

[Lunar Ronin]

10 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Are you sure that happened on live? Because the way I remember it, it was only discussed and the devs said "no" because they didn't want to turn the game into an ad stream and the players agreed because of how that worked in another game. (Edit: I don't recall ever seeing any real world ads in City of, and I never had to bother with any settings to disable that I can remember.)

 

 

There were ads for the Nike Air Jordan Jeter sneakers, the Nokia N-Gage, and the Babylon A.D. film with Vin Diesel.

 

 

 

 

Ultimately, the in-game advertisements were deemed a failure and NCSoft stopped it after a few months.

[brass_eagle]

1 hour ago, Rudra said:

Are you sure that happened on live? Because the way I remember it, it was only discussed and the devs said "no" because they didn't want to turn the game into an ad stream and the players agreed because of how that worked in another game. (Edit: I don't recall ever seeing any real world ads in City of, and I never had to bother with any settings to disable that I can remember.)

 

 

Yeah, I don't ever remembering it getting implemented fully. There was an option in the menu to turn it off, but it never turned on for me (greyed out). But I remember the opposite about community. Dev (community manager) enthusiasm and player signs of d00m. But @Lunar Ronin shows it was in. At least for a short while. Maybe I was taking a break.

 

At least the billboard looks somewhat low quality like the other crappy ones. 

 

Edit: Here is an old post I found, if you are interested, that confirms live ads were in-game like @Lunar Ronin says for a short while. There's a picture of the same Babylon movie. The poster hints it might have only been live in European servers, but also asks about cellphone ads and Nike shoes:

 

https://forumarchive.cityofheroes.dev/topic/193884

 

 

But getting waaayy off topic I suppose. Don't want to hijack out of respect for OP. 🙂 

Edited Tuesday at 06:47 AM by brass_eagle

[Rudra]

2 hours ago, Lunar Ronin said:

 

There were ads for the Nike Air Jordan Jeter sneakers, the Nokia N-Gage, and the Babylon A.D. film with Vin Diesel.

 

 

 

 

Ultimately, the in-game advertisements were deemed a failure and NCSoft stopped it after a few months.

 

53 minutes ago, brass_eagle said:

 

Yeah, I don't ever remembering it getting implemented fully. There was an option in the menu to turn it off, but it never turned on for me (greyed out). But I remember the opposite about community. Dev (community manager) enthusiasm and player signs of d00m. But @Lunar Ronin shows it was in. At least for a short while. Maybe I was taking a break.

 

At least the billboard looks somewhat low quality like the other crappy ones. 

 

Edit: Here is an old post I found, if you are interested, that confirms live ads were in-game like @Lunar Ronin says for a short while. There's a picture of the same Babylon movie. The poster hints it might have only been live in European servers, but also asks about cellphone ads and Nike shoes:

 

https://forumarchive.cityofheroes.dev/topic/193884

 

 

But getting waaayy off topic I suppose. Don't want to hijack out of respect for OP. 🙂 

I still have no recollection of that ad ever being in the game. Sorry.

[brass_eagle]

47 minutes ago, Rudra said:

 

I still have no recollection of that ad ever being in the game. Sorry.

 

Memory is funny. I missed the implementation myself. Don't be sorry.

[ZamuelNow]

Wasn't there also a contest for new in game ads at some point?  I'm remembering it happening but not the actual ads.

[Heliphyn34u]

Having a theater (for plays and whatnot) would be a nice addition -- even an outdoor theater location in a park would make sense (although there is an old ampitheatre in Perez, generally overrun by Clockwork).  One thing I don't think I've seen in-game is a nightclub/band venue.  There are pubs, and there's Pocket D of course, though that's more of a disco.  Think CBGB or 930 Club or Whisky A Go Go.  It'd be fun to have a line of people queued up outside a brick-front club entrance with a bassline just audible if you're standing right next to it.

 

Stadiums (Stadia?) and Amusement Parks aren't in-game either, but I think those would take up too much space.  Ditto Racetracks, Zoos, and Shopping Malls.  I guess the Arena is the closest we get to a stadium, and that's for the best.  Are there any playgrounds?  I can't remember . . .

 

Ice cream trucks would be cool, but so would an ice cream parlor -- there are a bunch of storefronts along Spanky's Boardwalk in Talos, including Cap'n Kraken's Restaurant plus a bookstore and a grocery, but the other storefronts are kinda generic.  It would make sense for one of these to at least have a sign for ice cream.  Failing that, maybe just an ice cream vendor at the Luau.

 

[Vic Raiden]

Dunno.

 

Anyway, I find it criminal that next to none of the shops/hotels/whatever across the overworlds have functioning interiors, even if it's just the lobby. Like, the only shops you get to enter in Paragon City are a small handful of enhancement vendors, while the only restaurant-adjacent location with a casually accessible interior is Blackbeard's Pub in Port Oakes, despite a number of other locales having already modeled insides for use in instanced missions. And don't even get me started on the only non-trainer tailor in Praetoria only talking with the players outside her studio instead of inside it!

 

Also, regarding travel hubs other than harbors: the map says there used to be an airport in Boomtown proper (i.e. inside the player-accessible boundaries), why aren't there any discernible ruins thereof!? And while I can accept the Skyway City airport being a more recent replacement constructed in the in-between space for extra safety, I also find it ridiculous for a city the size of Paragon to not have any 'regular' train stations that aren't the tourist maglev.

[Rudra]

6 minutes ago, Heliphyn34u said:

There are pubs, and there's Pocket D of course, though that's more of a disco.  Think CBGB or 930 Club or Whisky A Go Go.  It'd be fun to have a line of people queued up outside a brick-front club entrance with a bassline just audible if you're standing right next to it.

Studio 55.

[Vic Raiden]

6 minutes ago, Heliphyn34u said:

Stadiums (Stadia?) and Amusement Parks aren't in-game either, but I think those would take up too much space.  Ditto Racetracks, Zoos, and Shopping Malls.  I guess the Arena is the closest we get to a stadium, and that's for the best.  Are there any playgrounds?  I can't remember . . .

The only actual stadium I know of is the one in Kallisti Wharf, which is still under construction.

 

Haven't seen any playgrounds either, only a couple concrete basketball courts between random apartment blocks. No elementary, middle or high schools either, just the four Paragon University campuses.

 

Having a big shopping mall somewhere is a big dream of mine, as is having a coastside amusement park by that horn-shaped peninsula north of Astoria.

[Rudra]

I have to wonder if there are outlying suburbs to Paragon City where people actually live as opposed to the mapped portions of Paragon City which seems more commercially or industrially districted.

[Darmian]

1 hour ago, Heliphyn34u said:

Think CBGB or 930 Club or Whisky A Go Go.  It'd be fun to have a line of people queued up outside a brick-front club entrance with a bassline just audible if you're standing right next to it.

Well, Paragon Dance Party still exists, and frankly could easily be refitted with NPCs and a "live band" as opposed to the more dance oriented Pocket D.  Not to mention the Rikti Monkey Fight Club in Sharkhead, which is a lovely venue, mostly unused alas.  And as @Rudra pointed out, Studio 55 in Imperial City.

[Darmian]

The Loyalist Lounge in Nova is mainly unused, because it's in Praetoria, and is very nice.  Only accessible to Loyalists though.  Something like that elsewhere would be good.

[Lunar Ronin]

3 hours ago, ZamuelNow said:

Wasn't there also a contest for new in game ads at some point?  I'm remembering it happening but not the actual ads.

 

Yes.  Ghost Falcon posted on the old blue boards in September 2012 (after NCSoft shuttered Paragon Studios), that the idea was deemed unworkable for a multitude of reasons, but didn't go into what they were.

[Darmian]

58 minutes ago, Rudra said:

I have to wonder if there are outlying suburbs to Paragon City where people actually live as opposed to the mapped portions of Paragon City which seems more commercially or industrially districted.

There really should be what I call "Nearer Croatoas" at the least. 

[Vic Raiden]

56 minutes ago, Rudra said:

I have to wonder if there are outlying suburbs to Paragon City where people actually live as opposed to the mapped portions of Paragon City which seems more commercially or industrially districted.

I know there's a good number of medium-rise apartment blocks in Kings Row and Brickstown, but yeah, it is weird how there's not a single player-accessible proper suburban area with small single-family houses. The only area I know of that was described in official lore as a suburb is Eden, and even it is mostly skyscrapers, at least in the parts that haven't been completely naturified yet.

[Darmian]

2 minutes ago, Vic Raiden said:

I know there's a good number of medium-rise apartment blocks in Kings Row and Brickstown, but yeah, it is weird how there's not a single player-accessible proper suburban area with small single-family houses. The only area I know of that was described in official lore as a suburb is Eden, and even it is mostly skyscrapers, at least in the parts that haven't been completely naturified yet.

I'm partially imagining a Primal Earth "clean" version of Old Neutropolis. 

[Vic Raiden]

1 minute ago, Darmian said:

There really should be what I call "Nearer Croatoas" at the least. 

Speaking of Croatoa, hasn't anyone else found it weird how it's connected to Paragon City's maglev network despite being far enough away for the city to not even be visible on the horizon? Because I sincerely don't see how it could make sense in-universe.

[Rudra]

32 minutes ago, Vic Raiden said:

Speaking of Croatoa, hasn't anyone else found it weird how it's connected to Paragon City's maglev network despite being far enough away for the city to not even be visible on the horizon? Because I sincerely don't see how it could make sense in-universe.

Croatoa isn't a suburb of Paragon City. It is its own separate town, barely big enough to be a modern village. (Edit: It mostly seems to be a farming community that expanded to include a university.) And with a university there, after the Rikti Wars, it kind of makes sense to have a maglev connect to it. Distance maglev connections exist in Japan for instance, though I think those are more just updates to their pre-existing train lines. And there was an attempt in California to have a new maglev connection that ran across almost half the state, I think.

 

Edited 14 hours ago by Rudra

[Darmian]

5 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Croatoa isn't a suburb of Paragon City. It is its own separate town, barely big enough to be a modern village. (Edit: It mostly seems to be a farming community that expanded to include a university.) And with a university there, after the Rikti Wars, it kind of makes sense to have a maglev connect to it. Distance maglev connections exist in Japan for instance, though I think those are more just updates to their pre-existing train lines. And there was an attempt in California to have a new maglev connection that ran across almost half the state, I think.

 

I head canoned it as a wealthy but obviously semi rural area, due to the university, nice housing and farmsteads. All that got a bit upended with the arrival of the so-called Fae.

[ZamuelNow]

45 minutes ago, Vic Raiden said:

I know there's a good number of medium-rise apartment blocks in Kings Row and Brickstown, but yeah, it is weird how there's not a single player-accessible proper suburban area with small single-family houses. The only area I know of that was described in official lore as a suburb is Eden, and even it is mostly skyscrapers, at least in the parts that haven't been completely naturified yet.

 

As a northern city, I'd actually expect more skyscrapers than single family homes.  Especially after rebuilding from being blown up by aliens.

 

12 minutes ago, Rudra said:

(Edit: It mostly seems to be a farming community that expanded to include a university.) And with a university there, after the Rikti Wars, it kind of makes sense to have a maglev connect to it. Distance maglev connections exist in Japan for instance, though I think those are more just updates to their pre-existing train lines. And there was an attempt in California to have a new maglev connection that ran across almost half the state, I think.

 

While not as good as Japan or Europe, there are cities in America with intercity rail connecting them.

[Doomguide2005]

Should include Striga for having a small airfield.  Sky Raiders crawling all over the field.

[Vic Raiden]

Faultline and Sharkhead have similar airstrips too, the latter being part of Governor Cage's private property. Because nothing screams 'ultra-rich' like having a lavish mansion on a tiny island with its own airstrip and docks.

[UltraAlt]

3 hours ago, Doomguide2005 said:

Should include Striga for having a small airfield.  Sky Raiders crawling all over the field.

 

You mean this: