According to Uncle Ben, "With great power comes great responsibility." It's the mantra that has always driven Spider-Man, and now it can be your call to action in City of Heroes. Issue 13: Power & Responsibility is live, and it brings with it a ton of additions to the game.

Here's just some of the stuff you can now enjoy in Issue 13: increased flexibility by switching between two builds; pact leveling will keep your XP permanently in sync with a friend; Day Jobs give you a secret identity and benefits by logging out in specific areas, such as hospitals and stores; new powersets include shields and pain domination; the merit rewards system allows you to earn redeemable tokens by completing tasks; new story arcs have been added; and PvP combat has been revamped.

Whew! And that's only the major stuff. For more information on this issue, you can check out this thread on the CoH official forums, the issue overview, or the release notes. The full release notes can also be found after the jump.

Mac users now have another choice in their MMO gaming options!

"Players will soon be able to join the battle of good versus evil in the most popular comic book MMO on both the PC and Mac platforms...and in the same game world," commented Brian Clayton, executive producer of City of Heroes for NCsoft West. "Given Mac's fame as a platform for creative people and City of Heroes' unprecedented character customization options, I think City of Heroes is a perfect fit for the Mac gaming community."

Working with TransGaming, NCsoft is bringing the platform to beta with the launch of Chapter 13.  You can pre-order the software here, and sign up for beta access at the official site.

The City of Heroes Web site has been completely redesigned. In addition to a much sleeker interface that combines the old CityofHeroes.com and CityofVillains.com sites into one cohesive site, here's some new additions for you to check out:

Be sure to visit the below new sections to read about the signature characters from the game's lore:

• Signature Heroes
• Signature Villains

Also, you may want to visit the Media section and grab yourself a new wallpaper.

CoX lead designer Matt 'Positron' Miller is going to be running a D&D game for charity the day before Hero-Con '08!

On Friday October 17th, 2008 Matt 'Positron' Miller will be running a Dungeons & Dragons game for six lucky winners. Seats are being auctioned and proceeds will benefit 'SCARE for a Cure!' A charity that was created by Jarrett "The Defuser" Crippen in 2007.

The game will be held at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Santa Clara California at 8:00 PM. Winners of the auction must arrange travel to and from the hotel but they do not have to be 'City of Heroes' players or attendees of NCsoft's Hero-Con '08 event that will be held the following day at the Hyatt.

Good luck to everyone, and well done to Positron for putting in the effort for such a good cause!

Superheroes need secret identities. I think it's written in comic book law. It's a necessity so that the "secret" identity can one day be dramatically revealed to the world, only to follow up by magically writing that storyline out of continuity and pretending it didn't happen (I'm looking at you, Spider-Man).

Anyway, getting back to City of Heroes, we have received a developer's blog and screenshots from NCsoft outlining the new Day Jobs feature. Game Designer Phil Zeleski explains that players will now be rewarded even when they're not logged in since their characters will be working normal jobs during that time.

For example, if you log out in a hospital, your character will gain a temporary out of combat regeneration bonus for working as a caregiver. Keep reading for Zeleski's full blog, which includes a lot of information on a variety of Day Jobs.

 

As a follow-up to his discussion on Issue 13 PvE power changes, which we reported on last week, Senior Designer Floyd "Castle" Grubb has spoken on the Jester's Court podcast at length about what players can expect to see regarding the power updates.

The 41-minute podcast can be found here.

Senior Designer Bruce Harlick has answered many questions from City of Heroes/Villains players in the latest installment of "Ask a Dev," and he focused mainly on intricacies of creating interesting story arcs and missions.

When asked about the future direction of the game from the point of view of a storyteller, Harlick said that he really wants to explore some of the back story of existing characters. "You’re going to see some missions from me that deal with that," he said. "I hope to get a chance to move between characters and get more of their stories into the game."

As far as the differences between player-created missions through the Mission Architect feature and developer-created missions, Harlick said that, " we’ll push the envelop as far as we can here and use the resources we have, and the new resources we can get, to create kicking new Story Arcs and missions that go beyond what you can do in Mission Architect."

The full "Ask a Dev" article can be found here or below. Also, submit your questions for the Oct. 21 article with Senior Animator/VFX Artist Chris Bruce here.

Saturday, October 18, 2008, join the CoX teams in celebrating Hero-Con '08!

Join the City of Heroes & City of Villains Development team and other super heroes and super villains for a "Freem" filled day and night of activities.

This year promises to raise the roof of the exclusive Hyatt Regency Hotel in Santa Clara, California on Saturday, October 18, 2008. We have arranged special pricing at this beautiful hotel for our event attendees, if you wish to book a room for the event please enter this code G-NCSO to unlock or book directly from this page to get our special pricing for rooms. This special rate can be applied on dates prior and after the event as well.

For details on events going on during Hero-Con, read on!

NCsoft has combined the worlds of City of Heroes and City of Villains , making both subscriptions valid for both games, and all content!

There is a reason for the rejoicing in Paragon CityTM and the Rogue IslesTM. It is official - NCsoft® has completely merged the two games into one game universe. All current subscribers who only had one of the games (City of Heroes® or City of Villains®) now have access to the features of both games. Additionally, all City of Heroes and City of Villains games for sale at retail or online will grant access to both games.

This is the final step needed in preparing the IP for future projects, to be announced later this year. Paragon City and the Rogue Isles have always been a part of the same game universe. When City of Villains launched in 2005 as a stand-alone game, it did not launch with an extra subscription fee, so there has always been this feeling that they are closely related. What's different here is that NCsoft has taken down the barrier where players had to have a City of Villains serial code to make a villain, and vice versa. Now, it doesn't matter if you bought Heroes or Villains, you can make characters from either faction you want and experience their unique game content. Additionally, Heroes now have access to base building, which was previously only available if you had purchased City of Villains.

Read on for the rest of the press release! There's no word on a name change, or the new IP that's hinted at!

The folks from CoX as well as GameTrailers.com and Toyota have joined together for an awesome contest!

On behalf of Toyota and GameTrailers.com we are proud to present the Matrix Machinima Contest: Get In Touch With Your Dark Side!

Make a Machinima video with City of Heroes / City of Villains and have the chance to win the grandprize of a 2009 Model year Toyota Matrix S filled with good stuff! Act now! Submissions can only be uploaded to GameTrailers.com from July 1st through August 10th. Winners will be announced on Spike's GTTV on September 12th.

Click here for the contest details and rules!

So get your minions, sidekicks and henchmen ready, load up on hard drive space and make a Machinima masterpiece!!!

Good luck to everyone that enters!