Not to be outdone by their counterparts on Union, the heroes of Defiant have taken a group portrait of their own. Here’s one of the shots - for more images, check the thread on the Official Message Boards…

(Click the image for a larger version.)

Matt ‘Positron’ Miller has been chatting to several gaming sites and providing more details of the next major update to City of Heroes and City of Villains. Issue #7: Destiny Manifest will pit the heroes of Paragon City against ever more dangerous foes, as the villains of the Rogue Isles begin to grow in power to Level 50 and ally themselves with Lord Recluse’s deadly lieutenants!

For more information, check out the following interviews:

MMORPG.com Issue #7 Q&A

City of Heroes Warcry: ‘A View from Atlas Park’

GameSpy ‘Destiny Manifest’ Interview

GameZone Matt Miller Interview

We just wanted to remind all our players that the 14-day Trial Codes for City of Villains sent out as part of the Valentine’s Event must be used before the end of today, Wednesday 22 February.

If the code is used to create a trial account before the end of the day, it will still grant access to the full two week trial of City of Villains. If the code is not used by the end of the day, however, it will expire. If you’ve given the code to a friend, make sure they use it to create a trial account today!

Many of the most active and well-known heroes on the Union server recently gathered on the steps of Paragon City Hall for a group photo…

(Click the image for a larger version.)

Due to a problem with the email address for submitting entries to our Celebrate a Year of Heroism competition, we are extending the deadline by an additional week to Tuesday 7 March.

If you have already entered the competition before today, please re-submit your entry to ensure that we receive it safely.

Last week, all City of Heroes and City of Villains players should have received an email with details of the Valentine’s Event currently running in-game, and a 14-day Free Trial Code for City of Villains.

If for any reason you didn’t receive your email, though, you won’t miss out - see this announcement on the Official Message Boards for details of how to retrieve your Free Trial code.

The re-opening of the Paragon Dance Party as Pocket D seems to be causing a stir both in Paragon City and the Rogue Isles - and not just among clubbers and music fans…

In the wake of the re-modelling of ‘Pocket D’ - Paragon City’s very own extra-dimensional dance club, now catering to both heroes and villains - it seems that the mysterious owner DJ Zero is planning a grand re-opening bash, and has taken out adverts in the Paragon Times to publicise the event.

Quite what DJ Zero has up his sleeve remains to be seen, but it looks like something special might be on its way…

Tomorrow, 4 February 2006, marks the one-year anniversary of City of Heroes being released in Europe!

Although we’ll also be celebrating the two-year anniversary of the game’s original US release later this year in April, we thought it would be a nice touch to mark this occasion with a celebration of our own, and what better way to celebrate than with a competition?

Read on to find out what you need to do to enter, and what’s up for grabs…