NCSoft Gives Homecoming A License To Host City Of Heroes

It’s been some time since we’ve discussed City of Heroes. In fact. Our last official mention of it was at the beginning of 2020 when Jason Winter posted predictions for the year. His prediction at that time was that we’d get “officially sanctioned City of Heroes servers”. It turns out that he wasn’t entirely wrong, he was just four years ahead of his time.

It’s understandable. After all, we’d spent 2019 watching as the groups that took up hosting the game, following its official closure in 2012, make appeals to NCSoft to be allowed to officially host the MMORPG themselves. It’s easy to see where one might think that something official would be decided within a year or so. As it turns out, these kinds of things must really take time.

Today, Homecoming – a group that many in our own reader comments spoke highly about – announced that they have officially been granted a license to host City of Heroes. The announcement, posted on the Homecoming forums, assures players that their account and characters are safe, that they will continue to develop new content, and that the game will continue to be free as they’ll still be funded through donations.

The thread also includes a FAQ that answers some very important questions. First off, NCSoft retains ownership of City of Heroes and there are conditions to the contract. It’s important to note that this means NCSoft can tell Homecoming to shut down the servers at any time. As for all the servers out there, they do not fall into this agreement, although Homecoming hopes that their relationship with the other servers will allow them to consolidate the user base and bring everyone together under the officially sanctioned server.

After hearing the news, we received confirmation from NCSoft that the agreement is official, so things are looking up for City of Heroes fans. We've reached out to NCSoft to chat with them on the topic and will keep you updated with any additional info we get from them.