NCSoft Snags 'City of Heroes' & 'City of Villians' IPs
Cryptic Studios To Continue Developing New Titles & New IPs
http://www.crypticstudios.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=162&Itemid=31
from 
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All parties concerned have confirmed the sale of the City of Heroes and City of Villians intellectual property to Korean based NCSoft. NCSoft and developer Cryptic Studios made sure to point out that the sale will not cause any kind of decline in the titles' quality but only allow the game universe as a whole to progress.
Cryptic had the following to say about why they decided to sell the valuable IPs: "When we considered the future of CoH/CoV and the future of Cryptic Studios, we had a difficult decision to make. We've invested a lot of time, effort, talent and passion into the games, and we care about them. But we've got a lot of other ideas we're excited about too.
Ultimately, we decided that selling to NCsoft was the best and right thing to do for the CoH community. CoH/CoV will be in good hands at NCsoft, and the transition will be as seamless as possible. With this move, we now have complete creative freedom and the resources we need to develop new games."
NCSoft will be taking over all of the duties for the game upon the transition's completion, which will be overseen by Cryptic and NCSoft. After the transition Cryptic will be focusing on new titles and new IPs. One the flip side of things, NCSoft has announced that they have recruited numerous key members of the Cryptic Studios staff to join their newly formed NorCal studio which will support the titles.
Player relations have also picked up, NCSoft has stated that all players will be able to play as "the other side" free of charge. Also along with the release of Issue 11 will come a wipe of all character Debt and a bonus of 20,000 Prestige per Supergroup members for Supergroups.
Cryptic had the following to say about why they decided to sell the valuable IPs: "When we considered the future of CoH/CoV and the future of Cryptic Studios, we had a difficult decision to make. We've invested a lot of time, effort, talent and passion into the games, and we care about them. But we've got a lot of other ideas we're excited about too.
Ultimately, we decided that selling to NCsoft was the best and right thing to do for the CoH community. CoH/CoV will be in good hands at NCsoft, and the transition will be as seamless as possible. With this move, we now have complete creative freedom and the resources we need to develop new games."
NCSoft will be taking over all of the duties for the game upon the transition's completion, which will be overseen by Cryptic and NCSoft. After the transition Cryptic will be focusing on new titles and new IPs. One the flip side of things, NCSoft has announced that they have recruited numerous key members of the Cryptic Studios staff to join their newly formed NorCal studio which will support the titles.
Player relations have also picked up, NCSoft has stated that all players will be able to play as "the other side" free of charge. Also along with the release of Issue 11 will come a wipe of all character Debt and a bonus of 20,000 Prestige per Supergroup members for Supergroups.