AskED The Admin: Answer Compilation (News 4/20, 5/4: BONUS!)

[Platonix]

September 26th

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

Bid blast is a little feature to help give away some prized items for the everyday Gaian, though there's still many kinks to work out so that it'll work smoothly.

It's spring cleaning time again, hope everyone had put in their feedback. Which feature do you want us to work on the most?

Lanzer

armadillodreamer

Hi Lanzer! It's that time again. How about an update on the wing issue? I was very disappointed to see that the new animated wings layer behind long hair.

armadillodreamer

Hi Lanzer! Two weeks ago, I told you about an issue with back wings: that most layer BEHIND hair, making all wings look rather poor with long hairstyles, and many of the smaller ones are almost or entirely invisible! You said...

Lanzer

I just talked to a number of artist and we'll look into the issue you've mentioned. I can't promise anything yet, but do check in with us and I'll give you an update.

Following your request, the team did tried moving the wings to the front layer but because many of the wings are rather big, they look strange when they start to cut off the taller part of the hair. I'm sorry for the bad news.

Lanzer

Pilfer von Durem

Lanzer,

Did zOMG! make enough money quickly enough (Don't forget the cookies. The proposal for zOMG!'s addition of a flash animator is one of the highest cookie earners.) to prove to the stuffed shirts that it is relevant, popular, and worthy of a larger team?

I asked around and nobody remembered. What is the name of the female pirate NPC shown with the picture set that included an NPC with a backpack? It was at a con, I think, and wasn't a preview of the Pirate Queen from zOMG!
It was discussed in a previous AtA over a year ago.

Lanzer

Which feature do you want us to work on the most?

zOMG! Whomever made the decisions to downgrade the game really screwed the pooch. We have at least 3 major towns left to see made into expansions. Isle de Gambino has been worked on slightly, but we need Durem and Aekea.

Followed by Towns 2.0. A reboot, not remaking it.

Well technically zOMG's support is limited but we're still putting in time and resources in updates. Not a large and dedicated team unfortunately.

I don't think she has a name, it was a design done by Saka as a sketch, because the NPC never came to life we never named her I think.

Panagrammic

Sagebomb

Alchemy

First up props to pans leading feedback after the announcement of the level 10 prize. A few questions from that though.

There are currently walls in Alchemy, the most common one right now is the level 3 wall. To get past it you need to complete one of a few level 3 formulas (or create a lot of a couple of level 2 formulas). All the formulas involved have very rare components.

For faustos formula you need...Faustos formula.
For Sundays treat/fondue...gum and used tissue.

All of these have epic low numbers reaching MP. (no tissues listed 21 sold in the past month for example).

Pan suggested item flow tweaking is happening, but as someone who checks MP on these items several times a day, for at least a couple weeks (I lost track of when I started tracking) I can say there is no change in their vend flow.

1. When can we expect to see a heightened flow of components needed for level 3+ formulas which have left a massive bottleneck, capped by a wall.

2. Alchemy item recycling (through dd) is good to see, how’s progress, do we expect to see it starting this week still?



Trying hard to be hard core, but finding it hard XD

Bid Blast.

I have a lot of hope for this future and all the fixes which are being brought in were ones I (and many others) asked for. So thanks on that.

3. When can we expect to see the next round listed?

4. At what rate will new items (to bid on) be added (as in can we expect to wait a few days between listings like now).

Scavenger Hunt

Looking forward to this.

5. Any clues on how close we are to the release of this?

Just got out of a meeting about alchemy, actually.

The fundamental issue here is that the components are too rare, and that's making it difficult to proceed past level 3. Components are contained in the Philosopher's Cache. So, we'd like to get many more Philosopher's Caches created. To that end:

• we're reducing the difficulty of the GGB formula
  
• in appreciation to those folks that soldiered through the existing GGB formula, we are going to back-granting GGBs to anyone that created a GGB to compensate so that they get the advantage of the easier formula
  
• we are adding an alternate path to the Philosopher's Cache and Alchemist's Case that is constructible through farmable components

Many users wanted to have the components in the gold shop, but pricing the components fairly is difficult in that case; we'd like to see how the components price out with this strategy, and then if we need to improve the liquidity we can have a limited time sale in Dernier Cri or something.

With regards to the recycling:

This week, we'll use the marketplace for any item above a certain marketplace value. However, we'd really like to use diving dumpster instead (it's more fairly redistributive), so we'll be experimenting with that next week.

Bidblast:

Should be up later this week, with the changes discussed in the dev notice.

Panagrammic

Terrible Storm Coming

Hey Lanzer!

I have been wading through the Spring Clean-up Forum and the proposals but I haven't been able to do daily votes. In fact unless the cookie button has been glitched to be stuck in appearance, I don't think I've been able to second vote anything until the reset of votes went out today. Any thoughts?

You can only vote once on a proposal -- but we clear the votes in the main forum every so often.

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

twisted *wonders which members of Gaia's staff will answer these questions* twisted

1. What do you think would be worse -- losing your internet access, or losing your phone service? stressed burning_eyes

2. Which game/game series do you like more -- "Metroid", "Castlevania", or "Shadow Complex"? ninja emotion_dealwithit

3. What's your favorite kind of pasta/rice/etc.? emotion_kirakira emotion_omnomnom

Internet, easy.

This is a tough one, I would say Castlevania because of the style, gameplay, and music.

Sushi emotion_omnomnom

Panagrammic

Catalyste

Why did the price of the tickets for Bid Blast rise? I find it odd since we're already paying for the winning bid, but to pay more for the ticket to have a bid is too much of a gold sink.

So that a newly registered mule can't troll the bids too much. Update: Also, we're hoping that 100g is too expensive for a joke, whereas 10g certainly is not.

Lanzer

Sifen Yamishi

Evening Lanzer.

I would like to know whether you'll be updating Inventory Search so it will be as up to date as the Marketplace itself.

Also, there happens to be a glitch revolving around Inventory Search and the new pose format. When you click on a pose that has your avatar holding an item, the avatar does not show after clicking on said pose.

Are you aware of it?

Other than this, that is all I have to ask for tonight.

We look at the inventory system often, and sorting plus search features are often discussed. I do think that it's not too hard to implement.

I am not aware of that problem but will definitely check on it after ATA. Thanks for letting me know.

Narumi Misuhara

Lanzer

Existential Existence

I would like to see zOMG, some forum issues (like the ignore system), and the avatar arena worked on. I don't think anyone made any proposals in the Spring Clean forum about the arena though.

Too bad.

Since the bloodstone amulets for zOMG sold so well, will there be plans to sell more DMS tickets before or after the opening of DMS?

Got any more hints on the Halloween event?

biggrin

Annnddd care to share who the artist of the Prince of the Sea EI is? If not it's okay. I was just curious.

Halloween hint - there will be a masquerade

The artist who worked on the EI is not here right now, I'll ask and let you know next week

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooooooooooooooo! ...It's all ruined!!!!!!

...just kidding smile

Lanzer

-Shiny_Tsukkomi-

Good Evening Lanzer and Co~

--Is the QA for Dead Man's Shadow going along smoothly? I heard you ran into a couple of nasty bugs...
--Do you plan on releasing any Alchemy formulas that will require only components found in zOMG (like the Lawnshark Blades)?
--Any news on when Resort World will get an update?
--It's a bit of a stupid question, but here goes: Is the Gaia Staff allowed to vote for Spring Cleaning proposals?

Oh nothing to worry about, bugs just mean a bit of a delay

Not currently, as the first few formulas are designed to be accessible by everyone. More focused formulas will probably be released later.

No news yet, but we do expect to see one in the future.

The answer is no, Gaia staff don't get to vote in Spring Cleaning, or it would defeat the purpose of it being a Gaian focused event! biggrin

Have a great week everyone, see you all next Monday!

[Platonix]

October 3rd

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

October is here and Halloween decorations are popping up everywhere. Have you picked out a costume yet?

We're having good progress on the Halloween event, and the new housing editor is close to completion! Can't wait to see the new houses that everyone setup.

Let's get started with this week's ATA!

Lanzer

Crystal Sparda

Hi again. sweatdrop
Being as I live in an area with no halloween activity, I won't dress up (plus I'm too poor to get a costume).

I was wondering... where is all of Gaia's gold coming from?
Just from hearing it around, most gold is granted through either zOMG! or Booty Grab.
Are there any other things that grant somewhat significant amounts of gold?
I can't play Booty Grab purely because of the near-computer-crashing lag.
I give up on zOMG! due to being unable to go anywhere without being gift-raped by evil monsters.
So, are there any other things a Gaian can do to get some good gold,
other than being a complete freak of nature who stalks the marketplace for
7294382 hours waiting for a misprice or being a master scammer manipulator?

As much as I'd like to make a journal or site feedback thread, AtA seems like the only place
that I even have a chance a staff member can read about how ******** up the system is.
Gaia used to be about having fun and hanging with your friends.
Now it is all about who pays the most money to get items
and the users who successfully manipulate the marketplace to inflate items out the wazoo.
Haven't you wondered why the userbase has shrunk over the past few years?

Why was Ocean Party abandoned?
I was a great game, and many people enjoyed it and wanted it imported.
As soon as the gold conversion option was removed, it was abandoned.
I took a look at the forum for it and many people don't even know what it is.
Please please PLEASE do something with it?
I tried creating a proposal for it, but I'm guessing many people don't remember it
or never played it, so they don't know what they're missing out on.

Lastly, why should I stay on Gaia?
I know I haven't grown out of it, but it rather seems like
Gaia grew far apart from what it used to be.
I seem to only be sticking around for events, friends,
and VERY patiently waiting for a reply to my mod app.

You're right, most gold come from zOMG and Bootygrab as of today, while we are still trying to balance things out more.

We've just adjusted Word Bump, Jigsaw and Pinball, and before that we adjusted forum post, so try the new settings and tell us what you think! It's going to be work in progress.

Ocean Party is a fun game though user interest was way too little, and compared to other games that are more popular, we could only find time to keep up with a number of them. We spend our time on more of the core features today.

One of the major problem that we faced is the fact that we give gold away, and there isn't a real system for taking that gold away. The purchasing system remains largely unchanged over the years, but because of inflation, it gives anyone who owns the rare items a lot more gold. Inflation remains to be the toughest problem that we face today.

We continue to create new games, new items, and events that are completely free, and we hope that between the free features and games, to friends who you hang out with, Gaia is still a place to hang out and have fun. I'm sorry that the rare and exclusive items are now harder to obtain, and unless we start the economy, I don't quite know how we can tackle the issue unfortunately. I hope that everything else we do remains to be creative and fun for you.

Lanzer

Fractale

1: What is the alien Zurg 09, Flarn doing since we last saw him as a judge with Jack, during Halloween 2009 auditions?

2: What does Jack do the other 364 days of the year, when it's not Halloween?

3: In 2009, in the minicomic where Jack was holding Halloween auditions, Azrael proposed a Halloween event “of brimstone and darkness and fire” but his suggestion got shot down by Jack. Will we see a Halloween event, in the future, where Azrael gets to carry out his own event, that he proposed 2 years ago?

4: Is Liam officially with Sam, since they got to dance together back during Promageddon 2009 event? Even though it was am who first shyly admitted that she'd rather dance with Liam, Liam never officially asked her out to hook up. Are they together or not?

I believe he's hanging around Ron Bruise following his extravagant career

Making delicious pumpkin pies...

With enough fan support, maybe, though we have a lot of ideas for other events too.

Yup, it's now official, even though Liam is a little on the quiet side.

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

emotion_brofist Hello again, Lanzer! emotion_yatta

1. Has the staff ever considered that perhaps not everyone on Gaia needs and/or wants to have a gigantic, elaborate event in order to have fun for certain holidays? I mean, it's fairly obvious that you're all a little overworked/overstressed/etc. with everything ELSE going on with the site. sweatdrop

2. In regards to the previous question, and after what happened last year, was it ever an option to simply skip the Halloween event for zOMG this year -- especially with DMP coming out soon -- and just work on other events/things, such as a Christmas-themed event? *wants an ice-themed attack ring* emotion_kirakira

3. What's the one kind of candy that you just HAVE to have in very large quantities? emotion_omnomnom

Oh, and......Thanks for increasing the non-donor gold cap in zOMG! ninja

That's true, though we just naturally have a tendency to want to do a better job year after year. Maybe it's time to run more polls...

That's hard to say. The zOMG developers are pretty tied up with now with the updates, so we'll see what we can do.

Fizzy Cola candy by Haribo. Those are addictive!

Lanzer

PrincyBoy

Do you know if there will be a Halloween REI/EI this year?

If there is can we have a hint please.

Yes, but no hints yet as I don't even know what the item is. biggrin

Lanzer

Zweizi Galon

Hello Lanzer! Here's my questions. smile

1. Will we ever see any of these NPCs released? Sam was released and there was a lot of Gaia P.O.P. seen with the brown haired guy, any hints?



2. Any plans for more Meredith in the plot, or a more interactive bank/feature with her?



3. Any plans to continue the Devin x Lance romance plotline?

We create characters as we come up with storylines and ideas, so we would see them only if there is a story or a game in need of such a character. So that's why we have seen many new and different NPC since the release of that slide a few years back.

She'll need a lot more support from everyone to be put back on the spotlight

Quite possibly, they're a side favorite for many.

Lanzer

Terrible Storm Coming

Heeeeey Lanzer!

Is the new zOMG area going to be open all year round after the Halloween event this year, or is this going to be a special, once a year, super awesome Halloween extravaganza? Also will we be seeing new Halloween items from the new area/zOMG in general?

Yeah the area is meant to be an add on as opposed to a holiday event. I'll need to check in regarding new items, there should be new ones but no particularly Halloween specific.

Lanzer

Sifen Yamishi

Hi Lanzer.

I might as well take a stab on asking some questions:

1: Is Louie in the closet or not?

2: Any chances that more manga/storyline will follow this particular vampire?

3: Any hints on when Bren's shop is coming back?

4: Out of curiosity, is Devin the only GLBTI NPC on GAIA?

Nope, Louie is not as confused as he seems

Yeah but our upcoming plot is not going to be around vampires unfortunately

not sure about that one, sorry

The only one who's open, yes. Others? Well only time will tell

Lanzer

Oochiyama

Hi Lanzer~! :3

I was wondering a few things...

- 1 - can we get a hint for halloween this year? :3

- 2 - wihen are we gonna get a WEAPONS SHOP?! sad

- 3 - Is Ruby single? >:3=

Apparently masquerade is the only hint we have for now...

Sorry we should have had one but still haven't got around to it. Hopefully in the near future.

Yeah, so who wants to know? smile

Lanzer

Eruravenne

So I was thinking... This Halloween is going to be a masquerade of some sort, yes? Well, I believe the last masquerade we had on Gaia was the one where The Masque showed up. Can we expect anything that awesome to happen at this masquerade? emotion_kirakira

Also, will we be getting a new skin? Maybe more than one?

Well the event should be awesome for sure. As for new skin, I can't say no on that one. wink

Thank you for joining us on this week's ATA. See you all next week!

[Platonix]

October 17th

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

Halloween is coming up, how many of you already have your costume planned out? It's a quiet week here as we gear up for the event plus the housing and zOMG updates. So let's get started with this week's ATA.

Oh by the way, how many of you have seen Real Steel? It's such an anime movie, I love it!

Panagrammic

Fractale

- so I'm wondering- where do the staff take the majority of their feedback from? Focus groups? Email queues? Polls? Market research? How regularly do the staff actually check Site Feedback for user suggestions and feedback?

We read SF every day.

Of the others:

- email / letters from users
- random PMs to users
- random PMs from users
- polls / surveys
- focus groups (but infrequently)

While SF is really useful, there are really strong subgroups on Gaia that hardly ever venture into SF (i.e., RPers).

Lanzer

Fractale

1: I can't help but feel a little disturbed at your comment to my question two weeks ago: “what does Jack do year round, when it's not Halloween?” You commented with “he bakes delicious pumpkin pies”. Since Jack is a pumpkin-head...creature...thing, wouldn't his baking pies of pumpkin be like killing off his own kind? And Jack is ok with this? (or does he just use chunks off his own head? Which is still pretty disturbing) O_o

2: Are there any NPC's who are secretly Moga Tamers? Before the removal of some Moga in the Mogadex in its early stages, I noticed there was a Moga Twinkle. Could Hatsya possibly be a Moga tamer, since she has a Twinkle?

3: There was a post where Fleep once said

“fleep”

and remember, Site Feedback is NOT where the majority of the feedback we consider comes from

“fleep”

This is a much better way to get quality feedback from a broader range of users -- including those who don't use forums at all. We definitely always check Site Feedback to get a pulse on what people feel, but we have tons of different ways in which we get feedback from users.

- so I'm wondering- where do the staff take the majority of their feedback from? Focus groups? Email queues? Polls? Market research? How regularly do the staff actually check Site Feedback for user suggestions and feedback?

4: Can you dish the dirt on the Ringmaster's invisibility? Is he invisible by choice, and can control whether he's visible or invisible at will? Or did he have an unfortunate run-in with a whole lotta invisible ink at some point in his life?

That was a joke. biggrin Jack does all sorts of bad deeds but whatever those are they're not to my knowledge.

Not really, there isn't any NPC on Gaia that are tamers currently

Gaians who contact us through admins, PM, and more so the Gaians who attend conventions and participate in the feedback sessions, plus actual usability testing all contribute as feedback, and of course, your comments here on ATA counts too. We check whenever we have time, in no particular order since work piles up at different times of the week.

Panagrammic

Kain-Senpai

1. zOMG! is an important part of the site. It is the game many users have wanted since the famed phrase “Battle System” has been said. It hasn’t received the most love on this site, and I find that appalling. My question is, would the Staff Members be willing to discuss adding zOMG! to Facebook and bring more users to the game? This may include creating a “generic” style user for the FB-Only users to play the game. My reason for asking this is, because of the popularity of Monster Galaxy on Facebook. ( I understand this question may not be a satisfying question to the zOMG! Community.)

2. While the Alchemy Feature is something worth exploring, many users shun away from it for various reasons. For me, that reason is the rarity of Components on the site. Will the components rate drop increase any time soon? I am not talking about adding more to Bid Blast. I am talking about adding them into Dumpster Dive, so users would be able to grab them and use/sell them. I can understand this may hurt the Artist’s egos, but how can users enjoy the items they make when the rarity of the components are so low.

1. We've talked about this but there are some large barriers that need to be overcome. a) it would require substantial changes to the game, both on the backend (to support FB properly) and on the front end (to make the UI fit the FB canvas). Additionally, it really doesn't seem like the type of game that would be very popular on Facebook; FB lends itself to shallow experiences that take 5-20 minutes max and don't require other people to be online at the same time; zOMG is almost the opposite of that.

2. We've been tweaking drop rates up; on the list for this week is to take a look at rarity rates and see if components are getting dropped enough. Not sure what artists' egos have to do with anything.

Panagrammic

Kain-Senpai

1. Hm... interesting. When I played Moga, it was for more than 20 minutes. There have been times when I was playing it for hours. So, there are chances of others spending that amount of time to not only that game, but other Facebook games as well.

Sure, you might play it for more than 20 minutes, but each "battle" is only a few minutes long, at the most -- so if you need to do something else there is no problem dropping it and picking it up later. (Actually, a lot of FB games have an energy mechanism anyway, so you couldn't play it for more than 20 minutes even if you wanted it to).

Panagrammic

Kain-Senpai

Then what would be stopping you and the Staff from creating a zOMG! Lite specifically for FB? If you can't put the full zOMG! game on FB, a lite version may do the trick with not only bringing in revenue for the site, but have a version of the game that would bring users to the site and play the original game. If... that would make sense.

Nothing, I guess, but it would be almost a total rewrite at that point. zOMG was designed from the first as an MMO (i.e., long engagement periods with other people online at the same time), whereas FB games are short engagement periods with only asynchronous interactions with other people. Additionally, most FB games are designed from the outset to have clear monetization paths, something that has been hurting us dearly with zOMG.

Panagrammic

Sifen Yamishi

Lanzer, this is a question on behalf of a friend:

Do you need to live in California to work for GAIA Online? If not, can you work long distance to do the work, etc. for you guys? Can you explain how working for you guys can be done if we can do it long distance?

And a question from me:

If I wanted to work for you guys, what degree would I need to obtain? I'm currently trying to get a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. Am I making a mistake?

Yeah, you pretty much need to be in the Bay Area.

We tend to hire artists and software developers more than anything else. We hire bunches of interns during the summer.

Lanzer

Crystal Sparda

I saw Real Steel and thought it was total badassery!
Having Hugh Jackman in it didn't hurt. ;D

Can't wait for the event to begin!
Speaking of which, when is the event expected to begin?
Very soon, considering towns will be changing soon?

Will the true purpose behind the alchemy keys be released soon?
Any semi-vague estimate of time frame for when?

Any estimate as to how long Spring Cleaning will last this year?
Like, when is the proposals forum going to close and proposals be accepted?

Question for any/all devs/admins out there:
If you could combine three costumes for Halloween, what would you be?
Ex: Zombie Pirate Superman, devil banana ballerina, etc.

How are sponsor items created?
Does the brand tell you to make X item, or do they just
hire you to advertise and you guys just do everything else?

Event wouldn't start until closer to Halloween, and there will be trick or treating once again in Towns.

The true purpose is meant for Gaians to find out, so I can't ruin the surprise for everyone. :O

Dog costume, hot dog costume, chef costume.

Panagrammic

Crystal Sparda

Any estimate as to how long Spring Cleaning will last this year?
Like, when is the proposals forum going to close and proposals be accepted?

I think we're close down the proposals forum this week, and then start knocking off bugs.

Panagrammic

.~.Lady_Aji.~.

You guys dropped the ball on the alchemy system. The items should be hard to craft, not damn near impossible. Also, why the hell do some of the formulas involve destroying cash shop items?

They don't -- we recycle 'em through marketplace and/or DD (well, marketplace so far). That's why Cresento was offering items for bid.

Lanzer

Mademoiselle Kit

Dear Lanzer,

Several of the zomg forumers are becoming concerned with the direction Gaia is taking on zomg. Namely: no direction. Yes, we know about DMS and the eventual completion of BB Full. But after that, then what? The zomg gaians are getting a bit fed up with Gaia's policies and treatment of the zomg community, such as:

1. laying off most of our developers
2. threatening to delete/have no more new content in zomg unless we spend gaia cash
3. and the most severe of offenses: After the zomg community goes out of our way to go above and beyond the demands set, still nothing is being done to save zomg.

The zomg community has done many things to help save this game;

1. we have made the forums an active place to ask for help and organize events--its now become a very active forum in the past few months.
2. we have brought many new users to zomg through word of mouth
3. our proposal was the second to get to 5000 cookies
4. we sold out of Bloodstone Amulets in DAYS.

And yet, despite all this, we are still told that the future of zomg is grim. Two weeks ago, we were very upset when we were told that the forums would be moved into the GGD, a place where many game forums die. After all that work, after all that effort we've put in, after supporting zomg with our hearts and wallets, it seems to us like HQ is determined to kill off zomg.

Go into the zomg forum, Lanzer. Go into zomg itself. See how much support and love we have for this game. We don't want to see it become a dead feature with no more updates.

Please don't give us a half-formed, wishy-washy answer. We want to know why HQ is ignoring us after all the effort we've put in.

It is my wish that we can keep a large team building more features and expanding zOMG, as it's a great game that we put a ton of resources building and it's a fun game for many of you Gaians. At the same time, however, the resources within Gaia stretches thin and continued expansion of zOMG continued to be a challenge.

Suite honestly, the support for zOMG wasn't enough to sustain a larger team. Everyone love the game given the amount of time we put into it, and as a means to measure whether we can keep a team going we asked for your support to see if it's possible. We really appreciate the support for those who love the game and back us up financially. When we tally the total, unfortunately the amount is not high enough due to the limited amount of players on zOMG.

Everyone is still trying to do whatever they can, whenever they can as we know how much you love the game and so do we. I wish I have a better answer for you but unfortunately I can't at this time. Nobody wants to stop supporting zOMG, but we're in a really tight bind for resources right now. Sorry.

Lanzer

Kain-Senpai

Greetings!

I was able to attend the Gaia Panel at New York Comic Con, and I am disappointed that half of the entire Panel featured contests for the people attending. While I do understand and appreciate the attempts at making the panel “fun” and ”exciting” for the users, but I would appreciate more content about the site to be featured. This was why I came to the Panel, to know about future updates to the site. This includes discussing more new and upcoming features and information for the site, not to discuss old features (this includes making fail features such as BidBlast and Alchemy sound incredibly awesome).

Alright. Now with my questions:

1. zOMG! is an important part of the site. It is the game many users have wanted since the famed phrase “Battle System” has been said. It hasn’t received the most love on this site, and I find that appalling. My question is, would the Staff Members be willing to discuss adding zOMG! to Facebook and bring more users to the game? This may include creating a “generic” style user for the FB-Only users to play the game. My reason for asking this is, because of the popularity of Monster Galaxy on Facebook. ( I understand this question may not be a satisfying question to the zOMG! Community.)

2. While the Alchemy Feature is something worth exploring, many users shun away from it for various reasons. For me, that reason is the rarity of Components on the site. Will the components rate drop increase any time soon? I am not talking about adding more to Bid Blast. I am talking about adding them into Dumpster Dive, so users would be able to grab them and use/sell them. I can understand this may hurt the Artist’s egos, but how can users enjoy the items they make when the rarity of the components are so low.

3. The Achievement System has been out for some time, and with that has the discussion about what the points will be used for. This includes Lanzer, at one point, saying the fabled backwings being released from it. My questions is, are there any plans to create some sort of “shop” or feature to use the Achievement Points to purchase items on the site?

4. Is there any way to have the Artist’s take a look at several suggestion threads that I’ve created (and many users have added suggestions to) in Site Feedback? Backgrounds suggestions, Evolution Items suggestions, and Animated Items suggestions

zOMG had been a feature that received the most love from us for 3 years straight. A team of 16 worked tirelessly creating the game and we put tons of effort in tweaking the gameplay and making it more fun. Many of us sincerely want the game to do better and the topic of having the game on other platforms such as Facebook had been discussed. zOMG as of today is very closely tied to Gaia, in terms of avatar customization, marketplace, messages, etc, so making a simple port would be fairly difficult. If we get to obtain more resources in the future, we'll definitely change the position of where things are, but for now we can only wait and see.

The Alchemy feature is designed to be challenging, and the way of how it's designed might be too slow for everyone to advance, but in time things will become more abundant.

Alchemy kind of overtook as the means of gaining points for items, so we'll find another chance to use the achievement points.

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

1. Ever consider creating more "were-beast" or "anthropomorphic" body alteration/skin items -- namely, for people who wish to be Minotaurs, Were-Lions, Were-Panthers, Were-Jaguars, and/or Were-Tigers? (And yes, I based this particular question mostly off of the more recent "Castlevania" games from the past 11 years.) whee

2. What's the first Apple/Mac game you ever played?

3. Would it be possible to get a "Plasma Gear" recolor? You KNOW people want their own purple lightsaber(s). twisted

Well stay tuned for this year's Halloween event and there might be something that falls along the line of what you asked for.

One of the first Apple game was Load Runner, though there were older games but I just forgot their names. It was on my Apple IIe

That depends on how many people want the recolor, and which color do everyone want.

muumuupie

Uncle Haijin

Will we ever see the CEO anytime soon in a Ask the Admin? I think I can safely speak for the rest of the GCD that we feel like there is a disconnect between us and the higher ups in Gaia.

Yeah, I'll often stop by and check things out, but there are folks like Lanzer and Panagramic who do such a better job answering your questions and representing the staff that really, it's best for me to just play a supporting role (i.e. get out the way and let them help you out =)

In any event, I'm so happy you're spending your evening on Gaia Online, and hope you have an awesome time.

Thanks!

Panagrammic

DrQuint

hey, guys, how about alchemy items you can actually find yourself with relying on a luck based event?

Those Towns ones were good. Why get rid of them?

You're talking about the Golden Giftbox formula? We didn't get rid of it -- we made it permanent.

Lanzer

Shadow Coon II

Good evening, guys! I hope you had a nice weekend. 3nodding

I only have a few questions this time around~

1.) As of right now, the highest NPC SDPlus doll number is #332 ChromatiChaos. This should mean that there are 331 other NPC dolls, but twenty-eight numbers don't have any corresponding dolls (043, 053, 055, 058-060, 073-079, 091, 093, 094, 108, 109, 129, 130, 177-183, and 198 ).

My questions here are: why haven't the dolls for these numbers been released and are there any plans to release them in the near future?

2.) Is there any chance that the 30-second timer reset in BidBlast will ever be removed (or that there will be 'special' auctions where it's disabled)?

3.) What's one feature you've never really taken the time to put together or that isn't currently on the drawing board that you wish you could implement on the site?

One last thing: if you haven't done so yet, play Solatorobo: Red the Hunter. It's quite fun. :3

The SDPlus dolls weren't created in any specific orders, and originally we were only planning to make a few. There isn't a plan to make a complete set, but we do plan to make more.

Right now the way bid blast work is not that customized, so there won't be different types of bids going on. However, we do want to make the system work better.

The feature that would have been fun is to have a good world map feature where discussions can take place at different parts of the Gaia world rather than having everything in a forum. It's pretty hard to plan and make happen though.

There had been a lot of concerns about the development of zOMG today, and I wanted to say that we definitely hear you, and work on the new update will still continue. It's probably not the level of updates that many would want to see, and I'm sorry that we're not able to meet your demand at this moment. I hope that the new update will still be fun and enjoyable.

That's it for this week's ATA. Thanks for joining us and see you all next week!

[Platonix]

October 24th

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

It's a week away from Halloween, have you all picked out your costumes? Hope you enjoy the Halloween so far. We've more coming so stay tuned!

Narumi Misuhara

Fractale

4: Have you guys already got an idea for Halloween 2012?

I have two actually...

Narumi Misuhara

Crystal Sparda

Lovin' the event so far!
Can't wait to see what comes of it!

3. How long is the event estimated to last?
Is it ending on Nov. 1st or later?

4. Can we pretty pretty please have a create-an-xmas-item contest this year?
Maybe even make a few items, rather than just one?
We're dying to create items!!! xp

Thanks! the entire events team worked very hard for this one so we do very much hope it meets all your guys expectations. smile

3. I set a run time of about 2 weeks, how long we keep it up will partially be dictated by how much you guys like it. razz A minimum of a week either way.

4. We could try, but if you're talking about an item contest like the Coke one we did, I'm the only dev familiar with that system... and I still need to make the X-Mas event! XD

Narumi Misuhara

ROMVLVS

Narumi Misuhara

ROMVLVS

Hey lanzer! How are you this fine day! I've got some questions!
5) How do we get the eighth trick or treat item?

Thanks for taking your time to read this! Thanks!

Also, the Halloween event seems fun so far. I'm reminded of the old 2004/5 events.

....Ummmm.... there's only 7 Trick or Treat items...? ...is my shadow altering code again!?

On the fifth page of the item list the artist Kichigai M said there was an eighth item. Mean.

There's seven trick or treating items and one alchemy item so far. If there was an eighth item then they failed to give it to me, or I failed add it. (both very possible XP)

Narumi Misuhara

II_Kisame_II

Hello Devs and Admins, who are lurking.

The Space Batman would like to answer a few questions

Where you do guys see Gaia in the next 2-3 years?

If DMS is successful, could you hint what we might see in zOMG if work was to resume with a slighty bigger team.

Also what do you guys make of this idea?

II_Kisame_II

Imagine they made the old theater compatible with zOMG. It could be integrated to the zOMG Map, rather than be a additional feature of Gaia that requires severs to run. By doing so advertisers can use the zOMG theater to show their videos and special quests can be in place where the users have to defeat certain animated to get the reward. Imagine coke designed animated (lols). That I think would make the whole experience more engaging and ultimately more fun which makes the advertisers message stick more than say the current the flash places which is quite dull because all you do is move from one area to another.

I think if sponsors were given this option they would do it. Just think about it, past sponsors like DBZ or Captain America could have gotten us to fight villians from their universe. Do you see any other MMO having popular characters to feature in their MMO? I think it could boost zOMGs popularity. If you guys think their is potential in this idea, then i advise you guys to transform the Love building in Barton and turn it into the Gaia theater.

1. Everywhere ...on your phone, on your pc, on your gaming console... in your face!

2. No idea, Lanzer question XD

3. We've wanted to move the cinemas into towns for years. The problem is the same it would be with zOMG! ...finding the resources to do it, and creating an implementation that would allow us to execute on sponsorships quickly

Lanzer

Fractale

1: Where is Crescento from? Is his hometown REALLY Tlauixcalpantecuhtliopolis? Because he didn't say anything about that being from there, back during the April Fool's '09 event.....I, personally think he's from Aries Island, since he's flaunting Aries signs all over his clothes and ship....

2: Why is Rina hanging out with Kanoko so much? Why doesn't she ever hang with Deen, her angel imp pal? Are they even still friends?

3: Can you dish the dirt on the Ringmaster's invisibility? Is he invisible by choice, and can control whether he's visible or invisible at will? Or did he have an unfortunate run-in with a whole lotta invisible ink at some point in his life?

4: Have you guys already got an idea for Halloween 2012?

I don't think Crescento is from Aries Island but I haven't been able to find out the definitive answer, will need to keep asking, sorry.

Rina's only friend of similar age is Kanoko, so she felt more comfortable hanging out with Kanoko. Deen just appeared for a while and isn't around currently.

Ringmaster's ability is a secret to all, and will be revealed later.

Narumi Misuhara

Mister Him

1. why am i not finding jack for the trick or treating?

He changes locations every 20 minutes or so.

Panagrammic

Corinth Maxwell

1. Will we be getting the update(s) to Houses & Towns after the event? I'm starting to feel like it's the issue with Cars all over again...... sweatdrop

Housing is in QA and being tested.

Narumi Misuhara

PrincyBoy

When does this:


Happen?

I hope tonight.

Huh, cool image... Where did you find that? razz

Panagrammic

Mademoiselle Kit

Dear Lanzer,

Last week you saw how passionate the zomg community is about suppoting their game. This week, I want to ask you some questions about gaining revenue for zomg:

- How hard would it be to create Zomg themed RIGs, or at least put an item in the biofrost worth 249gc so people could support zomg AND get donator status. Powerup bundles, perhaps?

- There are several suggestions regarding putting ads in zomg. Perhaps not zomg itself (lag issues) but maybe a link in the zomg forum to a page full of ads and something to click on, like a daily chance, giving a little bit of gold as an incentive to do it. All the revenue from the ads on said page go to zomg. Something like this: http://img-cache.cdn.gaiaonline.com/f40e7c3d8999bdcbff46d4a6fd81464c/http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v694/boisterouslysilent/Allourproblemssolved.png (image and idea by boisterously_silent)

- Would it kill Gaia to advertise zomg a bit more? We're thankful for them adding the z!Forums to the games page, but there is more to be done here. Spotlight the community, make a "zomg week" or something, give the "learn about zomg!" page a facelift (it really needs it), ADVERTISE, add more alchemy items in zomg, something! We hear the main problem is that there aren't enough users, but the bottom line is that it is NOT OUR JOB to advertise the game, it's YOURS.

- We also hear we can't get any more developers/more content until zomg interest picks up. This is a catch 22--I've talked to several users on Gaia who claim they would play zomg "if there were new content". We all desperately want content, and the community is offering serveral ideas for monetizing zomg, but to have them shot down without you guys even trying them is irritating and insulting.

- There are hundreds of DEDICATED zomg users out there, who are willing to spend cold, hard, cash if we could gurentee updates on zomg every few months or so. Hell, we just want a new developer or two added to the team at the very least. But the problem here is that Gaia isn't giving us the opportunity to support zomg. Gaia isn't giving ITSELF the opportunity to support zomg. Instead of shooting our ideas down, maybe listen and think on them, or think up some ones yourself, and TRY THEM OUT before declaring them a failure.

- bundling zOMG items together so that they hit donation status makes sense, and we plan on doing that.
- zOMG themed rigs I think I touch upon in the FAQ.
- the ad page you show, while clever, would violate our existing contractual agreements. We're not allowed to have more than one ad per page with our providers (because otherwise the clickthrough rate would drop tremendously). We are evaluating Moga-style ads for zOMG during zone transitions.
- I touch upon advertising zOMG externally a bit in the FAQ. The cost of acquisition for MMO games is really high, and we'd be losing money. The inter-site zOMG recognition will be improved with the release of DMS.
- We currently have at least five people working on zOMG at the moment (albeit not all full time).

Panagrammic

-Shiny_Tsukkomi-

Good evening Lanzer, devs, and co.~
Don't think I'll be able to go trick-or-treating this year...I'm too busy. *wanted to dress like a pirate* :c

--Concerning those good deeds needed to allow those without an Amulet into Dead Man's Shadow: Will there be a visible meter that indicates how many good deeds need to be performed to lift the curse?

--How many Spring Cleaning proposals did you expect to reach the 5k cookie quota? So far, there's only two that have reached them.

Yeah, there will be a visible meter.

Clearly, we expected more. The votes are useful to give us a sense of prioritization, though, so it's useful, and we'll end us addressing a number of the requests even though they didn't get 5k votes.

Lanzer

Mademoiselle Kit

Dear Lanzer,

Last week you saw how passionate the zomg community is about suppoting their game. This week, I want to ask you some questions about gaining revenue for zomg:

- How hard would it be to create Zomg themed RIGs, or at least put an item in the biofrost worth 249gc so people could support zomg AND get donator status. Powerup bundles, perhaps?

- There are several suggestions regarding putting ads in zomg. Perhaps not zomg itself (lag issues) but maybe a link in the zomg forum to a page full of ads and something to click on, like a daily chance, giving a little bit of gold as an incentive to do it. All the revenue from the ads on said page go to zomg. Something like this: http://img-cache.cdn.gaiaonline.com/f40e7c3d8999bdcbff46d4a6fd81464c/http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v694/boisterouslysilent/Allourproblemssolved.png (image and idea by boisterously_silent)

- Would it kill Gaia to advertise zomg a bit more? We're thankful for them adding the z!Forums to the games page, but there is more to be done here. Spotlight the community, make a "zomg week" or something, give the "learn about zomg!" page a facelift (it really needs it), ADVERTISE, add more alchemy items in zomg, something! We hear the main problem is that there aren't enough users, but the bottom line is that it is NOT OUR JOB to advertise the game, it's YOURS.

- We also hear we can't get any more developers/more content until zomg interest picks up. This is a catch 22--I've talked to several users on Gaia who claim they would play zomg "if there were new content". We all desperately want content, and the community is offering serveral ideas for monetizing zomg, but to have them shot down without you guys even trying them is irritating and insulting.

- There are hundreds of DEDICATED zomg users out there, who are willing to spend cold, hard, cash if we could gurentee updates on zomg every few months or so. Hell, we just want a new developer or two added to the team at the very least. But the problem here is that Gaia isn't giving us the opportunity to support zomg. Gaia isn't giving ITSELF the opportunity to support zomg. Instead of shooting our ideas down, maybe listen and think on them, or think up some ones yourself, and TRY THEM OUT before declaring them a failure.

The economics for zOMG is not too different than other games, we did try different campaigns and offers, and it was many different efforts through thr course of two years. Please note that we had put in much effort, and though it is not the same level right now, we had done a lot within and outside of Gaia. It isn't a case where we don't think a project that cost millions in development cost isn't worth putting the effort putting resources over. Some of the economics came down to how much does it cost to advertise to have more new users, and how much do new users contribute in covering the cost for advertising. The cost didn't balance with the revenue, so we couldn't advertise as much as we wanted to.

Thousands of games are available and a handful have a large user base. Those who do are able to keep growing because the cost of marketing them end up with new users, and the new users plus the friends that they brought in end up creating revenue that is higher than the cost of marketing. Unfortunately 90% of games out there don't make that cut, and zOMG couldn't be that 10% which do, but because we love the game and the Gaians who play it, we're still supporting it the best way we can even though the economics do not make sense.

Panagrammic

Treemie

Panagrammic

I hope you didn't ban that girl who was cussing you out about the gold potion. She was upset and people were deliberately trying to rile her up. IMO.

Nah, of course not. For one, devs don't ban, and for the other, it was pretty tame compared to most of my Inbox.

Lanzer

Crystal Sparda

Lovin' the event so far!
Can't wait to see what comes of it!

To the questions!!!
1. Why isn't the Word Hunt contest clues as Gaia-related as it was originally introduced?
We don't get updates until late in the day (at least 8PM EST!)
and a certain clue is near indecipherable due to too many vague steps being listed.

2. New tattoos... any progress?

3. How long is the event estimated to last?
Is it ending on Nov. 1st or later?

4. Can we pretty pretty please have a create-an-xmas-item contest this year?
Maybe even make a few items, rather than just one?
We're dying to create items!!! xp

5. Grombies... will they make a return?

Actually it was other Gaians that suggested other topics, we'll keep having Gaia related topics as often as we can though.

Not yet, we've been focused on furniture for now

I'll pass your request to the team. The lack of a good system had hindered us for a while but maybe we can still put something together manually.

Grombies might make a return on the next zombie apocalypse, but not this year.

Lanzer

Valheita

My goodness, I made one on time! These are open to all developers.

1) What's your biggest regret (if any) about making Gaia?
2) Who's your favourite MoGa?
3) Who's best in office at Foosball?

Deep and meaningful questions, seriously. 3nodding

Biggest regret? I should have made everything in flash so that avatars can animate fully from the beginning. :O (but I don't think flash can do much 8 years ago)

I have many favorites, Windja (probably spelled it wrong) was one of them

I'm the best at cheering

Lanzer

ROMVLVS

Hey lanzer! How are you this fine day! I've got some questions!

1) Why won't you be my friend? gonk
2) Why don't we have shop items with the shop logos? Like, tank tops with the Gambino Outfitters logo, or polos with the H&R Wesley/Bifrost/Dernier Cri logo? I would totally want a plain black D*C polo, or a polo with a little bifrost on it. Why don't we have these items? I'd pay 100K for the D*C polo.
3) can we have a Cordell-centric CI soon?
4) Are we still limited to 3 questions?
5) How do we get the eighth trick or treat item?

Thanks for taking your time to read this! Thanks!

Also, the Halloween event seems fun so far. I'm reminded of the old 2004/5 events.

We have a crippled friendlist system that can't have over 500 friends.

That's a pretty cool idea. We usually design clothing with genre in mind so the logo aspect didn't come into play. It's a great idea and I'll pass it along

Can't promise anything, but I'll ask

Usually, depending on how tied up the day is

I don't want to spoil anything, but I'm sure the event forum will have people talking about it soon

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

1. Will we be getting the update(s) to Houses & Towns after the event? I'm starting to feel like it's the issue with Cars all over again...... sweatdrop

2. Is it reasonable to assume that this year's event will have the same degree of difficulty as certain past events? gonk

3. You have exactly one choice out of several hundred things you like to dress up as. What would you pick to dress as for Halloween? pirate ninja

Housing will have an update real soon. We had a few bugs but it's almost ready!

I think we meant to have a easier event this year

I love my sumo suit but I couldn't find the air pump for it, so I'm kind of bummed out. Haven't decided on what to wear this year.

Lanzer

Uncle Haijin

1.) Are any of the NPC profiles ready to be released? They've been talked about for at least a year in ATAs, but there hasn't been any hint of them actually coming up except in vague terms.

2.) Will more level 2 and 3 alchemy items be released? There's tons for the other levels, but the grand majority of people can't progress past level 3 because the components/formulas are just not there.

3.) With the recent Gambino business, is there any chance of Labtech X screwing all the haters (AKA the people out for Gambino blood) and hosting an X-Mas event? I mean, it has his name in it and people have been missing him. What has he, Labtech 123/Frank, and the rest of NeXus been up to lately anyway?

Sorry we've dropped the ball on the NPC profiles. Though in turn we've really ramped up on the manga stories so I hope it's a net positive.

Not all the formulas are discovered yet, but definitely we'll be adding more items.

Labtech's been working in the dark for quite some time, and I haven't heard of any updates from the art team, but I'll fill you guys in when I hear anything. Christmas storyline is still being put together so we'll have to see what we come up with.

Thank you for joining us on this week's ATA. Happy Halloween and I'll see you all next week!

[Platonix]

October 31st

Lanzer

Happy Halloween everyone!

How do you like this year's event? I'm happy that we are able to work on the world map and also add in Jack. Is there anything you'd like to see next year?

And what are you dressed up as today? For those who missed the webcast, I'm in my old pimp suit and made a fool of myself in the improv. biggrin

Lanzer

scullylam

lanzer, you were amazing on the webcast! btw, do you always say that to the ladies? wink "what's up ladies?"

okay questions.

1. with zomg celebrating its 3rd birthday, how does that make you feel? we had a huge party all day last thursday and shame you couldn't come. but it's all good. biggrin

2. you really were pimpin' it up there lanzer. made me snort. so are you planning to pass out candy to trick or treaters?

3. what do you think about evil timmy trying to take over the world? is he a threat to gaia? :O

I'm happy that zOMG continues to be supported by Gaians. Always surprise me how fast time flies. Feels like yesterday when we were celebrating the release of the game.

I do hand out candies, though I don't think the neighborhood kids will be impressed by my pimp suit.

Timmy is evil (for now) but he could only hurt himself in the process. smile

Lanzer

Fractale

1: When will my aquarium rock evolve?

2: Lanzer, last week you mentioned that Deen- Rina's angel imp friend- wasn't around, currently, so Rina hangs out with Kanoko instead. Where did Deen go? Why did he leave Rina? They're still friends, though, right?

3: Is the world map going to get more love in the form of updates, soon?

4: Will Bludeau ever find love?

What I want to see next year:
more Towns incorporated into zomg (Durem, Aekea, Dref Dur)
World Map expansions
more Zurg events
more "meaty" gold shop updates with more color variety and more updates to less frequently updated stores like Junk in the Trunk, Ruby's Rack, and Global Imports. Slimming on Cash shop updates
Santa's fat elf a** on a treadmill
x-mas taken over by Labtech X.
Diedrich blasted into space so he can serve a better purpose

The rock last evolved in the Jurassic era, it's slated to evolve again in 162.41 million years.

Nobody knows where Deen is, we'll just have to wait and see.

Well the event is a start. We'll see what happens after housing update. I do want more future events to involve world map updates or activities.

Lanzer

Crystal Sparda

*sigh*
I really don't like being a meaning-moe, but I am seriously frustrated.
I want demand answers on Alchemy.
I have been patient, but have yet to see any improvement on it.
You guys have supposedly upped the appearances of the gold boxes,
but guess what! I haven't gotten ONE box since it was released.
I have gotten wood trunks, two brown gift boxes, a pink link, and a fat cat alert,
but no god-forsaken gold gift boxes.
How are non-rich users supposed to even reach level 2 when they can't
even get ingredients to make a level one item?
I am very interested in the higher level alchemy items, but there is no way
to even get to the level required to make them without being forced
to create the items nobody wants and throw all your gold away in the process.
I honestly don't think this is a very good way for a feature to go.
The item drop rates are so ******** low it doesn't make it worth the time to get the level 10 dream item.

Why are the sacred keys for high level formulas?
That doesn't help anyone.
I thought they'd be something more... special.
*coughBACKWINGScough*

Trying to get off the topic of alchemy, why hasn't the arenas rule page been updated?
The avatar arena entry fee and prize information needs to be updated,
as it is deceiving for new arena entrants. sweatdrop

Will this event be the first event where the items aren't free?
So far, the only items we can get (other than ingredients) cost gold or wing stickers.
It is just kinda depressing to see 7 cash shop updates in one month,
then only get ToT items as the "free" items.
At least with Pie Hard, we got both ingredients and free event items.
I do love the ToT items, but am very displeased with the lack of free grant items this month. sad
We missed out on having possible I AM *blank* Wolf, bullet hole, and bloodied masquerade items,
all relating to the event, yet the only items relating to the event are either alchemy or cash shop items.
The cash shop items could very well have been the free event items.
For this, I am scolding you. stare

The list for reasons to leave Gaia is getting longer...

Sorry, was caught up handing out candies for a while.

Hi Crystal, sorry to hear that you're frustrated with the Alchemy. I've been talking to the creative team and I'm promised that the system is designed to be hard, but everything is designed to be obtainable through items that are given out for free. If anything, it just takes time and a bit of luck. An additional note is that the gold box is rare but there's a bigger chance of getting it through daily chance too, so be sure to catch them every day.

I'll get back to the CS team about updating the arenas, and sorry that the event doesn't have enough free items to give away, we'll continue to give a better balance in the future.

Lanzer

Zweizi Galon

Good evening Lanzer! And a Happy Halloween to the staff at Gaia for creating a wonderful event. smile

Here are my questions for this evening:

1) How much progress has been made on the Weapons Shop and Marriage System? When can we expect releases and what sorts of recent developments regarding have occurred?

2) When will Gaia release its "Create an NPC" contest? People have been waiting for years for such a contest! About two years ago it was advertised but still no release...when will we see it's release?

3) In the "Chapter 0" manga, a 'Jorts n' Skorts' shop in Durem and a Library in Barton headed by Librarian "Doris Baudelaire" were mentioned. Will we be seeing any addition of these locations to Gaia? I know a lot of people would be excited for a Retro clothing store or a Library! smile

P.S. As for next year's Halloween event, I'd love to see a trip to the past. Replace the whole World Map and shops with a world of Gaia from ten to twenty years ago! Kid Ian and Kitten Rufus runing the shop with Ian's adoptive family on Isle de Gambino, Ruby and Peyo's father cradling baby Peyo in their Hat Store. The lsit goes on, we could have a whole event and plot dedicated to the past, and gain some informational insight on our NPCs.

Sorry there isn't a release date for those features right now, we spent the past months on the new housing system and furnitures, and that will be released soon. We'll figure out what to work on shortly after.

We've definitely dropped the ball on that one, I'll talk to Reapersun about it and see what we can do.

Retro clothing store would be a great addition, we don't have one planned but I'll help pitch the idea.

Lanzer

.~.Lady_Aji.~.

Evening, Lanzer. Hope your having a Happy Halloween. Now, down to business. Below is a list of problems/ideas that I think will help get more people into zOMG!.

- Glitches/Silent NPCs: A lot of people are turned off due to this issue. HQ really needs to hire a flash dev that can tackle this problem. The Otami quest chain seriously needs to be fixed. Once it's fixed, players can go back to actually having to complete it in order to receive the boon that will help them breath underwater.

- The Intro: It sucks. It doesn't teach new players how to play the game. When I was helping my friend with the Village Greens quest, I had to tell him how to upgrade his rings and what the Null Crystal did. Bring back Frank!

- Quest Chains/Task Book: I think if you're in a crew with somebody who's new to the game, you should be able to see the NPC's dialogue and have the quest visible in your task book. That way, you're not always asking your crewmate what's next.

- Coliseum: This feature has so much potential. As others have said, why not add epic recipes and rare ingredient drops as rewards? This would make the Coliseum more popular.

- Bring back Goofball and the Fountain Game: Adding these features back into zOMG! will give players something else to do besides kill animated. Cause once a player reaches cl 10, they need something else to keep them entertained. Also, as a reward, these games could give out alchemy components.

Thank you for the suggestions. I can't answer to all them one by one but I've read through them and will put them into consideration.

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

Happy Halloween, Gaia Staff! ninja

1. stare Why is it that whenever Gaia has a "forum battle" event, there's almost always an unnecessary emphasis on making the site's users fight with each other, instead of an unlimited supply of creatures and/or enemy NPCs? With NPCs or creatures, not only is there zero chance of finding one with 0 HP, NPCs don't complain ad nauseam in the forums about losing to you, nor do they try to get their "friends" to gang up on you when you're offline. whee stressed

2. What's the one thing you absolutely don't want to get and/or hate to get when trick-or-treating? emotion_puke

3. Jedi or Sith? twisted

Events such as last year's event involves fighting NPC's, though when we think of player versus NPC we creating it outside of the forum since that makes more sense as you don't have to look around in the forum for someone to fight against. Though a hybrid of NPC and users is something fun too and we'll put that into consideration.

Liquorish. Just the smell of it makes me hurl.

It has to be Jedi. I just don't look good in red.

Lanzer

Jayce Reinhardt

Does Gaia know how lucky it is to have Pan, Nar and JK working for them?

Does Gaia plan on having regular updates/new cash items, new content to ZoMG

Can I fake marry NPC Ian?

There's few staff members as dedicated as them, and we're definitely appreciative of their consistant contribution, and most of all, their care for the community.

We'll do the best we can.

You can do anything, as long as you don't get caught smile

Lanzer

Sagebomb

So I missed the last couple atas choosing to catch up on sleep (always read the ones I miss though). But I wanted to step back from my usual more gaia feature questions to something a little different.

Table tennis.

I have been playing table tennis for over 15 years and in one of my searchs a couple weeks back I found some interesting footage of Marina at the LA open. I also saw some pics which I thought were pan, but seems they were only taken by him. (all questions pertain to staff)

1. How many competitive (Club level or higher) table tennis players does gaia have.

2. Who is the best

3. does marina has a username you can share?

4. Any tt brand loyaltys (Mainly im a Donic guy, but use butterfly accessories).

5. Any chance at a table tenis bat item (outside making a petition)

Gaia related.

1. For the sacred key (not asking what it does) are they able to be used right now, should one figure out the right conditions for doing so?

2. Did the formula rate in normal rare event boxes get nerfed? the last 10 pink boxes I opened pretty much all had the common drops (grass hats, viking helms etc), when the formulas were first added I was getting a formula 2/3 times.

Heh, there's only Marina. L0cke is a really good player but he said he "retired" from the game. (boo) Everybody else are just amateur level.

Marina

She's head of the QA department, everything runs in secret over there.

Not any loyalist that I know of, many butterfly users here, though I hold a Juic.

Maybe in a sports update. I am afraid that the interest is rather slim...


The answer is yes.

I think the problem is that as we add more items to the box, everything get more diluted for the chance of winning them. It's probably time to take some old items out.

Lanzer

Biyanka

Hey! No questions tonight (yet!), but just wanted to comment on what fun I had at Gameworks for the Meetup in Newport, KY/Cincinnati area on the 22nd. I live close enough to walk there and I met some awesome people! It was great seeing a face to a username, and also very cool meeting people who live in the same area, like the same things you do, and so on!

I was especially excited to meet a girl there; we both realized that we don't live that far at all, and she went to high school with a guy I went to middle school - what a small world! Even cooler because we're both Gaians. XD

Thanks for coming in this neck of the woods!

I'm glad you had fun. Helsing does an excellent job travelling around everywhere to host event and collect feedback from all of you. I hope that we can do more fun stuff next year.

Also happy that you met a new friend, and that's what Gaia is really about.

Happy Halloween everyone! See you next week!

[Platonix]

November 7th

Lanzer

Hello everyone,

How do you like this year's Halloween event overall? Any feedback is appreciated. The new housing editor is close to completion but we still have a few bugs to work through so there's still a couple more days of delay. It's looking really good and I can't wait to see new houses again.

How many of you actually watched scary movies during Halloween?

Panagrammic

Sagebomb

/complaint about some BidBlast problems including auctions that grant to the wrong person, and auctions that don't grant at all/

EDIT: that was talked about in dev notice

EDIT 2: that fix only looks at flipped, some auctions still didnt pay anyone.

Can you point me to relevant posts / examples? We're looking at this code now and can check.

Panagrammic

Sagebomb

/URL/
On this page I show where I won and got nothing, and the person who was on the opposite of the flip whom confirms they got nothing too.

1021 was won by a friend, (dieth) shes still at top, has been whole time, she didnt get anything, and I dont think 10th did, but thats unconfirmed.

Ah, can confirm no winner on listing 1039 or listing 1021. And there's still a display error with 1039. Sigh. We're looking at it, thank you.

Panagrammic

iBalthier

Hi Lanzer, hope you had a fun halloween.

My questions are towards the Coming Soon box- is early November before halfway through the month, or sometime after? emotion_awesome

In the language of Coming Soon, "early" means anytime before the midpoint of the month!

Panagrammic

Mademoiselle Kit

Dear Lanzer:

I'd like to give thanks for the measures that Gaia has taken lately to help zomg. Jack appearing in zomg, promising powerup bundles, advertising DMS, etc.

But there is still somethings a lot of us regulars are unhappy with namely: how zomg does not favor new users.

The current tutorial is horrid, not helping new users understand the game at all. The old tutorial with Frank, the train, and the Barton sewers, helped people get a feel for the game and understand concepts like buffs, ghi, and rage ranks much better.

Also, the prevailing glitches, like the silent NPC glitch, or quests failing to give rewards, make it hard for new users to advance through the game.

I have heard of several new users coming to zomg, not understanding the tutorial and falling prey to glitches, leaving because they feel its not worth their time.

Maybe if DMS does get the attention (and money) that zomg needs, some time can be taken to address these glitches and the tutorial problem?

Thanks.

My understanding is that the zOMG team deliberately stripped down the tutorial because the earlier, longer tutorial was losing users. JK or swarf would have more details.

Edit: That said, agreed that zOMG has a learning curve. We've been looking at more tutorial information and/or some kind of mentoring.

Panagrammic

bluecherry

Hi. smile I don’t want to be too much of a pain, but is there any kind of estimate on how much longer spring cleaning is going to go on? It was said to be intended to last a couple weeks or so, but we’ve definitely exceeded a month by now with no sign of any conclusions in sight.

There's an announcement queued up for this but it stalled out for a bit -- basically we're going to pull a bunch of the suggestions and then announce a maintenance / release schedule for them. I'll see if we can get the announcement out this week.

Panagrammic

Zamio

Hi, Panagrammic,

How are you doing on your novel? Just wondered...

I am far, far behind -- only 5k. Need to crunch on it.

Lanzer

Krissim Klaw

My question is why are there such horrible crafting odds with the LOW SUCCESS RATE formulas in alchemy. I tried to craft a level 5 formula, which was at my current level, with a low success rate and it failed 12 times at 50k a pop blowing 600k before I was forced to give up and let a higher level alchemist do it. What worries me is there are a number of level 10 formulas with low success rates and that trick won’t work with them since level 10 is as high appears to be as high as you can go. Many of these formulas have 750k-1mil craft costs.

Why isn’t there some sort of failsafe or increase in success odds with each failure so users don’t get screwed if they have bad luck?

Couldn’t you at least offer a sure thing option even if it was say 3-5x the original crafting cost?
---
On another note I am curious as to why you would make commissioning an alchemist so easy for scammers to take advantage of?

As it is currently set up you have to go on an alchemist’s word when it comes to how many times your formula failed. They could easily scam people out of gold by claiming the formula failed multiple times when it did not and have the user send over more gold to cover another try. On the flip side, honest alchemists find the entire situation stressful because they can’t show proof to their customers when something fails. Do you have plans to address this issue and make alchemy safer for all?

The crafting odds were made to follow what's common in many of the RPG games out there, where higher level formulas would have difficult success rate on lower level players. It seemed like a fair system where time and consistency is rewarded. Though I will forward your comment to the design team and see if we can increase the success rate.

You made a good point about the lack of proof in handling commissions. Maybe through a log or through posting, we should be able to find a way to make the action public or share-able.

DJ Helsing

Doomdragon8

DJ Helsing

Hi everyone just wanted to drop by and say hi.

Feel free to drop any questions my way!

Hi DJ!I just wanted to know,When will the Gaia Panel/Convention be in Florida again?

We are currently working on the list of events for 2012.

Once thats finalized we will begin reaching out to the conventions and then once confirmed we will announce them.

So I dont know yet smile Hopefully we will attend again but as of now nothing is finalized.

Lanzer

Fractale

1: Is La Victoire located in Isle de Gambino? It's been brought to my attention that the ground in front of the shop is the same as the ground in front of Gambino Outfitters.

2: If La Victoire is, in fact located in Gambino, does this mean that the observatory the star siblings are staying in, is located on Gambino Isle as well?

3: Why has the manga stopped getting numbered? The last manga that was numbered was #42- The Fall.

4: In the EI Report during the finale of Ravenwood Manor, it was mentioned that Mr. Jackdaw and Mephiste are one and the same. So is the guy's name Mephiste Jackdaw, or Jackdaw Mephiste?

You're right, it's never been clearly specified but La Victoire is located in Gambino, or should be, since we haven't properly updated the map.

Oh that haven't been established, I don't think it's in Gambino. Will let you know when I found out.

When we ramp up the frequency it just makes less sense for publishing numbers. Probably we'll put things back in numbered order later on.

Mephiste is an alias I think.

Lanzer

Sagebomb

Howdy

1) So, during component week a bunch of auctions glitched and didnt pay out. This was fixed through a back tuning the auctions to the click and claim way (thanks).

BUT...Now auction component glitches seem to be much worse,

Items either are not granting

or

Are granting to the person in 10th spot (before winner flip)

Most auctions seem to flip the winners names around as well.

This happened before but was fixed, this has happened again, there are threads in SF and Bugs forum, but no word on it being looked into, this is happening continuosly on a live feature, so can we get official word this is getting looked into?

EDIT: that was talked about in dev notice

EDIT 2: that fix only looks at flipped, some auctions still didnt pay anyone.

2) So you confirmed sacred keys are usable now, but if I was say level 5 could I use the keys? Or how about say level 9?

(I know you want us to find it ourselves, but it seems a few more clues would aid us in the such thereof)

Sorry for the bugs, we're deep into working through the system and fixing the bugs right now. Any auction type system where things run in the background are always really tricky to fix, it's not something where you click and immediately see if things work right or not. Things should be back to normal later this week.

As for the Sacred Key, yes, it would be better to first level up to higher level

Lanzer

.~.Lady_Aji.~.

- What's up with all of the light hair colors in the salon? The colors that are being passed off as dark aren't even dark. They're medium at best. Can we get some more saturated/darker hair colors? Stop saving them for cash shop wigs.

- The site's alchemy feature is a** backwards. A feature like this should be challenging. Not damn near impossible to do. Also, why on earth would you make it so that some of the formulas require cash shop items? I think that was a dumb move. All you're doing is causing cash items that people are interested in owning become rare and more expensive. Or worse, cause them to be non-existent because they are no longer available on the site. Just admit that you dropped the ball on this feature and fix it. Here's a post that gives a suggestion on how alchemy should work on this site.

Quote:

This type of thing is really the crux of the "issue of Alchemy". That is, many of the components are simply too rare to be of use to most people. Given that the system only grants you exp if you create formulas at your level or one below it, I don't see why any and all components that are necessary for level one formulas are not properly farmable. Realistically, in a 10 tier system such as Gaia's (There are only 10 levels right? I haven't messed with alchemy much due to rarity issues), the first 3-4 levels should require components that are being released in mass quantities or are created from components that are directly made from items released in mass quantities. That is, everything for the first few levels should be easily farmable.

Personally, I'd like to see every single component have a formula for creating it, much like the Orb Aggregate.

In this particular case, I look in my inventory and I see the following from zOMG: Polyester, Suede, Leather, Silk, Mystic Weave, Cured Hide, Cloth, Fauxskin, Kevlar, and Synthetic Fiber. In Bifrost I see Rawhide Leather.

The image for Fabric Swatches () has 4 different fabrics in it, so going with that here are some possibles:

Fabric Swatches = Formula 1: Fabric Swatches + 15 Rawhide Leather + 15 Polyester + 15 Silk + 15 Mystic Weave + 500 gold
Fabric Swatches = Formula 1: Fabric Swatches + 15 Rawhide Leather +10 Cured Hide +10 Fauxskin + 10 Synthetic Fiber + 500 gold


The first option uses the store bought component plus loot found in Bill's Ranch and Zen Gardens, the 2nd and 3rd areas respectively, both relatively low level. The second uses the store bought component, but this time the zOMG loot comes from Bass'ken Lake, Old Aqueduct, and Gold Beach, which are more mid to (low end) higher level areas, thus requiring a bit less due to more initial time investment to get that strong. And this is just for one instance of Fabric Swatches, so it's not like these would suddenly pop out at 100 an hour per person. It would require time and work, more so if you play alone due to lower drop rate, but it would be doable without needing luck in Daily Chance or tons of gold to buy on the vend.

Likewise, many other things such as toggles could have formulas such as this. Alternate methods like this as opposed to purely DC or rare/random boxes would allow this to truly be the fabled and promised system for backwings that was said to be an epic quest, but one that any user could do if they put in the time and effort.

Hair were very anime styled and the colors are a reflection of that. The system was made with 16 pre-set colors so hair styles would follow that palette. Wigs work differently so they would have different colors. We'll probably look into expanding hair color further down the road.

I'm sorry that the system is proofing to be more difficult that most Gaians would like. We face problems where users who own current special items would not like to see their items be given away for free, and those formulas are made for the owner of those items, while others are meant to be completely free.

Panagrammic

Sagebomb

emo Display of the last BB auction flipped, then flipped back and flipped forward again.

I wasnt in this auction

0_o....display is flipping like crazy right now


EDIT: for pans refference...I didnt touch anything on my comp during this recording.

Yeah, we're fixing this now. Some servers didn't get synced.

Panagrammic

Sagebomb

Cool thanks for that, and any word on who will get the items for 1021 and 1039 ninja (dont want to be pushy...max respect)

Dieth and you -- the listings for those should be stable now. There are other listings that didn't get a winner: 937, 981, 987, 997, 1001, 1021, 1023, 1029, 1039, 1063. We'll take a look and do a dev notice in a bit. Edit: Whoops, not all of those, some of them are still going on.

Lanzer

FF1 Red Mage

Good evening Lanzer. Thank you for the attention you've been showing the zOMG! community these past few weeks as of late. Halloween Jack and Moonrise were some fun events. Now, to address some issues at hand:

1. Is there a possibility of glitches being removed from the game? I've seen the Upgrade glitch be quickly resolved, but numerous others still remain, and persist Like Kit has spoken of, like Failing Quest Rewards, or Silent NPC's, are terrible glitches that can hinder the players, and bring them to a grinding halt in their progress. It's quite cumbersome, and can force users to quit.

2. What happened to the old Tutorial? I remember when the game was first created back towards October 2008, and the "Frank On a Train" tutorial was super fun. It helped me learn a little, but sadly, it seems like there is no current tutorial for new users. It simply starts them out with a CL 1 GGG, and puts them on their merry way. Whatever happened to Frank? Could we see a revamped version of the Train/Sewers Tutorial, with emphasis on Buff usage, and Rage Ranking?

Thank you, and have a wonderful evening, Lanz~

-Red Mage

The guys are keeping track of the bugs and are balancing between releasing new features and fixing problems. The progress is slower than we'd like to see but we're still putting time into it.

The old tutorial was fun but way too long and a lot of new players actually gave up before finishing it. We then shortened it and saw a lot more users getting through the initial hump. Unfortunately the old tutorial couldn't be brought back because it wasn't made to be swapped in and out easily.

Lanzer

Existential Existence

1) Many of the poses in the Monthly Collectible item Heartbreaker are not showing up for many many many Gaians (which means these poses cannot be equipped at the moment - I don't think for anyone). People have been posting about this in the bugs forum for many days (possibly weeks?). Can you pass this information to the artists?
You can equip the poses in the MP preview, but when you have the actual item in your avatar inventory, half the items will not equip.

2) Care to share who the artist of Prince of the Sea (the new 999 EI) is? (if they are okay with telling us who they are, that is)

3) Someone found an article about a possible movie partnership for the Monster Galaxy game! Congrats! Are the people at Gaia excited?


The Halloween event was great. Integrating the flash space with forum activity (turning into a wolf or human) was a fun element.

I'll check about the bug, thanks for letting me know.

Sorry the artist isn't here, but check back with me next week and I should be able to tell you.

Yeah we're happy that we got to work with a movie company, being able to see our own creations on the big screen would be awesome! Though I'm not holding my breath as most movie scripts do not get produced for one reason or another. Many things will have to happen, from funding to finding the right people, the stars will have to align to have things complete from start to finish.

Thank you for joining us on this week's ATA, see you all next Monday!

[Platonix]

November 14th

Lanzer

Hello everyone, sorry for being late. Got caught up with work today.

It's been a quiet week, as we're smashing the remaining bugs in the housing system for the final stretch.

How many of you have seen Immortals over the weekend? I was sitting beside a family with two 5 year olds. it was amusing how the father was trying to cover the kids eyes during the adult scenes. ..

Lanzer

Fractale

1: Will there ever be an ATA hosted on another day of the week, for people who missed the Monday edition?

2: Is there ever going to be an event, or CI or something where all 3 Jacks make an appearance? Jack Frost, Jack, the king of Halloween, and Radio Jack?

3: Does the king of Halloween, Jack, have a family?

4: Is Meili really dead?

A long while back a couple ATA were hosted during Friday. Perhaps next time we have Monday as a holiday I'll move it to Tuesday.

That's a fun idea. We'll keep that in mind. How would Radio Jack fit into an event? Hmmm

No, that's also part of the reason why he's so angsty. smile

Most likely...

Lanzer

Siefren

I cannot access my zOMG! Clan Guild, it's been like that since the very day I made it over a year ago. I keep getting this message:

"An error occurred:
Unable to retrieve information about this guild."

It's not the only guild I get a message like that from either. I really would like this problem addressed, and resolved. I've had a topic up in the bugs forum for a while but never got any feed back from anyone about it.

I am the owner of that clan guild, but i can't access it at all, and it's keeping me from being able to join any other clan, or being able to use my own. As for the other guild I'm apart of, I would really like to unjoin the guild so it's not just there taking up space. Can I please get some help with this?

I made a bug report thread about it, but never got an answer back on it.

I'll ask the zOMG team about this problem. I remember changes made to the clan guild but will need more detail. Thanks for letting me know.

carbonphyber

Siefren

I cannot access my zOMG! Clan Guild, it's been like that since the very day I made it over a year ago. I keep getting this message:

"An error occurred:
Unable to retrieve information about this guild."

It's not the only guild I get a message like that from either. I really would like this problem addressed, and resolved. I've had a topic up in the bugs forum for a while but never got any feed back from anyone about it.

I am the owner of that clan guild, but i can't access it at all, and it's keeping me from being able to join any other clan, or being able to use my own. As for the other guild I'm apart of, I would really like to unjoin the guild so it's not just there taking up space. Can I please get some help with this?

I made a bug report thread about it, but never got an answer back on it.

Please PM me with a URL to the page(s) in Guilds where you get this error and the URL to your Bug Report. I'll look into it for you.

Lanzer

PQ and Retrostacja

I am really excited to see the new Housing update; as someone who has their house decked out, my anticipation keeps growing! emotion_awesome

Alright, I am going to try and keep this short and sweet. Since most of these questions tonight are probably going to involve alchemy, mine aren't going to be surprising.

First, I want to thank the artist that created my brand new puppy here! I was very excited to see a mecha companion item with the release of Alchemy. My questions and criticisms aren't meant to offend, I am just voicing a growing amount of confusion about the quality of Alchemy items.

Ever since Alchemy was released, I quested for the Groovy MP3 Dog. Last week (two months later, and around 6 million gold spent) I finally gathered all the components and got my puppy. Only to find out that he only had a single pose. All my hard work and dedication for an item with just a single pose that has illogical item bumping.

Now, this is just my personal experience. There are other items which have the same situation, other items at even a higher Alchemy level such as the NPC Companion items. In my thread created in Site Feedback I have had many users agree that the quality of these items should be higher than some that they've been seeing.

Companion items almost always have these two poses: standing on left and standing on the right. Sometimes they come with extra poses as well such as being held in the arms or laying on the avatar's head.

Companion items from RIGs and other Cash Shop items have these poses, but not all of the items made from Alchemy? It takes real money for the Cash shop, but it takes real dedication to Gaia for those items painstakingly crafted in Alchemy.

And so, my questions are the following:

1. Why are some of the Alchemy items not being held to the standard that has been advertised?
2. Can these simple poses be added to the Groovy MP3 Dog?
3. Should Alchemy item layering issues be posted in the Avatar Item Glitch Report Thread, or is there a better suited thread?

Thanks for the comments and I'm sorry that the item didn't meet your expectation. We had to produce a lot of items in a relatively short time so having multiple poses is rather difficult.

I can't promise if we'll improve current items, or future alchemy items will be different, but we'll definitely be putting more time into future items, especially the higher level ones.

The item glitch report thread is the place to go. Hope we can have your problem resolved soon.

Lanzer

Krissim Klaw

Hello everyone, it is me with yet more alchemy questions.

I brought up the insane fail rates at the last meeting with people trying and failing countless times at crafting something at their own level. Is there any word on the system being tweaked? I have spent over a month getting all the components I needed to make candy mountain so I can have my cream kitty crafted. Tonight, and with the help of a lot of friends, I got the last of the components needed. The only problem is the formula is a level 10 with a 750k crafting fee and a Low Success Rate. The level 10 alchemists are going to be even with it meaning almost certain failure. My friend tried and failed so many times going for this.

The other question I have involves the supposed prize. Panagrammic went out stating this, but that isn’t really true.

Panagrammic

Level 10 Reward
There were concerns that the level 10 reward unfairly awarded users with tons of gold. So, we'll change it so that a reward will be given to anyone that reaches level 10 -- not just the first n.

You are still really only giving the prize to the first 5 alchemists. Everyone else gets an impossible to complete formula that will in the current market take 50-100million plus to complete. That is not a prize, it is a slam. Users are currently putting in just as much sweat, tears, and gold to make it to level 10 as the first few so why is it you guys find them less deserving of a little reward? Couldn’t you at least extended the additional crafting path to say the first 50 or so?

Yes I remember Panagrammic mentioning that. I'll check with him to see why that isn't the case. It has been a challenge creating a system that has a high range of difficulty yet not too painful to obtain. I thought we had already addressed it, but looks like I'll need to check back and see.

Lanzer

Jayce Reinhardt

#1
Just wanted to know if there was any chance the artists could, you know, meet the users halfway regarding alchemy. Is it because alchemy does not require cash that many of the items made from alchemy are only single pose even at level 9 or don't walk in ZoMG/Towns?

For example, MP3 Dog and the NPC Companions.

We don't expect Alchemy to be easy but we would like it to be rewarding and so far it seems the artists don't want to change anything. (Even when it first came out and they could have)

Is it because of their managers/Bosses or is it the artists wish to be unworkable with the userbase.

And when I say artists, I mean the ones that created Alchemy in the first place. Pan, Narumi, and JK can easily talk with us and not find us "scary". The ones who created Alchemy prefer to hide and act like this doesn't exist or make a opinion thread then disregard all of our suggestion or improvements.

#2
Are we just not worth talking to/taken seriously for an artist or is it a money issue?

For $5 I can get a nice multi pose item that walks in towns
For three months worth of effort, work, and loss of sleep for alchemy, I get a one pose level 9 item.

Easy third question

Do you like Minecraft?

We've been working on Alchemy still, and I share your concern about the quality in terms of the number of poses in the items. Alchemy had been a big project for us as it require us to create a lot of items all at once, and because of that we had a hard time spending a lot of time just on a small number of items. I'll share your concern with the art team and see what makes sense for us to do.

For those who had been attending ATA for years will remember a time when many of the artist attend ATA, though I think that over time many had received criticisms over their design, style, or decisions that it became too stressful to respond personally. I guess a difference between programmers and artists is that we don't tend to take criticisms too personally. I however will always forward your concerns to the team and discuss about possible solutions and actions.

Yeah Minecraft is a great game, many of us were into it, but that was a while back.

Lanzer

Damien_The_Omen

stare My question for this session is rather simple.

Are the zOMG devs really against individuals being on their own in high-level areas all that much, or did they just assume (as with every other instance following the "Doll Shrine" in Zen Gardens) that everyone who plays zOMG willingly wants to play with nearly anyone & everyone else that either needs a crew or more crew members? stressed

I'm asking because I apparently made a mistake in assuming that the new area would actually be a "stand-alone area", and not "an instance-within-an-instance". That I'm supposed to want the help of other people to get anywhere or do anything in this new "area", when I more-than-often prefer to play alone, is rather discouraging to me.

I believe the initial concept was to create gameplay that greatly reward group play, and in the update we pretty much kept that focus. Sorry if you find it difficult to play as a group.

Lanzer

-Shiny_Tsukkomi-

Good evening, Lanzer and co.
Can't wait to see those housing items layer correctly. ^^

Two questions:
--Are you planning to do anything with those leftover cookies from Spring Cleaning?

--What is the percentage of success for an alchemy recipe with a Very Low rate of success? It took me ten tries to craft one of those.

Currently there are no plans, it was made just for voting's sake.

Success rate depends on the player's own level, while the exact figure varies and I don't have a precise listing, I'm sorry.

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

1. Will we finally get our long-awaited cross-dimensional interior expansions* for our houses with the new Housing update? whee
*cross-dimensional = being able to purchase even LARGER interior housing expansions, despite the tiny exteriors shown in Towns

2. Would you rather have "The Elder Scrolls V: SKYRIM" on the PC, or on a console? ninja

3. Serious question time.........Would you rather sit through a Twilight marathon, or play a marathon of all of your favorite Castlevania games? xp xd

Thanks as always for your replies! 3nodding

Heh, as soon as we have the cross dimensional storage system that stores everything "in the cloud"

I only play games on console because I enjoy playing it on a bigger TV, also because my PC is old and whimpy for new games... Though playing MW3 on a gamepad is quite a pain

Castlevania anytime. I finished Symphany of the Night again on the PSP just last year.

Thanks for joining us on this week's ATA. I'll see you all next week!

[Platonix]

November 21st

Lanzer

Hello everyone, now that the new housing editor is finally released, I hope that you all have got a chance to re-decorate your home. We hope to have better social feature for housing and towns in the near future. There are still quite a few bugs to clear out, but that shouldn't take long to iron out.

So how's Breaking Dawn? Any big fans here?

Narumi Misuhara

Fractale

Narumi Misuhara

Fractale

*hi-fives Lanzer and staff on the Housing update*
no, I'm a hardcore twilight hater, Lanzer. A Spit on it and drive a stake through its heart kind of hater

1: Why don't most of our NPC's have last names, like the Von Helsons do? Or the Gambino's?

2: Is there ever going to be an “Ask the NPC”?

3: Are Serene and Jinx related in any way?

4: what's good ol' Fleep up to these days? Do you guys at HQ hang out with him after office hours? Once a staff member becomes a normal user on Gaia, do you try to value their opinions and suggestions like any other user, or do you find it hard to “let go”, and take whatever suggestions they make as if they were still part of the team at HQ?

1. Well you know what they say about characters without a last name...
4. He sits in the shadows watching... staring at that which was once his... but he will never have it... never! ...events... myyyyy preeeciousssss...

no, i don't actually. What do they say? And who are "they"?

poor Fleep. Gaia needs to hire him back so you both can work together and make superfantasticMEGA event babies! Events so freakishly awesome that they kill the servers for days!
Not that yours aren't great on their own.... whee

"They" are those who know these things (descriptive I know razz ) and at least on American television, characters without a last name tend to be... expendable...

Narumi Misuhara

.~.Lady_Aji.~.

- Is the cash tree glitched? I did the 10 offers and it's still there.

Some changes were made by another team, I've sent an email inquiring what the new behavior is supposed to be. I'll pass that info along once I have it.

Lanzer

Platonix

Oh man, so much to talk about this week.

· What's your opinion of the hubbub over Andrew Hussie, creator of Homestuck, objecting to your homage items?

· We can't display avatar equip items in Houses anymore... cry ruined ruined ruined... crying

· Could you pass along a smack upside the head or something to whoever replaced the Bunny Tail in the Sundae's Treat formula with the Bento Bunny? scream from an item that's no longer available and has never been re-released, to an item that's no longer available, has never been re-released, and costs over 100K more on the MP...

I just found out about that myself. I'll look into it and see what's up. No matter what we'll do the right thing for sure.

It's too bad that the feature is not in the new housing editor, but hopefully we'll be able to add that back in sometime later.

I'll check for you, hopefully we'll be able to get it changed.

Narumi Misuhara

Esdella Vie

How hard do I have to clap for Josie to be a featured NPC in the Xmas event? : D

*shrug* the NPCs that will be in the event haven't all been solidified yet so at the moment not too hard. smile ...can't promise anything though.

Narumi Misuhara

Uncle Haijin

3.) Is there any chance of a Labtech X X-mas event or just X in anything anytime soon?

...not looking good...

Lanzer

Fractale

*hi-fives Lanzer and staff on the Housing update*
no, I'm a hardcore twilight hater, Lanzer. A Spit on it and drive a stake through its heart kind of hater

1: Why don't most of our NPC's have last names, like the Von Helsons do? Or the Gambino's?

2: Is there ever going to be an “Ask the NPC”?

3: Are Serene and Jinx related in any way?

4: what's good ol' Fleep up to these days? Do you guys at HQ hang out with him after office hours? Once a staff member becomes a normal user on Gaia, do you try to value their opinions and suggestions like any other user, or do you find it hard to “let go”, and take whatever suggestions they make as if they were still part of the team at HQ?

Guess I'm lucky that I haven't watched the movie. smile

Many NPC don't have last names for the sake of simplicity. In hindsight, perhaps every single NPC should have a proper last name...

Not that I know of.

We last met a a club, so I guess that's after office hours. And any staff members will always be valued as they have much more of an understanding of things inside and outside of Gaia.

Lanzer

Elynai

Many item bugs are ignored. Are you ever going to start fixing any of them? There are a bunch posted in the official item glitch thread here started in February and I don't believe any of them have been addressed. There is also the Avatar System 3.0 forum.

Are you ever planning on using the In The Que forum that was added at the beginning of this year? Why did you add it and then never use it?

With Bidblast you list the day that the listing will definitely finish on, but not the time. Are there any plans to add this in the future?

Sorry but we've missed fixing a lot of the avatar item glitches, but we definitely have been fixing many issues there consistently, and many bugs had been fixed. There are some issues that we can't fix because of the limitation of the avatar system for it's a towns/flash related problem and we can't fix it on the art side. If there's anything specific please let me know.

That forum is planned for things like Spring Cleaning and for site related bugs as well as features. So that's what we'll be using it for. Wish we could have moved faster on this.

Because the time depends on the people

Narumi Misuhara

Black Witch of Ra

Event/Plot Q's:
* Can Aekea be the host area of X-mas 2k11?
- Return of Robo-Santa?

...Up to writers...annnnnd....No to Robo-Santa ...besides, he's back to his old human-ish self!

Lanzer

Esdella Vie

Hey there!
In the past few years decorating the site for the holidays(like bats and snow in the background) haven't really been done.Are the changing headers for RIGs and events the reason why, and if not, could we see the headers change for the seasons again?

How hard do I have to clap for Josie to be a featured NPC in the Xmas event? : D

I'm not going to mess with the bs concerning HS, I'm sure it will be touched upon quite enough. ninja

Well we spent time working on the world map, additions in towns and poured in a ton of time making the funny NPC costumes this year. We pick and choose the things we wish to work on within reason of how much time we have, and as Gaia as so much content and areas, it's extremely hard to update everything, I just hope that whatever we work on are creative, and often humorous.

Many people clapping would help a lot better than one clapping hard. smile

Narumi Misuhara

LiXKuja

How's the halloween conclusion coming along?
Will we see a persona sponsor and item for the up coming two new games in the future?
Timmy seriously needs to evolve again...
Is the world page update coming soon.

I saw Breaking Dawn online, it was good but the second part will be even better.

Soon, I'm told it may be ready by Wednesday.
No persona sponsor lined up that I'm aware of, though that would be cool
I've pushed the world page update to January so I can focus more on the X-Mas event. Otherwise it's ready to go, I just need to build it.

Lanzer

Uncle Haijin

1.) Will we ever find out if Zhivago's his first, last, or just a codename?

2.) Who raised Ian after he escape from Vladimir and will we ever see his adoptive family?

3.) Is there any chance of a Labtech X X-mas event or just X in anything anytime soon?

4.) Your character profiles, can you show them to us?

The unknown adds to the mystery... smile

Good question, I always thought that Ian strived for himself

Nimura might be the better person to answer, but I haven't heard of anything yet...

You mean my character profiles or the NPC? If it's the NPC we still need to work on them...

Lanzer

Cyndelle Maxwell

stare "Twilight"? Please. talk2hand I root for "Team Belmont", just like my brother. xd twisted

whee Anyway........Is there any chance that we'll ever get to see better clothing styles and/or options (i.e., NORMAL clothing) for female avatars in the Gold Shops? I know a lot of guys complain about the grand majority of Cash Shop items (RIGs, EIs, etc.) being female-oriented, but apparently, they don't notice that when it comes to regular, non-CS clothing, it's the girls who are always getting the short end of the fashion stick. I mean, I usually end up having to search through at least six different stores to find a decent skirt and/or dress that either goes a little further than a virtual six inches below my waistline, or doesn't totally cover up my legs AND my feet. That, and I'm not a big fan of "balloon"-type skirts that are as wide as the "wingspan" of my arms. xp stressed

It's difficult to have an effort to "make better clothings" as we have such a wide spectrum of styles to cover. If there's something particular that you'd like to see, it would be easier for us to consider, otherwise we have a really big list of requests from different Gaians asking for specific themes or styles, and that's what we based by usually.

Lanzer

Zamio

Hi, Lanzer, Panagrammic, Ubermegatron, et al.

I was wondering if we'll be getting some new Christmas outfits this year, like we got last year? From the shops? And what color they will be?

Hope you have a nice Thanksgiving!

Yeah we'll have Christmas themed outfits, though I don't have any more detail as to what they would look like, sorry.

Lanzer

Eudaemon

1. Can you give us any update on this giant Gaia vs. Homestuck chaos? (maybe to quell the huge raging fire between the fandoms?) If not, it's okay since it is a business relations ordeal....

2. Is there any plans to make Alchemy more viable for users who aren't insanely rich?

3. Any plans on more Housing items?

I've been out of the loop until today so I'll catch up and see what's going on. I'm afraid that some of the new artist might have made some mistakes along the line not knowing the legal aspects. Though I'll find out what exactly is going on and get back to everyone on the issue.

Definitely. We're careful to separate out different types of alchemy items and have routes for different kinds of goals between different Gaians.

That too, many artists have pitched in for new items and they should be out after more bugs are fixed.

Lanzer

VKiera

Hello!

ALCHEMY SUGGESTION!!! *cough*

I was wondering if there was anything in the works for alchemy storage? Like the items I'm collecting that aren't actually found under the alchemy tab in my inventory, for example I have a formula that calls for 20 dragon plushies, it's rather troublesome to wade through them all in my inventory.

I can put them in my storage locker but then when you check your progress the alchemy page doesn't recognize items you have in storage. So anything in the works to fix that?

That sounds like a tricky problem, yeah storage is a system made to be efficient at storing items and not for getting item info quickly so that everything else can run fast. But we'll see what we can do to help with the problem. Thanks for letting us know.

And that's it for this week's ATA. Happy Thanksgiving and we'll see you next week!

[Platonix]

November 28th

Lanzer

Hello everyone, hope you all had a great Thanksgiving weekend. How many of you actually lined up for a Black Friday sale?

We're still busy fixing the bugs related to the new housing system, if you've got any feedback or suggestion I'd love to hear them. Let's get started with this week's ATA!

Narumi Misuhara

Fractale

4: A while ago, Narumi teased us with a hint that something new was being worked on for the summer of 2012:

"Narumi Misuhara"

As for next summer there's a new game mechanic we've never tried on Gaia before that I would like to program for that event. I'm hoping that if I can start on it soon after X-Mas, next summer will be one to remember.

. Is there any other hint as to what we can expect for next summer's event?

...Nope, we haven't started next summers event and I don't expect planning for it to start for quite a while.

All I said was that there was a mechanic I would like to use for that event, the mechanic itself doesn't require me to know what the event will be to work on it ...and no, I haven't started working on said mechanic yet razz

Lanzer

Fractale

1: Is Gino's mother, Rosalie REALLY dead? I ask because – well obviously, the manga never really gave proper closure on this. We saw her silhouette get shot by Zhivago, back then, but a single bullet can't kill someone if it doesn't hit vitals- which is another issue that wasn't clarified in the manga. I also feel like I should point out that even if, by some chance, Rosalie is dead, then like all the people who we've seen die in Gaia's history: Gambino, Flarn, Bruce Hardcastle- who've been brought back at least once, from the grave, that Rosalie has a chance to, too. Eventually. Right?

2: A few weeks back, you answered my question of whether Jack had a family with this comment:

Lanzer

No, that's also part of the reason why he's so angsty.

So can we assume that Jack was born from a family of pumpkins, but his family is dead? Or that Jack was originally just a pumpkin without an actual family, but is like an Original Animated?

3: Is there any hope for a “Garage Sale” update for the NPC stores, this December? I recall that the Garage Sales were popular in years past, since they only came out at the end of the month and had lots of recolors, and new items across many stores.

4: A while ago, Narumi teased us with a hint that something new was being worked on for the summer of 2012:

"Narumi Misuhara"

As for next summer there's a new game mechanic we've never tried on Gaia before that I would like to program for that event. I'm hoping that if I can start on it soon after X-Mas, next summer will be one to remember.

. Is there any other hint as to what we can expect for next summer's event?

If Rosalie is still alive I'm sure she would have found Gino by now... unfortunate she isn't around.

Jack don't have parents, how he came to being is still a mystery. You can say he was found as an animated creature.

We'll probably have an update but I don't know if we'll call it the garage sale again.

Narumi Misuhara

MrsrachaelSnape

are we going to have a olympics event? for 2012?

Short answer: I don't know

I would like to but will depend what resources are available to me at the time. An Olympics event, assuming it was similar to the previous one, would require flash resources which may or may not be available depending on Sponsorships.

Lanzer

Yeata Zi

HEYHEYHEY! I'm Agent Zi of the GiB, and I have a few questions for you. My thanksgiving went pretty well--I went to my first Black Friday event, but didn't get the items I was going after. Oh well. biggrin

On January 17, 2007, [NPC] alien_mothership predicted that Gaia would destroy itself in about five years. That date's a gettin' closerrrrrr. (Gaiapocalypse 2012 anyone?) Do you have any plans for this, or did Mother lie to us?

Concerned Citizen claims to be a member of GiB, but he's not listed as one of my agents! Can we remedy this? I'd be ever so happy.

What has our G.i.B. intergalactic super spy UFO 07 been up to? (Does he miss his Miss Moneypenny?)

Is it true there have been UFO sightings around zOMG recently?

Was UFO 12 ever found, or is poor bobo wandering around Gaia lost? Because he was a little kid five years ago! I'd feel horrible if no one ever found him.

Can we hope for the Flarn skin? *wiggles eyebrows*

I don't believe in alien mother's prediction but some others still do. Even though I don't believe in it, going through an apocalypse might be kind of fun. The end of everything!

You mean you don't want others to claim as a member of GiB or the other way around?

UFO 07 is now older, wiser, and working on new projects after leaving the family. At least that was what's intended.

There's been no sightings as of late, as there's been no news surrounding other UFO like #12.

Narumi Misuhara

LiXKuja

Will Christmas event use the world map in any way? Love to get the elf pants we never got last year.

The current plan is to use the world map in a similar fashion it was used in trick or treating... hopefully this time we can actually update some of the map graphics xd ...no promises there though.

Lanzer

MrsrachaelSnape

are we going to have a olympics event? for 2012?

who is the artist for the prince of sea?

for houses , I want more than one room.

Maybe, we haven't planned for the summer event yet.

I've asked, but she's quite shy and wish to be anonymous. Sorry!

We hope to have multiple room too

Narumi Misuhara

Yeata Zi

dragonprincess1

Yeata Zi

Oh, Narumi! hello! Throw on some shades! Or drink a Zurg energy for all us old 06 plotters? Five years and goign strong!

I think Narumi's avatar will look mighy fine sporting some really cool shades, no?

Oh definitely--and then Narumi would be safe from neurolizers look bangin'!

Done.

Lanzer

pj444

yum_salmon yum_shrimp yum_tamago yum_tuna THIS SUSHI IS TO GET YOUR ATTENTION LANZER! yum_tuna yum_tamago yum_shrimp yum_salmon


Hello Lanzer. My questions are as followed:
1) Will the Zurg ever make an appearance in another plotline?
2) Will the Zurg make an appearance in zOMG?
3) Is there a possibility for a new map in the making for zOMG? (I know it also depends on the income from the game itself)
4) Could that new map incorporate the Zurg?
5) Will there ever be any continuation of Old Aqueduct? It seems like that is the forgotten step-sister of zOMG.
6) Are the UFO sightings in zOMG true?
7) Would you be willing to go green (Zurg)?
cool Can I have all your hrooman candies? o 3 o

I think the Gaiapocalypse 2012 was covered.

Thank you for all you have done Lanzer,
pj444

Thanks for the sushi!

Maybe, but I think we're always trying to find something fresh every year, maybe as a side appearance instead of being the main plot.

No plans had been made, but we'll definitely consider with enough requests.

If there might be a new map or whether or not it'll be related to Zurg is still yet to be determined.

The sewer was kind of an intro area that didn't work out as a place that's fun to play through, so if we spend time we probably won't be expanding on that.

Lanzer

dragonprincess1

Thanksgiving is something that I do not celebrate, since I'm from Australia. But I hope you had a nice weekend. : )
Sadly, no money here.. All out. So no bargain shopping for me.

Questions:

Has the culinary connoissuer, UFO 05, any recent success from returning to his home planet? (Cookbooks, TV Guest apperances?)
I still plan to annihilate him in an Iron Chef Cook-off.

If it is true that UFOs have been sighted in zOMG, is there any plan in the near future that will see them tie into the plot?

I don't think the aliens have any problems getting home, they have UFO's after all.

There's a chance but I can't promise anything for now. I hear all the Zurg fans today so as long as the demand is there we'll consider.

Lanzer

Dan Robinson

Hey! It's been a long time since I've attended one of these. I had a wonderful Thanksgiving, and I only have two questions for you guys.

1. What are the chances that we can get the Banggai Cardinal back in Phin Phang?

2. Will we see a Blue-Rose-inspired MC in the near future? If not, could we?

Yeah we might change the behavior and put it back, probably way later.

Hmm, I haven't heard of any ideas around Blue Rose, I wouldn't say it's likely...

Lanzer

Lyca_Watyre

Hi Lanzer! Did you have a nice Thanksgiving? Would you like a Zurg Energy Drink?

Hail Zurg!

Oh I have my share sitting in storage, you should keep yours. smile

Lanzer

Existential Existence

Who is the artist of prince of the sea (EI)? If they are willing to let us know mrgreen Someone else asked already xd

WOOOO FIRST PAGE

1) Also I posted this last ata and first mentioned it 3 ATAs ago (with the heartbreaker MC), but there are several items that are glitching where poses do not show up in the dressing room (and thus cannot be equipped at all on Gaia anymore). The heartbreaker item still has not been fixed. These glitched items include:

Fremere's Guard (all gens)
Western Zodiac
Heartbreaker
Dionaesil (all gens)
Trick or Treat tote (all gens)

Can these items get fixed? An explanation of the glitch can be found at the linked post. All the above listed items seem to be affected by the same glitch.

2) Housing is cool. It would be super cool if we had an item that could act like a "wall" so we can create separate rooms in our houses and partition things apart biggrin

add: something like this could be coded as furniture we could buy

Took this image from google

3) (question added late) Is Meili really dead?

I'll pass the post to the art team. Thanks for bringing it up.

Most users use bookshelves as partitions, but perhaps we can create actual partitions for separating areas in the house. Good idea.

Not unless the story hinted otherwise...

Narumi Misuhara

Yeata Zi

Narumi! Since you are wearing fabulous shades... what do you think about all this Zurg plot craziness? eh?

Gaiapocalypse 2012?

b***h was crazy... 'nuff said.

Lanzer

Uncle Haijin

1.) If Dark Reflection Edmund is a skinny otaku, what does that make Dark Reflection Zhivago, some sort of shy, gentle nerd that plays a lot of first person shooters?

2.) Are the Star People (Rigel, Mintake, and the other ones) demi-gods?

3.) How does Labtech X's company, NeXus, fund itself? You can only funnel so much money out of G-Corp before someone notices, so they have to have some alternative funding so they can afford to maintain Rapture the Sealab Compound.

Wow, is that what you think of Zhivago? I tend to think he's less of a nerd. smile

We haven't addressed that, but it's most likely.

It's been told that they also fund themselves. Many people are interested in their experiments and technology.

Thank you for attending this week's ATA, see you all next week!

[Platonix]

December 12th

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

Christmas is just two weeks away. The shopping malls are packed, everyone's planning on their vacation during the holidays, and we're working hard on the event.

First of all I want to wish everyone a great Christmas and fun filled holiday season. I'll be headed off to Europe for three weeks myself so I wanted to share my holiday wishes early. Hope you'll have fun on Gaia and offline as well.

Let's start with this week's ATA!

Lanzer

MrsrachaelSnape

Hello Lanzer !
1.Can we have other holiday items? I would love to put a menorah in my house . Also any Hanukkah theme clothing .Here's my thread on it http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/site-feedback/can-you-make-other-hoildays-items-as-well/t.76415327/?_gaia_t_=3934

2. Can we have a cafeworld type game either on facebook or on gaia?
http://cafeworld.wikia.com/wiki/Cafe_World_Wiki

3. I really like soul crash but I wish you get more energy when you level up. Can that happen?

I hear you. It might be a little late to work on other items in time, but I think it would be good for us to be better prepared next year. Your continued requests are important, for sometimes we just need to be reminded for some of the more obvious items and features we need for the holidays.

Well there's a game that has similar style and with tons of NPC plus storyline in the works. It's called Summer Springs, and though it's more of a farm/city building type of game, it has its roots set from resource management games and you will find it fun also.

Level up don't happen often enough so there's not that much incentive for giving more energy, rather the energy bonus from visiting friends is more rewarding.

Lanzer

Fractale

1: Why are there so many events that focus solely on or even partially on vampires (Louie and his kin) and zombies (zombies, grombies, glompies, ect)?
Halloween 2k7- vampires
Gaia Olympics 2k8- Vampires
Halloween 2k8- vampires
Halloween 2k9- vampires
summer 2k10- vampires
Halloween 2k4- zombies
Easter 2k10- zombies
Halloween 2k5- zombies (grombie)
Gaia Olympics 2k8- zombies (glompie)
Feels like they've been overdone to death, and there's a lot more races Gaia's created or mentioned in items that need the spotlight. Can the gaia staff stop giving so much attention to zombies and vampires for a good, long while, and focus on Arachnids, Doptera, Dwarves, Fishmen, Dragons, Angels, Goti, Cyclops, Nymphs,Demons, angel imps, devil imps, Orcs, centaur, Vylons, Zurg, Nartians, and Flower Imps, Sirens,Unicorns, Druids, Yokai, or Sno Yetis.

As cat and Japan crazy as Gaia is, I'm pretty surprised you guys haven't done an event or CI or manga around Bakenekos and Nekomatas and making them NPC's (which I would just LOVE to death- hint, hint) and anthromorphing the star kittens.

2: when will we seen a conclusion to the Halloween manga? Why is it that the manga endings come so late after the holidays, like we waited months for the ending to Frontier skies, and now the Halloween manga?

3: Will we ever receive the same amount of Gold Shop updates as the cash shop receives? I think it might be nice to work in simultaneous updates for the gold shop, when the cash shop gets updated, and to have a small update with the same theme as every cash shop update. Would something like that be possible for the artists to work on?

4: Why haven't we received updates for trash and flower exchange?

Ever considered some staff are actually vampires and zombies? You'd be surprised! We do brainstorm between different themes, which explains what we did with this year's Halloween event. The repeated themes just speaks to certain themes' popularity.
It's true that many of us are cat lovers too. So don't be surprised to see more cat stuff.

Speaking of cats, I just got a cat myself! You can visit Waffle's page at:
http://waffles-the-cat.tumblr.com/

Usually we're too ambitious and lined up too many features back to back, and between Halloween and Christmas we have little free time so things got delayed yet again. Sorry!

Gold shop updates are in big spurts and it's funny that the team had gotten used to that schedule, but it's definitely something worth looking into again.

We picked housing and housing items to work on, as we think it'll be more fun than updating the exchange, so the exchanges had been pushed back a bit. Meanwhile, I hope that everyone enjoy all the housing related updates.

Lanzer

CleoSombra

Hi, Lanzer and friends.

In a Site Feedback thread a few days ago, I learned a few things. One, Gaia has created a total of five facebook games. Congratulations! However, I also learned that the existence of the facebook games has little or nothing to do with the rest of the Gaia, apart from Gaians helping to make Gaia profitable enough to create these games. In fact, if what this developer says is correct, it appears that the success of Gaia’s games has nothing to do with the success of the site.

When a user expressed concern about Gaia falling by the way side, the developer said this:

Developer

. . .
As for the home side getting left behind don't worry. You guys are a dedicated and loyal user base and as long as Gaia Online is making enough to justify us all being here, we'll continue to support it. The theme for 2012 from the new higher ups is the Gaia community. ...this next year will be about working on projects that we feel are right for Gaian's and far less about crazy new features created mostly for new users that do little to nothing for those of you still here.

Quote:

You guys are a dedicated and loyal user base and as long as Gaia Online is making enough to justify us all being here, we'll continue to support it.

As was pointed out, it appears that this suggests that if Gaia Online thrives, then Gaia Online will stay. It seems to suggest to me that if the Gaia facebook games thrived and Gaia Online did not . . . Gaia Online would be eliminated. Is this true?

Let’s say that Gaia Online loses (more) people. Sponsors stop sponsoring the site as much. Gaia starts to go into the red a bit while the Facebook games are in the green. Would the profits of those Facebook games help to keep Gaia running, or would Gaia Online simply be taken down/shrunken?

I understand that many are concerned about how resources are lined up between different games and titles. Perhaps one of the reasons why it's confusing is because Gaia as a company share the same name as GaiaOnline. Imagine if we're Nintendo, Blizzard, or Capcom, we are dedicated to be a creative house that constantly come up with new ideas, gameplay and art, and as we mature we would have different teams with different ideas.

As a company we need to be able to earn money so that we can "keep the lights on". Gaians definitely support Gaia to the point where we will always be able to support you the best we can, and if our other titles take off, that just means that as a company we have more money to hire more talents across the board. Hope that makes sense.

DJ Helsing

Existential Existence

DJ Helsing

Hi everyone!

Just wanted to swing by and say hi.

Feel free to drop questions my way as necessary.

what con has been the most memorable for you amongst all of the cons you have attended this year?

hope you enjoy the holiday

Wow thats a hard question.

I can't really pick one because every event had something special about it wether it be a great crowd or a memorable moment every event in 2011 had a cool and unique occurance that made it special.

Were still working on the 2012 list so stay tuned for more info in the next few weeks.

Narumi Misuhara

Sakura Parfait

When can we go caroling in Towns? What's the Xmas event about? Is the Housing update the only GS update we have for December or is there more?

Caroling should hopefully be out this week, the main event will launch next week.

Lanzer

dragonprincess1

Europe sounds fun! I hope you have a wonderful time.

Questions:
The homeplanet of the Zurg's terrain. What is it like?
Is it mountainous?

Are there any Zurg festivals we are not aware of?

The Zurg world is a purple world that's actually quite fantastic to see. We had a picture of it posted a long time ago. Sorry I'm not able to find it right now but I do believe it's still around somewhere.

Zurgtember fest? No I don't know of any off hand, probably need to ask an alien himself.

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

Lanzer

Let's start with this week's ATA!

stare And pray that it doesn't get sidetracked yet AGAIN. whee stressed scream

1. The "Suggested Content" panel in "My Gaia"......When will we be allowed to have an option to shut it off? Not only is it not necessary to me in particular, I don't just add users to my friends list at random -- especially when said users are already on my "ignore list". cat_stare

2. Why, exactly, are the "Bloodstone Gems" 50% more expensive than the "Bloodstone Amulets"? It seems unusual that something that can be equipped would cost less than something that can't. cat_whee

3. How do we go about getting a larger Housing editor frame that displays the entire room on a single screen, as in the below image? cat_stressed cat_scream



Thanks as always for your replies! ninja

Oh, the list definitely shouldn't have ignored users on it. It should be a lab feature in the near future.

The Amulet came first and we wanted it to be more accessible since little people know about it. The gem is mainly a status item.

Ah, that is a good suggestion. I'll look into something maybe like a full screen mode. Thanks for the suggestion.

Lanzer

shellsmachine

- On October 7, Panagrammic announced in the Site Changes thread that "For a few weeks
we've removed the entry-level cash fish (Octopii, Lazor, Knight, Memphis, Pinchi, and Cooks).
We're trying to slow down the creation of new tanks for a bit."

It's now been a few months. When will Phin Phang be re-stocked?

- Is there any chance of a holiday gift for the aquariums? Perhaps a new set of Aquarium Snow
Crystals from the Daily Chance?

Sorry Panagrammic got tied up with some other tasks and Phin Phang won't be updated until later. We're working on a number of holiday items but I don't think we have holiday aquarium items for the Christmas season. Sorry.

Lanzer

Existential Existence

hi lan lan

bal;kj;lakjdfasdf insert stuff here

add:

Hope you and staff will have a relaxing vacation. biggrin

1) the black friday bundles are still in the cash shop under the all tab a few pages in, just wondering if this was normal
2) are you guys working on any new features for the main gaia site or concentrating more on updating/tweaking current features?
3) what are you most excited for working on in 2012, for GaiaOnline?

Oh yeah we'll be taking that away. Thanks for the reminder.

We're more focused on fixing up current features right now. We hope to address current Gaians concerns over bugs and problems before working on new stuff.

I think that we have some pretty cool improvements that we can make in Towns after housing.

Lanzer

Cyndelle Maxwell

Lanzer

Let's start with this week's ATA!

ninja Yes, let's do so indeed, especially seeing as how two of my questions are ABOUT "Ask the Admin". whee xp

1. Was it ever considered feasible to give "Ask the Admin" its own forum/subforum?

2. For that matter, why isn't there a forum/subforum specifically created for all of the ATA questions that don't get answered every week? It seems a bit annoying, as well as needlessly time-wasting, for people to have to re-post their questions week after week, simply because their questions are unable to be answered "in time" before the session ends.

3. We now have an option to view 50 friends per page. Not that this isn't a welcome change, but I'm wondering if more can be done. For example, why not allow the option to view up to 100, or 200, or even 500 friends on a single page? Also, why not allow us to rearrange the users on our friends list in the same manner that we can rearrange the items in our inventories through the "Inventory Arranger"?

ATA does have it's own subforum for the archived threads, and Platonix had been terrific in summing up the threads over the years.

I wish I can answer everything, but unfortunately I won't be able to have any work done if I attempt to do so. There was a time where I answer every single PM that came to my inbox, but eventually it got to the point where bugs aren't fixed and features aren't done and I have to step back. Sorry about that.

The friend manager is out of date and we're hoping to remove the 500 friend limit and along that line we will have more browsing options too.

Lanzer

Platonix

Lanzer

Platonix

· Could you pass along a smack upside the head or something to whoever replaced the Bunny Tail in the Sundae's Treat formula with the Bento Bunny? scream from an item that's no longer available and has never been re-released, to an item that's no longer available, has never been re-released, and costs over 100K more on the MP...

I'll check for you, hopefully we'll be able to get it changed.

So, no luck on this, huh?

I found out that Bunny Tail was put there by mistake, and there had been intention to re-release Bento Bunny but we haven't got around to it. Thanks for checking

Lanzer

LabTech David

Hello Lanzer!

Happy Holidays to you too.

My question is:

1-When we the aquarium fish return? Like Mir Pinchi, the Lobster, and the Mermaid back in the aquarium shop? They were taken out and they said they be back within weeks, but it's been month and they are still not there.

2-This is more of a suggestion.. so here goes. When will Gaia release the items that the G Corp Labtechs wore? I know there's a labcoat and medical mask, but what about the pants, the shoes, and the hat they all wear? Are we ever going to get Grombie skin Re release?

Sorry the update took a delay and we'll get back to it later. I'll dig into it and try to have it updated in time.

Ah, if you like those items I'll ask about them. It shouldn't be hard to re-release them. I'll let you know as soon as I find out!

Thank you for joining us this week. Have a great holiday everyone! I'll be taking off to London this Thursday and will be back after New Year. See you all then! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

[Platonix]

January 9th, 2012

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

Happy new year everyone! Hope all of you had a great holiday and enjoyed the Christmas event. Just got back from Paris last week and barely got past the jet lag. ^^;

On the coming year we'll continue focusing on improving many of our core features, mainly Gaia Towns is the center of our discussion lately and I'd love to hear form you what is that you love and hate about Towns. We'll also take time to work on various bugs and features around the site. We'll share more as we point out what to tackle.

Let's start 2012's first ATA!

Lanzer

MrsrachaelSnape

Hi Lanzer

1. I love the idea of Alchemy just not how hard it is to get components.
Can’t components be easy to get. Why not have them in many ways to win it? Like mini games, zomg, town/rally and so on. A lot of old features get forgotten , why have components in old mini games and such .Therefore there is more components as well more people using old features .It’s a win win.

2. Can we have a re-color of fairy wings in gold shop? Like red ?
My thread-http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/site-feedback/re-color-fairy-wings/t.76553199/?_gaia_t_=3934

We do have many ideas about having future alchemy be based on specifics on what people do, from mini games to zomg. Though at the beginning we want to make sure that items are not just available to people playing specific features so we didn't focus on that. We'll have more to share later.

Yeah I liked that suggestion a lot. Will pass it on. It should be a quick and easy addition to the gold shop.

carbonphyber

Corinth Maxwell

Lanzer

Hello everyone! Let's start 2012's first ATA!

1. Concerning the Marketplace "listing view settings", can they be changed so that when a user selects to view 20, 50, or 100 items at a time on one page, it automatically -- and permanently -- becomes the new default view setting until the user decides to choose a different view option?

I distinctly remember building that, but in my test a few seconds ago... it looks like the page size feature is broken (at least for logged-out users).

It stores your preference in a "cookie\", so your preference is stored independently on every browser.
Unfortunately, if you find a link to a marketplace "itemdetail" page with a different (20, 50, 100) number in the link, your preference will be changed/updated.

Narumi Misuhara

MrsrachaelSnape

Fractale

Loobee

What happened to Panagrammic? He was one of the few people who actually communicated with us. He was so nice and had such great ideas. I miss him.

I thought this was just a groundless rumor . Has Pan really been fired, or relocated or whatever? I'll be pretty disappointed if we lost one of the greatest devs who actually made an effort to keep the lines of communication open.

His name is still brown. I hope all is well. Why does all the great devs leave us sad

He hasn't left, he's been moved up the chain. The results of which is he's a bit more hands off of Gaia than he was before, but he very much still cares about all Gaian's and stays apprised of all that we do and helps out when needed.

Narumi Misuhara

MrsrachaelSnape

Yay. So what work does he do now?

He leads all of Engineering for Gaia Interactive.

biglanky14

Fractale

The Undead Suitor

Holy s**t I was joking before, but he really got "promoted" to a more hands-off job?

You guys really don't want to deal with us do you?

yay promotion. I'm happy for him, but he and his "Hands on" approach in the forums will be missed.

Suitor: so much for them giving more focus to the community (which I assumed would be a lot more communication directed at us) in 2012. Hmph.

Hi Fractale,

We know that we could do a much better job of communicating - Pan is excellent at that. We're going to try to be much better at that this year. We won't always do a good job, or respond to everything, but we're definitely aware of our shortcomings here and are trying to get better. Hopefully you'll see us around fairly often as the year goes on.

And please keep pointing it out when you think we're falling down.

Lanzer

Krissim Klaw

I’m sorry for posting my questions here and the backstory behind them, but I felt like I needed to reach out to a living breathing person over at Gaia headquarters rather than just dump this somewhere in the feedback forum where I wouldn’t even know if someone took the time to read it.

First off, as the person who has been working on Formula 1: Risen Quest Inizio I would love if I could get any sort of confirmation on what this is even for at this point? I’m guessing some sort of backwings, but they are clearly not the angelic ones I thought I was going after.

The heart of my first question is why did the staff feel the need to be so cryptic with the backwing formulas and lack of description on what formulas like this one were even for? Would it have been that bad to add a couple words or a sentence to the first formula’s description to let people know what type of item would be made? Considering how much effort is required to even come close to completing the formula, it only seems fair.

I spent countless hours, massive amounts of gold, and so much energy pouring my heart and soul into this quest because I thought I was going for the feathered angelic backwings that I have been waiting for since 04. For the last two months I have been working hard to track down components, haggle with sellers, and on many occasions stalk the vend constantly for components that there were literally zero listings for at the time. I was given a square peg, round hole, and left to spend hours a day gnawing that peg to somehow make it fit. There were times I did three way trades, finding one user with something I needed, discovering out what component they were after, than haggling with another user to get something I could trade to another user so I could finally bring it all the way back and trade to get one component closer to finishing this quest.

It was a long grueling grind and I spent hours each and every day since I got this formula, working this quest for months to make as much progress as I have. I have just reached formula 9 in the quest chain for those curious. While I am the first to admit I have more gold than the average Gaian is going to want to throw at this, I am nowhere near rich enough to just buy every little thing I need, if it is even listed. I had to work carefully on every purchase to make sure it would be within budget so I would have a hope at having enough funds to make it all the way through. I had to do all this in a System that is almost all demand and no supply.

Still, I hoped my effort would pay off because of course I was under the impression I was going after the white angelic feathered wings I had been waiting years upon years to show up. For the longest time there was nothing to tell me otherwise.

The quest had been requiring nearly all angelic items when it came to the giftbox rares needed, not to mention all the feather components I was sacrificing and I thought must symbolize the adding of the feathers on to the wings. The formula’s title certainly didn’t help. Risen, that sounds angelic. Rising up to heaven like all good little Gaians should. They even have the same tiny picture of white wings that the ‘Angelic’ ones, just listed in bidblast, have only the bubble is blue not gold.

I was nearly finished with formula 8 before the wings showed up in bidblast to finally give me an inkling at how wrong I was. That is 269 cache components into this quest chain and that is only counting the philosopher’s cache components, not the giftbox rares, store items, or other formulas I have had to pick up to sacrifice in this.

This is the first time an avatar forum site managed to bring me to tears over something , so bravo to you guys on that. You wanted this to involve blood, sweat, and tears and it has taken all. Too bad for me it got me nowhere. My only consolation is apparently I am not the only idiot who thought the Risen quest was going to be for angelic backwings. There were several threads floating around Gaia with discussions on it, and of course no one from Gaia Team felt the need to point out how wrong we were although someone popped in within an hour of releasing the angelic and demonic formulas in the bidblast to tell us they have been in the Alchemist’s Case the entire time…

Even worse so many of my close friends had been cheering me on and chipping in along the way which breaks my heart because I don’t want them to know how truly soul crushing this has been after all the effort. My dear, level 10 friend, Computosaurus, agreed to be my alchemy slave in this monstrous undertaking and handle the alchemy side of combining things while I brought the components to her. Another of my friend’s, MonkeyQueenForever, has been putting in nearly as much time as me to track down components and buying things I need, all so she can donate them to me. It has been kindness like this that has given me the strength to force myself to complete the Risen quest even though it appears to be for white demon wings that will lack the feathers I so desire.

Users have been trying to lift my spirits up for the last couple of days by remarking I could attempt to make profit off selling whatever pops out of my Risen quest at the end, but this was never about profit for me. It was about completing a quest I’ve been waiting for since 04 and now not only did I find out I'm on the wrong quest but I know I won’t have the funds, energy, or time to even give it a second try, if by some miracle I was able to get an angelic formula.

I’m trying to shake off my pity party but I felt like I had to get my story out there because I am a living breathing person behind this computer screen and I am also the face of one of the users who is clearly by your standards not hardcore enough for angelic backwings. I'm not even sure what I expect to get out of this post. Clearly nothing is going to fix it for me minus a pair of angelic wings dropping down from the heavens as payment for all the effort and time I have spent. Perhaps this will at least prompt someone to tack on a description to similar formulas so other users are not so misled in the future.

My final question for the night, is this really all you hoped the angelic backwing quest to be?

Thanks for writing krissim. We have been keeping ourselves updated with the threads on SF and glad that you're bringing up the issue here.

I'm sorry to hear how your quest turned out. There are many factors that we put into consideration when alchemy was first designed and many had to do with trying to make it as something epic and special, thus we didn't to put attention into making it easily accessible and that's something we should have paid attention to.

I wish I can go back in time and make things right for you. I know I can't do that but I'll definitely go back to the team members and work on what we could improve on for alchemy to lessen the pain that many of you had gone through. It'll take a bit of time since some of the core member of the alchemy team is on vacation right now but we'll have something more solid to share at a later date.

Once again I'm sorry and thank you for sharing your story with us here.

Lanzer

Fractale

1: We learned that the Gaia world is hollow, and inhabited by the “Core People” that formed a group called the UTSC (Universal Transcendent Spirit Collective) (believers of a non-traditional religion, and who sought true enlightenment mentioned in the Reve Rouille EI Report. Are we going to be seeing this group again, preferably outside of the EI Report, and in the manga, instead? Seeing the core of Gaia and what goes on there, would be pretty cool

2: If Meili isn't dead (or is revived, eventually, if he is dead), will he and Gino get back together, to be BFF? Sort of like a Calvin and Hobbes type relationship?

3: What ever happened to the idea of Gashamon? Mewpit was the first ever Gashamon Item, and its numbered as #003. Why aren't there any more Gashamon, and how many were there supposed to be?

4: Why haven't the following SD Plus dolls been made, yet, instead of constant new ones filling the gaps?
Mr Crux, HE, Gemini Twins, Pisces, Olivia, Rin, Lin, Kin, Faunzy, Dally, Lilja, Sprout, Drystan, Macduff, Puli, Denwen, Winsor, Fei, Dreamcatcher, Presentina...
The full list of missed SDPlus dolls is here

We have big plans to create more stories for 2012, but I can't promise whether or not we'll cover that specific plot though. I hope to have more to share later this month

Hmm I'm sorry but I don't think that would happen. Things will be clarified at a later manga.

I believe that Gashamon was an idea that we didn't follow through unfortunately. We don't know if there will be more later.

We haven't been making as many SDPlus dolls as we should, but we'll definitely be making more for the recent characters, and there probably won't be much dolls made for the old characters unfortunately.

Narumi Misuhara

MistressMinako

- What happened to Pan? Was he moved to another part of the site where he could no longer speak with users or update the dev notices?

- Why were basic back wings turned into something very, very few people will ever have a shot at? What happened to making basic items like that, available to everyone?

- The "trickle-down effect" isn't working. Why are components so rare? Is this really what was intended for Alchemy?

- Is the staff actually taking any of the feedback about Alchemy to heart?

We care very much about alchemy, and are indeed looking at the feedback - in fact we are already gathering the feedback for review. We're aware we're taking a while and currently our focus is on figuring out our projects for 2012, but we most certainly haven't forgotten about alchemy.

biglanky14

MrsrachaelSnape

MrsrachaelSnape and FairyOfGrace

(long conversation about the state of avatar item gitches)

if you read the site feedback more.Lots of people are saying none are being worked on really, so it just a wasted. They really need to work on that more and make a list what been work on what going to be work on.Like Juno did sad .

Hi Mrsrachaelsnape!

I'm going to have to find a nickname for you since I always leave out the "a" in rachael - maybe MRS? smile

I posted last month in one of the threads, but like I said we definitely don't ignore item glitches. We're working on some internal processes to get more fixed, and also trying to make it more obvious when something is fixed. This goes on the list of communication things we could do better. It's not going to change overnight, but hopefully we'll get better over time, even if it's simple stuff like letting you guys know we're reading a thread and it's not being ignored (even in cases where we can't/aren't going to make the change requested).

biglanky14

FairyOfGrace

MRS wink is my real life sister, I call her a lot of names rofl

LOL - awesome. I'm guessing I can't use many of them, huh? wink

Lanzer

.~.Lady_Aji.~.

Evening, Lanzer.

When is HQ going to realize that the site's Alchemy featured is totally messed up and give it the re-haul that it needs? I don't mind a challenge, but this feature is damn near impossible to participate in. Also, if only a small percentage of the userbase was suppose to be able to use Alchemy, why shove it down everybody's throats during events? Alchemy should be accessible to everyone and not just those with extreme luck and GC to burn. On another note, stop putting alchemy formulas in the Treehouse. That's what the Bifrost is for.

I also noticed some goldshop item glitches that I would like to see taken care of. The items are the gray brisk day coat and bao. In the gray brisk day coat, a section of the coat is missing. With the bao, the problem is that for as long as we've had the ability to turn our avatars around, I noticed that the bao doesn't layer properly with the bao hairstyle. This same glitch is also happening with the bao recolors. I would like these items to be fixed please.

Screenshots:

We wanted the feature to be a challenge but a lot of times how actually difficult things are is hard to plan out before things are released to the public. Nobody enjoy hearing unhappy feedback and we definitely take everyone's comments to heart so we're definitely looking into what we can do, and whether there will be changes to the core system or addition of new items or formulas will be determined and announced at a later date.

I'll share your bug with the team. Thanks for sharing.

Lanzer

Loobee

What happened to Panagrammic? He was one of the few people who actually communicated with us. He was so nice and had such great ideas. I miss him.

Panagrammic is just busy working on another project at the moment. He's still helping us out tremendously.

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

Lanzer

Hello everyone! Let's start 2012's first ATA!

Hello, Lanzer! Happy New Year!

1. Concerning the Marketplace "listing view settings", can they be changed so that when a user selects to view 20, 50, or 100 items at a time on one page, it automatically -- and permanently -- becomes the new default view setting until the user decides to choose a different view option?

2. About the Housing "storage" in the Inventory Arranger -- would it be at all possible and/or feasible to change the default capacity of that particular storage to "unlimited", or give users another high numbered (250/500/1,000/etc.) housing inventory expansion that users would have to "purchase", similar to outfit save slots?

3. About the Marketplace Notifications we get every time an item sells -- instead of us getting a single message for each item, is it at all possible to get a daily, weekly, or bi-weekly "digest" of what did or didn't sell from our individual stores?

Hope you don't get flooded with three weeks' worth of questions waiting to be asked! cat_xd cat_sweatdrop

That's a great suggestion. We'll put it into consideration, for the next time we update the marketplace.

It's definitely possible, right now we're focusing our flash developers on Towns right now but we'll be able to get to it on a later date.

Having a digest is possible though it won't be a small change on a programming sense. I'll let Darknrgy know. Thank you.

Narumi Misuhara

Yeata Zi

HEY Y'ALL!

I realize I'm late so my questi0on is unlikely to be answered--but ZURG! I miss them! Will I be seeing any soon?

Also, this woman in black item is the best I've seen in forever. More please?

Thanks, I'll pass this on to the rest of the team.

Lanzer

MistressMinako

- What happened to Pan? Was he moved to another part of the site where he could no longer speak with users or update the dev notices?

- Why were basic back wings turned into something very, very few people will ever have a shot at? What happened to making basic items like that, available to everyone?

- The "trickle-down effect" isn't working. Why are components so rare? Is this really what was intended for Alchemy?

- Is the staff actually taking any of the feedback about Alchemy to heart?

Pan's working on another project but we've been really active on dev notices and just last week we had more than 5 updates. We continue to work hard, and if there are any specific areas that you think we're lacking, please let us know.

The back wings were seen as the most coveted item, and the natural aspect to an item that is owned by everyone means that the item is not coveted. As a result we planned for the back wings to be hard to obtain, and I'm sorry if that's a let down. As time goes by things should be easier to obtain just as information and items are more widely accessible. I'm hoping that we'll also make changes to make things easier too, we'll have a solid plan to share at a later date. We're discussing it constantly because of the many feedback we've received, at the same time we also need to monitor the actual rate of progress by everyone, so things are taking time and we're sorry if we haven't made changes sooner.

Lanzer

The Undead Suitor

Is there any chance for someone with a knowledge of percentages and drop rates working on alchemy, or are you going to let the short sighted artists continue to have free reign to run the system into the ground?

We know of the drop rates but how many attempts are being made is the action that we need to monitor. We would be thrilled if we came up with a perfect system that everyone is happy with yet doesn't exhaust itself in a short time. Unfortunately that didn't happen, but we continue to monitor usage as we listen to everyone at site feedback and plan on next steps.

biglanky14

Rya Dracosin

Prism Moon

MistressMinako

The Undead Suitor

(Bold added by next poster. -Platonix)Auxiliary question; Can we please reign in Reapersun, or at least keep her from creating sequels to items she wasn't involved in?

I would very much appreciate this. Right now, certain aspects of her work are bordering on unprofessional. She's not the only one.

(Italics added by next poster. -Platonix)I would appreciate, Lanzer, if someone on-staff was promoted to actually dealing with users concerns. Right now, I don't feel as if anyone is listening. Looking at the problems with Alchemy, zOMG, other feature and item management. I feel like the site is slowly falling into disrepair with a heavy emphasis of quantity over quality and a quick cash grab before everything goes to pot.

There needs to be a stop put on staff members dashing off ill-worded posts and vanishing. It doesn't look good when a single sentence by a staff member results in a 20-page thread full of insulted customers.

I have to say that I agree with all of this, especially the italicized.

I hate to play the oldbie card, but I've been on Gaia since late '03. I love this site and I wish it all the success in the world, but I honestly feel like Gaia's quickly dying. This may not be the case but it's definitely how I feel for all the reasons Minako stated, most notably the alchemy issue.

I was really excited about alchemy at first, especially because I've wanted a pair of plain white wings since foreverrr. I was determined to work my way up, but I quickly found that it was a nearly impossible task for me. I have a good amount of Gaia Gold but I can't even get past level three without going bankrupt. Getting to level 10 is a feat that can only be accomplished with such a massive amount of gold that I can't even fathom how anyone could ever earn enough without obsessively vending or dropping tons and tons of cash into the site like it's going out of style. Alchemy is all about luck and wealth. Everything on Gaia seems like it's been about chance and Gaia Cash.

To add insult to injury, it seems like none of the Gaia staff members are really listening to anyone's legitimate concerns about this; it feels like it's been in one ear and out the other. Only a few small changes have been made to the alchemy system, and with the way it is now, simple angel/demon wings will be virtually unattainable, and I feel really let down. I've waited eight years for them.

See, they may say they read the SF and are listening, but i think what we'd really like to see is at least, at the very least, say "we're looking into it" and have someone come in to that thread once a week if it's kept up in SF or wherever to say "hey, we're still looking into it" and MAYBE explain what is going on with what they are doing, at least GIVE US INSIGHT into everything, PLEASE?

Hi Rya,

Good to see you again smile

Totally fair point. Like I said elsewhere here, we can do a better job of this. I certainly can't promise that we'll be everywhere that folks want us to be, but we'll try as best we can.

As Lanzer mentioned too, there are some things we're doing to improve our Comms. We're trying to do more Dev notices when we fix things (we've done 5 recently), we're doing the Gaia State of Union videos each month, and we're looking to run more contests, like the Fortune Cookie one. Ok, I know that's not strictly communications, but these are hopefully all signs that we know we can do more on the communications side and are working to get better.

biglanky14

Rya Dracosin

^_^ hope you've been well!

I am pleased that there is a lot more communication than there used to be. But us in SF, at least, would love to hear more on the topics that get to them. I know you guys post in select few threads, and I know you have very little time to post, as you're busy doing stuff to keep Gaia running. Which is why it would be nice if you could maybe designate someone to spend some time responding to threads in SF, after information has been gathered about the topics.

You know what would be kind of interesting? A weekly newsletter of sorts. Covering the more popular topics of SF, and what is being done towards those things. Just an idea. 3nodding

My response to Rya kinda addresses your comments, but the newsletter thing is interesting. I certainly don't want to promise anything (the last thing I want to do is set an expectation that we can't follow through on), but I appreciate any and all ideas of how we can get better. Eventually there will be that one great one that works for everyone smile

biglanky14

Prism Moon

Rya Dracosin

See, they may say they read the SF and are listening, but i think what we'd really like to see is at least, at the very least, say "we're looking into it" and have someone come in to that thread once a week if it's kept up in SF or wherever to say "hey, we're still looking into it" and MAYBE explain what is going on with what they are doing, at least GIVE US INSIGHT into everything, PLEASE?

I agree, I think they could really benefit from designating a customer service rep to the SF, at least from time to time.

Hi Prism,

Actually, multiple folks do this - both staff and mods have it as part of their routines to check SF and other forums regularly and report back their findings. But we haven't done a great job of letting you guys know that. We also of course can't possibly do everything that's requested of us in there, but the vast majority of it does actually get read.

One thing that's been a tough balance is that because there's so much more in there than what we can do, if we're posting in every thread it'll be a lot of "Thank you for your post"-type comments without much follow-up action, which may not look great to users either. But maybe that's something we've misjudged.

Lanzer

Ridley Starsmore

1. Why can't anyone else host the ATA? near a month seems like a long time.

2. I hear over and over again Alchemy isn't broke. Your userbase disagrees. This isn't a question, just an informational statement. You may want to ask the ones responsible why it's failing so hard.

3. Why are the angelic and demonic wings in a broken thing like Alchemy? That is NOT available to everyone. It is a crying shame that it has to be released through bid blast so the highest farming exchanger can get the ONLY one that has appeared in 6 months.

It's the first time in 8 years that I've taken a 3 week vacation so we didn't really had made plans for anyone other than myself to host the ATA. But I'll keep that in mind in case there will be any other long breaks in the future.

As devs and admins we don't consider that anything is working great if Gaian's are unhappy about it. Things might not be broken as in it's working with the formula and rates that were designed, but that doesn't mean we're happy with it, and we always strive to make improvements. Alchemy is no exception and we're in constant discussion to what we can do as next steps. I hope that we'll reach the state where the feature is challenging yet achievable by many.

Thanks for joining us on this week's ATA. We'll see you all next week!

biglanky14

One last thing since this is locked. If you have any ideas about communication improvements, please PM me. I can't promise I'll reply (unfortunately I get tons), but I'll take any and all ideas.

Thanks for joining us tonight!

[Platonix]

January 23rd

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

Happy Chinese New Year! When the clock struck 12 last night fireworks went off everywhere and my cat jumped to the cat tree to seek refuge. smile

Hope everyone like the recent gold store update. We've been putting time in planning for the new Towns update as we work on bug fixes around the site. We'll also be focusing on the alchemy issues this week.

Last week I've asked a number of you about the idea of having free fishes in aquarium, and the response is positive so later on this week we'll also have some free fishes to be given away. Hope to see some nice aquariums in the near future.

Narumi Misuhara

Fractale

3: Quoting you again on a past ATA. You mentioned that “I do want more future events to involve world map updates or activities.” This statement followed after something else you said: “We'll see what happens after housing update”. So now that we got not one but two housing updates, back in december; one in the cash shop, and one in the Faktori, has the staff been planning anything for events to involve the world map, and making it mre interesting than just clicking around to find Holiday NPC's on the map pages? Is the world map going to get more love in the form of updates, soon?

Soon ...probably not, I do want to try to get some of the World maps updated through events but until we can better tie events with a cohesive story there really isn't a whole lot we can do with it for events.

Lanzer

Fractale

1: Have you found out anything about the location of the observatory the star siblings are staying in, yet? You said you'd let me know when you found out....

2: In a past ATA, I asked you (Lanzer) “Can you dish the dirt on the Ringmaster's invisibility? Is he invisible by choice, and can control whether he's visible or invisible at will? Or did he have an unfortunate run-in with a whole lotta invisible ink at some point in his life?” Your answer to said question was: “Ringmaster's ability is a secret to all, and will be revealed later.” To that, I ask- how much later? How long do we have to wait for Ringmaster's creator to drop by and give us the scoop on the guy's invisibility origin?

3: Quoting you again on a past ATA. You mentioned that “I do want more future events to involve world map updates or activities.” This statement followed after something else you said: “We'll see what happens after housing update”. So now that we got not one but two housing updates, back in december; one in the cash shop, and one in the Faktori, has the staff been planning anything for events to involve the world map, and making it mre interesting than just clicking around to find Holiday NPC's on the map pages? Is the world map going to get more love in the form of updates, soon?

From what I know, there's an observatory near Aekea, perhaps we'll be able to find it in the world map some day.

It's still a secret as far as I know.

For now, instead of specifically Gaia World we're focusing on Gaia Towns, which should have a lasting effect on how we update the Gaia World. It'll have big influence on how we update the Gaia World later.

carbonphyber

CleoSombra

Happy Chinese New Year!

When will we ever be able to sell Bloody Fabrics and Blood Droplets on the MP? It's been, you know, months now, and they still say "Item not found in item search table." when you try to sell them.

Also, Black Bibbles.

No new info on Black Bibbles.
I asked the item creators if they could make sure those two bloody items are marketplace-able. It should be done soon!

Lanzer

.~.Lady_Aji.~.

Evening, Lanzer.

About alchemy. Coveted =/= Super Rare. For years, a lot of users have been waiting for the release of backwings. And for years, we were told that everybody would have a chance at getting these wings through some kind of quest. A quest that was hard, but still able to be done by the dedicated.

However, as it is now, it's damn near impossible to get these wings without having extreme luck and real life money to burn. Why should only a small percent of the userbase be able to level up through alchemy? I find this to be totally unfair. All this alchemy feature has done is piss people off and cause elitism among some users. Please, fix alchemy.

Another problem that I have is with the snowblind pose on the daughter of snows. The pose looks horrible on avatars with dark skin. Can this be fixed?

Screenshot:

Thanks for your input, we'll be getting together this week with the team members for alchemy and will have some suggestions later this week or on Monday.

Unfortunately the way layering works is that they can either lighten a color or darken it, and it cannot do both depending on the color of the skin. Probably the "fix" would be to release a different color that would work well with dark skin.

Lanzer

snufflypoo

Will Memphis the mermaid ever be put back in Phin Phang?

Probably, we need to adjust the settings but we don't want to change them when Gaians still have Memphis in their tanks.

For those who just want Memphis without the Booty Grab aspect, we could have a free version that you can get.

biglanky14

Krissim Klaw

I just wanted to say thank you to those who have been looking into alchemy and trying to remedy a number of the issues us users have been encountering with the system. <3

My big question for this week, and one I know is plaguing a lot of users is do you intent backwings to be an item the average Gaia can earn if they put the time and effort into alchemy, or do you truly only expect them to be an item for high tier players that have 100mil up to chuck into the alchemy machine? I believe a lot of us were under the impression backwings would be something any Gaian could go for, with a bit of work, but your post a couple of weeks ago about them having to be purposely rare and expensive so they can be coveted has left many of us in confusion.

Another little question I have is I heard rumors that more poses may be added to some of the single pose alchemy items. Is there any truth to these rumblings?

Hi Krissim Klaw!

As a couple of other people have mentioned, we're going to take a look at pretty much the whole system. That doesn't necessarily mean we're going to make any specific changes - I'm purposely being vague because I really don't want to set any expectations that we might not fulfill. That also means that I don't really want to give you an answer one way or another right now because it could change based on what we think is best for Alchemy going forward (which of course is driven by feedback).

Hope that makes sense, and thanks for your patience with this.

carbonphyber

jonjon21428

Hello ATA
I only have 1 concern. Ever since Deadman's Shadow was released something was wrong with the new loot it gave out.
It seems the Blood Droplet, the Bloody Fabric, and the Kamila's Essence, which are all brand new zOMG! loot, do not show up in the marketplace. Users are allowed to place them in their store, but when searching them up in the marketplace, they will not appear. Also, these items oddly will not appear in the "zOMG!" tab in the inventory, only the "All" tab. A similar glitch happened around halloween when the Pumpkin Gummy was being distributed. The glitch was resolved and Swarf explained the situation that the gummy was set to the wrong value.

swarf

I had to change the item data last night for gummies because they were causing upgrades to fail. But I may have changed their sub-type to the wrong value. I just changed it again to a different one.

It would be greatly appreciative if this issue was investigated 3nodding

edit: looks like Cleo got to this before me sweatdrop

Cleo did ask this on the first page.

I just confirmed that all three of those items should now be addable to the marketplace (notice: this may take up to an hour).

carbonphyber

beckygrendel

Fantastic! Red Eye also needs to be added. biggrin
Red Eye MP listing

Try it! It appears to have already been fixed.

Lanzer

Corinth Maxwell

Lanzer

Hello everyone! Happy Chinese New Year!

cat_biggrin Happy Chinese New Year! Sounds like your cat wasn't having all that much fun..... cat_sweatdrop

1. Why is it, that with certain sets/suits of multi-pose armor items released in the past two or three years, the artist(s) who create them always manage to leave out the greaves (i.e., armor that covers the parts of one's avatar from the waist to the knees) from those items, yet they include (nearly) every other piece of armor to cover the rest of the avatar? There have been lots of items that I wanted to buy that ended up getting passed over because of this particular glaring omission. cat_whee

2. Can we get a tab for our "Customize Avatars" page that shows which items we currently have equipped -- and only those items? cat_ninja

3. What's YOUR (and by "your", I mean "any staff member who wishes to answer the question", if possible) take on "SOPA", "PIPA", and the the issues surrounding the chaos in regards to major file storage/file sharing websites getting shut down or altering their services entirely? cat_scream

Thanks for any questions you can answer, as usual. cat_3nodding

I think it was the art style of that particular artist. She probably tried various styles before settling with what looks the best. I'll mention that to the artists. Any other items you found?

We wanted to have that feature on our next inventory page update. We don't have a time for when the next update will be but it's definitely a great feature to have.

The take down was very different than the bill that was being raised. There were not only piracy but a lot of other illegal activities related to the business that was shut down. As far as SOPA goes, it's rather obvious that we need something that is planned by people who have much better understanding of the online space, and much more consideration of consequences that would follow. Technology is moving faster than any government body can catch up, it'll just take time for us to get there. Just hope that we'll take cautious steps that won't hinder the growth and freedom that we treasure.

Narumi Misuhara

LiXKuja

Will there be a small V-day event this year?
Is February CI gonna be the typically dating sim?

V-day event... Yes
dating sim CI... *shrug*

Lanzer

Shadey Kitty

When will DMS glitches be fixed and when will levels be added?

I can't promise the upcoming levels, but I'll go check on the issues and see if any of the glitches can be fixed in a timely manner.

Thank you for joining us on this week's ATA. See you all next week!

[Platonix]

February 6th

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

Sorry for being away last week, I flew back to Canada to spend time with family for a one week late Chinese new year celebration.

We started working on improving the Alchemy system last week, and although the changes are small, it's the beginning of many incremental steps to come. We're monitoring progress as we move on and will make more adjustments or simply introduce new items or formulas later.

There are also free fishes to collect for spicing up your aquarium. Hope many of you like keeping an aquarium.

Welcome to this week's ATA!

Narumi Misuhara

CleoSombra

Narumi Misuhara

CleoSombra

Hi, Lanzer.

Q1. What's the likelihood of the Rejected Olympics returning this summer?

...An Olympics event.... during an Olympic year...noooooooooo... that's preposterous...

classified_fu

Okay, but is this going to be an exact/close replica of Rejected Olympics with town v. town (oh plz oh plz oh plz emotion_kirakira ) or is it going to be something different?

Can't really say, aside from still being very early, some of our ideas will depend on the state of Towns at the time.

Narumi Misuhara

Jayce Reinhardt

Narumi Misuhara

Jayce Reinhardt

#1 Will Boog ever get a chance to make a EI/REI?
#3 Any chance of seeing NPC Ian in the Valentines day event? If not, will we ever see him again?

*nods*

Was this a yes to both? emotion_kirakira

Oooop, no, my nod was to #3 NPC Ian. I have no knowledge or say on which artists work on what.

Lanzer

Fractale

1: In a past ATA, I addressed you with my concern of many missing SDPlus dolls a while ago, most of them of characters who never got made into their own doll; to which you replied: “We haven't been making as many SDPlus dolls as we should, but we'll definitely be making more for the recent characters, and there probably won't be much dolls made for the old characters unfortunately.” Why is this? There's no reason that I can see why older characters shouldn't have their own dolls, especially when Ian and those old NPC's have a lot more than just one doll in their likeness. Please, please encourage whatever artist is doing the SDPlus dolls every CI to go through this list and make the dolls of older characters we don't have in SDP form

2: Here's another follow-up question that I couldn't squeeze in last week, for you, Lanzer. You might remember that I expressed a bit of frustration and disappointment over the fact that you were showcasing vampires and zombies in nearly every event, for years; giving them full or just partial spotlight, like how you drag Louie or Ian into most events, and throw some new form of zombie into the mix. Now, you replied with “The repeated themes just speaks to certain themes' popularity.” I don't buy that. I'm willing to bet that if your staff threw up a poll and a forum topic for users to comment on what they wanted in Site Feedback- more zombies and vampire events, or an event with races that never got as much spotlight, or completely new races and fictional, mythological creatures, the answer would leave zombies and vampires in the dust. You have so many creatures and races on gaia, I don't see why you don't give them more attention in events, instead of sticking to tiresome undead types all the time. It's gotten old.
These races are just a fraction of what you can play with and bring into events: Arachnids, Doptera, Dwarves, Fishmen, Dragons, Angels, Goti, Cyclops, Nymphs,Demons, angel imps, devil imps, Orcs, centaur, Vylons, Zurg, Nartians, and Flower Imps, Sirens,Unicorns, Druids, Yokai, or Sno Yetis.

3: Instead of Cash shop artists working on cash shop items, gold shop items, site art, event art, ect. , would it be at all possible to keep Cash shop artists doing their thing with making art and pixels for the cash shop and every other area of the site, but have a small team of Gold shop ONLY artists, to work on NPC art and gold store only items, so the gold shops can get more frequent updates with items, to at least rival the frequency of the cash shop updates?

4: Since we discovered, around the time that the Zurg appeared in the manga, that Gaia was registered as a planet, by their spacecrafts, does it (Gaia) have any moons that orbit it? If so, are any of them inhabitable? In the Roses of Mare Frigoris Gown's item description, it mentions that the same roses on the item were rare specimens that only grow on the surface of the moon (which I assume is called Mare Frigoris, or simply is the name of the plains the rare roses grow on, on that moon). However, we don't know if this moon is Gaia's moon or not. Can we get to see more references and story into this moon where rare roses grow, in future item descriptions, and hopefully get to to see if it is, in fact, Gaia's moon, or if it's inhabitable by people?

As we only have limited time to work on everything, we chose to make SD Plus dolls for characters that are most recent and most popular and work our way down. With our free time, the decision would come down to deciding which free items to make, for example:
- hairstyles
- tattoo
- more free gold shop items
- game reward items
- special collectible items
And it's always a contention on what would make some Gaians happy, and unfortunately, not everyone will be happy with one choice over another.

Event storylines are actually collaborations of many staff members, and my personal input is actually little to none. Though what I'd like to emphasize is that we aim towards making more people happy, and if Gaians speak up and want to see other creatures, we wouldn't think twice about expanding our choices of characters.

Artists actually share many different jobs, while some contractors might have one single task at hand. We try to have big batches instead of releasing one or two items at a time to make the releases more special. Potentially changing that scheduling is something that we could consider but not a priority at the moment.

No, Gaia's moon is un-inhabitable, which is why the Roses of Mare Frigoris is so special.
(edit: I meant un-inhabitable! biggrin )

Lanzer

CleoSombra

Hi, Lanzer.
Q2. What was Gaia's role in the creation of Soul Crash, Zombie Farm Friends, and Summer Springs? Did members of Gaia Interactive's staff do any of the coding or art for those games?

Gaia is as much a studio as a publisher at the same time. We have partners that do the coding and artwork while we help with translation and gameplay, while some other games we handle the coding through an outsourced development team.

Lanzer

.~.Lady_Aji.~.

Evening, Lanzer.

- Glad to see that the alchemy team has made some changes to the feature. What other changes can we expect?

- When will the glitches in zOMG! be taken care of? Ex. = The silent NPC quest chain glitch, the lag in the game and the visual orb count glitch that has been happening since the release of DMS.

- When I try to equip the first pose (the one with the large stand-up camera) in the modern movie makers, it un-equips my wings. Can this be fixed?

Our first priority is to improve the formulas on the lower bracket, which in turn should improve things for the harder items. We are also directly looking at the hardest formulas to make sure that they are not too hard. Meanwhile, we're discussing new formulas also. We hope to not only adjust the system but to expand it and make it more fresh and more fun.

I'll ask about it. The NPC glitch might be easier to fix than the lag problem.

We can look into that bug, should be easy to fix.

codemonkey37179

Yen Quest

Questions!

1. I heard that Town 2.0 is currently being worked on (as in, not the brainstorming stage). Any idea how long it'll be before Gaia start updating it into the website?
---
I'm ready for this. Was waiting for a while. emotion_dowant

The framework for Towns 2.0 (i.e. the chat, avatars etc) is just about done. Some of the parts will be used in the upcoming Valentine's event. The next step will be to get things like the bugs and flowers working, and then the maps for the towns themselves. I can't say exactly when you'll see it on the site, because it is huge project involving a lot of people. I will tell you that we have a lot of exciting ideas, and the avatars will be able to do more.

Lanzer

Jayce Reinhardt

#1 Will Boog ever get a chance to make a EI/REI?

#2 Could we ever get a recolor of the Red Rose Corsage?, I have a thread in the SF and users seemed to want them in white, cornflower blue, yellow, and possibly dual colored.


http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/site-feedback/white-rose-corsage/t.76804841/?_gaia_t_=3934

#3 Any chance of seeing NPC Ian in the Valentines day event? If not, will we ever see him again?

That I can't tell because I'm not the one managing who gets to do what next. Often the decision is based on style and the theme of what's being worked on, but I don't know all the details regarding the decision.

Because the red rose corsage is an anniversary item, it wouldn't be right to make something that is just a re-color. If we would make more corsage items it will actually look different than just a re-color.

Lanzer

Catalyste

When will Timmy evolve again? It's been a while.

Also, thank you so much for having the [lite] fish drop Alchemy items! I hope when you say Items, you mean Components.

Heh, I wouldn't want to see what Timmy will become if it does happen, which is unlikely.

You're welcome, hope you enjoy the new fishes.

Lanzer

Yen Quest

Questions!

1. I heard that Town 2.0 is currently being worked on (as in, not currently in the brainstorming stage). Any idea how long it'll be before Gaia start updating it into the website?

2. Regular EIs has been few and far inbetween these days. Will there be an increase in them this year (at least big enough for people to notice it)?

3. Bringing this up again since it's been a long time since I asked... SDplus Blindbox. Why can't we buy it directly from cash shop? We have so many dolls in existence, it's not even funny on how rare it is to win it from Chance Items / Rigs.

4. Any major plan on redesigning site layout, landing pages, navigation header, etc?

---
I'm ready for this. Was waiting for a while. emotion_dowant

Question #3 is totally not related to my avatar.

2- We all enjoy the idea of EI, but unfortunately they just take so much effort to make and maintain, that it became so daunting of a task. I'll ask about it and see how the state of things are with EI.

3 - SDPlus dolls had been one of the side bonus for CI, so if we provide a SDPlus box we'll need to think of something else as a bonus. Until we figure out what that is, it is unlikely there will be an SDPlus box.

4 - Not immediately, but I am hoping that we can improve on the site header, and the world page should be changed when we improve Towns.

biglanky14

Diamond Cache

Hello Lanzer!
1. I was wondering if there was any insight on the [Lite] fish drops. We know that they're alchemy related, but do they directly drop components like Sea Water, Wriggling Tentacles, etc, or do they grant giftboxes, caches, etc?

2. What ever happened to Spring Cleaning ideas? Are there intentions on reviving the forum, or announcing results?

Hi Diamond Cache,

I'm just answering the second part of your question here smile

We're still paying attention to Spring Cleaning - in fact, some of the recent things we did (such as commas in the marketplace) came directly from that, and we're considering others as well. However, we are thinking about how we want to move forward with it - whether to let it keep going, or to close it. Because we are still working on some projects from there I don't really want to close it just yet, but it probably won't be too long since I don't want you guys spending time voting up projects we're probably not going to be able to do. That's a long way of saying we're still paying attention, and haven't decided what to do with it longer-term yet smile

Lanzer

gataka

Any zOMG! news?

What is Gaia working on that isn't Gaia Online related?

What exactly is the "???" step to profit?

No update at the moment, sorry.

The upcoming social games are the two publishing games Soul Crash and Summer Springs, while another iPhone game is being worked on.

??? = love. No games make profit if nobody love it. whee

biglanky14

Existential Existence

biglanky14

Existential Existence

classified_fu Just remembered ATA was on. crying I was watching tvvvv TTTT+++_____TTTTTj

Eh. Well NO QUESTIONS BUT(T) at least I can share these beautiful man legs with you Gaia people.

mrgreen

Oh yeah and HAPPY COMING ANNIVERSARY GAIA

Uhhhh.....thanks?

smile

I hope you enjoy and encourage all men and women at Gaia to dress in heels to celebrate this special occasion of Gaia's 9th Anniversary!

*throws confetti*

I'm fairly sure that's not going to be a required dress code. At least I sincerely hope not, since my ankles would shatter within minutes.

Lanzer

Diamond Cache

Hello Lanzer!
1. I was wondering if there was any insight on the [Lite] fish drops. We know that they're alchemy related, but do they directly drop components like Sea Water, Wriggling Tentacles, etc, or do they grant giftboxes, caches, etc?

2. What ever happened to Spring Cleaning ideas? Are there intentions on reviving the forum, or announcing results?

Since no fishes will die until next month, we actually have some time to decide. For now our decision is to drop a box so that we can put in many different components.

DJ Helsing

Chibi Halo

DJ Helsing

Hey everyone hope all is well just stopping by to say hi!

So what's up next on your schedule? Curiosity time here. What would be your dream location to go for a con or meet up with Gaia users? Out of all the cons you've done with Gaia what are some of the ones that you look forward to each year?

KatsuCon is coming up next week so thats really exciting.

I don't really have a dream location, just as long as there are alot of users who i can hang out with and get feedback from.

Thats a hard question because i hate playing favorites but i do like Fanime alot as well as Gencon and definately both San Diego and New York Comic-Con

DJ Helsing

Corinth Maxwell

DJ Helsing

Hey everyone hope all is well just stopping by to say hi!

cat_whee *waves & nabs one of the headphone-wearing donuts scattered all around Gaia* cat_xd cat_rofl

Donuts nom nom nom

Narumi Misuhara

Existential Existence

Jayce Reinhardt and Existential Existence

/long debate about who's cooler: Ian vs. Louie/

You are so cruel crying
Tears from sleepless nights come from Gino and Meili not being together though - Louie already has Moira.

Who does Ian have? Oh yeah...a CAT!! rofl

Not just any cat!!! He talks, he dances and he eats werebeasts!

Narumi Misuhara

MrsrachaelSnape

How come Cindy didn't report Rufus saving the day?

*shrug* I don't write this stuff, haha

Lanzer

Darc Nightgale

Was wonderin' if you guys are still planing on doing anything with the achievements we have gotten. Also maybe we could get achievements from the games here.

For example puzzles. We could get achievements for playing so many games.
Take fishin', maybe if we fill so many buckets, or catch a certain amount of fish. It might get more people to play some of those games.

The Case of Pietro hasen't evolved in a long long time. Any chance of it gettin' an update soon?

Achievements are mainly for status, while we are considering adding more achievements, but for the time being there are more pressing issues like Alchemy. Might be a while until we look into an update. I do like the game related achievements suggestion.

Case of Pietro's last evolution will happen later, but I haven't been able to get a date yet, sorry.

Lanzer

Chibi Halo

Yay, it's good to see you back again Lanzer. I have a couple of questions here that I hope you can answer or at least give some insight into.

1. The Spring Cleaning forums for 2011 have been around for nearly eight months and I wonder if anything has come from it yet. People are still making threads as though it's still relevant to do so. Will anything be done with those forums anytime soon?

2. I've had a bit of a proposal out there in the SF off and on since last April for a recolor of the G LOL mistress set to white. I've been toying with the idea of making a petition for this as well and try to keep it alive for the remainder of the year in order to try and get that recolor made and out there in the gold shops before the end of the year, possibly in another Garage Sale update. Do you think if I showed more support for the idea in the form of a petition over the rest of this year I might have a chance of realizing my dream of having a white G LOL mistress skirt from Gaia? You've already realized a part of my dream of having a white Elegant corset and G LOL mistress skirt combo with the white Elegant set about three years back.

2 - I can't promise anything but if there is enough support, we'll definitely consider. Though in the past we haven't done that many re-color of past items.

Lanzer

Kangit

Hello. cat_3nodding

For now, I just one question: What animal is Mudslide supposed to be? It only seems to be defined as a "creature".

Mudslide isn't exactly an animal since it's not something found in the animal kingdom. I would say that it's a cute little monster if you don't call it a creature. smile

DJ Helsing

Skife_Nunya

They I was just wondering what are some of Gaia's criteria for coming to a con... is there like a min size or something like that? I know a ton of people in utah who would love you forever if you came go Anime Banzai

Yes and no smile

Long story short we can only physically attend a limited number of cons due to the number of weekends in the year smile as well as the cost it takes for flights, hotels, food, taxi trips etc.

So we preselect conventions at the beginning of the year based on size and location.

With that beign said I always want to support as many events as i physically can. I am constantly sending out packets to conventions and events that request our assistance with free Gaia gold cards, bumper stickers, all new prize cards, hats, shirts, plushies and other goodies to help support their event.

If you are or know a representative of a convention that want's our support all they need to do is PM me, DJ Helsing with their request and then i'll send them a super short list of questions that i need answered and then the support gets sent on over smile

So just have a representative of your local convention PM me and ill send prizes and goodies. smile

Lanzer

Antiq

Hi biggrin

I'm sure you have noticed the significant decline in users online at any given time lately, we've all noticed it. Does this concern you, and what do you think is the reason for it, and do you have any plans to attract more members?

It's everyone's wish to have more Gaians all the time. We are busy trying to make a better hangout spot, more free stuff, and more storyline for 2012. We'd like to continue trying to make every Gaian happy, and we wish that if Gaians are happy, they would tell their friends to join.

Thank you for joining us on this week's ATA! See you all next week!

[Platonix]

February 15th

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

Hope you all enjoyed the Valentines Day event and collected your prizes. We've had more than a million love letters sent through this event! Thank you for participating!

Let's get started with this week's delayed ATA. I got a ticket to watch Conan live and I couldn't pass that up. biggrin

Panagrammic

Fractale

Panagrammic

MrsrachaelSnape

1. Will all facebook games come to gaia at one point?

Not all of them, but definitely the ones that we think might appeal to the Gaia community.

If they come to gaia, does that mean the areas in them will be canon to Gaia-land? emotion_kirakira
*crosses fingers*

Unfortunately, probably you'll just have to squint and ignore the fact that they're non-canon. It would be really hard to reconcile some of our upcoming games with the Gaia storyline.

(It's hard enough keeping the Gaia storyline consistent -- trying to manage a storyline across nn different properties, different development and writing teams, so on and so forth, would be really challenging.)

Lanzer

Fractale

Thanks for rescheduling the ATA smile

1: Why don't you change your avatar, Lanzer?

2: What would your “My Little Pony” name be, and what would your cutie mark be?

3: In both the Cirque du Gothique CI, and the Love Charm 3, Colonel Pepperpot is shown with cat ears. Does this mean that he's not human; but instead, maybe a bakeneko or nekomata with a human form, or some kind of human/ spirit cat hybrid?

With my terrible fashion sense it'll be an eyesore. smile Besides, it's easier for people to recognize me when I'm dressed the same.

Iron Pony. A glowing insignia on the chest.

Yes, those are real cat ears, call it nekotama or whatever's appropriate.

Narumi Misuhara

Crystal Sparda

6) How close are we to the release of Towns 2.0?

Not close at all, we are at the beginning phases of production.

biglanky14

MrsrachaelSnape

Hello staffers!

my questions are:

1. Will all facebook games come to gaia at one point?
2.You think houses one day can have where we can have more than one room?
3. can the item wizard school have a re color of black and yellow?

Hi MRS,

Good to see you! Let me take a crack at your questions in order:

1) Probably not all of them, although some will (we're hoping to have a non-Facebook version of MoGa on the site fairly soon, for example). Our Social Games team works with a number of partners in developing the games, and depending on our contract, we can only release games through certain channels (e.g. Facebook). We'll bring over those we can.

2) It's possible. We've kicked around a bunch of ideas for Housing, and that's one of them, although it's by no means a sure thing at all. If it did happen, it wouldn't be for awhile though because of all the other stuff we're already working on.

3) I dunno - I'll have to ask the art team smile

Narumi Misuhara

sgkat

MrsrachaelSnape

sgkat

biglanky14

3) I dunno - I'll have to ask the art team smile

Um... why hasn't this already been done?
We had the other three Harry Potter houses come out in sequential RIGs.

I would really like Opera Phantomess's questions answered.

not in hufflepuff color's

I know that. stare
My question was: Why, if the other three house colors were released in RIGs back-to-back, did Hufflepuff not follow this trend?

...I know!!! Where's the Hufflepuff love crying ...it's 'cause it's the best house and everyone knows it!

Panagrammic

siskataya

Panagrammic

biglanky14

Uh what? This is the nonsense that comes up when Narumi drinks at work.
"Wit beyond measure is a man's greatest treasure." Ravenclaw FTW

Biglanky and Narumi, you accidentally mistyped other lesser houses when you meant to type "Gryffindor." You may want to go back and edit.

Pffffft. You know, I have taken those "What Harry Potter House do you belong in?!" quizzes and every single time, the sorting hat puts me in Slytherin. eek

What!? We must battle it out with a Quidditch contest.

Well, first we'll have to write the Quidditch feature, and then we'll battle it out.

Well, first we'll write it, and then we'll get sued by Rowling.

Once we settle, we'll battle it out with a Quikkitch contest.

The battle lines have been drawn!

biglanky14

scullylam

tipped sooooo haaaaaaaaaaaaaard. xd

Gryffindor = so cliche. Plus I have neither the red hair, glasses, or skill with gurdyroot required to be in there.
Hufflepuff = really? C'mon
Slytherin = Although having the common room be under the lake would be awesome, I prefer conversing with people who aren't monosyllabic

Ravenclaw = awesome. No question.

Biglanky14 = Harry Potter geek

Narumi Misuhara

O.O Hufflepuff = Gaia = Earth ...where's the love for your own kind!!! crying

"So Gryffindor is fire, Ravenclaw is air, Hufflepuff is earth, and Slytherin is water, hence the fact that their common room is under the lake. So again, it was this idea of harmony and balance, that you had four necessary components and by integrating them you would make a very strong place. But they remain fragmented, as we know." -JKR

Uncle Kenny

Crystal Sparda

4) (For any staff to answer) Is ghosting items 100% against the rules,
or is it okay to just ghost items on your mules purely for visual purposes?
This has been a long debated issue and I believe it would be nice to get
at least a few admin's opinions or rulings on the matter.

Ghosting items is something that we don't condone in any way and is something that a user does at their own risk. We aren't going to punish anyone for ghosting since it is our fault but we definitely don't encourage it. We may make a change in the future to prevent ghosting outright but for now it's just not recommended.

siskataya

Crystal Sparda

2) How involved is Gaia staff in moderator applications?
I just ask, as it seems that the moderators seem behind and lacking.
I applied about a year and a half ago and still haven't been accepted or declined.

Heya Crystal Sparda,

Thanks for the question about moderator applications! We know there have been issues with application for a good while now, and we are sorry for any frustration this may have caused applicants. The good news is that we have recently made fixes to the system, and are currently working on resolving the outstanding applications and taking new applications. We expect to have a round of new mod training underway soon, so keep looking for it.

Have a great evening! biggrin
Sisky

Narumi Misuhara

Jello Lime

I was wondering if the Gaia staff was planning to make another one of those funny videos for their 9th anniversary?

Also, are the Devs getting a lot of valentines?

Sorry no silly videos planned for this anniversary. So far I've received over 250 Valentines.

biglanky14

Cecilia Wolfram Davidson

How would you guys feel about making a running team to raise money for charity or having a charity-supporting softball game? And by running I mean 5Ks, 10Ks, fun runs, and half- and full marathons

As someone who's done a handful of triathlons and half-marathons, I love this idea. We just don't have that many people here who are into running.

But if anyone is doing the team relay that goes from Napa to Santa Cruz over a 30 hour period, you'll see me there. In fact, please pick my body out from the gutter smile

Panagrammic

scullylam

Panagrammic

Diamond Cache

Oh, and a few more curiosities. I saw pictures of two new games that Gaia's been creating from the con, the epic looking dragon-RPG game, and a game based around cats. Are those to be released on Gaia, Facebook, or where?

And also, will we be able to see Monster Galaxy on Gaia soon? I can't wait!~

The dragon-RPG game will be FB but we'd like to release on Gaia as well if we can manage it correctly. (Actually, we'll probably be grabbing Gaia users to help us playtest, as well).

Monster Galaxy on Gaia is imminent.

does that mean that group... what's it called... four letter word... well your testing group, will they be working on that or you planning to use any user for testing that game?

Not sure yet -- we might open it up to a larger audience, since we're looking for several different types of players and there might not be enough users in SCAS for what we need.

biglanky14

NothingGold

biglanky14

NothingGold

Would you please look into getting Pietro evolved?

Hi NothingGold,

We are looking into it - I know that this has been a big question for awhile. No promises on anything, but we are looking into it.

Thank you.
It's nice to hear that.
For a long time we haven't gotten any sign that this is even a concern or an issue to the staff.

I'm also curious as to how it will evolve after it's finished since it's taken so long to get updates.

No problem. And we're totally aware of the larger problem - that we haven't been communicative enough with you guys on some things (not just the Case, but other features/events/whatever as well). We're working hard to change that, and appreciate your patience with us smile

Lanzer

Existential Existence

COPY + PASTE!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Yay for ATA!!!! *picks your brain*

1) Are there any contests planned in the future where users can submit original content to be judged and made into items? People are pointing out that user-designed items are being tagged with a red spool of thread so I was wondering if maybe that was due to user-made item contests getting a revival of some sort.
2) How old are Gino and Meili? If that info is not available...how old do you picture them to be? biggrin
3) Have any new news about what's going to be done with the drops from the aquarium lite fish?

Also great MC video!! That was funny! Skit commercials are the best. It reminded me of this Gaia commercial someone posted up a while ago.

Louie > Ian!!!

emotion_bigheart HAPPY LATE VALENTINES emotion_bigheart
Thanks for re-scheduling ATA!!

Yeah we're going to bring item contest back. Working on details and hopefully we'll have details for you all pretty soon.

Gino's in his early 20's and Meili's old... he's a demi-god so he's been around for a while.

Gaians will be able to see what the items are for when the time comes. Please wait and see!

Narumi Misuhara

Sifen Yamishi

Good evening Lanzer.

A quick question regarding the 2k12 Valentine's Day flash hangout.
Is there a possibility that we can have this as a permanent fixture into the website, but have some kinks worked out? Like have keyboard movement for our avatars as a function as in our other flash spaces?

I ask mainly because the flash hangout is so wonderfully done and it kinda helps that it has really great music to play through.

There's talk of having the space available in the new version of Towns... but it's just talk at this point. smile

Panagrammic

Humphreypoptart

jellykans

What is ghosting items?

I assumed fish when I read this. It's still a problem in Aquariums.

IIRC Lanzer pushed out some fixes for this a few weeks back.

Zero Omega

Ancient Wing

My Questions

1. My sister's account, she forgot the password, and it's the 2-4 attempt trying to get some moderators get her information (Without her Email, since she forgot the password for it also) is there any other way to get her account opened?

Shoot me a PM with some details and I'll go ahead and help you out with this. In general it's best to file a ticket at our support center (http://www.gaiaonline.com/help) and then our staff can look into it, but if you PM me I'll help out with this situation.

biglanky14

The Undead Suitor

Fractale

The Undead Suitor

When is the next plot update?

And will zhivago kill everyone?

I hope so. He's the only villain we have.

don't make me get out the dictionary again, Suitor.
Zhivago's an incompetent lapdog. He can't kill anyone- except Johnny. His track record proves he's been able t kill only 1 of his victims, throughout the course of history.
Lousy shot, and didn't kill Ian
or Louie
Or Gino.
Or Meili (?)

And Cresento and Nicolae are better villains?

The only things they stab are eachothers butts.

<Ignoring side commentary> smile

We've got some plans that when they're released, we really hope you guys will be happy with it. Yes I'm being coy, b/c I don't want to promise something we end up not being able to deliver. But the plot is really important to us, and we're definitely paying attention to it. All I can ask you to do is be patient for a bit until we're further down the path and would be able to talk in more detail.

biglanky14

The Undead Suitor

But Lanky, don't you think they stab eachothers butts?

This is deeply important side commentary

its like

middle commentary

front and center commentary

...rear...commentary *snickers*

But yeah, just...try not to be too late. Don't want people to forget about it! Since like...the last update was...around....before halloween?

LOL - yeah, I know. Let's just say we're trying to do this right, and that takes a little bit of time to prepare. As usual, I don't want to promise anything because maybe it falls apart, but we are certainly paying attention to it.

biglanky14

The Undead Suitor

biglanky14

The Undead Suitor

Do you get like...a dollar every time you say the word promise?

I think you do. >:)

Only when I say "I don't want to promise."

On a completely, totally unrelated note, I'm retiring tomorrow to my private island that was purchased with a suspiciously large number of singles.

I must commemorate you patience with collecting that many singles

I would have blown it on strippers by now

<refrains from posting the 17 different awesome responses I have to this quote since Lanzer is in the thread and already thinks I shouldn't work here>

biglanky14

Scobre

biglanky14

The Undead Suitor

oh crap, I dont want you to get fired

you're like, the coolest guy here.

Gaia should be staffed by a bunch of biglankys

cause youre awesome

just saying

anyways, keep up the great work and all

*fist bump*

*fist bump* right back.

Seriously though, I just try to let people do their thing and not get in the way. We've got a bunch of awesome people here, and it's too bad that we've made enough mistakes that we've sullied our own reputations with some of our users. This is what we're trying to fix. But in terms of who actually does the stuff that makes Gaia awesome, I'm probably last on the list (unless you count being hyperactive in front of a camera).

The monthly collectible video was awesome and it's ok to make us all laugh. Don't feel bad about being in front of the camera, you did great. Gaia is doing great and awesome with all the new updates already this year.

Thanks! We had a great time making it, and I'm glad most people enjoyed it too.

Narumi Misuhara

Diamond Cache

Hello guys! I was wondering about a few things.~

1. Will the Alchemy Update Thread in the alchemy forum ever be updated? I know some changes to Alchemy have been made since it's creation (on Feb. 1st) but it hasn't been updated at all.

2. Any new updates on Alchemy? I haven't heard much in a while.

3. Will the payouts and betting options for Slots and BJ ever be raised? It seems impossible to get some of the more expensive items from P&J without playing Tiles for tickets.

I appreciate it.~

1. So far we've had no additional updates to post there.

2. We have a meeting soon to review how the changes we've made thus far has affected the system. I assume once we do we'll then have additional stuff to post in the alchemy update thread.

3. ...No idea...

Lanzer

scullylam

woot. made it. okay. 3 questions.

1. can we have more zomg related sdplus dolls? not just limited to zomg only npcs but staff that worked on zomg, past and present. (petition thread)

2. when will there be time to fix bugs and glitches in zomg?

3. can we have a zomg themed rig? or be zomg be a part of a rig? sure we love our rigs and the story with it, but can zomg be used for one? or bring back in some of the characters at least to a rig?

yeah i am asking too much, but it would be cool to see other npcs from the game be a part of gaia more too. sweatdrop

I'll ask about it, don't think we have any planned at the moment.

We're trying to find time to fix the more immediate bugs but the devs are a bit tied up at the moment, sorry.

A rig would be unlikely, not saying that rigs cannot be based on previous titles but usually we try to create new themes.

Zero Omega

scullylam

Zero Omega

scullylam

Zero Omega

Lurking lurking lurking~ ninja

oh hey it's a zero!!!!!! biggrin

gah. i can't keep track of how many staff is in here now. whee zero, when are you becoming an sdplus doll? wink

COUNTER QUESTION!

Why need a doll when you can get the real thing in our various recordings? pirate

but some of us like the "mini me" versions so we don't have to keep stalking watching in said recordings. ;D

COUNTER-COUNTER QUESTION!

you get my email? xd

I'm scared. gonk Possible and I missed it, send it along again.

siskataya

Ancient Wing

My Questions

2. Will there be a way to buy Gcash using your Credit card without using Paypal?
(Last time I checked, I can't) )

Heya Ancient Wing!

Thanks for the great billing question! Just so you know, you don't have to have a Paypal account to use your credit card to purchase Gaia cash. Although the payment is processed using the Paypal payment page, it doesn't require a Paypal account to make the purchase, and you'll be billed like a regular credit card charge.

To use a credit card for a cash purchase, take the following steps:

1) Go to http://www.gaiaonline.com/payments and select the 'Credit Card" option. You'll see a Paypal payment screen pop-up but not to worry - this just processes the transaction, but doesn't mean you need a Paypal account.

2) Click the link that says "Buy as Guest" and you'll enter the credit card payment flow. Follow the steps and you should be able to purchase your Gaia cash.

Hope this answers your question!
Sisky

Zero Omega

Purloined Parfait

Zero Omega

Purloined Parfait

Hey Lanzer and Co:

Been having a problem with the fish from the Dumpster Dive - immediately after saving the tank, they die, and go belly-up but without any notification or drops popping up in my inventory. Would you be able to look into this?

I can't answer from a dev side because I don't know the technical answer to it, but if you submit a ticket to our Help Center (http://www.gaiaonline.com/help) we can look into granting back any fish that were lost this way. We've done this in the past when we had Aquarium fish death issues.

I did post about it in the Bugs forum I believe, and never heard anything but I will definitely put a ticket in.

Sorry if we missed it! We're well aware of it now. Tickets are delicious, they kind of taste like a three-year old fine Gouda.

Lanzer

Crystal Sparda

1) Is a tattoo update in the process, or has it not been discussed yet?
We'd really appreciate an update, as we haven't had one in years. *pout*

2) How involved is Gaia staff in moderator applications?
I just ask, as it seems that the moderators seem behind and lacking.
I applied about a year and a half ago and still haven't been accepted or declined.

3) Any news on the "create an item" contests front?
Has there been any talk on having another one?

4) (For any staff to answer) Is ghosting items 100% against the rules,
or is it okay to just ghost items on your mules purely for visual purposes?
This has been a long debated issue and I believe it would be nice to get
at least a few admin's opinions or rulings on the matter.

5) Just a suggestion, but can you guys work on updating
the captchas in report forms so that they match the ones in post submission?
It is still on the old ones and those are getting complicated to read.

6) How close are we to the release of Towns 2.0?

Ah, you're right, it's been a while and it seems like we haven't been keeping tattoo's in mind. We are talking about non clothing items constantly so hopefully we'll have an update later.

We're looking into that

Yes, we are going through with the next item design contest. We should have more details later.

I think Kenny answered that one already

We'll look into the captcha. It's always a pain to deal with, if only there are no botters...

We're pretty far away, to be honest, but CodeMonkey is really fast and is showing a lot of progress.

DJ Helsing

Scobre

DJ Helsing

Hey everyone just stopping by to say hi.

Feel free to throw stuff my way if you like.

Yeah I do have one DJ. Can gaia come to Oregon for a convention?

Unfortunately not this year but im more then willing to support events in oregon just have one of their representatives send me a pm and ill send over support!

siskataya

Yeata Zi

Are you having a good day, admin and Devs?

emotion_bigheart emotion_bigheart emotion_bigheart emotion_bigheart emotion_bigheart emotion_bigheart

I am having a good day actually - thanks for asking! I've enjoyed sending Valentines to people, getting work done on community and moderator projects, and hanging out in Site Feedback reading through the threads. I do confess I am tired though - Wednesday is early training day, I have to be up at 4am to get to the gym by 5:40 to warm up for my 6am training session. I'm thinking it will be an early evening for me!

Hope you are having a good day too! biggrin
Sisky

Lanzer

seemingly routine

Hello there. I just have one question today.

In Fishing, there's this glitch where after fishing you don't get the fish you caught.
It would be okay, but in addition to not recieving the fish you caught, you also lose the bait.
So basically, you waste your time and bait while recieving nothing.

I was just wondering if this glitch was ever going to be looked into/fixed?
I know it's not just my account either, because just looking through the bug/technical support forum for games, I can find more than one thread with people having the same issue. It's a little frustrating.
So if someone could look into this, I would really appreciate it! (:

Also, here's a few links I pulled up with people having the same issues;
http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/games-bugs/fishing-buckets-not-saving-for-some-fishers/t.77885537/
http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/gaia-fishing/fish-won-t-show-up-in-invo/t.77824551_1/
http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/bug-report-technical-support/icy-tuna-fishing-problem/t.77920883/

Hmm, let me look into it some more as such a major bug should have been fixed. Hopefully I can have an answer for you next week.

Zero Omega

Yeata Zi

Zero Omega

Yeata Zi

>.>

Also, hey erryone! How's it going?

Good good! Been jamming out to some Mars Volta and Pink Floyd all day and apparently getting mail left and right that Sisky ends up finding for me.

Hope things have been good for you and everyone else!

Awesome musical tastes!

I very badly wish to listen to the wall lined up with watching the Wizard of Oz...... Have you ever done that?

I've heard so much about it but I've never actually done it, in length, myself. I've seen various clips of it though.

My musical tastes expand pretty far and wide, I try to go out of my way to give anything a chance.

Zero Omega

Yeata Zi

Zero Omega

Yeata Zi

I've recently discovered Pandora--and I've found many, many bands that I don't think I would have ever listened to otherwise are actually quite worth my time.

I use Spotify for any music I listen to while at HQ, but then just retreat WMP when I'm at home. Although I have a strong love for Last.FM

I am so behind on all the music technology available on the interwebs. I have no idea what any of that is!

Pathetic!

Spotify is similar to Pandora, WMP = Window Media Player, and Last.FM is a social site that tracks the music you listen to so you can discover other artists and friends that listen to similar music. xd

Narumi Misuhara

dragonprincess1

Hello, hello...
How was your Valentine's Day?

1 ) Any word on Mother's prediction of the world ending is true?

2 ) What are your personal thoughts towards the Zurg event before, during and after?

3 ) Any news from the zOMG front?

4 ) Wondering if you could pass this onto the MC artists, that they did a lovely and beautiful job this month.

I hope you all have a fantastic rest of the week. : )

1. It's not

2. None, before my time.

3. None I'm aware of

4. Here here!

biglanky14

Denham

Hey guys! Thanks for doing this for us on such short notice. Just a couple simple questions from me.

1) Do you think we'll have the option to move ATA's again in the future? We haven't had very many in the past few months.

2) Will there be more commercials for MC's an other items in the future?

Hi Denham!

Yes, quite possibly. Trust me, it's not like we don't want to do ATAs. Mondays were just great days where a lot of staff was available to participate, and moving them makes it a little tougher schedule-wise. But these are really valuable to us too, so I'm guessing we'll try to move them around more often in the future.

And for the MCs - maybe.....maybe not smile

Lanzer

Kytona

Good evening Lanzer and Co. - I hope you are all having fun taking over the world. I have a few questions tonight that I hope you, or someone else can answer.

1. I've been concerned as of lately with the state of zOMG, I've been looking around to see if there's any news and there dosen't seem to be... So... Are there any new updates for the game in the pipeline soon? Anything you could tell us? Rings? Summons? Anything... Please?

2. Any plans for re-releasing OMG Hats to be sold in the Gaia Merch store? Sometime soon I hope? What of the zOMG rings that people have mentioned, are there any plans to sell those at some point? I remember posting this before, but I wanted to ask and see if anything happened with it.

3. I'd like to make a request for a Black and White colored pimp set, or even Black and Silver. I've been meaning to make a request thread for a recolor. Do you have any plans to release older store items in recolored types? I'm also on a Gold colored kick lately. You guys don't seem to have a whole lot of crown items that work with the Warmth of Apollo shade of Gold... And the ones that do kind of fit seem to be more suited for Female avatars. Is it at all possible to make some new Crown items that are better suited for Male avatars? Just a new one in Gold color... I love the Gold shade on the Royal Crown Red item from Prize & Joy, I'd love to keep that shade, and make the Red a different shade of Gold to go with it. Darker or lighter, just something to match with Warmth of Apollo is all I ask.

Thanks and have a great night 3nodding .

I can't say much about the zOMG updates, and for merchandise we currently don't have any more OMG hats. We lost contact with the guys who made the original hats and we haven't found a replacement.

In the past we had created re-color items from requests and petitions, though I don't know if the pimp set will be getting another re-color.

biglanky14

Lemonade-Skittles

Hiyas!

Uhm, uhm, do you think there's any chance we'll get more low-level alchemy formulas that are more widely accessible. For example, formulas that use components that can be bought from Gaia's shops or farmed in games like zOMG directly, instead of relying on a luck-based grant system?

I feel left out because I've never been a super lucky user, nor a super rich one, so the whole system seems off limits to me.

Hi Lemonade-Skittles,

We're taking regular looks at Alchemy to see what needs to be tweaked. That could mean making certain items more available or lowering the requirements for certain things within formulas (as we did last time), creating new formulas, or a variety of other things. We generally want Alchemy to be challenging for users but not impossible, so we're working in that direction. It's just a very complicated system so we can't really say what we'll do next because every change affects other pieces of it, and we need to see how the changes we've already made have changed things.

Lanzer

Krissim Klaw

Since I know alchemy is your favorite subject of course I shall bring an alchemy question to you. 4laugh

I'm curious why it was decided that the smaller backwings earned in formulas must be sacrificed to continue? You have to pay so much gold just to get them, and since there is no guarantee a user will be able to even make it to the next set of wings it seems rather harsh to make them sacrifice the smaller sets to continue. Also, any chance you can confirm if the final set will or will not have all the poses of the smaller wings attached to it?

Thematically it made sense for alchemy to change a smaller wing to a bigger one, so that was decided at the beginning. In general we're still working on making things more obtainable. Unfortunately the final backwings will not have the poses for the mini backwings, sorry.

Zero Omega

Razumi Yazura

Zero Omega

Meeki

I was curious if you guys were planning to do another Gaming with Gaians webcast? That was so fun! I really love things like that and the GGW softball games.

P.S. Left 4 Dead or Team Fortress 2 maybe?

I would totally love to do another Gaming with Gaians webcast, that was awesome fun. As for GGW, I'm looking into what we could possibly do for GGW, no promises yet though! (Oh man, I sound like Lanky, someone stop me. gonk )

It's too late, man. Once you start, you will always sound like Lanky. (Kidding, kidding.)

Left 4 Dead or Team Fortress 2 would be awesome, though.

No...
No...
No...
...

...

NOOOOOOOOOOOOO~!!!!! gonk crying emo

siskataya

Meeki

I was curious if you guys were planning to do another Gaming with Gaians webcast? That was so fun! I really love things like that and the GGW softball games.

P.S. Left 4 Dead or Team Fortress 2 maybe?

Heya Meeki!

I'd actually love to do that again - it was a total blast for us too! Sorry I was so horrid at the games, but I did get a final headshot kill of Zero in COD: Modern Warfare 2 which made my day.

We don't have any specific plans yet, so I cannot guarantee anything, but we are definitely considering it! If we do, maybe you could be on my team and help me out? biggrin

Sisky

Lanzer

gothiclolitadoll

Hi Lanzer,

1. Will be ever find out who Peyo's Father is?
2. How long does it take the Art Team to figure out the next up and coming RIG? Does it take longer than a month?
3. Did most of the Gaia Staff first play on Gaia before they actually joined the Team?

Thanks!!! classified_jet

I do think so, we're trying to tell more stories this year, and I hope that we can cover Peyo later.

The team does go through a monthly cycle. They go through a lot of ideas before sticking to one that we're confident about.

Almost all the artists do, while developers are usually not, since most of them are too nerdy for Gaia. biggrin

Panagrammic

Jello Lime

Fractale

this is the busiest I've seen AtA in a long time. And with so many staff. Makes me a happy Glompie.

And Panagrammic's even here whee

Well, someone has to represent for Gryffindor.

biglanky14

Cecilia Wolfram Davidson

biglanky14

Cecilia Wolfram Davidson

Lanky made me think. How many admins and staff actually exercise and do long runs?

There are a few here, but the most inspirational person here by a country mile is Sisky. Ill let her tell her story, but suffice to say shes literally transformed her life, and is now helping others in the office do the same.

Its seriously one of the coolest things Ive ever seen from someone Ive worked with.

Wow. I can imagine. smile I lost 30 pounds in the past year from running and lifestyle changes

Yeah, she's literally half the person she was before (or right around there).

And funny you ask these questions. Ling here is a certified Zumba instructor and is teaching classes here on Wednesday nights. It's going on right now, actually smile

siskataya

Awwww, thanks Lanky - that was super sweet! Thanks for all the support. And WELL DONE Cecilia Wolfram Davidson - 30 pounds is AMAZING. You must be super proud!

So, what Lanky is referring to is the fact that I used to weigh 325 pounds a few years ago. All my life I was always overweight, but it got out of control until I was dangerously morbidly obese. I started a lifestyle and fitness diet in January 2010 and set a goal for myself: Lose weight and get fit enough to climb Mt. Fuji.

I ate well, trained hard, and 17 months later, I had lost over 150 pounds of fat and climbed Mt. Fuji. Goal was met on 8.11.11 and I haven't looked back. My world has changed so much, now I am trying to "pay it forward" by helping others. My goal is to make everyone feel the joy I have. My new motto is 'Movement is life". I am going to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro later this year - I'll take pictures for everyone. In the meantime, I recently went cage diving with sharks with my friend Ty. We made a video if you are interested!: Sisky is swimming with sharks in Hawaii! :0

And, part of my "pay-it-forward" plan is to bring it to Gaia. One of my projects is going to be to start a health and fitness forum where we can all share tips, hints, recipes, and support each other in good health. I hope you like this idea - maybe you could let me know any ideas you might have. If anyone reading this has ideas, let me know - just shoot me a pm!

Again, congrats on the 30 pound loss - that is phenomenal! So proud of you biggrin

Sisky

Narumi Misuhara

Yeata Zi

Give it to me straight Admins and Devs: Should I completely give up hope on ever seeing the Zurg return to Gaia?

In all seriousness, yes I would. As far as our writing team is concerned the Zurg plotline is concluded.

Lanzer

Opera Phantomess

Good evening and thank you for holding the ATA on a Wednesday! Please bear with me as I am very detail oriented and cannot ask a simple question without giving all the nitty-gritty surrounding one! gonk Feel free to beat me for doing this. >.< Long post is looooooooooooong.

1. What is going to be done about the fact that the Quest formulas have caused those who have and do not have them alike to hoard multiple components in mass quantities, causing what should have been semi-plentiful and already rare components to become next to non-existent and worth millions of gold in the Marketplace and Alchemy Exchange. They are doing this because the Quest formulas call for these components in good sums for not just one formula in the chains, but multiple ones, not to mention there are several formulas at level ten that repeat what was called for prior. This hinders those users just looking for those components to complete the normal formulas to have to shell out way more gold than they should or simply give up because Alchemy is already hard to do without hundreds of millions of gold and large amounts of luck already. As it is, I am putting my Alchemy quests aside simply because certain components for formulas I want to complete are way too expensive, and for me to have already spent over twenty five million gold to just get thirteen XP toward reaching level four and having several incomplete formulas due to a combination of the above and the use of disappearing Cash Shop component items leaves a really bad taste in my mouth that is just getting worse.

2. Why are the Quest formulas so rare in the first place, and why do they cost billions of gold and huge amounts of luck to craft? Why do they have so many parts to them, especially after reaching the level ten stages of them? Even those who can afford to continue on are warning others with a Quest formula about going past the level nine formulas that also generate the medium-sized wings because it just is not worth playing cat and mouse with the formulas after that. Add the fact that each level has at least a low chance of being crafted (or very low), and you have numerous users questioning your objectives in the first place and being put off from Alchemy, the backwings, and even this site as a whole.

3. While the changes to the Cache and Case formulas were such amazing steps in the right direction, it does nothing when a large group of users are after the same components and formulas and other components and formulas are left in the dust because they are not used in many formulas, if any, and the formulas are too costly and not worth crafting at all. Why not at least put formulas in The Bifrost for each of the components (amount of gold to purchase should not exceed what is already established in the other shoppe formulas) that are found in the Cache that use gold shoppe items (not items from Dernier Cri, unless you create formulas for those items to be made at any time), zOMG! loot and crafted items (keep in mind some crafted items’ recipes are only given out once per person!), Fishing items, Towns items, Tickets, Credits from Word Bump, Tokens, Aquarium fish drops/items and the fish themselves (so long as they cost gold only or are free from Daily Chance), Aquarium decorations and backgrounds (once again, only gold costing ones or free ones found in Daily Chance only), housing and avatar items from both Enchanted Trunks and the other Magical Giftboxes, and whatever other things that are free by being purchasable with gold, found in nice quantities in the Daily Chance, and/or farmable? It did not take me long to make mock-ups of three components I was focusing on that would sink a lot of gold without using Cash Shop/RIG only items.

4. Are the Enchanted Trunks and other Magical Giftboxes going to be given alternative paths in their respective formulas as well? Also, the Golden Magical Giftbox formula has yet to have any of its paths reflect the changes to the Cache and Case formulas, making it more expensive to craft than the other two.

5. Will Cash Shop items be taken out entirely from formulas and replaced with gold shoppe alternatives in larger quantities? If not, are there any plans or at least ideas to make the Cash Shop items have corresponding formulas that use what I had suggested above for component formulas to keep the formulas the same, but have an alternative way to obtain them without spending real life money or enormous amounts of gold in the Markeplace or Exchange?

We do want to shift towards the idea where buying from other users would not be the only means of obtaining components. We'll continue to improve the system to make things more obtainable.

We also recognized that formulas themselves shouldn't be hard to obtain. Outside of being unfair to those who had tried real hard in obtaining current formulas, we are trying to shift that balance.

There are constraints on certain items that were once Cash Shop items to have other components from the Cash Shop also, while original components or other items don't have that constraint, and that's what we're focusing on.

In general we will focus less on cash shop items and have more and more obtainable formulas. Thank you for sharing your concerns and ideas with us.

We have a great turn out today! Thank you so much for joining us on today's ATA! Have a happy Valentines' event and we'll see you all in two weeks! Don't miss the Gaia anniversary!

Lanzer

MistressMinako

Super-late and frankly I've posted all I really can at the moment in a certain thread in the SF. I am glad the lite fishes drop something related to Alchemy so much so that I've started stocking a couple tanks with fish (and I hope they continue to be given out in DC as a normal thing... we don't need any more Ocean Spray tops or Amigo pants). I know the lite fish don't trigger booty grab, but do they glow at all?

I would like to know why the back wing formulas are so rare that we've seen more given out through BidBlast than we've seen appear out of boxes. Seems a little backward to me. I'd rather have the level 1 formulas in Bifrost for 100-200K or something like that.

The lite fishes should not glow at all, only the existing ones from Phin Phan do.

Understood your concerns, we'll keep working on it. Thank you

biglanky14

Corinth Maxwell

cat_stare Bumping this, because I'd like to be able to get an answer before the topic closes. cat_whee

Quote:

I hope there's plenty of staff on hand to answer everyone's questions tonight, because I'm sure that there'll be a lot of them. cat_xp

1. Would it be at all possible to add "Go to page..." links to the top of the "View All Comments" page, instead of having to scroll all the way down to the bottom to click on them?

2. Is it possible for us to get a "Friend Tracker" to see which of our friends are online in zOMG, as well as find out which server(s) they're currently playing on?

3. Small issue, but......can we have a way to manually re-size the "Caption" speech bubbles that we place in our profiles, much in the same manner that we can re-size avatars and/or images?

Thanks as always for any answers you & the rest of the staff can provide! cat_3nodding cat_ninja cat_cool

Hi Corinth,

I think I'm being especially dense today, but would you mind PMing me with the details of #1? Are you referring to Profile comments?

For #2, that's a cool idea, but honestly I don't think we'd have the capacity to build something like that right now. If we do find some time later on, that's a good suggestion.

Interesting - I have no idea how hard of a change that would be to make. Remind when you PM me about #1 and I'll see if I can find out.

Quick note to anyone else PMing me this week: I'll be out of the office next week so I might be even slower than usual in replying to PMs smile But I promise I will at least read them.

Thanks for joining us today!

[Platonix]

February 22nd

Believe it or not, today's AtA was so massive that the transcript is too long to fit in a Gaia Forums post. I'm going to have to split it into two posts. Enjoy!

Lanzer

Hello everyone and welcome to this week's ask the admin thread! Hope everyone had a great time at the Gaia anniversary. We're still hard at work on the Towns update and planning for the next event plus more NPC stories are now under way.

I understand that many were concerned about the state of zOMG, and I'm sorry I don't have a specific solution to announce, but I'd like to share with you where we came from and give everyone a little more insight to where we came from:

Knowing that there are many unanswered questions about zOMG, I know that we owe everyone further explaination about where we came from and how we arrived at the current decision as it stands.

zOMG was a project we created many years ago, with a large team, tons of time, money, and resources, we put in enormous effort trying to make something with lots of depth and gameplay that is deserving of the loyal Gaians waiting for a battle system. Large console titles takes about 10M to 30M to produce, large MMO can cost north of 100M. Creating a complex game is a very expensive endevour and with a tight team our expense was low in comparison, but still quite astounding for a Gaia project. We invested tremendously and at the same time, we put in tons of effort in promoting the game, marketed heavily outside of Gaia, partnered with flash game sites to include zOMG as one of their titles, and hoped for the best as the game press forward.

As the fate of all games, there's a certain element of luck on whether or not the leader of the project comes up with just the right amount of idea, style, and organization to make a game a success. Thousands of games are created each year, only a hand full were ever profitable. zOMG received a warm welcome by Gaians and we had our initial supporters for zOMG, though over the next months, it was clear that the support for zOMG itself could not sustain the team to continue adding features at a fast pace. It's scary to think how many millions would a game need to make to sustain a team of engineers, but removing the math, the bottom line is that there just wasn't enough. Within the gaming industry, the math is pretty clear on what makes a profitable title and what doesn't. We were in a tough place when the numbers didn't add up.

Many of us adore zOMG and the effort we put into the game, and had been constantly putting in effort to maintain the game while trying to add more features on the side. While other companies typically shut down a game the moment they don't see success, we continue to do whatever we can to maintain zOMG because we love the game, and because we know many Gaians enjoy it. Two and a half years after we realized that zOMG couldn't cover the cost of building the game, we still released the DMS update. Not for profit, but only because we wish to entertain the Gaians who deserves more content from zOMG.

As a company, I cannot argue with anyone who thinks that Gaia is "money hungry" or only think about profit. We do think heavily on the bottom line, we do think through how many people should work on which project so that we can earn money. We think like this because every month we work out the math and we are faced with facts such as how much more time can we be in business if we can't make ends meet. We were once faced with hard facts down to the exact number of months that we can operate until we can't pay our staff members anymore and have to shut down. We had to make choices to make the company smaller, and we have to make the choice of making certain titles for wider audience because we would like to keep the lights running.

Despite the constraint in money and resources, Gaia is lucky to have such a great user base and we have the support to have a team dedicated to continue updating core features, creating new events, mini games, and items for the community.

DARKNRGY

There's been some discussion around zOMG that has our attention. We've been listening and this is as good as an opportunity as ever to make things a little bit more official. Normally biglanky14 would do this, but where is he???? DISNEYLAND!

We don't expect that zOMG can experience the kind of growth we want, as a company, compared to some of the other things we could be doing. I don't have a good excuse for the people that love and play zomg and just want for it to be great. Due to the resources it would require to meet expectations, it just made more sense (to us) to try again with something else. Some of the same great people that made zOMG are making new things, which we also hope will be great.

zOMG is one out of a large number of features that require our attention and there are some hard calls to make. Currently, we don't have any plans to add content to zOMG. It is in maintenance mode, which means we intend to keep it up and running. The zOMG following is formidable and we know the community deserves a great deal of respect. We'll do our best to keep things running smooothly and provide support. That's our current plan - nothing more, nothing less. Could the plan change? Of course, who knows. Since we're a little strapped in the Swarf department we're exploring some options for getting some additional help for bug fixing. It's a tricky project to maintain because its infrastructure demands a wide set of knowledge so we value your patience while we figure something out. If the stars line up right, we'd like to work on minor improvements - rings, updates to quests, that sort of thing.

So that's it. There really isn't much more to the story unless you want to go on rumor. Yeah, we wanted a bigger and better zOMG, but we took our shot and weren't satisfied with the results. The window of opportunity has passed and now we want to continue to take a fresh look at online gaming. The more users we can reach, the better production we can provide. We all want something new and shiny. I hope everyone can relate to that just a little bit smile . No matter how you feel about it though, the Gaia team we have now (which right now is a really loyal and passionate group of old skool folks), will continue try and make gaiaonline.com run smooth and for everyone to have as much fun as possible. The same thing I've done every single day of work since May 2004. I'm sorry expectations weren't communicated well and I hope this clears some things up.

DARKNRGY

Memory Haunts You

"We took our shot": Could you please clarify this a bit more, do you mean the things that have been done to make zOMG! profitable, lately, do you mean the release of DMS?
Can you explain why you were not satisfied with the results? What exactly was it that was expected?

"The more users we reach" I still maintain that it is possible to reach more users with zOMG! if the many suggestions for its integration in the site would be carried out better and more promptly.

"I hope everyone can relate to that just a little bit": sorry, no I can't, not if "something new and shiny" goes at the cost of something old and worthwhile.

"I'm sorry expectations weren't communicated well and I hope this clears some things up"
It's a start and I thank you for it, but may I suggest posting something like this as a "Site Announcement"?

There are more people who play zOMG! than visit the forum or the AtA. In the Site Feedback, when some people started threads about zOMG!, some other people rolled in who were really shocked and taken aback at what was happening, but had not heard of it yet. I'm sure there are more people lurking around in-game and on Gaia in general who may want to know.

It would be good to announce clearly what is happening and why, along with some reassurance that the *maintenance* of zOMG!, for example server cycling, will still be taken care of on a regular basis. Because if this is not communicated clearly, officially and site-wide, a whole lot of rumours start floating around and causing panic among the less-forum-attending players.
Thanks in advance!

The shot we took was ... well, the whole production and launch and subsequent promotion. DMS was another shot, but we didn't go into with the same level of confidence. As far as result satisfaction, the goal posts moved around quite a bit. Originally we didn't envision such a comprehensive MMO, but that is what the scope eventually provided. At that point our expectations increased to include user base growth, revenue, outside acquisition. I personally would have liked to see about 5X as much overall activity in all of those areas. I wasn't in a position to make the decision and I don't know exactly what metrics were used.

Narumi Misuhara

Crystal Sparda

Short simple questions since I asked the whoppers last week. wink
Happy 9th Birthday, Gaia!

1.) We getting an Easter mini event this year?
If not, what is the next big event?
I'm anticipating something huuuuge! I want something BIGGG!!!
:::EDIT::: (LAWL, cool, you're working on an event, BUT WHAT IS IT?) whee

2.) Who's going to MetroCon this year? pirate I AM!
Do you guys go to other panels while at cons?
I better see someone at the Death Note Mafia!

3.) I think all the GCDers who saw the leak the other day love you guys now!
I can't wait for it to finally happen and be released!!! wink
Will it be soon, or are we going to be waiting a while to see the "change"?

1. Yes
3. Don't know what you're talking about

Zero Omega

Ancient Wing

1. Alright, My Sister's account's problem hasn't been resolved yet, a Ticket is already filed, and it's about to be, if not mistaken, the 14th, Business day she has been waiting. I even PMed an admin and yet he has to reply back (after two mails) So... Anything to try to remedy the problem?
She's being patient, although "crazy" enough to post a video verifying her, me and one of her friends to verify herself as the owner.

2. If My sister's Account problem gets solved, is there will be any other way to retrieve a lost password, WHEN the email tied to the account lost it's password also?

3. Gaia Wordbump seems to "break" at when I fill up alot of words. Is this recurring?

Sorry about the delay, my PM box got a bit slammed over the Gaia Anniversary post. I'll get back to you today! I'll get back to your second question through PMs.

Lanzer

Existential Existence

Again Happy Anniversary month Gaia! Thank you for your existence on the Internets. Also that towns virus was a super sexy forum event. It was real fun

Questions:
1) Since zOMG won't have any story/meaty-ful content updates, is it still possible to have new recipes/rewards/epics added in to older areas while zOMG is on hold? Such as dropping new Epic recipes to hard mode boss instances in the lower levels, like the Kokeshi Doll Shrine, Duneslam, General's House, etc.? Or will all zOMG non-bug related activity be at a standstill?

I feel that zOMG can still be updated in some way without sucking up too much staff time - by updating reward content for zOMG via things like new epic recipes in older areas (much like how Prize and Joy gets new items now and then to revive interest in ticket Games). Maybe once a month, Gaia can give a dev a day or two to add in a new epic recipe to an old boss area? People would appreciate it while zOMG is in maintenance mode...it would feel like it's being less...uh...'abandoned.'

2) If zOMG buddies aren't going to get any added benefits aside from being a pet decoration to the game, can we get static poses for our summon buddies that our avatars can wear/equip in the forums?
In the past when summons were a new concept a dev poll'd people about what features users would most want with their buddies, but nothing ever came out of those discussions, probably due to time constraints. However, it gave people hopes that their summons would do stuff in the future. Since a static or animated equip pose in the forums seems like something doable it would be a great to at least have those for zOMG summon buddies.

3) Has there been any attention/talk about improving the Avatar Arenas lately? Or is this a non-issue right now? Many months ago Pan held a fireside chat about the arenas that resulted in an increase in the entry fee, but that was all that was done.
Can we get a non-competitive arenas where we can just enter avatars into our gallery...without competing in the arenas? This proposal has 114 cookies btw not that it makes much of a difference hahahahahahahahahaha.. ha.

GOOD LUCK WITH TODAY'S ATA!!!!!!!
Hope you are all doing well and thanks for re-scheduling ATA to Wednesday!

GO LOUIEEEEE!!!

zOMG is on maintenance mode and there isn't a clear definition on what we can add to the game, so I don't have a clear answer right now, though as we gather resource we'll be able to have a clear answer for that.

I'll look into having the summon buddies as items. If it's not too hard, we should be able to do it, but we'll have to look and see.

The new version faced difficulty and was never released, and that caused some delay in the initial updates that were planned. I'll look into adjusting the entry fee and potentially additional arenas.

DARKNRGY

Mademoiselle Kit

Dear Admins;

I am going to be frank with you; we of the Zomg community are angry. We feel we have not been treated fairly. We put work and effort into promoting our game through word of mouth and with our wallets, and yet time and time and again our favorite game is shunted into a corner.

Now with the removal of all our devs, it is clear that our game will be left to rot unless we do something.

Need I remind you guys the contributions we made to promote our game:

- Getting our request to hire a new Zomg dev in the spring cleaning forum to 5000 cookies; the second thread to do so
- Supporting zomg with our wallets; may I remind you of the time we sold out the 5000 bloodstone amulets in DAYS, earning $20k for zomg? Where did all that money go if it didn't go to saving our game?
- Getting new people to play zomg all the time; according to swarf, there is a steady trickle of new players each week. So why isn't Gaia supporting them by fixing glitches/giving us hope of new content?
- With the release of DMS, zomg traffic increased as well as revenue. If this revenue hasn't been going to zomg, then WHERE HAS IT BEEN GOING? We were told all zomg money went to development of zomg. It is clear we have been lied to.

According to swarf, it would not be difficult to keep up development on zomg, inclding development of new areas, with only a few devs. Yet despite this, Gaia has pulled ALL OF OUR DEVS, giving us no hope at all for an update to the game. Zomg is not like fishing or other Gaia games. Zomg is a MMO, and MMOs NEED updates to survive.

I am beginning to suspect that all this time, despite what we did, despite the suggestions we gave, the HQ seems to want zomg to fail. That is the biggest slap in the face after this whole thing. We were given some hope after the success of DMS, after selling the amulets and the increase in traffic. And yet after all we've done, to have our last devs taken away? It's like we are being told they don't care.

This is a fair warning: the zomg community is FURIOUS about this new development. Step inside the forums and see for yourself. We are a passionate community, willing to give money and support to our favorite game, and we WILL NOT stand for this. You have been warned.

Do you remember five years ago, Gaia? Back in 07 when it was annouced that zomg was in development? The "battle system" was Gaia's baby. It was the first game where you could step into the Gaia world. After having been on Gaia since 2005, the first time I stepped into Barton and saw that town, virtually animated where I could walk around...I cried. I cried because it finally made Gaia real.

Why are you abandoning what was once your baby, Gaia? Why must you constantly make new features, then let them lay into waste and never update or fix them? Why must you whore yourself out for facebook games, when the majority of people on this site don't care about the facebook games?

Yeah, I know it's frustrating. We wanted zOMG to be more successful and that's why the challenges were laid out. There is a trickle of new users, but the number of users leaving is larger and the total daily users continues to drop. DMS had some effect, but not what we were hoping for. We are not seeing growth or even steady state.

Any money purchased through Gaia goes to Gaia. While we compartmentalize projects in terms of revenues, etc, money from one area is not systematically directed to any particular project.

Development for zOMG is complex from a technical and creative standpoint. Development is just one aspect of production and even that requires specialized knowledge, special tools which are difficult to revive, etc. There are some things that are easy, however, and I'd like to explore those options with the team.

Lanzer

Teh Savior

Why are oni sets still soulbound?

The item is still available from the Fortune egg and from other CI, though it was originally a soul bound item and we're at a spot where if we change it now it'll also upset those who expect the item to continue being soul bound.

warrior_of_boognish

Fractale

warrior_of_boognish

Fractale

emo I miss slow-paced ATA. Too many outside communities moving in on GCD's turf.

That isn't too much of a bad thing Fractale.

*lurklurks*

ya it is. I always felt ATA was something special to the GCD. Like a private party.
not so private if you announce it, now to everypony every Gaian
emo

It shouldn't be something exclusive to the community of the GCD, it should be something open to anybody who cares about the site and may hap get their questions answered or suggestions heard in the process regardless to what part of the forums they may hang around on.

Narumi Misuhara

Fractale

TO NARUMI MISUHARA

“Fractale”

has the staff been planning anything for events to involve the world map, and making it mre interesting than just clicking around to find Holiday NPC's on the map pages? Is the world map going to get more love in the form of updates, soon?

Narumi Misuhara

Soon ...probably not, I do want to try to get some of the World maps updated through events but until we can better tie events with a cohesive story there really isn't a whole lot we can do with it for events.

Mortok

Ooooooooooooor they could just draw a new map that includes all the current areas from the existing story. There's no good reason they couldn't do that, and it would, in fact, be far more practical than any of the ideas listed here, all of which would involve building flash games/environments and other stuff almost completely from scratch.

Mortok brings up a good point. Why does the staff want to create extra work for themselves by tying the world map update and expansion into a cohesive story in an event? Why can't you guys just...oh, I don't know....draw some maps, including all the areas we have, and add them to the world map? Or make a user contest where users can draw and submit different maps for all of these areas, and spare your artists the workload of doing it themselves? (with the exception of adding the winning maps to the Gaia world map)

The reason I said updating maps through events was because that way it doesn't require scheduling time just for map updates. It may seem like a bit of an odd concept but it's a way of being able to work and update something without having to negotiate for the exclusive time to do so... ie. I ask person A... "hey do you have time to work on the world map?" Person A responds, "nope" I have to do x,y,z and I won't have time".... but if I have an event coming up and I know person A,B,C will be assigned to work on it then I can have them work on it during the allotted time of event production instead of having to make additional time just for that. Make sense?

I doubt we'd ever release control of the world map mostly because one of the founders already drew the entire Gaia world, it's just not all on the world map yet. In addition the user contest still requires resources to set up, create and run. Granted it's less work but still work that needs to be scheduled out.

siskataya

Sakura Parfait

siskataya

*lurking too* Just letting you know I'm following along! biggrin

So out of curiosity, when will a Health and Fitness forum be made? whee

Actually, it'll be coming out pretty soon - I'd say within a couple of weeks! I'm just organizing the forum, working on sticky threads and resource links, sub-forum topics, etc. It's gotten so much positive feedback from the community, and I am grateful! I really think this will be a really fun place for the community. I am also trying to come up with some ongoing contests we can have, and drawing some achievement art certificates to give to members.

If you or anyone else has more ideas, definitely let me know! I check Cecelia's thread in SF often, so you can post there, or shoot me a pm. Actually, given the number of pm's I get each week, best to post in the thread. xd

Hope this answers your question! biggrin
Sisky

Social Jackie

Chibi Halo

Social Jackie

Panagrammic

Lemonade-Skittles

Random question: Can we possibly get SDPlus dolls of the characters from SummerSprings? =w= On top of that, I'd really adore a Sherlock plushie. emotion_kirakira

Oh, great idea! I also want one, now that you say that.

Sherlock plushie? WANT!

/lurk

So Jackie, do you know if there'll be any plans down the road for maybe a Summer Springs tie in bundle like the MoGa group did to promote Monster Galaxy to a wider group of Gaians? I'd so love to see some of the outfits Lena, Tom, and the others wear on Gaia for our avatars along with some of the animals like the little fox, Toto, Nero, and the Sherlock penguin.

Do I know of any plans? Nope. Does that mean there aren't any? Nope. But, all the right people do read these threads so who knows what ideas might have just been brought into existence! smile

Zero Omega

Madkool

Hi guys!,

With the limited supplies of alchemy components beginning to dwindle quickly, will we start to see a push for more of them to enter the market through the daily chance and other free features? What's the plan behind the backwing formulas? The ingredients in them have skyrocketed in price (see Bag of Petals) even though only a miniscule amount of formulas even exist. What are the plans to rectify issues like that, especially in popular formulas like the backwings?

What are some of the general ideas that have been discussed thus far to improve alchemy?

Do you like your eggs scrambled, boiled or sunny-side-up?

Can't answer the Alchemy related things, but as it's been mentioned, it's definitely a work in progress and data is always being reviewed so the best choices can be made. Definitely check out some of BigLanky14's and Narumi's posts for more info.

I do, however, tend to like my eggs sunny-side-up. But I have no aversion to scrambled or boiled.

scullylam

hey zero. i made popcorn want some? biggrin

POPCORN! scream

Jak Bauer

scullylam

Jak Bauer

Zero Omega

scullylam

hey zero. i made popcorn want some? biggrin

POPCORN! scream

/swipes some of Zero's popcorn and returns to lurking status

hey now! there is enough to go around. sweatdrop

Yes, but it's sweeter swiping it from Zero! smile

Panagrammic

SS2-SITH LORD

2. Is Soul Crash going to be brought to Gaia? I would really like to play some of the games you have on facebook but refuse to join. I know of others who feel the same way.

3. Do you have a date set on Monster Galaxy being released on the site? DJ Helsing mentioned it in the monthly video.

And the issue is with Aquariums! ( Big surprise right? )
Seriously though. There are still Ghost fish in peoples tanks. Gaia is loosing out on profit because of this and this problem is spiraling out of control! There are gaians with fully ghosted tanks right now and earning profit from them! I will find proof if need be!

2. IIRC Soul Crash is not going to be targeted for the site, as we want to move MG and Summersprings over first.
3. Was originally scheduled for end of February, is getting pushed out as we deal with issues.
4. Yeah, examples always help.

Panagrammic

SS2-SITH LORD

Should i pm you with proof. I will need to find tanks that have ghost fish.

Yeah, PM me and Lanzer, if you could. Thank you.

Panagrammic

Fractale

Summer Springs is coming to Gaia, too? Man oh man, I love you Pan!

Yeah, let me qualify that with a "maybe." We need to get the licenses cleared, look at the scoping, so on and so forth -- but our best guess was that Summersprings has more overlap with Gaia than Soul Crash or other games.

Monster Galaxy on Gaia, though, we've been working on for a while.

DARKNRGY

Mademoiselle Kit

First, are you aware a game, such as an MMO, needs ADVERTISING to get more players? It needs money put into it first, before more people will come and play and give you revenue. Zomg had no such thing. We've been told that Zomg was pushed out too early, before bugs were fixed, and these same bugs still plague the game each day because of Gaia's constant NEW NEW NEW SCREW OLD STUFF! attitude. Bugs still plague the game three years afterward that have never been fixed, and are detrimental to the game experiance. That is why people left.

Second, about expansions--it doesn't matter what you guys think. You want an MMO to succeed? You need EXPANSIONS. Same as advertising. Money needs to go in before money will come out. Constantly HQ has shown they don't understand this.

We're angry because HQ doesn't seem to understand these fundamentals, and seems to want to push out more facebook games, when the majority of Gaians don't even play those games.

Focus on YOUR SITE instead of whoring yourself out to facebook, kthx.

When zOMG was launched there was a substantial marketing investment and we promoted it the best we could. Not sure where you got this idea that we didn't try to promote it. We also tried an expansion. Although I do agree that continued expansion and marketing would increase its popularity, that goes without saying. It's not a binary calculation though; the growth would need to proportional or better than our investment.

Lanzer

jonjon21428

1) Since the train station in zOMG! is being unused, is it possible to link it to an area, like the old Video Lounge but displays ads, therefore creating some revenue for zOMG! ?

2) Is this a possiblity? Devs can resize their avatars using the admin panel, maybe allow users to, it could create more revenue.

3) Ever since DMS was released, the Alastor quest has been broken for everybody, (The quest after the 25 miniboss). No one is able to continue in the quest, so can it be fixed?

4) Also another glitch with DMS, sometimes the second tier of DMS (The Green Rooms) glitches and cause the whole instance to freeze, making the crew lose hours of progress.
This glitch happens when 1 person in the crew, who is in the 2nd tier, teleports to the null chamber while the other crew members are still in the 1st tier of DMS, this causes the whole instance to freeze. No one can move, and if one refreshes the browser, it gets worse, the get communications cut of with the whole crew (Not being able to talk at all) and stuck in the same spot, until the person completely resets the zOMG! browser, making them teleport out of DMS but lose the whole entire instance.

5) You should make BigLanky14 do more of these emotion_awesome

6) Love for zOMG! ? emotion_kirakira

1) Ads typically require a wide range of audience to work, for example, a million unique users would earn a few hundred dollars. Unfortunately zOMG isn't the type of game that has a wide audience base as opposed to small viral games or videos, etc.

2) Don't think we can compile avatars into items with our current system, but I love the idea.

3) I do want to do whatever we can to deal with the bugs you mentioned. I hope to bear good news when we obtain more resources.

Uncle Kenny

Destrius

Uncle Kenny

*looms*

Hey, I just wanted to thank you for finally clarifying on lastpass and other automated programs issues.

That controversy had been plaguing vendors and causing arguments all the time. When someone asked about it in the Q&A subforum, the best we got were mixed answers from a mod who didn't seem to understand what the question was. xd

No problem, I'm glad it helped clear things up!

DARKNRGY

Sakura Parfait

Dark, one of the reasons why there are users leaving the game is because, from what I've heard, there are bugs and glitches in the game that have still not yet been fixed. Not to mention, the lack of new content to keep most users' interests.

Indeed! One of the options we're going to explore is to bring in someone who's familiar with the system on a contract basis. I'm not happy that it has bugs that interfere with the experience because that's one of our big initiatives right now.

Panagrammic

adelaar1

So uh, not ZOMG related exactly....

But when are you people going to fix the inventory organizer? You know, the one that doesn't even work for some people anymore? The one that's labelled really really really really old?
You know right, the inventory arranger? The thing that should let us organize the things we get on site since EVERYTHING winds up in the inventory anyways? That thing.

My recollection (may be incorrect, don't quote me) is that this is definitely on the list to look at. Believe that we're looking at rewriting it with HTML / JS so it works on a wider range of platforms.

milkbun

Chrystal Liena

milkbun

le iggy

late for AtA! :c

hello lanzer and staff~~ -waves-

to anyone who wants to answer:
Why why whyyyy is the Stein Item Glitch Report thread so ignored in the S&F? emo

I promise that this thread isn't being ignored. We've been taking a closer look at it, especially in the new year. I know that last week I and a few other artists tackled a bunch of glitches. It's slow going and unfortunately some glitches can't be fixed but we are going through the thread.

Quick question, is there any chance that Stein's post can be updated to include any glitches that have been fixed so users can know what has been worked on?

We'd definitely like to make all the glitches we fix more visible!

milkbun

le iggy

heya milkbun~~ 4laugh heart

I'm glad all of the staff has become more vocal with the community. Is it possible to update the thread when you fix certain glitches? My main issue is that Gaia puts out SO MANY items each month so I know things will get over looked, but there's a lot of illogical item bumping happening lately. For instance, say I put on Cassopeia's (sp?) skirt but it will get knocked off by the Astra Snowy Winter. emotion_donotwant

We definitely want to make all the glitches we fix more visible. I'll take a look at your glitch as soon as I can since the items are relatively new.

siskataya

kristinized

I'd love to see Gaiacon in Orlando!

Thanks for the suggestion! I'll make sure to forward the idea along to DJ Helsing. I cannot guarantee he can or will get there, but I can let him know you'd like a Gaia con in Orlando.

Be well biggrin
Sisky

Panagrammic

Mademoiselle Kit

ZOMG does have the potential to do this. It is an original MMO with an interesting storyline and plot--moreover, it allows us to use our avatars to save the Gaia world. This works in Zomg's favor. Since HQ is all up in facebook's junk these days, if you could find a way to port zomg, or even advertise zomg on facebook, usership would no doubt increase.

I am just astounded that Gaia would even consider throwing away what used to be their baby, what has so much potential without even trying. Want more money? Release more powerups and buddies--us hardcore players WILL buy them. Want more users? Work on fiixing the glitches, add hope of an expansion, and advertise a bit. These things could be done with little effort and little money, but it would increase revenue, players, and above all else, satisfy a very pissed-off userbase.

So, the bug thing has been addressed by both Lanzer and DARKNRGY, but it bears reiterating: we definitely would like to fix bugs. Minor content is also not an impossibility (call it at the level of adding new rings or new quests or whatnot), but major expansions are a pretty serious investment of time and resources.

We looked at porting zOMG to FB, but there are a couple of strikes against it: a) It would be difficult to fit it in into the FB canvas and upgrade it to the FB api. It might require substantial changes to the UI and whatnot. Also, b) the games on FB that tend to do better are spot-engagement, asynchronous games. zOMG requires concentration for longer periods of time, and the other people playing have to be on at the same time, so on and so forth.

The issue with advertising is that advertising for games is very expensive (i.e., $1 / lead or more). In general, we only advertise if we can do break-even or better.

DARKNRGY

adelaar1

So uh, not ZOMG related exactly....

But when are you people going to fix the inventory organizer? You know, the one that doesn't even work for some people anymore? The one that's labelled really really really really old?
You know right, the inventory arranger? The thing that should let us organize the things we get on site since EVERYTHING winds up in the inventory anyways? That thing.

We have a design for this to port it into the main inventory app. It's on edy's project list, but we need to take care of some other things first. Don't have a solid date to give you, but it is planned!

Uncle Kenny

2-Bit Hustla

Add towns and rally to your Gaia apple app! The whole Gaia community has been begging for it and you say it's to hard! Stop being lazy and work hard on the app and make Gaia towns and rally for the apple app you made! If you don't add Gaia towns and rally I'm deleting the app immediately!

Unfortunately, all of Apple's devices that run on the iOS platform do not support Flash. Our features like Towns and Rally are built and run on Flash so there is literally no way for us to put them into an iOS app and have them work.

Narumi Misuhara

Madkool

Hi guys!,

With the limited supplies of alchemy components beginning to dwindle quickly, will we start to see a push for more of them to enter the market through the daily chance and other free features? What's the plan behind the backwing formulas? The ingredients in them have skyrocketed in price (see Bag of Petals) even though only a miniscule amount of formulas even exist. What are the plans to rectify issues like that, especially in popular formulas like the backwings?

What are some of the general ideas that have been discussed thus far to improve alchemy?

Do you like your eggs scrambled, boiled or sunny-side-up?

When we have additional updates on our intentions with alchemy we'll update the appropriate thread in the alchemy forum. As things stand now there is no additional info we wish to disseminate. Details on our long term plans with alchemy are posted here.

Lanzer

Mademoiselle Kit

Dear Admins;

I am going to be frank with you; we of the Zomg community are angry. We feel we have not been treated fairly. We put work and effort into promoting our game through word of mouth and with our wallets, and yet time and time and again our favorite game is shunted into a corner.

I'm sorry that you felt being mis-treated. It's understandable as zOMG hold so dear to many of us. What I must state is that we did do whatever we can and will continue to do so, and with whatever contributions Gaians made, we hire contractors and involved other staff to make the recent updates possible. You're right, contributions on one of the major items do amount to more than 20k, though the challenge is that a typical senior engineer start at 80k of salary a year, then adding health insurance plus other costs will almost double the cost per engineer for us. Even as the cost is difficult, we'll continue to do whatever we can.

warrior_of_boognish

Chibi Halo

You need to suggest an office worker update to your bosses so we can get business suits for men and women with pinstripes and lots of pants in the gold shops dude. Because we all know you're the artist of armor and pants. At least, that's how people remember you.

Well I can suggest but that's pretty much the extent of it, no promises or guarantees and all that baggage. Maybe the opportunity for such an update may arise sometime in the future, who knows.

Also, being that one armor dude doesn't really count for much or say much... :V

Uncle Kenny

Existential Existence

edy

blackaddersfork

please stop trying to be facebook. i don't want to be one of the faceless masses.
how can ppl abuse saving trash, bugs, and flowers from towns?
will reapersun ever finish pietro?

How? The collection of bugs, flowers, and trash was botted. One user in particular was saving ~100k items every minute. Same problem we have all the time with features. Some users are always trying to cheat the system.

Holy crap man how much trash does one dude need???

Hoarders - Gaia Edition, coming to a station near you soon*!

*Not really, though that'd be awesome

Uncle Kenny

Queen-of-the-Rogue

It would be and Biglanky could run it! He did so well with the MC commercial giving him his own TV show would be even more popular I'm sure.

All the same that's got to be a pain for you poor Devs. You fix something then you turn around for two seconds and it's broken again. I bet you never get any peace when you're at work.

Saturday nights are never boring, I'll say that much.

Zero Omega

Existential Existence

I took this image off of google just for you



It does not look pretty.

That looks like my desk! (Okay, not really.

... Kenny, shaddup)

carbonphyber

meep12345

2) What is the most efficient way to get La Victoire's store (aka the Ca$h $hop) changed from the pop-up (flash?) version to the standard version of the typical gold shop front?
-Clearly, gCa$h using shops, like the Phin Phang and Back Alley Bargains, exist with normal gold shop fronts, so why can't La Victoire as well? What is the need to cling to, IMHO, an outmoded/outdated shop front that, with certain browsers, can be extensively laggy?

Is there a specific reason you want it not in a pop-up?

Zero Omega

meep12345

I don't know if anyone has asked these questions, because I just got on Gaia (and out of school), but here goes nothing (I did read the OP by Lanzer):

1) What can Gaians due to get a message across to the (supposed/so-called) "Writers" of the storyline/plot/etc of Gaia?
-This questioned is spurned into existence over the fact that so-many of these stories are claimed to have been concluded, thereby making their content unnecessary... Yet, Gaians continue to demand more of this (so-called) concluded content. Basically, what can we, as in Gaians, do to convince (as in get the message across to) the writers that more old, like the Zurg/Gold Shop NPCs/Threat of the Animated, and not-so-old, like Valefor Academy/Cirque du Goth/Dark Reflection, is better than the current obsession with "new and shiny"?

2) What is the most efficient way to get La Victoire's store (aka the Ca$h $hop) changed from the pop-up (flash?) version to the standard version of the typical gold shop front?
-Clearly, gCa$h using shops, like the Phin Phang and Back Alley Bargains, exist with normal gold shop fronts, so why can't La Victoire as well? What is the need to cling to, IMHO, an outmoded/outdated shop front that, with certain browsers, can be extensively laggy?

3) How does DJ Helsing determine which (supposed) "rumours" he is going to answer, typically, at the end of his monthly update videos AND what can we do to influence/suggest/determine which "rumours" he will be end up addressing?
-Honestly, although this is fairly new phenomenon, these monthly update videos, the "rumours" have been, well, questionable (especially with regard to whether they're even a genuine "rumour" in the first place) AND I think there are probably more aptly serious "rumours" that could be addressed instead...

4) How effective is the SF in actually getting a message across?
-Not that I think the SF is a bad forum or anything of the sort, I find myself curious as to how effective posting in the SF can truly be?

5) Concerning what will, and will not be, I would like to ask a question regarding a developer quote from an SF thread:

Cashmere Cactus

These EIs will probably never happen without the loving guidance of boxcarsocial, one of the writers who used to work here. To us, he was known as "Boof," and though he didn't write a huge portion of the comics or announcements, he contributed a lot of hilarious ideas, including most of those fake EI names. Boof was really big on Gary's Island Adventure, but I think the funny part about it was that he absolutely never elaborated on who Gary was or what his Island Adventure entailed.

Boof still writes amazing articles for a well-known humor website, but to protect his privacy I will not reveal which one. But imagine that they're really funny.

Ling came up with The Philosopher's Portrait. It actually came to her in a dream: it was a new EI that was just framed portraits of various philosophers, which would be pretty much the most boring item of all time, but the concept made us laugh.

Gaia writer and Monster Galaxy associate producer meatless came up with a great EI idea a while back: Rascal & Toots, which tells the tale of a swamp-dwelling hillbilly bootlegger and his crocodile buddy. The trick is that it should never be made clear which one is Rascal and which one is Toots.

Since we did, ultimately, end up with Gary's Adventure Island, is it fair to say that the rest of these EIs (and perhaps the ones that Nicu was marketing in this comic) could will end up being real items or...?
-I believe it goes without saying that Gary's Adventure Island was an unexpected, yet more than welcomed, surprise, but, as a result, it has spurned a fair amount of speculation as to how reliable developer quotes (from only last august, BTW) are, therefore I believe clarity is warranted on this matter...

-----

I have a few more questions, but I will postpone them for the sake of getting these answered, if at all possible cat_neutral

3. I compile the "rumors" for DJ to read off. We have a list of things we hear a lot around the site and use that as a basis for the "rumors." Admittedly these aren't "rumors" as much as they are misconceptions that we want to clear up. If you wish to suggest some, just post in the Monthly Update thread or shoot me a message! We typically do one serious "rumor" and then something a little silly to leave on a good note.

4. Posting in SF is pretty effective! We do read SF all the time and take a lot of things into consideration, a great example of this was today. A thread popped up about making a Hot Topic for Game of Thrones, so I posted in that thread and let them know we can take it into consideration. So if you've got ideas or feedback, definitely post in SF!

Zero Omega

meep12345

Zero Omega

3. I compile the "rumors" for DJ to read off. We have a list of things we hear a lot around the site and use that as a basis for the "rumors." Admittedly these aren't "rumors" as much as they are misconceptions that we want to clear up. If you wish to suggest some, just post in the Monthly Update thread or shoot me a message! We typically do one serious "rumor" and then something a little silly to leave on a good note.

4. Posting in SF is pretty effective! We do read SF all the time and take a lot of things into consideration, a great example of this was today. A thread popped up about making a Hot Topic for Game of Thrones, so I posted in that thread and let them know we can take it into consideration. So if you've got ideas or feedback, definitely post in SF!

Thank you for clearing that up for me cat_4laugh
...And I will PM you some rumours I'd like to have addressed (once I have them compiled, since I didn't expect that kind of response cat_sweatdrop ).

Just a quick note, keep in mind that I can't promise we'll address all rumors. xd

[This transcript continued next post.]