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thunderspy

My husband and some other online volunteers work on Thunderspy, a City of Heroes private server. I don't contribute very much, but might as well keep everything here!

What is Thunderspy?

City of Heroes is a retro superhero MMO from the days before all online games became World of Warcraft copycats.

It still has the best character creator of all time. I never played on the live servers, but it was very popular with my artist and writer friends. It also has a unique pet class with programmable macros, so my Guild Wars friends who mained Necromancer often also played the City of Heroes Mastermind.

I recommend it. It's easy fun in a big group and has pretty cool settings and lore for solo exploration. Thunderspy's always adding new costume pieces and cute events and stuff, too.

How do I play?

Go to Thunderspy, make an account, download Sweet Tea, add the thunderspy manifest, and play! Everything you need is on the website.

Anyway, here's some of my media, edits, and screenshots.

(image: Step 1: Download Sweet Tea. Step 2: No need to add a manifest. Step 3: Validate. Step 4: Launch. City of Heroes has never been sweeter. )

My characters

(image: My cat Praetorian. Ever see loose dollars on the ground? It's his money! Do the right thing and return it to him. )

(image: My giant villain beetle. How did it get so huge? Baffles the world scientist. )

(image: My gargoyle Praetorian. A creature of pure duty, honor, and justice. Every time I log in, he is perching on top of something really tall. )

(image: My Oblivion knock-off Praetorian. An unknown heir to the throne? The countess of Bruma won't like this! )

Playing with textures

(image: Retextured some of the cars to have the Planet Fitness decals. )

Fighting the AI upscales on Reddit

So City of Heroes has the best character customization of any game of all time, so naturally people like to share their costumes and character stories on the City of Heroes subreddit. Some people even draw their characters or make little Photoshop edits. It's cute, honestly.

Then, around May 2024, an aggressive trend of AI upscales took over. They take so little effort to produce (literally only need to upload your screenshot from the character selection screen and press "enhance") that they easily snuffed out any creative posts. This deeply annoyed users.

The head reddit mod changed around this time, too, and he wasn't up to the job. The best he could do was pin a megathread (and unpin an important FAQ one) and tell each person to post their AI images in there.

Obviously no one listened to him.

So I launched my attack.

I downloaded 20 or so AI posts, loaded them into a PDF in Scribus, and printed them out at the library. Then I drove straight to the gym and started punching them. The evidence of my deed was posted to the Reddit, titled Long time coming!

Long time coming!
byu/aloebloom inCityofheroes

"I try not to punch people with my knuckle tat to keep it fresh, but you AI upscale posts seem like a special occasion. Catch my hand!"

My favorites are the ones of the elliptical.

(image: Using the elliptical with AI upscaled heroes taped to the pedals. )

These were taken while in motion, so there's a deranged energy to the shot, especially since they are posted at the end of a set of photos people quickly flip through.

Most people thought the post was funny and a bit carthartic (people really hated the AI posts!), but a few took it seriously! They thought I really was driving all over town in this rage, punching things that make me angry, and raving about AI.

It's funny because it's so far from the truth. I sighed such a deep sigh of relief when the one guy about my age left the gym as I was entering. I mean, I had to do my duty, so I'd diligently punch 20 Reddit posts in front of anyone. But I'd way rather have the gym to myself!

I almost got my wish, too, then a lady about my mom's age walks in and uses the treadmill right next to the elliptical I was about to tape up. Despite the wild energy of the photos, those were taken very sheepishly!

I got the effect I wanted, though! No one posted AI at all for months outside of my easily ignored thread, and they only did so in attempt to rile me up! By the time the shock subsided, the trend was getting old for people anyway.

Take that, random Reddit mod. There's no substitute for good old fashioned bullying.