10 Moments That Saved Dead Video Games
1. Fan-Run Severs - City of Heroes
An often overlooked entry in the MMORPG genre, City of Heroes has been a cult favourite since its inception by offering players the chance to create their own hero or villain and spread justice or fear within a large open city.
It's a genius idea for a game and quickly found a devoted fanbase but when compared to other MMO giants such as Guild Wars and the mighty World of Warcraft, City of Heroes struggled to sit comfortably alongside its competitors but managed to remain active for a solid eight years which is pretty darn impressive in the grand scheme.
Once the servers went down it seemed that the door was finally closed on City of Heroes, but the hardcore fans tried on multiple occasions to get the game up and running but nothing major ever came to fruition. That was until 2019 where it was revealed that a private server for the game had been running for years and had been very popular amongst players, but this was soon shut-down due to legal issues.
Miraculously though, in 2024 the official source code for the game was made freely available and fan-made support for the game has flourished under a new donations system.
Long live the hardcore fans.