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In line with many amazing competitions from NCsoft Europe and their Draw the World Together children's charity, the most recent contest involves the UK's Daily Mirror. To celebrate the latest expansion to City of Heroes: Issue 12: Midnight Hour, NCsoft is offering one lucky Mirror reader a chance to win their very own Intel Core 2 Duo PC complete with 20" monitor encased in a uniquely-crafted case hand-painted by Andrew Wildman, one of the Draw the World Together artists.

Wildman is best known for his amazing work on the ThunderCats and The Real Ghostbusters comics during the 80's. One of his crowning achievements during this era was his work on the final issues of the Transformers comics for Marvel. To own a PC case hand-painted by him would be an honor for any comic book or gaming fan. Entering the contest is easy, and even if you don't win the grand prize, four runners-up will each receive a copy of the game.

If you haven't noticed, recently Eurogamer has been doing a series of re-reviews for the most popular MMOs, especially older ones. The City of Heroes/City of Villains games are a perfect candidate for this re-review, since they're a little over four years old now, and have just released an update. So in this re-review, Eurogamer takes a look at a few major points of the game, including the state of the server population, the most recent update entitled Issue 12: Midnight Hour, and their general view of how the game held up over all these years and where it could be headed.

Their consensus for the server population is grim, stating that the game seemed empty in the lower-level areas. This is quite common in MMOs of this age, as high level "end-game" content is usually first priority on the developers' agendas. But perhaps the underlying point that Eurogamer reiterates to us here at the end of the article is the fact that Champions Online "will inevitably take its throne". That's a whole new blog post in itself.

Our friends at mmorpg.com have reported a groundbreaking event taking place this Thursday. In a field test of the new Dyyno streaming technology, Matt 'Positron' Miller of NCSoft will be giving a live demonstration of some of the new City of Heroes Issue 12: Midnight Hour content. This includes a scenic tour of the new high-level zone, Cimerora. Matt will do his best to answer questions arising during the exposition.

Dyyno is a new high-quality streaming system that allows one-click broadcast of gameplay (or any other window) to an online audience. It's still being worked on, and we're warned that technical issues might complicate Thursday's broadcast, but it looks like an exciting new piece of tech. Visit the mmorpg.com Dyyno Room on Thursday evening at 5pm PST / 8pm EST to watch the tour, put questions to Matt and join in the test.

If you've got a deactivated City of Heroes account and that brand new Issue 12: Midnight Hour content is looking incredibly tempting, then fear not. NCsoft has given every City of Heroes account an automatic free weekend pass that started Thursday, May 22nd at 11am and will continue on until Sunday, May 25th at 8:59 PM Pacific. This is by no means something new for CoX players, but the timing is incredibly nice as there's a bunch of new content to check out.

We're just curious if there's any crossover between people playing Age of Conan and those who've played City of Heroes. When your time is limited by a busy schedule, it can be hard deciding between just one or two games for your weekend entertainment. Both games definitely have a lot to offer players for a weekend of play, but we have a feeling that the recent outbreak of barbarian fever might just be too strong for some.

Proving once again that some of the best MMO material out there is made by the fans, Chase Arcanum and Cinder Flame have released a comic book that showcases CoX Issue 12: Midnight Hour in all its various aspects. Assembled using a huge guest cast and a lot of hard work with screenshots, the Midnight Hour comic takes a wickedly humorous look at the newest issue to hit CoX, with special emphasis on the Midnight Squad and the Villain Epic Archetypes.

Regular readers will have encountered Chase Arcanum's acerbic humor before, when he covered the infamous wedding of Manticore and Sister Psyche in comic-book format. This latest edition, which can be accessed from the CoH main page or downloaded directly in PDF format, looks to be the most ambitious collaboration so far.

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Face down the forces of evil! Give good a quick jab to the jaw! Massively has all the CoX Issue 12 news you can handle. Make sure to check it out!

Acclaimed City of Heroes fan video maker Michelle, otherwise known as Samuraiko, has released her second Issue 12: Midnight Hour video, timed to coincide with the issue's launch to the live servers yesterday. Unlike the first (completely speculative) piece, this one contains plenty of footage from the actual issue, including material from Cimerora, the Midnighter Club and the Imperious Task Force.

Warning: there are some very brief potential spoilers in this video. Blink and you'll miss them, but don't say you weren' t warned!

Samuraiko's highly regarded in the CoX community as one of the best fan video makers out there, with standards comparable to those set by the official CoX videos. She's produced her own trailers and promotional films for CoX since Issue 11, including a documentary of Manticore and Sister Psyche's chaotic wedding. In her latest offering she also does a little voice acting, giving the reaction that most of us give when we step on to Cimerora' s shores for the first time.

'Midnight's Secrets' is available in high quality format on the Samuraiko Productions web site. The YouTube version follows after the break.

Our friends over at rpg.boomtown.net have posted a lengthy interview with Matt 'Positron' Miller, lead developer for City of Heroes and City of Villains. This comes just in time for the live launch of Issue 12: Midnight Hour.

Matt gives us the rundown of Midnight Hour, hinting at future storylines and assuring players that there's a very long game being played here. The seeds of future adventures are being planted right now. There's even a hint that the task force recipe drop award system, currently causing some dissatisfaction, is to be revamped. Quite right, too - who wants to undergo a whole Task Force just to get a measly Trap of the Hunter recipe instead of an endurance and health-boosting Numina's Convalescence?

Today at 6.00 AM CDT, earlier than many players were expecting, the live servers for City of Heroes went down to be patched with the latest Issue: number 12, Midnight Hour. According to lead developer Matt Miller, the testing process has been 'surprisingly smooth' and the live rollout is bang on schedule. Full patch notes are now available including some significant changes to trial accounts, which should stymie RMT considerably.

CoX players can now enjoy all the new features, including long awaited Villain Epic Archetypes, the new Midnighter Club content, the beautiful Ancient Mediterranean zone of Cimerora, the vast number of new power combinations available through Powerset Proliferation, and of course the numerous Quality of Life improvements. These last have been so well received that some players have likened the experience to playing a whole new game.

They had it coming.

City of Heroes Issue 12: Midnight Hour, now in Open Beta, comes with a nerf or two as well as all the good stuff. Over on the Test server, some changes have been made to high-level Family mobs. The changes are now on their second iteration. In the first round, high-level Family minions were altered in status, increasing their relative power without increasing the XP rewards, so that more work had to be done for the same overall result.

In response to a request for clarification ('lol devs pwnt the family mish?') the Dev Castle responded 'Indeed.'

In the latest round, minions are back to being minions again, but the XP reward has been nerfed down. The reason given, which will surprise nobody at all, is 'their reward scale has been lowered to be commensurate with the risk involved in the encounter'.

So why target the Family?

Sometimes the tiny unannounced changes are the most fun. City of Heroes Issue 12: The Midnight Hour, currently in Open Beta, has sneaked a little extra feature in under the radar.

Ordinarily, characters in CoX who fall into the water simply splash about on the surface. You can swim around there, but diving has been impossible, with the tantalizing exception of one narrow shaft in Grandville. This had been the only place where characters could submerge completely, although there was no underwater swimming, just a very surprised Coralax on a coffee break.

Our friends over at Mmorpg.com have revealed an exclusive new video for CoX Issue 12: Midnight Hour!

The video tells the story of the Midnight Squad, the secret cabal of magicians and scholars whose home - the Midnighter Club - we recently visited here at Massively. The Midnighters are only now building their numbers back up again, after the invading Rikti dealt them heavy losses.

The video's narrator, Montague Castanella, is the contact who gives out the Midnighter mission arc to heroes, ultimately giving them access to the Club. Percy Winkley, besides being a specialist in abductions from the receiving end, is also well versed in the various origins of power and will help heroes gain a greater understanding of theirs.

The other Midnighter mentioned in the video, Ashley McKnight, will be found at the Cap Au Diable University over in the Rogue Isles. She serves as a villain contact, also giving eventual access to the club. As for the shadowy gentleman at the end, he can be found in Sharkhead Isle and goes by the name of Darrin Wade. His missions are strictly villain-only, and have one of the best (and most truly villainous) finales of any arc to date.

Watch the video here!

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Face down the forces of evil! Give good a quick jab to the jaw! Massively has all the CoX Issue 12 news you can handle. Make sure to check it out!

City of Heroes Issue 12: Midnight Hour, now in Open Beta, brings with it a vast assortment of Quality of Life fixes and tweaks.

One small but highly significant fix slipped through the net and missed appearing in the first round of patch notes: the buildup of Brute Fury in PvP and against Archvillain and Giant Monster class enemies has finally been persuaded to work the way it should have. Brutes gain an additional 5 points of Fury when attacking these targets, which more than doubles their Fury building rate. The short version: a Brute can now kill you far faster than you'd expect, and can contribute more to drawn-out fights against the game's toughest enemies.

The Brute community has anticipated this change for a long time now. Without the fix, their viability in PvP was not much to write home about. Now, Castle the Powers Guy has made a lot of Brutes very happy.

Kaiserin tells the story best, with a one-shot painted comic strip.

With City of Heroes Issue 12 finally in Open Beta, people can talk about it, and there is a lot of talking going on.

On May 7th, the folks at Split Infinity Radio managed to corner CoX Devs Floyd Grubb and Matt Miller, otherwise known as Castle the Powers Guy and Positron the Lead Developer, and sit them down for a good long interview. Players attending via IRC also submitted questions.

Much like the earlier interview with Joe Morrissey on CoH Podcast, there's a lot of meaty information. Although DJ Jules can sound giggly and nervous at times, she's a sweetie and a long-term supporter of CoX, and SI Radio is the winner of a MMOFury fansite award. So we're going to let her off.

The interview is now available for download here.

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Face down the forces of evil! Give good a quick jab to the jaw! Massively has all the CoX Issue 12 news you can handle. Make sure to check it out!

Massively Speaking Episode 4 runs down news and features from Massively.com for the week of April 28th- May 4th. Two of our talented columnists fill the third and fourth chairs this week: James Murff and Player vs. Everything's Cameron Sorden! Listen in as we tackle the CoX Issue 12 content, rumors of new World of Warcraft features, and Guild Wars' third anniversary.

As a note: when we discussed the Activision/Vivendi E3 event, we were unaware that Blizzard was not going to be attending.

Have a comment for the podcasters? Shoot us an email to massivelyspeakingpodcast AT gmail DOT com. Maybe we'll read your letter on the air!

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