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Some zOMG! Clarifications

Hey Gaians,

We want to take a moment to address the issue of zOMG! being shut down, and to give more details about why we are unable to bring zOMG! back. We understand that people have been upset by this news, particularly those Gaians who have been loyal zOMG! players. We'd to take a moment to address several of the major concerns and comments about zOMG! closing that we've seen expressed in the forums:


a) With regards to our previous announcements, in which we said "don't worry: zOMG! will be up and running as soon as it's patched up!", we want you to know that when we made these statements, we did honestly believe we would be able to bring the game back after fixes were made. It was never our intent to NOT bring the game back. The decision to leave zOMG! down was only made after learning about serious problems with the game's code. We do want to apologize to you, however, for the way we worded our messages. We should not have said the game was definitely coming back even if this is what we believed when we made those statements. It was never our intent to be misleading about the state of zOMG!, and we understand why this is upsetting for you. We are sorry, truly, for any frustration this has caused.

B) Regarding the reason zOMG! cannot be brought back, there has been a lot of speculation on the reason for our decision. Frankly, the truth of the matter is that during an investigation into issues with zOMG!, it was discovered that zOMG! had a serious flaw in the code. Basically, there was a security exploit in the game that, had it been abused (and thankfully it wasn't!), would have allowed people not only access to zOMG!, but to our site's servers and ultimately, to all your accounts. Knowing this was the case, we couldn't, in good faith, continue to allow zOMG! to remain up and running. We even had one of the fabulous former zOMG! devs look into the issue to see how long it might take to fix this exploit, but a concrete estimate was impossible to make given the sheer volume of code. Ultimately, we decided to leave zOMG! shut down because the security of your accounts and our servers is priority.

C) Finally, we would like to say that closing zOMG! had nothing to do with money, or whether or not zOMG! was making a profit. Frankly, zOMG! hasn't made an overall profit for a while now. We've left zOMG! up and running because we love zOMG!, and more importantly, because we know that YOU love zOMG!. Closing zOMG! was actually a very difficult and sad decision for us, especially for those staff members who saw the game from its inception, to launch, and beyond. At the end of the day, however, the safety concerns over the exploit had to prevail.

We hope this provides you with more details on why the decision to shut down zOMG! was made. Again, thank you to all the players who have supported zOMG! over the years - we hope that you'll carry forward fond memories of the friendships you made with other players in game.