No, I'm not leaving the game. My wife and I are going to visit a beach for a couple of weeks because we're already tired of the cold. But before I go I thought I would make a list of things we've all been bitching about, and who knows? By the time I get back some of them might be solved!

Ok, that might be a bit of wishful thinking but I know at least a couple of the staff at GamersFirst do actually read this blog. The staff and forum mods at G1 can track the IP of each user on their forums and I find it really nice that I can do the same thing here. At least one has been seen reading the bosses section of the blog. I wonder what that means?

So anyway, lets think of this as a Players Priority List, as opposed to whatever priorities G1 and Hyperion may have in mind.

1. We Want Our Characters Back: GamersFirst obviously knows this one, but they aren't doing a damn thing to make it happen. The standard line is that Indy21 is handling the issue but by now G1 has probably seen that Indy21 isn't much good at handling in-game issues, never mind anything else. G1 is going to have to get involved in the process of getting our characters back, if it's ever going to happen.

This thread from the forum pretty much sums up a lot of players feelings on this subject. We're wasting our time here and I'm in the same frame of mind. I don't have much interest to grind, never mind spend money on the game.

2. Stable Servers Would be Nice: You can look back on the load-0-meter website for the last few weeks and see that almost daily there has been a server outage or a mass disconnection. This particular situation is actually worse than anything Acclaim ever threw at us. This is one issue that G1 cannot blame on Indy21.

3. Mapload Disconnections: This is one issue that G1 is blaming on Indy21, but I don't understand that at all. I've been having this problem since G1 took over the game, and it has only gotten worse over time. I estimate that I get disconnected from the game on 4 out of 5 map changes, or character changes.

4a. Respect for European Players: I'm not saying "more respect" for European players, or even "some respect" for Europeans. How about any respect at all? The European players outnumber all others by about 2:1, but it's like pulling teeth to get announcements published that include GMT times.

4b. Weekend Event Decisions on Thursday: I'm making this 4b because it's part and parcel with "respect for European players". Peak playing times for all players are Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings. The decisions about our weekend events are happening on Friday afternoon in the California timezone, which is well after midnight for us. We Europeans lose that event time for one peak playing period. The events are often extended to Monday but that is a work/school day and most of us can't take advantage of it. Let's have these decisions by Thursday at the latest so we can all enjoy our weekend.

4c. Black vs White War on Phoenix: Why is the weekly war scheduled for midnight GMT on a Sunday night? Oh right, it's that complete lack of respect for European players again. Silly me.

5. Payment Options for G1 Coins: The payment options for G1 coins are a patchwork at best, with most countries using different systems. If you're going to accept Paypal, why not accept Paypal from every country where it exists? This makes no sense.

6. Test Characters Should Be Retired: Everyone likes to see how they are doing compared to the others, particularly the high level players, but G1 test characters are taking up the top spots on those lists. I remember I almost had an orgasm when I made it to the Bardo top 100 list. How hard is it to mark the "retired" option for test characters in order to take them off the lists?

7. Punishing Players for Being Players: Players are being punished for doing what they do, deciding for themselves how best to spend their time in the game. The case in point is the Major Levels gift event. Some of the noobs in the game have collected a couple hundred or more XP cards, and they're being banned for a week or more and the cards taken away? Hey, the noobs didn't invent the event. They're just being noobs.

Maybe the next time you want to run an event you could talk to a couple of veteran noobs first.
There are a few of us left, for now...

8. We Want Our Characters Back Dammit: First and last, because it's that important.

Now about that beach...

- SpearDriver2