City of Heroes creators NC Soft and Paragon Studios just released a statement about its latest expansion – Going Rogue – offering up a release date of August 17th 2010. Here’s to hoping it has nothing to do with Sarah Palin.

The update will allow players to walk the line between the two factions of heroes and villains in the game. This second paid expansion will have the players’ moral choices effect game play for the first time. “Heroes can fall from grace to become Villains, while Villains can redeem themselves to become Heroes.”

In addition to this game play mechanic, players can now enter the alternative game universe of Praetoria. New missions, zones, costumes, enemies and power sets including: Demon Summoning, Dual Pistols, Electric Control and Kinetic Melee will be available.

Lead Designer of City of Heroes had this to say about Going Rogue, “I was proud when we launched City of Heroes® back in 2004 and even prouder when we unveiled the City of Villains® expansion in 2005, but Going Rogue is by far the best work that this team has ever done. Paragon Studios has distinguished itself as a premier studio committed to excellence with every issue and we’ve raised the bar on this expansion. I’m so honored to be a part of this team and I believe that our players will be absolutely amazed when they see what we’ve done.”

City of Heroes: Going Rogue will have to be purchased as a separate expansion, or as part of the City of Heroes: Going Rogue Complete Collection which includes both City of Heroes and City of Villains. Both iterations of the game will be available shortly from the NCSoft Store.