City of Heroes team renamed Paragon Studios

Although City of Heroes creator Cryptic Studios may have been acquired by Atari, the massively multiplayer online game's publisher isn't about to let urban blight set in. NCsoft recommitted to the City of Heroes and City of Villains franchise today with the announcement that the Mountain View, California-based studio focused on the MMOG is getting an actual name.

Formerly known as NCsoft NorCal, the studio will henceforth be known as Paragon Studios, taking its name from the virtual world in which City of Heroes is set. Founded in 2007, the studio has grown from an original roster of 20 employees to its current size of more than 50 people.

Coinciding with the name change is the release of City of Heroes: Architect Edition. The latest repackaging of the original City of Heroes includes all of the content updates, including the latest Architect add-on that lets users create and share missions, story arcs, and characters.

This is not the first time that the Paragon name has been tied to superhero-themed PC games. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the unrelated Paragon Software released a number of PC games using Marvel licenses, including The Punisher, X-Men 2: Fall of the Mutants, and The Amazing Spider-Man and Captain America in Dr. Doom's Revenge.