Late last year, NCsoft acquired the entirety of City of Heroes and City of Villains, purchasing Cryptic Studios’ stake in the game and transferring responsibility for the game to a new office known as NCsoft NorCal. Not only has Senior Lead Designer Matt Miller shared some of his thoughts on the changeover, the team has revealed its plans for Issue 12: Midnight Hour.

Issue 12 should be released some time in the first half of this year, and adds an entire new story arc along with plenty of game enhancements. The issue will add the Midnight Squad, an organization of “mystics, scholars and mages” decimated by the alien Rikti invasion. Because of the issue's Roman-theme, players will get new Roman-style costume options. Characters from level 10 to 20 will get new missions that help the Midnight Squad recover a secret that could help defeat the Rikti. Then, characters from level 35 to 50 will be able to explore new Roman-style zones to face an “enemy of time itself.”

Villains who have reached level 50 will be able to create Wolf Spider and Blood Widow archetype characters, and all Villains and Heroes will get access to an additional primary and secondary powerset. Finally, there will be lots of improvements to everything from power trays, contact management and the chat interface to the ability to convert inspirations into inspirations of another kind.