A Few More Days… And “Make Good” Details
Posted on SOE’s security website:
May 12, 2011
We thank you for your patience as we continue to work around the clock to restore our game services. We know this has been a frustrating time for you and appreciate your understanding as we work to confirm the security of our network.
In light of the recent outage of Sony Online Entertainment’s game services due to April’s cyber-attack, we are committed to compensating our loyal player base for the inconvenience caused by the data breach and lost game time while we improve our security measures.
We are currently in the process of an extensive upgrade to our network to further protect your information from future attacks. It will likely be at least a few more days before we restore our services, and when we come back online, here is what you can expect for each of our game services.
First and foremost, all impacted players will receive 30 days of game time added to the end of the current billing cycle in addition to one day for each day the system is down. Additionally, many games are offering a variety of in-game items and special events to welcome players back once our services resume (per the outline below). This is true for both PC and PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system based products.
- EverQuest II and EverQuest II Extended: A series of events, including Double XP, Double Guild XP, Loot Bonanza, and City Festivals
For our lifetime subscribers, we’ll grant in-game currency; specifically 20,000 coins for Free Realms, 7,500 Galactic Credits for Clone Wars Adventures and 10 Marks of Distinction for DC Universe Online (in addition to the items listed above).
And finally, our Station Access subscribers will receive 500 Station Cash, in addition to the subscription time and items listed above.
Additionally, we announced today that SOE will provide its U.S.-based Station Account holders with complimentary enrollment in an identity theft protection program through Debix, one of the industry’s most reputable identity protection firms. For Station Account holders who live outside the U.S., SOE will be offering similar programs, if and as available, and will provide details as they’re confirmed for each country or territory.
We continue to work around the clock to restore SOE’s services and thank you for your continued patience as we complete our investigation of this criminal attack.
Thank you,
Sony Online Entertainment
Tags: account security
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Comments (27)
Aeosin
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Well it’s about time they finally updated the SOE site. This is surely good news. Looks like they are offering some good comeback deals too. Thanks SOE.
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Juull
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I’m withholding my opinion on the EQ2 offerings, but my 7 year old nephew who is a lifetime Free Realms member is really excited. Doesn’t take much when you’re 7, and it was Auntie’s PII on your account anyway …
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Hammerhorn
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If they wanna make it a real loot fest offer 4 fabled items per raid chest for a week so we can make up for lost raid time all us raiders dont need jack from any heroic zone and we cant make up the time lost to getting raid loot on our people to progress. So for johnny low play time this deal is great but for people with max level, max AA and raid geared toons this offers little or nothing unless we wanna roll alts which I dont. I dont think this is too much to ask coming from a raid leaders perspective between the bugs in the x 2 zone which caused so many problems also even before all this(Valhsera / Spider) cuttin holes in our raid time progression. Then at least I could see my force geared how it would be without the interuptions.
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freudrick
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I just threw up. Cannot believe how cheap these rotten greed mongers are.
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TheInsaneFurry
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Station cash would be better, maybe some free copy tokens to escape the live servers. I just hope they run these “events” for a decent length of time, so both the weekday and weekend players get a chance, not just 1 day stuff that 50% of the player base misses because they cant log in at that time.
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Fleewell
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While I am glad to see some sort of a commitment for restoration of services the “see what we are doing” stinks IMO. I bet the banks that have to pay more to replace all the credit cards than SOE is… Anyone want to bet that the exp bonus is like a weekend… where not all can partake? I work and often do not get to recieve much from these events… /sigh
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Lempo
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@Aeosin – http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/413/notsureifserious.jpg/sr=1
Why should ALL games not be eligible for a station cash bonus?
The double XP bonus will undoubtedly be a joke, it should run for the # of days that the servers are down, that is really the only equitable way to do it. This would not give anyone an ‘advantage’ over someone else, some can play every day, some can not but if done in this manner both types would be able to get the same amount of exp that they would have by the end of the double exp.
Duble XP potions could be given out as well but still not as equitable as above.
RL will prevent some players from taking advantage of it as Fleewell pointed out.
Raid zone timers need to be set to reset in 36 hours for 2 weeks, or extra loot in raid zone chests as was already suggested.
Loot bonaza? If that is anything like a hot zone then it is a joke.
I’ll just be glad when the servers are back up, potentially running on the new hardware (not holding my breath there). I did not expect much in the way of a make good from SOE, the 30 days is kinda meh, if $15 a month meant enough to me for that to matter I doubt I’d be playing anyway.
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Willlow
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For eq2 I see double xp, city festivals, and loot bonanza. Not sure about that. Double xp should be triple (though if its on for a week or two then I guess double is good enough), city festavals were happening anyways, and I’m not sure what loot bonanza is.
I’m mostly interested in what ‘making good’ means for raiders.
Like making all zones ‘hot zones’ for 2 weeks does nothing for me.
I’m hoping ‘loot bonanza’ means something more like raid kills drop 3x the loot (ie 6 pants instead of 2) for a week or two. I mean the guild I’m in runs the 3 ez mode zones each week, so 2 weeks of down time would require a 3x drop rate for a week to ‘make good.
Perhaps also throw in no lockout timers. or half lockout timers on everything for a month… something like that as well.
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Mookachooka
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For the crap they’re offering.. meh not even worth getting outta bed
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Inque
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It does look like a very cheap package. I was expecting that they would offer a decent amount of SC to subscribers (maybe 2k) or even get their SC designers working on a special freebie such as new flying mount. I do like the proposal of double / triple loot for a few weeks as that would make up for the lost raid time.
I’d rather they do in-game stuff like this than offer extensions to subscriptions that cost them real cash. They have lost a lot over this and I’d hate to see them lose more and jeperdise hardware upgrades / future development.
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Azzaroth
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Sry,
but.. cheap,weak and pathetic
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isest
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I read the details. This was nothing less than what we already expected. The double xp better be for at least the minimum of the downtime we had, otherwise its going to be a joke.
City festivals, we already get those, so I have to ask why the mention that. They come and they go, unless they are turning them all on.
What I want to know what is a loot Bonanza?
What I would like to see fixed is the problem with the bp dropping, in the pq fix that for us at the same time.
The rewards feel shallow to me, like I said most of them were already expected, and I have to ask is that the best they could come up with.
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Steve
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Very, very, weak in my opinion. Basically there are 5 types of people here.
1) I just want to play; I don’t care about free stuff; protect my identity.
2) Trollers that don’t even play –the ones trying to say well here is a free copy of rift so I get free stuff in game.
3) I play on the free server and I want stuff. When it comes back on I want more free stuff.
4) I paid for the game and I cannot play but this downtime has taken me out of interest in the game.
5) I used to play and I saw all the post and I was coming back but maybe not now.
I play on the free server just to hang out with real life friends and we do so once a week. I am at gold subscription and I have played eq1 and eq2 from the beginning. I love this game, the lore, the depth, the things to do solo, group and raid. I have really gotten into pvp and enjoy it immensely. This downtime is devastating. I can’t imagine how they feel on the inside SOE.
I work in a datacenter and its not pleasant went things go down or you have a breach. I understand the need to step back and fix the internals and keep the containment inside without the outside world telling you everything you did was wrong.
This is and has cost Sony a lot of money. Not to mention the collateral damage to smaller companies that are impacted by a down of this size. Could SOE have communicated better …well sure but we have no idea what the FBI is telling them on the inside.
I will come back and play as soon as the servers are back online. I am loyal to my friends and still love the game. But if anyone from SOE is reading this …I want you to know I am looking for something else to play now with my friends. I do not expect you to hand over the game to the customers but I thought you would do more to keep the customers you had …and even more so to bring people back. I highly recommend you start advertising your online games instead of relying on word of mouth. Offer some real incentives to stay and come back. The “make good” so far in my opinion just is not good enough.
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shlitzi
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Double XP and City Festivals?!! Are they friggin kidding me – cheapskates.
We all deserve a friggin Raid-level Griffin mount with unique looks and a option to get one Free House at least.
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Adam
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Cheap and easy ” buy back” rewards very very lacking in the Smedley and Smokejumper in the dunktank area!
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Anaogi
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Heh. Fan Faire should be…interesting this year.
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Uma
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For the people who want double xp for a week or more as a reward I dont get it. I took my main toon – BRIG threw in a pot and mentored down to lvl 85 and went to chardock (sp?) not on a double xp weekend from 278 aa and got to 300 in no time. The last double xp weekend I took my sk 257 aa – monk 252 aa – and ass 232 aa threw in a pot and lvl down to 85 in chardock i was getting 6 aa per every 30 min – you do the math. I muted the loot and made some nice plat on couple toons. I love the Raid lvl Griffin mount idea. I can not raid atm due to my kids practices or games. I dont think it would be fair to give me a raid piece like a helm or shoulders for a reward like some have suggested, but how about another portal instance like last time that would drop a raid piece charm slot that I could use, just throwing an idea out there. I am not looking to get alot of free things, I am just looking forward to getting my game back !!
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Steve
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Hmm, now that I see someone else is posting here with the name Steve I guess I need to find a new name to post under.
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Hal9000
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This “make good” program is a complete joke for EQ2. They might as well have slapped us in the face with a trout instead of offering stuff that we tend to get once a month anyways since their servers always crash. Who wants to bet that Loot Bonanza is just them lazily re-activating the portal events for the 12 year anny?
I hope people attending Fan Faire bring crates of rotten fruit and vegetables with them. Imagine how terrible it would be if the servers are still down by the time Fan Faire rolls around.
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Aeyri
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A $1 million identity theft policy for millions of people (if you include SOE and PSN), doesn’t sound “cheap” to me, even including the mega-group discount I’m sure they got 😉 Letting everyone play for free for a month and a half while they still pay their bills isn’t “cheap” either, although only fair and just. I’m also guessing that hiring 3 security firms over the past month to investigate this mess, and upgrading their systems hasn’t been cheap either.
As far as the in-game rewards, it seems that out of the games listed in the release, EQ1 and EQ2 are getting the most benefits. There seems to be a lot of speculation going on here and I would personally say hold your judgment until we see how the rewards actually are. Honestly, since they are already reimbursing us for our lost game time, they didn’t NEED to give us anything else, but they are. I’m content with what they’ve given us, although some sort of ‘Survivor’ title would be nice 😛
Meanwhile, I’m sure they are still busy fixing bugs and working on GU 60/61.
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Shawna
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If a free (prestige) house is an option, I would LOVE the Vigilant Rescue airship for a house.
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Elderon
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Wow, double XP, Loot Bonanza, & City Festival. (Which May’s festival was missed anyway because SOE network was down, so that’s not a perk)
Should i feel excited and encouraged to turn on my box for SOE anymore with these WONDERFUL, ENTICING, special events?
Fail… <–And I've even failed myself for using this overused meaningless word but i have NO OTHER words for my disappointment
Bah
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Shawn MT Godrinal AB
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OMG what they say are “Make Good” Details
What are they doing for us raiders?
Double loot timers cut in half anything?
Ya double xp is cool and all if you are not max aa and level but as for me and all of my friends we are max level and max AA.
THROW RAIDERS A BONE FOR GOD’s SAKE
http://www.godrinal.com
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Mrs Vole
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Really missing the game now!
Some free station cash would have been a better gift overall.
I would also have liked to see some questline or in-game referencess to the downtime, written into the lore.
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alan`
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The sheer lack of imagination with this “package” is staggering,bonus xp must have took them ages to come up with that,it’s pathetic it really is.
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Barroness
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This make good deal is weak and is not well thought out. SOE(EQ2) side should be focusing on server merging since ALOT of people will be gone and esp. those on Bazaar and Vox needs to be let free due to the fact that it will be so empty there.
You want a good deal that really hits the mark? Trion opened up 7 day free trials on Rift now thats a good tactical move.
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Murfalad
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The package is fine to me for current players, 1 month free + special events sounds good enough for current players.
But for me its lacking as a reason to encourage new people to pick up EQ2, I’d have opened up the servers to a free months play while all the veterans got their free month along with a 30-60 day extra free play for buying velious on a new account.
Although that sort of thing would fit much better with new servers, Splitpaw is already overloaded, if everyone returns its going to have population enough to handle, with extras it would be off putting to new players due to poor performance.
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