So near around my birthday back in 2004, I spotted a PC game box on the shelf that had a bunch of superhero characters on it and asked the store clerk "What was this all about?"
That, said the clerk, was one of the newest Massive Multiplayer Online (MMO) games called City of Heroes.
I knew what MMOs were. Up until then, they tended to be fantasy-based like Everquest or Runescape, and I wasn't too enthralled about them. I was more into science fiction than fantasy, and more into comic books than either at the time.
Having a superhero based online game was tempting to pass up, though. So I bought it.
And... got addicted to it.
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Welcome, to Paragon City!
Don't mind the Level 1s... |
Part of it was the gameplay: Relatively simple compared to other MMOs of the time, with different means of crafting boosts (enhancements) to give your character more power and durability in battle. Another part was the roleplay: A healthy mix of different (Arche)Types to roll made mixing and matching powersets reasonably fun and gave you a chance to build different ATs to test which ones - Blaster (Ranged Damage), Controller (Holders), Defender (Healers), Scrapper (Melee Damage), or Tanker (Meat Shield) - worked best for you.
One of the things about being into superheroes was being into the set universe - DC, Marvel, other - that allowed for fans' imaginations about being a hero in that 'verse. While CoH was its own franchise - and indeed ran into issues stopping players from rolling trademarked builds - fans still have in their heads a stable - entire teams worth - of different types of heroes they'd like to be.
It was common for players to roll multiple alts. The game gave you 10 slots per page (and a ton of pages) to fill, and people would just get about 50 or 60 of them built before maxing any of their levels up (first to 40, then to 50). Altitis (altoholism) is a thing, and CoH contributed to it. New ATs like Brutes, Corruptors, Dominators, Masterminds, and Stalkers added even more addictive appeal.
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| Say hello to Witty Librarian, on the Homecoming's Excelsior server! |
When I first got the game in 2004, it had just finished its Beta testing phase and was actually two-three weeks into gaming. I stumbled around on the various servers before settling on Champion server where I was able to meet people who were willing to team up. One of the things about leveling in-game is that you have to run missions, sometimes story arcs provided by NPC contacts, or Task Forces that doled out bigger item drops. So there's a lot of PvE (teaming) involved. Finding an active Supergroup - think Avengers/Justice League - was a must.
(In terms of PvP - player vs. player - City of Heroes attempted that by adding a new side City of Villains and then created Arenas and shared Hazard Zones where PvP would happen. Two things happened: 1) The developers brought it in too late and the PvP fans weren't interested in the game and 2) Too many people had gotten into the teaming part of CoH/V to where they didn't want to play against each other, so the PvP aspect remains minor)
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| Soling this mob at Level 8 in Perez Park would be a mess. Find a team first! |
Thing about the game, certain ATs played better early on that others. Blasters (think Superman's heat vision or Iron Man's repulsors) were extremely popular early because they were easy to figure out and doled out the most damage. Later updates (Issues) began nerfing or boosting other ATs to where Tankers (think the Hulk) became the preferred type to roll. There was an epic nerfing of armors in Issues 5 and 6 that almost killed the whole game, but the players tolerated it as later Issues course-corrected those mistakes and allowed the game to be more fun.
As I said, Tanker became very popular, to the point where it's one of the often-seen builds in the game. A group in one of the servers began hosting Tanker Tuesdays on a weekly basis, which quickly built a following and a good way to find people to team with on other days of the week. Up above is one of my many Alts, Witty Tanker. Yes, there is a theme. Gamers will tend to name alts after a common nickname/identity. My in-game nickname is Witty, short for Witty Librarian, and so I've rolled numerous Alts with Witty in the name.
You'd be amazed how quickly names can go in-game. When murder hornets hit the newswire late April 2020, I immediately logged in and created a Murder Hornet alt. Within minutes of my doing that, I started receiving in-game text messages from angry players that I had gotten to it first.
All those screenshots are from last night's Tuesday Tanker run (missions team running high-level door missions to help lower-level builds that are SideKicked can get better XP to level). You can see a lot of different uniforms and costume styles, part of the CoH allure. City of Heroes gained a reputation for one of the most diverse and colorful costuming among all the MMOs - better than Warcraft - and allowed for even more Alts to get built around themed costume designs.
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| And THAT is what it looks like when your Alt hits a new level up! |
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Oh no, the abandoned mine map! Veterans of the game
aren't a fan of these (too narrow, and one map has a nasty room
we called the Layer Cake). |
While it was fun to play - and needed a few months here and there to step away to keep from getting too addictive - it all came to an end when the game's owner NCSoft decided to end it (in spite of its popularity in the US and Europe, the South Korean company never understood the appeal and wanted to expand newer franchises) by 2012. The outrage back then was intense, even from non-players. Attempts were made to buy up the rights, but they all fell through,
and it all ended with fans standing in Atlas Park holding up torches in remembrance.
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The Last Night in Paragon City
November 30, 2012 |
Except...
A number of gamer fans had gained access to the base code, and had begun underground servers to maintain and keep a core set of players going. Due to the illegality of it - NCSoft still owned the rights - they kept it hush-hush as much as possible, inviting back players they knew would keep their damn mouths shut.
(Glances about) (whispers) I got invited to the secret server around 2018.
Until 2019, when someone finally blabbed on a public forum, due to concerns that the game code contained the personal information of those who had paid to play between 2004 through 2012 (some MMOs required full registration for full access, some offer limited access for free, and CoH had both). Immediately, hundreds of thousands clamored to get back on the game, even with the pending legal battle that NCSoft was sure to unleash.
Except...
NCSoft decided not to pursue the matter as long as none of the server providers required people to pay (they could donate monthly to help pay for server space/office bills instead). Someone must have explained to the bosses that this was an audience that could - and would - pay down the line if they ever brought it back as a fee-based MMO.
A number of alternative CoH sites sprang up, with Homecoming - formed by the people who ran the secret server - gaining a sizable advantage. Homecoming also made back-room discussions with NCSoft to be the official provider, with all of the talks wrapping up this past January to where the game is officially back.
Whether they will convert the current setup to a pay-to-play model - which could reduce the number of active Alts and the ability to build post-50 Veteran-level Alts - remains to be seen. In the meantime, there are nights when multiple servers on Homecoming are packed, there is ongoing interest in playing the game, and demand for new power sets for more Alts remains constant.
So I may have my Shardtobers back after all! If I can convince people that the gameplay's improved to where we can run those Task Forces in under two hours now.
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| Witty Librarian in figurine! |
And don't even get me started on all the Badge Hunting that happens in-game...
