I'M SORRY THAT THIS IS SO LONG, BUT PLEASE, PLEASE PLEASE READ IT.Today, I read something very disturbing.
This.It starts with an Explorer whom I recently met suggesting that we get in game support. It ends with said explorer deleting everything URU related from his computer.
Another disturbing thread:
http://mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=21358It starts out innocent enough, but then an Explorer I used to be friends with, someone I thought I knew, suddenly claims that "Anyone who should be taken seriously doesn't like Multi player puzzles." Whilyam. I'm saying this right here: That. Hurts.
But, It also saddens me. Why? I only just met the guy! Why should I be sad by his leaving? Why Should I be saddened by Whilyam's rash comments?
Truth be told, This has Been, as the title says, A Long time Coming.
To Fully Understand where I'm comming from, I want to go back to the begining. So YOU Can understand.
It started with the release of Myst and Riven. My clearest memory that I can distinctly remember is of my dad installing the Five CD set onto my Uncle's computer, and that now ever so familiar D'ni 5 appearing on screen. A short time later, we moved the Riven Install to our main computer, bought in 2000. It was then that we met Gehn, Explored the Islands, Flew across the MagLev and even got a stunning glimpse of the age of Tay.
My First Myst memories. Suddenly seeing the Spherical shaped mound that was so prominent on the Box art and Inserting the Infamous Fifth Disk was a crowning moment for me.
In 2001, My Dad got Exile for Christmas. At the time, I didn't know it was related to Riven and Myst, despite being titled "Myst III Exile", not until much later. I remember Saaveedro Linking into Tomahna, stealing Releeshan, and us following through. My dad played through it, and I watched. Occasionally, I'd give my suggestion, and we'd solve a puzzle! My Favorite moment was the Sphere ride in Amateria. WOOOSH!
Years would pass, and I would replay the games. The infamous "VRRRRMMMSHSHSHSH" sound would be set as the start up sound on our (at the time) only computer, and forever ingrained into my memory.
In 2003, I was watching TV, waiting for dinner, like any good eight year old would, and then I heard it.
"VRRRRRMMMSSSSSHHHHH...."
I looked up, and there it was. URU. Ages Beyond Myst. The marvelous worlds displayed on screen, a Garden with spinning blocks, An age made of Trees, The "Island In the Clouds" and all of it backed by The tune "Burn You Up, Burn You Down."
I told my dad when he came home, and a few days later, I was playing around with the steam vents in Eder Gira.
We didn't have the Internet then, and as I watched the Loading screens scrolling past advertising "Uru Live" I was hooked. Other People in the game! That was amazing! I stared at the installation screen for as long as it took. I didn't care that I was ignoring dinner, nor that it took AGES to load the different ages. I was having fun.
Teledahn was the first age I finished. And opening that door, and hearing the screams of the Bahro, it was shocking, and scary.
Soon, my dad began bringing home forum threads he had printed out at work, and I loved reading about the different topics written by a kind, caring, happy, and growing Myst Community.
It was 2004 when I learned about Uru Live's closure, and my dad came home one day with the "To D'ni" Expansion pack on a CD. He told me as it installed that that was as long as it took to originally download.
Once it finished, I suddenly had the KI, a device I had gotten by just randomly clicking items. Suddenly, I could take Pictures of things I had to Print Screen before. Wandering around the ages, my first find was that the Bevin Book suddenly had a working linking panel! Linking into that Neighborhood, and seeing the broken Heek Table, the fuzzy imager, and the List of names of Explorers around me, I was saddened.
There was a need to see these fellow explorers in person, the want to meet the person who had snagged a Maintainer's Suit. There was... a Call.
Reading Sharper's Journal set me on the course to the Fetch Quest known as "Marker Missions."
The Great Shaft, The Great Zero, The Five Bahro Stones in Kirel, Phil's Relto, the Spyroom. I Suddenly knew I wasn't alone down here. And yet, at the same time, I was.
I was alone. And I was used to it. When we got Internet access via Dial Up, The first thing I learned of about URU was the "Until Uru" Project. I went into the cavern, and it was largely the same. Empty, alone.
Then I met someone, a real LIVE Person! Suddenly, the Cavern didn't seem so empty any more!
Then there were group meetings. LOTS OF PEOPLE. I tried to enter myself into this brave new world of Chat, Text, and the infamous Emoticons { :) :D :( :P Ect...}. I did so in a poor manner, not understanding half of the things they were saying.
Sadly, this didn't last long, We cut the Internet, and I forgot about Until URU well until 2006. But, still. It was fun while it lasted. My favorite User KI Command was /Tentsmash. Good Times, Good Times.
In Christmas of 2004, I received Myst IV, Revelation as a present. Sadly, it didn't play well with our computer until Dad upgraded the graphics card. When I returned to Uru for the Path of the Shell expansion, Suddenly, everything seemed Completely different! The ground at the cleft wasn't black, finding the bridge in Gira at night wasn't a pain! I was in a whole new world, AGAIN.
Then, in 2005, my dad got a work at home job. We had WIRELESS Internet! I read the Uru Obsession forums daily, and dived through the archives like a mad man!
In 2006, I rejoined Until URU, just under a different name now. I knew a LOT more about the Internet at this time now. Now, then. Continuing on, I knew MOUL was coming, but I wanted to be known first. Hence the Until URU moments of 2006. Funnily enough, I never ONCE set foot on D'mala. I chose to stay with the User KI enabled shards.
At This Point I'm going to take a small detour to point out one of many points I wish to make in this post. In order for URU to have survived as long as it has, it needed the Hackers. {No, not THE Hackers who you hear on the news that break things for Breaking sake, those are CRACKERS. I'm talking about the Hackers who sneak into things to fix them.} Back then, we were all AOkay about Hacking into URU, just so long as there was a recent back up and no server crashes, everyone and their cousin had User KIs. Well, maybe not EVERYONE, but the point is: Today, There are three groups. Those who claim Hacking is Evil, and that there needs to be a Community wide "Cleansing" (also stated by someone I respected) and the Hackers banned from the Game for Life. The Hackers who try to point out that the "Cleansers" aren't making any sense at all.
And The Third Group. Caught in the Middle. The ones (like me) who everyone seems to ignore. To make a Political comparison- SORRY! So verry Sorry!-, it's like the Current US government. Democrats Vs. Republicans.
Say, Did you know that there are MORE that two choices on the voting ballots? Yes! There are! Have you ever heard of them before? NO! Why? Because the MEDIA (to this comparison, the Forums) Only ever focuses on the two main groups.
The two that groups are only made out of a few certain members are made out to be more powerful than they are. But Nobody ever pays attention to the other third member parties. Like this "Middle" group for URU, let's call them... "Faces of Stone" for now.
So, we have the "Cleansers", The "Faces", and the "Hackers" Ladies and Gents. As I've said, the "Cleansers" want to "Clean" the community, there by preventing any changes. The Hackers want to help the Community, there by attempting to make changes. And the "Faces of Stone", caught in the middle, who just don't see the point of all the fighting, and just want the game to evolve as it naturally has.
I'm not saying that there are ONLY Three groups, but for now this will have to do.
Now that I have that settled, let's move on.
In 2007, MOUL started, and the Cavern Rejoiced. I was excited to be in MY FIRST OFFICIAL Online Cyan game! It was something, a constantly changing world! I joined a forum, and became a member of Uru Obsession hood, constantly packed with explorers.
And then came the Episodes. Don't count me wrong, they were AWESOME when they happened, With "Scars" being the best of the bunch. But this was when the trouble began. In the original Journey, there was the whole "Choose a Side" thing that never came to fruition. Now it has. {I CHOOSE CHAOTIC NEUTRAL!} There were those who rejoiced at the Episodes (complaining about never having been involved in major story plot) and those who complained about it.
Now, I never really complained much about the episodes, My computer couldn't handle more then a few avvies in an age, and I was fine with it- Hey, even MINKATA was laggy when it was just ME there- But my ONE MAJOR beef with them is that, on the Monday that Yeesha appeared in K'veer, I had to go out to Gymnastics. She appeared RIGHT when I wasn't there. Now, I'm Not' blaming Cyan, Even if they hadn't gone episodic, and had even PLANNED for Yeesha to show up at the same exact day and time, I would have missed it anyways.
People complained about the "Bahro Civil War" and other such things as well. I didn't. Excluding that one event which I was probably going to miss anyways.
But this is my point. People. Complaining.
It was at this point, when the episodes began, that a division began. A small, hair line fracture. When MOUL1 closed, this crack widened, and it continued to widen even more when The "MORE RoadMap" and the "Open Source" Projects were announced.
Cyan has given Us, the community, the Keys to development, the very source to URU. Cyan, By nature, take things slow, and deliberate. They've reflected this in everything they've done. Each and every Myst game has taught us one thing above all: Patience.
In The first Volume of The Watcher's "Words", it says the following:
Take time, and move it to and fro.
This is reflected in Gahreesen (with the power room, and the bridges), Kadish (the Moon room), and Museum Pods. We wait. Patiently, we wait. Now, with the Open Source movement, People aren't waiting for things to come as they will.
Now, going to my main concerns, As I've mentioned above, I've been in URU for a long time. Almost from the beginning. Recently, I was attempting to do a certain glitch/feature on an Alt Avvie when some came out and told me that doing the jump would cause me to crash. I'm sorry, but this particular glitch/feature wouldn't cause such a thing. They've never told me this in my Main Avvie, but in my alt avvie they seemed to be much more commanding, thinking I was new. I'm sorry, but please, Don't act like you're supperior.
Also, Recently a buddy of mine was told, very rudely, To "Stop using buddy chat!" This has also happened to me. Twice. By the same person. By a neighbor of mine. {You know who you are.} The first time I apologized, as I WAS a bit wordy. But the second time, I was engaged in a full fledged conversation. (WHICH, By the way, also ended not a few moments after the neighbor told me off.) I removed him from Buddies.
Another point is this: Recently, an explorer made an avatar named "RandMiller", and soon enough, declared that he would not be standing there if there were ingame support present. Also, there are certain people around the cavern, who may be just kids and not know any better, who are going around, shoving relto books in people's faces, also there are cases of Harassment, and improper quoting of rather rude media. Again, would be solved by ingame support.
I'm sorry. But this is how things are: It has gotten to the point where people are:
1. REMOVING Uru from their computers because of the two conflicting sides. (two MAJOR cases so far: the explorer I met recently and The former Forum admin.)
2. Telling others people not to do things through intimidation. (My Above case. It is NOT Nice, and just plain rude.)
3. Not even considering other people's opinions, and calling them and their like people who "Should not be taken seriously." (Above linked to.)
4. Telling others very RUDELY to stop using the poorly constructed chat system. (If you have a problem with someone being wordy, just put them on the Ignore list. "/ignore {NAME/KI#}" is very useful. Do NOT tell them off in a rude PM.)
5. Being a total jerk about things. (No Comment.)
Dark and gloomy, eh?
NOW THEN! For the Solutions.
The major concern is Poor Moderation/a lack of INGAME SUPPORT.
How do we solve this? My plan is simple. Volunteer Community members, having signed an NDA that would prevent them from revealing their identity, known as "Restoration Surveyors" would act as Ingame support in place of the "Restoration Engineers." Completely Anonymous.
In order to access their moderator powers, the ResSurveyors would have to Login into Server access. Something like: "/ResSurveyLogin USERNAME PASSWORD" with the USERNAME and PASSOWRD lines being replaced with their names. Upon loging into the special mode, a special ChatLog version would be started, Going directly to CYAN's servers for review. You would need to then type "/LoginReason REASON HERE" to give your reason for the entire log in at the end in order to Log Out of the surveyor account.
Any Surveyor Command would have the name appear as "ResSurvey#42" Or some other randomized number, therefor keeping the actual number of Surveyors unknown. All Surveyor Commands would be carried out by an altered "/me MESSAGE" command. Such as "/RS MESSAGE" Which would appear as:
ResSurvey#42 Says: "You have offended SuchAndSuchPeople for SuchAndSuchReasons, and I am giving you only SoManyChances left to improve your behavior or I will have to Ban You."
Via a Private message, only with a blue bracket instead of Yellow.
Any offences would be reported with "/ReportSurvey MESSAGE" and would be delivered to all online Restoration Surveyor avvies, even if not logged in to the surveyor account. All of these Reported messages would be saved to a special log file on a special Cyan Server, along with the chat logs of the login activities.
All ResSurveyors would be Reviewed every two to three months by someone at Cyan to see if the surveyor in question has gotten "Power Hungry" Or any such reason.
Now, I mentioned that they were Volinteers. How would this work?
In real Life, they would email Cyan for an application. A ResSurveyor Or someone from Cyan would then email back asking for their reasons to do so, and, uppon a serrious answer, they would give them a date and time to be ingame. At this time, the Surveyor in question would then ask the Applicant in question a list of questions that would prove if they were worthy or not to be a surveyor. Durring the application process, Cyan will know who they are, but the Surveyors will not. All Communication between aplicants and the Surveyors will be done via Randomly generated Numbers. That way No-One will know who is Surveyor and who is not.
Should they pass, Cyan will email them a Non Disclosure Agreement binding them to not reveal that they are a Surveyor at all. Not even in the far far future where URU has closed down again. They will not be allowed to mention to family, nor friends, that they are a surveyor. The only ones Surveyors may talk to about Surveying business are other Surveyors or Cyan, and even then, the ID's of the other ResSurveyors may not be shared among Surveyors.
I'm sorry at how long this is, but I need to get this off my chest. I NEED to get the message out.
My Main, and FINAL POINT, is this:
I've grown up with this community, I've been with it from the start, almost. As well as anyone, I know what it was. And yet all around me I see people who act against the very virtues we learned in Cavern. Pride, Greed, Anger. It saddens me. As does the fact that that the hood in MOUL I was a member of is now so empty. Every day I log in, and It seems like I'm the only Member of Uru Obsession online.
It makes me sad to see this little community fall appart. But I digress.
This is your wake up call, URU community. Three Virtures; UNITY. DUTY. DESTINY.
Oh, Also, Any comments trying to pick a fight will be filtered out and deleted. ;)
_DTC
{P.S.: I have this funny little quirk about my personality to over react to EVERY SINGLE LITTLE THING I say. Probably as soon as I post the blog post I'll be bashing my head into a wall about how I shouldn't have posted this. And now having finished writing this entire post, I'm still debating to even post it! Gone through three Edits now. Still not to My Likeing. Four edits now. I'm just going to go with it! Send the Spanish Inquisition if you Like, I'll be here until the end!}
