Tuesday 28 February 2006

Pic of the day: Where is everybody? Hello? Hello?

A hero's return?

One of the the first things on my mind when I got Internet access at home was, of course, City of Heroes. I had been away from the game for two months rather than the two weeks I had foreseen. How would my supergroup react? How far would they have come, those I fought together with at level 35? Surely they would be close to 50, those who hadn't already reached that magic number and made new "alts", alternate characters.

At the usual time, I logged on to the Justice server (one of the American servers, as I had decided to cut out Europe and concentrate on only one continent... I do have other interests too,now). I looked around, flew around to the zones where I used to be. I did a mission or two. I looked for my old friends, but found none. I pointed my web browser to the supergroup's home page, and got another surprise. The page told me in no uncertain terms that I was banned. Now mind you, I had not come as far as logging in, so it can hardly have been anything personal. And my IP is dynamic, whatever the ISP assigns me when I log on. So most likely either the whole of my ISP is banned, or the site is only open to a select few. If any at all.

So there you have it. I know time flows faster in pocket universes, but even so... I return after two months and all traces are gone of the people I knew and the group I used to belong to. That was not quite what I had expected. My hero is also largely a supporting character, a defender, better at protecting other heroes than at defeating villains. I can still do most missions alone, but I am not using my powers to their best. Looking for a new group seems tiresome. I am not likely to do that until after my next fad, which starts on March 2nd with the release of Sims2: Open for Business.

In the meantime, Magus Andlit spent a few hours teamed up with the quasi-African tank girl which you saw in these pages on Saturday. They are both designed for larger teams, but finding non-morons on short notice is generally more trouble than it is worth. Then again, isn't that so in real life too? More's the pity.