New efforts!

[Ohioknight]

Just thinking out loud, a peer to peer model where everyone technically has their own 'server' that synchronizes with everyone else's 'server' over a shared neutral medium would, in theory, be just about impossible to shut down.

But to build a thing like that you'd have to have already developed and demonstrated a technology that allowed distributed clients to do something like use a power to throw a frisbee to another player or something -- crazy talk.

[Sinistar]

On the day the shutdown was announced, I was told they actually got all the Paragon staff together to make the announcement and while they were in that meeting their computers were boxed up to take them out of circulation.

On the other hand I've never seen an example of that process being executed in a foolproof manner.

Doesn't mean someone who had some type of warning what was to come didn't copy the code, or had been copying it anyway as a "just in case" idea. 

To say that NCSoft no longer has the code is pure garbage.

[Sinistar]

Just thinking out loud, a peer to peer model where everyone technically has their own 'server' that synchronizes with everyone else's 'server' over a shared neutral medium would, in theory, be just about impossible to shut down.

So...when do you think you will have that ready?

Relax, I kid, I kid..........or do I?

[Jaybonaut]

He is none other than former CoX Senior Designer Tim "Black Scorpion" Sweeney.   

Is it Sweeney or Sweeny?  Tim Sweeney is that very vocal guy from Epic Games who hates Microsoft.  I don't think it's the same guy at all.

[Brigadine]

For NC to end the talks they did is unreal man.

[Codewalker]

Tim Sweeney is that very vocal guy from Epic Games who hates Microsoft.  I don't think it's the same guy at all.

If by "very vocal guy" you mean "Founder and CEO", yeah, that's Epic's Sweeney. I don't remember him being that vocal, but then again that was back in the days when Epic (Mega)Games was called Potomac Computer Systems, so he may have changed since then.

Tim "Black Scorpion" Sweeney is actually spelled with the 'e' as well, despite the apparent typo on Paragon Wiki. Funnily enough, he went to work at Epic after Paragon Studios was shut down. I bet that wasn't confusing at all.

Well, apparently I'm remembering wrong. I could have sworn he went to Epic with Hosun, but apparently he went to Capcom and then some company called Schell. I distinctly remember joking about it -- maybe he was just interviewing there but it didn't work out. Here's his linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timsweeney67

[Tubbius]

I wondered how this thread jumped 6 pages in 2 days.

Then I read all the stuff. 

What's this Reddit business someone mentioned, about Paragon's failure to get the game?

And, yeah, this reads like it's all over.  Unless NCSoft decides to release City of Heroes: Classic or something after a basically five year dead zone. . . Right.  :/

Then again, come to think of it, they could rerelease City and have ads everywhere in it for Master x Master!  Genius!

[Codewalker]

The synchronized Paragon Chat model is technically not really one of those three, but a distinct fourth option.

Yeah, it's somewhere between #1 and #2 on your list. It can run in offline mode in which case everything is handled locally, or it can cooperate with other people's instances to give the illusion of a shared world.

The next logical step would be to implement some sort of oversight layer to regulate the coordination, possibly using cryptographic signatures, in order to resolve disputes when individual nodes don't agree about what happened.

For something serious like team-based combat you'd probably need to adopt a model similar to FPSes, where one node is selected as the authoritative "host" while in an instance, which runs things like combat calculations and distributes the results to the others.

[Sermon]

What's this Reddit business someone mentioned, about Paragon's failure to get the game?

https://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/4gv8xl/final_moments_before_city_of_heroes_shut_down_for/d2lkkqd/

It's not as juicy as one might hope.

[Victoria Victrix]

Well my initial thought is this.  First, they needed some characters for this MOBA, preferably ones they own, so they don't have to pay to develop new ones.

And the other is that they think Americans are children that can be distracted with a new doll done up like their beloved now incinerated doll.  Except the beloved and now incinerated doll was a 60 cm tall resin model, highly articulated, and completely customizable.  And the one being offered is a 15 cm rigid-bodied hard plastic Barbie-clone model with 5 joints.  The costume is the only thing that is the same.

Or...to say it with pictures...they stole this--



They're offering this

[Matt Bold]

If BABs said in the reddit thread that there were private servers running around when the game was live and everyone seems so sure a copy of the code exists somewhere, I don't know how nothing has come up so far and how it hasn't been accidentally "leaked"

[Arcana]

For something serious like team-based combat you'd probably need to adopt a model similar to FPSes, where one node is selected as the authoritative "host" while in an instance, which runs things like combat calculations and distributes the results to the others.

I wonder how viable the space shuttle model is: five computers calculate, majority consensus calculation wins.

I've seen this done (often badly, but still) in cluster datastores.  One node makes an assertion.  If it matches a locally computed assertion it is accepted.  If it doesn't, but enough nodes make the assertion to cross a threshold, the local contrary assertion is revoked.  The worst implementation of this I'm aware of: Active Directory itself.  But there are good ones.  It has to be doable for real time calculations, since the space shuttle worked (at least, initially: I believe the quorum flight computer system was revised at some point after the system was implemented).

[Arcana]

And the other is that they think Americans are children that can be distracted with a new doll done up like their beloved now incinerated doll.  Except the beloved and now incinerated doll was a 60 cm tall resin model, highly articulated, and completely customizable.  And the one being offered is a 15 cm rigid-bodied hard plastic Barbie-clone model with 5 joints.  The costume is the only thing that is the same.

Look, for the last time I said I was sorry, Amazon was out of stock, and who knew silly string was that flammable?

[MegaWatt]

Look, for the last time I said I was sorry, Amazon was out of stock, and who knew silly string was that flammable?

i desperately want to believe this is a real incident.....

[Vee]

Oh like we all haven't made bukakke snuff films with our overly sexualized tony stark dolls.

[Black Pebble]

Well, apparently I'm remembering wrong. I could have sworn he went to Epic with Hosun, but apparently he went to Capcom and then some company called Schell. I distinctly remember joking about it -- maybe he was just interviewing there but it didn't work out. Here's his linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timsweeney67

I'm friends with 2 Tim Sweeney's in the video game industry. One of them has his own Wikipedia page. The other is a ginger.

Neither have crossed paths, despite my best efforts at a photo.

And I haven't worked with soulless Tim Sweeney since Paragon. :-(

[Black Pebble]

I never believed that for a second. Of course they have copies, it would be stupid for them to delete an asset when storage is so cheap.

I see you haven't had a chance to meet with the NCSOFT operations team.

[Surelle]

I see you haven't had a chance to meet with the NCSOFT operations team.

Lol, ouch!  Hi Black Pebble!  Welcome to our little corner of the internet!     We're keepin' the home fires burnin' here.  How have you been?  What have you been up to lately?

[Dev7on]

Hey guys, I'm sort of late on this I heard the recent news that NCsoft's new MMO project Master X Master have added Statesman into their game I know we're furious right now because Facebook and Twitter is blowing up. When I visited their site and read his bio it's actually Tyrant wearing Statesman's costume! That's disrespectful to us, to the Devs from Paragon Studios and to Jack Emmert who created him. This leads me to SO many questions: Will this affect the deal with Nate Downs? Are we EVER going to see our City back? We need answers!

[Dev7on]

This is as close of an answer as anyone will ever get on the talks.
They failed. NCSoft is going to keep the IP.
Any attempt to use it will be seen as copyright infringement.
It's bittersweet in knowing, but now I know there's no point in checking daily for an update.
The answer finally came.

NO! I WANT TO HERE FROM NATE DOWNS AND TELL US IF THEY FAILED OR NOT I'M NOT GOING DOWN WITHOUT A FIGHT!