TonyV

By the way, that is an awesome story.

I synchronized your forum and CIT passwords to your CIT password. Give it a shot now.

Also, you might have to clear your cookies for the tracking and everything to work. If all else fails, hit F2 and try logging out and back in.

I just logged in and didn't have any trouble. Are other people having any issues? (Are other people not?) If I've hosed something up, I definitely want to fix it!

And that oughtta do it. All I did was put our main site files under revision control and pull the source back down, so you shouldn't notice any difference. As always, though, whenever you make any changes, there's a risk of wonkiness happening. If you notice anything, let me know!

Here's the thing, though.

Christopher Bruce was one of the most loyal employees to the game. He was an avid player before he worked for NCsoft, and when a job came open, he moved all the way from Oklahoma out to San Francisco to be part of the the City of Heroes team. When times were lean, he was one of only 15 people working on the game. He was the only animator and effects guy. He was extremely innovative when it came to features such as power customization that everyone else had all but given up on, even the players themselves. He attended every in-game dev/rep event that I knew of, he diligently answered innumerable questions on the forums, he gave us unparalleled insight into what was happening with our game, and most of the players truly liked and admired him.

Now normally, when you have someone who has such a rapport with your customers, who has shown such unswerving loyalty to the company and its products (for god's sake, he worked on Auto Assault before City of Heroes!), and has a demonstrated history of churning out amazing work, you don't lay them off. Even when times are tight, you keep them around, because they're the ones you want with you especially when times are tight.

I don't know why the guy was laid off. From what I've read and heard, he doesn't know either. If layoffs had to happen, why lay off the guy described above? None of us may ever know. Maybe he wasn't as productive as he used to be. Maybe one of the new people is a wiz that makes him look old and busted in comparison. Having dealt with corporatie layoffs myself, most likely in my opinion, is that it had nothing to do with his will or ability. Since he had worked for NCsoft for a while, his salary, bonuses, and benefits were very likely higher than many of the other employees', especially the new people's. I could be wrong (such is the nature of speculation), but it just strikes me as a purely short-term financial decision.

But here's what concerns me. It's not that the game is suddenly going to fold. It is that City of Heroes seems to be getting more and more "corporatized." One of the things that sets City of Heroes apart from most MMOs is its community. Unlike most other games I know of, the devs and reps really do feel more like friends than overlords, which is how most other games feel. But if the company starts prioritizing other concerns such as inflating the bottom line over the loyalty, dedication, contribution, and customer relationship in their employees, what does that say about how it regards its customers or how it will treat them down the line?

My concern is that it doesn't take many decisions like this before City of Heroes becomes MMORPG #2183, ho hum, and I sincerely hope that this doesn't become just "one of these things that happens."

Still, I'm the same ol' Tony that I've always been, so things can't really be that bad.

HOLY $@#!

I've been given millions of influence before, but cold, hard cash? And a hundred grand at that!!? Damn, man, that's AWESOME!!!

(Sorry, I had to...)

Shoot, man, guessing is half the fun of it! That's why I put the origins out beside each abbreviation, to give a contextual hint on where to start.

Now, I'm not saying that raptor packs or inherent fitness will destroy the game. But I will say, no matter what you are arguing for or against, "You mind your little red wagon and I'll mind mine" is always a facetious argument. This is an MMORPG. We're all riding in the same wagon.

What? No I didn't, and you can't prove that I did!

Behold the power of having access to edit the answers! Seriously, though, I could have sworn it was in there. Assuming everyone who got to it would have gotten to it, add four to the number of times it would have been answered correctly. Since it's (no surprise, probably) listed last, it shouldn't have affected any other answers.

Well, as two of you figured out already, I went ahead and posted a quiz that is, in theory, a little easier. The answers aren't that hard, but the challenge is mentally getting them in order before the allotted time is up. If you're feeling up to it, give it a shot. Here it is:

• Alphabetical Archetypes

Dude, eight is awesome. Before I looked them up, I could only remember around ten, and hell, I worked on a lot of the articles for them!