Here is your free trial information!

Amarsir · December 2006

It seems like every few days someone's making a new post asking about free trials. That's great for the game but it must be a pain for all involved having the information so hard to find. So here's my attempt to centralize it.

As of this edit (4/13/07) the best place to go is right here.

If that stops working, here are two more options.

1) MMORPG-partnered Good vs Evil trial which appears to be still active and is supplied by this site's hosts. Access to both sides.

2) Ask anyone who plays to give you a referral key, at least for as long as that program lasts. They can do so by going into their account management page, and should be happy to do so as it can earn them a free month. (Note, players may only give out 4 codes every two months.)

What do I do with the trial key?

Firstly, go here to download the software. You want CohUpdater.exe. Get that and run it, it will install and download everything you need to bring the game up to date (for both sides). If you have a slower connection, get the cd zip files and install from there, it will be a tad faster but require a little more action on your part. (There will still be long downloads after those, consider them a jumpstart.) I personally would choose to let the updater do it's thing and just wait.

In the meantime, go here to create your account. This is a two-step process. First you create an NCsoft account - if you already have one for Guild Wars, Auto Assault or something, you can just choose "manage" to use that existing one.

Either by creating or logging in, you will get to a page called PlayNC Account Management. One of the sections is called "Games List." Click the link called "Add Games" and it will ask for a 20-digit serial code. This is where you enter the key you received. Just add that and a few minutes later you'll be able to log into City of Heroes!

What happens when my trial ends?
If you want to continue (and keep the characters you've started), go buy a retail version of the game. It does not have to match the trial you had - so you can upgrade a CoH trial with a CoV retail, or CoV trial with a CoH retail, or either with a GvE trial. The best deal is probably picking up a Good vs. Evil box (from Walmart at the moment) as you get the most updated discs and some nice unique bonuses with it. However I leave that up to you.

This is very important - The retail box will have it's own 20-digit serial code. You're going to go back to the NCSoft account page and log in on the account you made before. This time do not click "Add Game". If you do, you'll create a separate login and lose any connection to the trial and the characters in there. Instead, look at your "City of" listing and click the "Account Details" button. Under the "Game & Version" section you will see an "Upgrade" button. Click that and your trial will have turned into the full game. And you get the first month of playtime (on top of the trial period) included for upgrading.

What are the costs for Heroes / Villains / both[/color]
$15 a month whether you have one game or both. That's why "Good vs. Evil" is a good choice - both sides for the same monthly fee. You can save money by pre-purchasing several months in advance. Another option is buying time cards at a store, each comes with two months worth of paid time. So you can see that finding these for less than $30 (as has been known to happen) can get you some nice savings.

Anything else I should know to get started?[/color]
The tutorial, known as "Outbreak" for heroes and "Break Out" for villains, is fairly fast but nicely informative. Read the tips you get along the way and absorb as best you can. A few days later when you're getting used to the city, it's not a bad idea to make another character and run the tutorial again - you may better understand things you missed the first time.

Actually it's not a bad idea to make another character anyway. Different archetypes and powersets can play pretty differently, and you may find some other character suits you better - or at least learn more about what other players contribute to a team.

If you want examples on how to build your character, or just more information about the game, here are the official forums. There are some very well written guides in there (search in the guides forum or look for a pinned thread in any particular archetype forum). Of course it's still an internet forum so caveat emptor.

If you're having technical problems with the game, this link takes you directly to the tech forums. (Easy to get to off the main forum page but important enough to single out.) The game has it's share of bugs but I'm always impressed by the knowledge in that forum.

If you have account problems, go here. The support staff reached that way cover several games so may not be as knowledgeable about City of Heroes specifically, but if you have account or billing problems they can help.

Deadaye13 · December 2006

Thanks for clearing this up..

/sticky plz

Unknown · December 2006

What a helpful post!

I came to City of Heroes about three months ago after enjoying a free trial from MMORPG.com. The only trouble with the 14-day trial was that finding out where to go was a little bit difficult (at least for someone with my low level of brilliance!). This post clears up all of the confusion and hopefully newcomers to the game will view and use it.

Thanks!

TehDung · December 2006

Bump

Thanks for this post I really wanted to try both villains and heroes trials and i guess this saves me the time. But you say i gotta go out and buy this game afterwards, I live in Canada and GvsE isn't sold here yet... anybody got an idea when and where it will be in Canada? Or do I gotta take some kinda road trip south to buy it?

jsw40 · December 2006

Originally posted by TehDung

Bump

Thanks for this post I really wanted to try both villains and heroes trials and i guess this saves me the time. But you say i gotta go out and buy this game afterwards, I live in Canada and GvsE isn't sold here yet... anybody got an idea when and where it will be in Canada? Or do I gotta take some kinda road trip south to buy it?

If you have a credit card I'm pretty positive you can buy the serial code online and just download the content.

Amarsir · January 2007

Originally posted by TehDung
But you say i gotta go out and buy this game afterwards, I live in Canada and GvsE isn't sold here yet... anybody got an idea when and where it will be in Canada?

Apparently, some Canadian Walmarts are stocking the game. I say some, because I checked walmart.ca personally and it's not listed. However, I do know some players from Canada have reported finding it at thier local Walmart.

Official word from Lighthouse, the official representative for the publisher, as of November 10 is

The only retailer who currently has the Good vs. Evil edition is Walmart.
While I know it sucks to try and get in Canada, I did overhear a conversation between some marketing and sales peoples who were talking about the Canada issue. All that is to say, yes we are aware of the issue, but don't have a speedy fix for it. I'll keep you posted if I hear anything else.

And that's the latest I've heard. It has also been said that some time in 2007 the GvE box would be made available at more outlets than just Walmart - but that doesn't narrow it down much.

As for the GvE codes being sold online, those aren't the codes you need. Because there were goodies included with the GvE box, people who already have both games wanted the perks but didn't want to have to buy a whole box. So for $10 they can buy just the bonus items. But that won't help upgrade a trial account to retail.

If you can't find a GvE box, what I would probably do is look for either a City of Heroes or City of Villains box. To the best of my knowledge, as of this moment, you can upgrade a GvE trial with either retail code, and still have access to both side and all your characters so far. Obviously you don't get the bonus stuff of course, but then there's that online code available ifyo ureally want.

If that is wrong or stops being true, if you cannot upgrade a GvE trial with a CoH or CoV retail, please let me know. It's not something I can actively try for myself regularly. As I said though, at the moment I have confidence that any retail can upgrade any trial.

(The above tip is based on my knowledge of people's experiences and the requirements of the login interface. That may not be the officially endorsed method and it may stop working like that at any time, though I've never heard any official statement for or against upgrading the game like that.)

Even if that's wrong, worst case picking up the single-side editions is that you'd start over with new characters and get an included month for each box. I know Amazon is carrying each of the older boxes for $20, so to get both is $40 and two months included - as opposed to GvE's $30 with 1 month included. So if you can't get to a Walmart, or can't find it at yours, that's not such an awful option.

Hope that helps

Amarsir · January 2007

Bumped because people are asking again.

christwarior · January 2007

thx dude! no seriously ive been wanting to try this game since it came out and i couldnt because i couldnt find a trial 4 it! thx again!!!!!

junie · January 2007

So I hear this City of Heros is very fun, I think it is a fun game but on the other hand there are many things that I don't like about this game that makes me understand that there are things in this game that make me cry, I hate to cry but this game makes me and what I want to do when I ever play this game and get this trial working is that I would like the make sure that there are things that I want to do that include making a house and killing monsters with my super hero abities for once and for all this game is made of man power, we need that man power in the real world guys, understand me? And the thing that we need to do is understand our ability to think in the real world, videogames slow people down and make them die, there are people who died in this world because they are evin.

MrArchy · January 2007

HEY STRADDEN!!!!!

/sticky this one please!

Amarsir · February 2007

Edited the main post with the latest trial offer from Filefront. Also, for Canadians there was official word that Good vs. Evil should be purchaseable from any Walmart but not from the online store. If they don't have it in stock they should be able to order it for you. No word yet on non-Walmart versions.

vajuras · February 2007

Can a mod please please sticky this post!!!

Amarsir · February 2007

Bump to keep it on the main page.

Amarsir · February 2007

I can understand why they might not want to sticky it, the information is dated.

Still, it's annoying when people would rather post a new begging topic than scroll their eyes down 5 whole lines on the same page! Sigh.

Anyway, edited because Filefront's offer seems to be closed up, and of the backup single offers only CoV seems working. But the MMORPG one seems great as far as I can tell, and should be easy for anyone reading this.

vajuras · February 2007

there was a mod that used to come here hope I didnt drive her away

yeah I used the free trial from this site worked great. was disappointed though I could not login to my main it made me create a new account + I could not register for CoX official forums using the trial lol

Amarsir · February 2007

Gets ignored enough on the first page, I can't let it slip to the second.

<bump>

Mcnasty05 · February 2007

bump

Unknown · March 2007

Bump because someone asked about this in another thread.

Unknown · March 2007

Bump again. Sticky maybe?

Amarsir · March 2007

Bump from page 2.

vajuras · March 2007

There is a free trial still right? I know I used it a few weeks ago to see the changes. Went to freedom server hero side and had a lot of fun. Was pretty corny tho looking at all the heroes flossing their wings. Wish I could PK'em and take their wings

Sidarkun · March 2007

I just created an EU PlayNC account, and i registered the GvE trial key just fine even though it says its only viable in North America.

Sidarkun · March 2007

Looks like it didnt work anyway. When i try to login to the game it says that my Username and/or password is incorrect.

Amarsir · March 2007

Haven't had to bump in a while.

Amarsir · April 2007

Thanks to the referral program, people are throwing trial keys at each other now. So this isn't strictly necessary. However, it needed an update anyway so I figured why not bump it back to page 1.

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