Joystiq has you covered with all things Metal Gear Solid 4!
Posts with tag coh

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
New City of Heroes fanzine launched

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Fan art

City of Heroes community relations manager Alex 'Lighthouse' Von Minden doubles up as the editor for a new CoX Fanzine. The current issue is technically Issue 1, the former 'Issue 0' having been released as a preview issue, reproducing material from the Fan Submissions section of the Top Cow comic.

Issue 1 features a spectacular cover by Douglas Shuler, with Back Alley Brawler and Ghost Widow apparently on the same side for once. The background of Cimeroran soldiers can only mean they're among the many Heroes and Villains who've chosen to set aside their differences for long enough to help Imperious make the future safe. Ghost Widow's not looking too shabby for someone who's been dead at least three years, as Back Alley Brawler (the developer) would have liked to affirm.

Continue reading New City of Heroes fanzine launched

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
Hints keep coming for future content in CoX

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Classes, Lore, Rumors

It's a month and a half since City of Heroes Issue 12: Midnight Hour went live, and by now the developers will have been hard at work on Issue 13 for some time. While there has been little in the way of concrete information, over time the Developers have given out a multitude of hints and comments that have enabled us to put together a speculative look at some of the coming content. As we'll see, there's been a lot more hinted at concerning powers and game systems than new mission content or zones.

The safest bet for Issue 13 is the introduction of the Shields powerset, which Back Alley Brawler has described at length: 'Shields will be a defensive powerset, not an AT. They'll also be useable with any unarmed or right handed weapon powerset... because Shields require their own combat mode animations, they have to work with every attack power, every buff, debuff, hit reaction, pool power, ancillary power, and patron power that might be used while holding a shield out in front of you. So the bulk of work on Shields is just all the animations.' The bulk of those animations were completed with Issue 12, as many of the Cimeroran NPCs use shields. Since the NPC hero Blue Steel is famous for his shield, we'd be surprised not to see him play an active part in the game at last.

Continue reading Hints keep coming for future content in CoX

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
Strong hint at Broadsword for Villains in CoX

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Classes

Back Alley Brawler of City of Heroes has made a brief but encouraging comment on the official forums, hinting strongly at a new piece of Powerset Proliferation in Issue 13. Villains who had complained of not having access to the funky new Nictus Sword have been reminded that they don't have the necessary sets 'yet'. Unless this is a cruel tease, this means Villains will be getting broadsword soon - and despite Back Alley Brawler's habit of turning into a shark when he visits the Test Server, we don't think he's that mean.

We already know that more Powerset Proliferation is coming in Issue 13, because Positron and Castle have told us it'll bring the villain equivalent of Empathy (which won't, of course, be called Empathy). Issue 13 is also an ideal time to give Villains the Broadsword set, as it should be bringing Shields, too. We've already learned that Shields will be a defensive powerset, usable with one-handed and unarmed sets; this opens up the possibility of Broadsword and Shield wielding Brutes, surely an obvious combination to go for. The Shield animations are now largely done, courtesy of the Roman NPCs in the Cimerora zone released with Issue 12, so we can't see any reason why they'd miss Issue 13.

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
Car offered as prize in CoX machinima contest

Filed under: Super-hero, Video, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Contests

After a tense week of mounting expectation, in which we waited for the promised big news to hit the City of Heroes multimedia forums, the Toyota Matrix Machinima Contest has just been announced. Contestants are asked to put together a video using City of Heroes and/or City of Villains, in which the theme is to be getting in touch with your dark side. After all, even heroes have a dark side of some sort, right? Videos have to be 2-4 minutes long and no more than 200 mb in size.

The Grand Prize is spectacular: 'A 2009 Model Year Toyota Matrix S model filled with a year subscription to "City of Heroes" and "City of Villains," an XBox 360, a Playstation 3, a Nintendo DS gaming console, and tons of super hero video games!' We know there's an ocean of talent out there, so we're anticipating some stellar entries from the CoX machinima crowd.

Details of the contest, along with full rules and regulations, are available at the official website.

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
CoX July desktop wallpaper recalls controversial issue

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Lore, Rumors

This month's desktop wallpaper for City of Heroes recalls Issue 3, A Council of War. This was one of the most content-packed issues, bringing (among other features) the Striga Isle zone, the Hess Task Force (still a firm favorite) and the Kheldian epic archetypes. New Epic Power Pools were opened up for the regular ATs, and 'zone events' such as the Ghost Ship, the Clockwork Paladin and Lusca, the giant octopus of Independence Port, were added.

There was also a key change made to the game world itself, which excited controversy across the official forums and beyond. The Fifth Column villain group was replaced with the Council, an organisation very similar in powers but conspicuously lacking the Nazi background. As A Council of War coincided with the official European release of City of Heroes, some irate players reached a seemingly obvious conclusion: the Fifth Column had been removed due to 'political correctness'

Continue reading CoX July desktop wallpaper recalls controversial issue

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
New CoX patch on Test makes stunning changes

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Patches, PvP, PvE

A new patch has gone to the City of Heroes test server today. Courtesy of the European CoX forums, we've been able to take a look at the patch notes a little in advance. It's another round of fixes and tweaks, and we're particularly pleased to see the dual pistol wielding Lady Jane has been given a stern talking-to and instructed not to rush into combat like a maniac any more. The 48 month Veteran Reward pets are similarly non-suicidal - for real this time.

The controversial change, though, must surely be the adjustment of Total Focus: 'All player versions of Total Focus Disorient Magnitude reduced to 3.' For those who don't know, Total Focus is a double-handed overhead smash that previously dealt a Magnitude 4 disorient. That's one of the most powerful stun effects in the game, enough to send a boss staggering and temporarily helpless.

Continue reading New CoX patch on Test makes stunning changes

World of WarcraftWorld of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
Cinemassively: This American Hero

Filed under: City of Heroes, Second Life, Cinemassively, Machinima


We're subbing in for our regular machinima blogger, Moo Money, who is AFK for the next little while. Today for Cinemassively, we're bringing you a video we stumbled across recently and really enjoyed. For those who are fans of the Chicago Public Radio show This American Life, this machinima made by SuperZuck took elements from both TAL and City of Heroes and presented (the beginning of) a day in the life of an old-school hero turned filmmaker. Tasty shades of meta.

While this is only part one of the work, we are definitely interested in seeing more machinima of this nature! Paragon City holds many heroes, each with a different story, and reasons all their own. Excellent work, SuperZuck, and congrats on your first-place win in Molotov Alva's "Your Virtual Life" machinima contest! We look forward to the rest of this "episode."

Anti-Aliased: Keep crying, sportsmanship is dead

Filed under: Culture, Opinion, Anti-Aliased


One harsh world PvP battle later, your corpse lies on the ground as your opponent stands triumphant over you. Both of you put up one good battle, as even your opponent is down to barely any hit points -- the kind of battle where a few randomly generated misses turned the tide of the engagement. Yet, what do you get for your efforts against this opponent? Do you get a /salute, or a /kneel? Maybe even the honor of a /bow? No, of course not, you get the /spit and an orcish teabag in your face just so the 12-year-old on the other side of the keyboard can get his daily jollies.

Of course, that's not counting the 7 more times he's going to camp your corpse just so you can't progress for the next 3 hours. And it's also not counting the ninja looters, the belligerent kids in battlegrounds who take orders from no one, and the lying little brats who spew language fit for a factory worker but cry to their parents the second you try to enforce some authority.

We have many ways of quantifying these behaviors; things like "If you can't stand PvP then go to a carebear (normal) server," "If you don't like it being done to you then do it to someone else," or "Get better gear, n00b." We all know what's going on here, and it's none of the above. Let's just say it aloud and come clean about it: Sportsmanship is dead, and it's been dead for a long time.

Continue reading Anti-Aliased: Keep crying, sportsmanship is dead

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
In-game ads now live in CoX

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains


The first sign of the much-debated in game advertisements has now made it into City of Heroes. So far, there appears to be only one ad, a billboard-size poster advertising JETER CLUTCH sneakers. British players needn't worry about seeing this particular ad, as they won't be able to, whether they play on American servers or not. The ads are regionally targeted, so only those that are appropriate for a given audience will show up. We've not yet received any reports of what the UK players see instead, though some players have found a cached image of Statesman standing near a Union Flag.

Understandably, even though these ads are optional, not all players are happy with their presence in CoX. Immersion seems to be the main issue, so some players, led by Marcian Tobay of the City Scoop, have started a satirical thread to customize the sneaker ad for a super-powered audience. There are some funny entries, but you'd be hard pressed to match Zombie Man for sheer quality of snark.

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
City of Heroes ramps up the excitement for Comic Con

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Events, real-world, Comics

The City of Heroes crew have fired up their travel powers to attend Comic Con, which runs from July 23rd to 27th in San Diego. The band of heroes in attendance includes Community Manager Alex 'Lighthouse' Von Minden, Community Co-Ordinator (and PvP enthusiast) Jill 'Ex Libris' Henderson, and developer Ray 'Blue Steel' Snyder, among others.

The big event of CoH's Comic Con is the Pocket D Jubilee, which has been scheduled for Saturday July 26th. You needn't be a City of Heroes subscriber to attend; all you need do is visit the booth and ask for a VIP Pass. The event is open to all Comic Con Attendees and City of Heroes subscribers that are 21+, have valid I.D. and have picked up a pass from the NCsoft booth. In the spirit of Pocket D, the interdimensional nightclub where heroes and villains can mingle in peace, the first thousand visitors to the booth also get a free drink ticket, one per person - again, provided they're 21 or older.

The VIP Pass will also unlock a special item in-game. NCsoft haven't yet announced what it is, but availability is limited to this one show only.

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
Jack Emmert named as GenCon industry guest of honor

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Events, real-world, MMO industry, Champions Online

Jack 'Statesman Jackalope' Emmert is to be one of the Industry Guests of Honor at GenCon, to be held Aug. 14-17 in Indianapolis. Best known for his work on City of Heroes, in which he took over from original lead designer Rick Dakan, Jack is now the chief creative officer in the Cryptic team working on Champions Online.

Jack Emmert is definitely qualified to speak about iterative game design, as the City of Heroes design process featured no small number of clinkers that were identified as such by the player base, despite looking good at the design stage. Jack's self-deprecatingly frank about his early mistakes, and explains how he's learned from them: 'We assumed a player would get the mission, go into the instance, realize that he was facing a "boss," leave the mission, find a friend, and then tackle the "boss" together. I was pretty darn naïve back then.' Jack's willingness to engage with the player base had the unfortunate secondary effect of giving dissatisfied players an articulate target for their frustration. Even now, Jack is still remembered in some quarters as a sort of uber-bogeyman armed with a colossal nerf bat.

Continue reading Jack Emmert named as GenCon industry guest of honor

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
Grab your free CoX slots while you can

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains

Enigmatic City of Heroes redname Ghost Falcon has drawn players' attention to an important point: the offer of two free character slots just for logging in won't last forever. When Issue 12: Midnight Hour went live, bringing with it the long-awaited code for additional purchaseable character slots, all players who logged in were able to claim two slots for free. Long-term players got even more, but everyone was granted at least two - which is conveniently just enough to start one Soldier of Arachnos VEAT and one Arachnos Widow.

The patch notes at the time explained that this wouldn't be a permanent offer, but some players may have overlooked this. As Ghost Falcon explains, 'Please note that the free two slots are only being given to "active" accounts that log into the game during this gift window. If your account is active, but you've never logged in, you're not getting your two free slots when the window closes.' The good news is that NCsoft hasn't yet specified a closing date for the window. Nonetheless, if you're thinking about coming back to CoX, or just pondering logging in for long enough to claim the freebies, now is a good time to do it.

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
Unlockable Nictus Sword sneaks into CoX

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains

'Forged a million years ago, black blade!' sang Blue Oyster Cult far too many years ago. They were, of course, rocking out over Elric of Melnibone's famous soul-drinking weapon, Stormbringer. Since the patch of June 17th, something not all that dissimilar to the moaning sword has now turned up in City of Heroes as a new broadsword option, without any announcement in the patch notes.

The Nictus Sword, as you can clearly see, manages to be both dark and shiny. A Nictus, for those who have yet to encounter them, is a form of evil Kheldian, a disembodied quasi-vampiric energy being.

Continue reading Unlockable Nictus Sword sneaks into CoX

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
New CoX patch brings /sync command live, nerfs Behemoths

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Bugs, Patches

The CoX servers went down today to apply the latest patch, which is mostly a collection of fixes. It's notable for the inclusion of a player-side means to address the sync bug, which we looked at late last week. By using the /sync command, players can now resynchronize their client with the server, putting an end to the 'deserted city' syndrome.

Unfortunately, the buff icon bug which has been hanging around for several weeks now is still not completely fixed. This bug messes up the display of little icons that indicate a given buff has been placed. Archetypes whose powersets include a lot of team buffs, such as Corruptors and Defenders, have found this especially frustrating.

Continue reading New CoX patch brings /sync command live, nerfs Behemoths

World of WarcraftWorld of Warcraft
'Blind invites' still a heated subject in CoX

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Culture, Grouping

There are three subjects guaranteed to cause multiple-page arguments on the CoX forums. (Four, if you count the old chestnut about how 'the Fifth Column were taken out of the game because of the European release', which doesn't seem to crop up any more since Issue 12, for some reason.) In short, these are:

  • Why does everyone hate PLers, and what is so bad about power leveling anyway
  • Defenders aren't Healers, and if you say they are, you are a noob (and should go back to WoW)
  • Why do people send blind invites, I hate it (or alternatively, 'why do people get so worked up about blind invites, it's no big deal.')

Continue reading 'Blind invites' still a heated subject in CoX

Next Page >

Massively Features

Tip of the Day

Reached the endgame in EverQuest 2? You're not really uber until you have your epic weapon. Find out how!

Featured Galleries


follow massively at http://twitter.com
    News
    Academic rss feed
    At a glance rss feed
    Betas rss feed
    Bugs rss feed
    Business models rss feed
    Classes rss feed
    Contests rss feed
    Crafting rss feed
    Culture rss feed
    Economy rss feed
    Education rss feed
    Endgame rss feed
    Events, in-game rss feed
    Events, real-world rss feed
    Expansions rss feed
    Exploits rss feed
    Forums rss feed
    Game mechanics rss feed
    Guilds rss feed
    Hands-on rss feed
    Humor rss feed
    Interviews rss feed
    Launches rss feed
    Legal rss feed
    Lore rss feed
    Machinima rss feed
    Maps rss feed
    Massively highlights rss feed
    Massively meta rss feed
    MMO industry rss feed
    New titles rss feed
    News items rss feed
    Opinion rss feed
    Patches rss feed
    Player Housing rss feed
    Politics rss feed
    Previews rss feed
    Professions rss feed
    PvE rss feed
    PvP rss feed
    Races rss feed
    Reviews rss feed
    Roleplaying rss feed
    Rumors rss feed
    Server downtime rss feed
    Trading card games rss feed
    Virtual worlds rss feed
    Features
    Adventures from the Back Row rss feed
    Anti-Aliased rss feed
    As the Worlds Turn rss feed
    Ask Massively rss feed
    Behind the Curtain rss feed
    Blogging into Mordor rss feed
    Cinemassively rss feed
    Comic Watch rss feed
    Dwell on It rss feed
    EVE Evolved rss feed
    First Impressions rss feed
    Gamer Interrupted rss feed
    Have Clone, Will Travel rss feed
    Making/Money rss feed
    Massively Event Coverage rss feed
    Massively Hands-on rss feed
    Massively Interviews rss feed
    Massively Speaking rss feed
    MMO Mash-up rss feed
    MMO MMOnkey rss feed
    MMOGology rss feed
    MMOS X rss feed
    One Shots rss feed
    Peering Inside rss feed
    Player Consequences rss feed
    Player vs. Everything rss feed
    Practical Marketing rss feed
    Rogue Signal rss feed
    The Daily Grind rss feed
    The Digital Continuum rss feed
    The Gaming Iconoclast rss feed
    Tip of the Day rss feed
    TurpsterVision rss feed
    Under the Hood rss feed
    Strategy
    Grouping rss feed
    Guides rss feed
    Leveling rss feed
    Making money rss feed
    Quests rss feed
    Raiding rss feed
    Tips and tricks rss feed
    Media
    Comics rss feed
    Fan art rss feed
    Galleries rss feed
    Podcasts