VO
(?)Artist
Offline
- Posted: Mon, 01 Nov 2004 23:59:28 +0000
Dear Users,
Over the past day, I've seen various positive/negative feedback regarding the Halloween Event and site problems. I'd like to address these issues with hopes to give you a better understanding of the situation as well as alleviate any frustrations you may have.
Regarding the Halloween Event:
The Halloween Event was perhaps our most ambitious one time event we've ever tackled on the site. It was our hope to immerse our users in a fun storyline that would relate well to Halloween. We expected there to be a large turnout to our site and we did set up specific hardware to address our estimates, but we did not anticipate the actual turnout that showed up on Halloween day.
Believe you me that we were all amazed that we broke another event record with almost 20 thousand users on at all times during the event.
It was because of this that the event forum slowed to a crawl, and broke a few of our scripts for the Halloween event. During the whole event, we were all working hard to get the game back up and running, and to fix all of the problems involved. The reason users didn't see "admins online" is because we were working in the background to fix all of the system crashes, roleplaying as labtechs, or working on more artwork for the event.
In terms of the trick or treating, we wanted to limit the time of day that Jack would appear because 1) it makes sense in the context of the day/night system and 2) because we wanted to encourage users to participate in the zombie event as well. However, because of the site crawl during this period, we have opted to extend Trick or Treating for another day.
In the end, with the Halloween event, we wanted any user who just wanted to drop in for a little bit would be able to get one item. Of course, any user who would spend more time would be able to get more. Yes, this does reward a user who spends more time on the site, but doesn't that make sense? We really do empathize with our users' frustrations with the event. But please rest assured that we have been trying our best to address these problems. And it is equally frustrating that we cannot accomodate everyone's needs.
Issues such as server crashes and load problems heavily rest upon our hardware constraints. And while we'd like to add more hardware to make things run even more smoothly, we are limited in our funding. A site like GAIA requires A LOT to maintain and we are very grateful of our donators who keep the site up and running and expanding.
Regarding Current Site Problems:
We are working as hard as we can to get everything back up and running. Please rest assured we will keep you posted when we fix specific issues.
With the introduction of Avatar System 2.0, as well as upcoming features like fishing, etc... our system has become a lot more complex and we expect to have other issues that may arise. But please rest assured that we are working our hardest to get all of the bugs out in a timely fashion.
I hope that clears things up for you, and everyone here at GAIA would like to thank you for your patience and support!
Take care!
VO & the GAIA Staff
Over the past day, I've seen various positive/negative feedback regarding the Halloween Event and site problems. I'd like to address these issues with hopes to give you a better understanding of the situation as well as alleviate any frustrations you may have.
Regarding the Halloween Event:
The Halloween Event was perhaps our most ambitious one time event we've ever tackled on the site. It was our hope to immerse our users in a fun storyline that would relate well to Halloween. We expected there to be a large turnout to our site and we did set up specific hardware to address our estimates, but we did not anticipate the actual turnout that showed up on Halloween day.
Believe you me that we were all amazed that we broke another event record with almost 20 thousand users on at all times during the event.
It was because of this that the event forum slowed to a crawl, and broke a few of our scripts for the Halloween event. During the whole event, we were all working hard to get the game back up and running, and to fix all of the problems involved. The reason users didn't see "admins online" is because we were working in the background to fix all of the system crashes, roleplaying as labtechs, or working on more artwork for the event.
In terms of the trick or treating, we wanted to limit the time of day that Jack would appear because 1) it makes sense in the context of the day/night system and 2) because we wanted to encourage users to participate in the zombie event as well. However, because of the site crawl during this period, we have opted to extend Trick or Treating for another day.
In the end, with the Halloween event, we wanted any user who just wanted to drop in for a little bit would be able to get one item. Of course, any user who would spend more time would be able to get more. Yes, this does reward a user who spends more time on the site, but doesn't that make sense? We really do empathize with our users' frustrations with the event. But please rest assured that we have been trying our best to address these problems. And it is equally frustrating that we cannot accomodate everyone's needs.
Issues such as server crashes and load problems heavily rest upon our hardware constraints. And while we'd like to add more hardware to make things run even more smoothly, we are limited in our funding. A site like GAIA requires A LOT to maintain and we are very grateful of our donators who keep the site up and running and expanding.
Regarding Current Site Problems:
We are working as hard as we can to get everything back up and running. Please rest assured we will keep you posted when we fix specific issues.
With the introduction of Avatar System 2.0, as well as upcoming features like fishing, etc... our system has become a lot more complex and we expect to have other issues that may arise. But please rest assured that we are working our hardest to get all of the bugs out in a timely fashion.
I hope that clears things up for you, and everyone here at GAIA would like to thank you for your patience and support!
Take care!
VO & the GAIA Staff