P7S1/Alaplaya Sets Up Temp Forum, Responds to SOE Concerns
ProSiebenSat.1/Alaplaya has established a temporary forum and thread to discuss the ProSiebenSat.1/Alaplaya-SOE deal. Here’s the announcement from Coldor, Alaplaya’s Community Manager:
Hello fellow SOE- and Alaplaya-Gamers,
with this board we just created a temporarily catch basin for all your questions regarding our new partnership between SOE (Sony Online Entertainment) and ProSiebenSat1 Games.
This will not be the final billboard-solution for the upcoming SOE-Games. With the following launch of DC Universe Online all SOE-Games will get their own dedicated websites with appropriate designs and a fresh billboard for you to use.
We are looking into a bright gaming future here at ProSiebenSat1 Games and the upcoming big SOE-Games like DC Universe Online, EverQuest II, Free Realms and PlanetSide 2 are just the tip of the iceberg.
So stay tuned for more details to come.
And now in the IRC channel, Coldor is answering some questions specifically.
- SOE games will have nothing to do with Alaplaya at all.
- With the launch of DC Universe, we will introduce a new in-game currency that is similar to StationCash. It will not be Alaplaya Points. Your Station cash will be converted to our currency and you will be able to use it with EQ2 and Vanguard.
- Since EQ1 is not part of our SOE deal, I can’t give you an answer if we can “split” Station cash just for your EQ1 account. I will bring up the idea up with station cash to let users decide how much they want to get converted.
- Currently everything is in discussion here and at SOE. It’s not totally set in stone.
- IP-Lock is being discussed as I have already told you, so please don’t decide on just that.
I suggest reading all the followups, but this one from Coldor is key. The deal may NOT be done just yet…
This topic is currently being discussed internally and at SOE. I can’t tell you all the detials now, but I hope that we are able to loose some restrictions. And for existing accounts that play on us servers and vise versa, they will be able to do so in the future.
So for all existing SOE-Players: We are trying hard to find a solution that you don’t get seperated.
A followup posted by Protagonist who seems to be a moderator or spokesperson of the Alaplaya forums who is a director at Alaplaya:
Some clarifications:
- The SOE Games will get their own Website and Forum
- If you played eq2 on an US Server you still can do this. Seems some missed that
- So far we never deleted an account because of inactivity
and:
We believe that a game like EQ2 still has huge potential and we plan really big marketing efforts in Europe for it. The SOE games will not be integrated in the alaplaya webpage as we totally understand that you want to feel home.
and from Coldor again:
I can understand your concerns about the coming changes to your beloved games, as I am an EQ2- and DCUO-Player for myself (Level 90 Wizarad on Valor and Level 16-Character in DCUO).
But for all that I have seen here and all things that have been discussed in our offices with SOE-Staff, things will be mostly the same for players ingame and on the websites. The only thing that changes really is that you will have an account with ProSiebenSat.1 Games. SOE-Games will be getting their own websites and bill boards and will not be integrated within the alaplaya-portal.
There will be no drastically changes in the item-shops for SOE-Games either and we don’t want “power-gear to pimp your character” in it. We can assure you that, as we are also longtime SOE-Players (and Gamers at all) here at ProSiebenSat.1 Games. We may introduce new items to the shops, but that will be things you appreciate and that don’t affect gameplay or balance.
Our team here at ProSiebenSat.1 Games is growing continuous to ensure the quality in service and management that players will appreciate. Please always think:
We listen, we care, we are gamers, we won’t let you down.
Another update from Protagonist:
Regarding the topic having everything ready already: That is just impossible. We will start game by game and it will take a certain time. The deal was announced in January (we are a stock exchange [listed] company and have to announce things at a certain time) and since then we are working on the stuff we need to work on.
BTW: I would not say that our korean games are low quality but I understand that the taste is different. They have different target groups etc. That´s why all SOE games gets their own destination [website].
We have enough long time EQ players to understand your worries. As long as it stays constructive we are listening carefully and yes we read the SOE forums and other fanpages a lot to get an understanding of the critics.
Can you trust us? That is something we just can build up over time. Give us the time and we will build it up together. We want to go that road with the community.
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Comments (44)
Keeler
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After reading this it seems like we should all jump ship from SOE and have these guys run everything. IF this isn’t all bullshit. I truly truly hope this doesn’t kill Everquest. I guess only time will tell.
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badcat
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Nothing is set in stone yea right. Sounds like dammage control at its best.
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skippydippy
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Oh theres little doubt there a lot of fire fighting going on,and i have an inherant distrust of any company that proclaims they’re “gamers” its false and shallow and well just trying to hard to get down with da kidz
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MrsBadger
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I can’t believe Sony thinks this is a ‘better regional experience’, when even the level of English delivered is so poor, let alone the message that emerges.
I don’t care who Sony wants to make a deal with over who gets payments, but I am NOT dealing with this company myself. And why the heck would we need a seperate website from the Sony one? It’s just insulting in every way, I want off Splitpaw asap.
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Feldon
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skippydippy,
SOE did the same thing at last year’s Fan Faire. Over and over it was “We’re players too.”
Alaplaya is now coming out and responding to these issues here and in the IRC channel (server: irc.euirc.net channel: #alaplaya.en ) while SOE is saying nothing. They are addressing every issue we are bringing up in the IRC channel.
It does not change the perception or possibly reality of Alaplaya as a company, but I am surprised by how they are responding to these issues.
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Aeyri
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Some news coverage: http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/02/23/soe-responds-to-prosiebensat-1-fiasco-says-its-not-a-done-deal/
Here’s hoping there will be more.
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Stargrace
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“Your Station cash will be converted to our currency and you will be able to use it with EQ2 and Vanguard.”
Vanguard doesn’t use station cash (and is not one of the eight games listed in this deal). Did they just let slip that the game is going to be going Free to Play and a market introduced?
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Kwill
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I don’t believe much of this marketing fluff. Sounds like damage control to me. Sorry, I don’t justification for a plan to add anything to the marketplace, “items we would appreciate” or not.
The game is becoming more than regionalized, it’s been sold as a Euro version to this company. I didn’t think there could be anything worse than the drama that surrounded AoD, but this is of a magnitude that is boggling.
I don’t really have a dog in this fight, as they say, since I am an American and play in a guild with only one UK person that I am aware of. However, the idea that the entire Euro (and possibly East Asian) player base is being separated from the community is shocking and sad. I enjoyed the international flavor of EQ2. I think SOE was quite short sighted here.
Feldon, thank you for your coverage, which has been worthy of a gaming journalism Pulitzer!
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Kwill
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Adding, I saw that the Massively article linked above has the offending original comic by CheesePirate, but no mention of the fact that it was that comic that started the massive banning.
I say always leave it to the Norwegian comics to poke the hornet’s nest!
I agree again with MrsBadger, again, that the standard of written English from this company leaves much to be desired. I noticed that, too — not sure if they were just typing stuff on the fly, and decided they didn’t care how “wizarad” was spelled, or really have no idea how it is spelled in English. We won’t even get into the awkward sentence construction. That’s not to say they aren’t a good company, but there is a lack of attention to detail presented here.
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mixxit
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I just wanted to add this quote from coldor in the channel also
‘Coldor: and yes vanguard will be free to play’
Not on topic to eq2 but is an soe game and I thought some would be interested
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Kwill
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@Feldon, perhaps it’s not surprising that Alaplaya is responding this way. Consider this — you just stretched your financial resources to buy a game division from an international company that will add a lot of prestige to your stable of games. And guess what? That big international company does a piss-poor job of announcing the transition, and suddenly all that new subscriber revenue looks like it’s going to dry up like an empty well because the player base knows you are a two-bit company with shady business practices, doesn’t want to be regionalized, and so are all cancelling their accounts.
So why wouldn’t you leap into mega-damage control mode, and try to keep pepole from leaving? At this point, they will say anything to keep their million dollar investment afloat (to stick with CheesePirates nautical theme)!
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Feldon
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No better sum-up than that!
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Feldon
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Vanguard going Free-to-Play. I’m sure people will gripe, but at this point subscription numbers for Vanguard have nowhere to go but UP. At this point just getting people to LOOK at the game will be worth any small amount of grief.
I know I’ve heard how wonderful Vanguard looks many times and have never tried it out.
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Arcos
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I too distrust people who say they play and love the game. After all SOE have been saying all their staff play the game and look at how surprised they are at the effect of these changes. Surely someone should have said – hold on a minute, what about such and such a group.
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Kwill
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It’s actually probably a good thing for Vanguard, as you say. I did play it briefly when it came out, but went back to EQ2 (or EQ, I can’t even remember how long ago that was). At the time of launch, it had some intersting features that weren’t common in other titles.
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Lina
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But in the end, it will not change things for me, if I am forced to Prosieben. I will never let that company get anywhere near my credit card. I already suffer from insomnia, but the little sleep I do get shouldn’t be ruined by lying awake worrying about security. It’s SOE or nothing here. Cause I won’t be forced to choose between friends and family either. So I guess it’s nothing.
/Khayna, lvl 90 paladin – Freeport
“Free Feldon 2012” – you rock!
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Stargrace
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@Mixxit – thanks for the info on that, I was told specifically that VG would NOT be under this new partnership, although I’ve been suspecting F2P would come along since they started ‘working’ on it again. Sure would have been nice to have heard this from SOE though, instead of some random company that I’ve never heard of before yesterday.
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Stargrace
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@Feldon As a VG player (playing there since beta), I agree that F2P itself is a good thing, we have a small player base, and bringing in new players is not a bad idea. However. If there’s region locking, that will be bad and having someone else let it leak is also bad.
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Feldon
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I don’t think Alaplaya staff have ever had to deal with a company (or its quick-to-anger customers) like SOE. Be careful what you wish for.
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badcat
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Well they had to do something with vanguard, so free to play it is. I saw this comming wit the free to play stuff, I just did not see the fire-sale starting this year.Things must be a lot worse off financially for soe than what I thought. I remember when swg go hit with the nge, and smedley said we anticipated some player drop off, he was not expecting 90% player base loss. I got to wonder what the player base loss will be now, since a canceled account goes to silver status, or whatever status it is. I think they expect some folks to cancel, but I wonder if they expected this type of outrage. I think once again smedley has blow it. How does smedley and sj hope to have good will for eq2next now that they just basically tossed the player base under the buss.
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Galicus
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i really do think the big problem as to why ppl are so mad is the region lock thing……we really don’t think it if far to bring this into a game like this that has been running for so long, i play with a few Americans on the Splitpaw server and i’m not happy that i may not be able to play EQ2 with them anymore…..if this does not change it will be a very sad day and u will loose a lot of customers :(:(
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Rugrat
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Protagonist is the one who on day 1 of this announcement posted that there would never be any IP region locking.
Unfortunate, this is.
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Kwill
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Actually, I bet the powers that be at SOE are pulling their hair out at what Alaplaya is doing — leaking info about Vanguard FTP, clarifying details that were probably still somewhat confidential. There’s nothing Carlson can do, or anyone else, at this point since they caused the initial problem, and it’s not their company to stifle. Alaplaya, as I said, is just trying to salvage their investment, screw SOE.
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Kwill
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In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the SOE VP’s aren’t all sitting around a conference table right now moaning with their heads in their hands, while Smed is screaming into the phone at someone at Alaplaya =)
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Buggabug
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Even IF the entire deal was scrapped I couldn’t bring myself to play eq2 again, simply for fear of what they aren’t telling us. Will be logging in to donate my valuables to my guild and simply uninstalling.
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Sigtyr
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The proper thing to do for them is to let people freely choose where they want to play, remember it is probably VERY easy for Pro7 to do a better job than SOE in Europe IF they want to. SOE has been a failure in Europe since they launched had their service and planning been better fewer EU players would be playing on US servers.
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Eschia
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I wonder why our version of vanguard hasn’t gone free to play. Everything else did…
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Kwill
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Very good thought, Sigtyr! Reason in the face of chaos.
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kahonen
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Seems to me the last thing that will happen will be server transfers away from EU servers. Given people’s response not just to splitting the servers but to Alaplaya’s reputation, who in their right mind would stay. I’m sure Alaplaya didn’t pay for empty severs. Realistically, server transfers are simply not going to happen!
@Rugrat: If you go and re-read that reference, he didn’t actually say there would never be IP locking. He said something more akin to “we’re not currently thinking about people transferring” – this could be taken to mean they were ignoring it.
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Sigtyr
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Well EU customers where charged more for the same services due to SOEs strange exchange rate policy and so on and on. Had you done a survey on the EU servers this autumn many would have been unhappy with SOEs services in EU.
I am not defending the deal as it is because it is stupid but SOE had already lost a lot of trust in the EU, that is why so many from Europe does not play on the EU servers.
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Daalilama
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Aside from the fact that both companies grossly underestimated the reaction from the community and the utter lack of anything by SOE that comes close to this response to the players by Alaplaya, I will give them the credit they are due in at least manning the f*ck up and responding to the concerns of the community regardless if its complete bullshit or an actual attempt at mitigating this disaster to try and accomodate the community concerns…its really sad tbh that a company your own community blasted in the fastest and largest thread actually had the balls to respond to something you have elected not to SOE…so for that I’ll give them props for the time being…but only on the quick response something SOE should have done when the feedback thread ignited.
With regards to Vanguard…ya I didnt see that listed as one of the alaplaya games…does that mean this was a recent change since the volcano sized anger by the community erupted by SOE to get the region locks or account deletion in alaplaya’s EULA removed? Doubt it but all we have at this point is poor speculation as we get nothing from Smedly except “I’ve been getting alot of positive feedback on this agreement” granted smed is the one sending himself these “positive feedbacks”.
I really hope for EQ2’s sake they listen to the community and do right by us on this as a US player on Naggy this wont directly affect me but indirectly it will when I lose alot of old friends to the new iron curtain…I spent 2 years on Vox before rerolling on Naggy so I’m fully aware of craptastic locked servers are….sorry for the long rant.
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Kwill
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Sadly, as to SOE’s reaction, George Orwell again said it well:
•”Day by day and almost minute by minute the past was brought up to date. In this way every prediction made by the Party could be shown by documentary evidence to have been correct; nor was any item of news, or any expression of opinion, which conflicted with the needs of the moment, ever allowed to remain on record. All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary.”
– George Orwell, 1984, Book 1, Chapter 3
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Sigtyr
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What baffles me is that SOE totally seems unaware of what their customers think and what they prefer, I have always got the impression by those who have met the EQ2 developers and programmers that they usually have a decent idea about the playerbase prefers. I assume that this whole deal comes from higher up (and did not smokejumper say something about that early on?).
Apart from the PR failure (that someone has to be fired for) it is a huge failure in understanding your customers and that is not a good sign, in business understanding your customers is #1 if you do not do that you will fail no matter how much money you have. I hope that Pro7 has a hefty breach of contract clause in the deal that will force SOE to pay a hefty fine when (if) they have to break the contract, that finally may be the thing that forces change in upper level management at SOE. (I just assume Pro7 to be smarter and better businessmen than SOE it is hard to believe they would be worse)
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bhagpuss
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Geez, things are moving fast. Just came home from work and making my way through the news.
Vanguard going F2P isn’t a surprise. Been expecting that since they put devs back on it. The way the news has leaked is though. I noticed in the FAQ that EQ2 was alone in being singled out for the grandfathering of EU players onto US servers. I went to the DCUO forums but couldn’t see anything about it there. Didn’t check Free Realms. What are Allaplaya (if we’re calling them that now rather than pss1) planning on doing with all the SoE games that only have US servers anyway? Are they starting up new EU ones?
This has all the makings of one of those PR stunts where companies announce something so terrible that when they reveal the actual thing they had planned all along, bad as it is, it looks so mild in comparison that everyone not only swallows it but says thank you. Except you need a marketing department that knows what it’s doing to pull off that kind of trickery. Does SOE actually have a marketing department?
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Grimmond
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Note that Protagonist did not ask us to trust him or make us any promises, he said …
Can you trust us? That is something we just can build up over time. Give us the time and we will build it up together. We want to go that road with the community.
SoE aslways says “Trust us” then they knife us in the back. This guy is talking about a long road of mutual respect. Note also that he is here with Coldor and is answering questions . Ever in recent knowledge remember SJ answering questions … willingly … truethfully ? Where is Hollly and Smokie and Smed ? They walked away from this deal, screwed us up one side and down the other and are drinking jack and coke at the pool side right now. The EU players might just be better off with Alaplaya.
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Eschia
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I’m actually starting to feel a bit of sympathy for the other company. As others have said, they probably thought they were just getting a nice little deal, but turned out there was more to it then that, and their ways will have to adapt to it. It’s like selling a used Mal-kept Ferrari to a guy who just wanted a small car just for getting to work and back. They got hosed lol.
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Kwill
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I agree with those who have some sympathy for Alaplaya … their dirty laundry has certainly been aired in the overall blowup caused by SOE. Not that they didn’t deserve to be scrutinzed, but I am sure they didn’t expect the depth of research and reporting that occurred right at the outset.
Not only are they dealing with the community split, they are also dealing with the legitimate criticism of their corporate practices.
I doubt they have the marketing department to deal with this — unlike SOE, which does have one, but apparently the entire staff is on vacation. I wonder, too, is there an international dimension to this, as far as what kind of reaction and response is expected? Certainly there’s a language barrier of communicating in English, to some extent — Protagonist is trying but his writing is not fluent.
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Feldon
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“Credit cards with legs.” – Kelly Flock, former CEO Sony Online Entertainment, describing customers to other SOE top management.
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Necromancer
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Does anyone else find an odd sense of humor in the fact that ProSiebenSat.1/Alaplaya is actually trying to be open and responsive to the community – creating their own forums for people to post feedback, actually responding to people and trying to be as open and communicative as possible – where as we haven’t heard a peep from SOE?
The question we should be asking is why exactly are we still giving SOE money when they treat their customer base like crap?
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Deah
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Im 36 years old. I dont want to exchange my adult and experienced community to one that charges for avatar outfits – manga style. I, nor my fellow guild mates, are naive teens who steal their mom’s credit cards just to pimp a lo-fi forum look. We have families, we have jobs, we are equipped with critical minds. We are not sheep for you to shepard, SOE!
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Deah
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Btw im banned for posting ” Free Feldon 2012″ so i need to let some steam out somewhere…
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Grimmond
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Necro – I had the same exact thought. History can only be the final judge of honesty, however intuition and gut feelings are a good way to judge the future. It’s odd that I am getting a warm and fuzzy feeling from Alaplaya and an extreme biting cold void from SoE who we know so well. Should I be surprised ?
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Sigtyr
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Well the Alaplaya are actually trying to answer people, they have at least read the book on public relations. Maybe we all want to sub with them in the future?
We know this Ala has a director that actually answers peoples questions, a second thing is the haughty “speak better English” LOTS of people in Europe speaks less than stellar English (remember BPs Swedish board chairman at the gulf “little people”) Live with it. SOE has provided nothing so far.
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Katzilla
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I wonder if this is the REAL reason why my transfer of 4 toons from Halgar to Telon still has not been done in Vanguard? The answer I have got since before Xmas is that transfers are “broken”. Guess this is an understatement….:( PLEASE dont FUBAR Vnaguard AS WELL!!!!
Really dont know what to do at this point-cancel Eq2 and delete and play VG or wait and see and hope for the best??
All my EQ2 toons are on US servers in US time based guilds even though I live in the UK. If I start a new toon on an EU server but also have toons on US servers does that change the way the game launches to play that one toon? How the hell are they going to get around the in game mechanics of that one? Who owns my account Ala or SOE??
What happens to folks who have toons on US AND EU servers- do they now become totally unplayable based on where you live and which server they were started on or a combination of the two fators?? SOMEONE needs to PLEASE explain EXACTLY how this will (or will not work) FOR THE PLAYERS so that folks can at least make an informed decision rather than a knee jerk and two fingers up to the whole mess. Although, the latter is VERY VERY appealing right now… /cry.
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