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Apr-15-2004 12:07

The time is approaching for an end to the Beta testing phase of Sleuth, and some kind of relaunch of the game. I plan on continuosly tweaking and adding to the game, but we've fixed most of the big bugs, and I think the game is pretty well balanced now.

I don't have a hard date for a launch, but I'm leaning towards early May. There are a few ways we can handle this, but I want to get input from some of you. I have two big questions:

1) Should we reset the character database and make everybody start from scratch, or not? There have been a lot of bugs and expoits that were open earlier in the game that no longer are. Also, I've recently made an adjustment to slow the rate at which high level characters acrue skill points. In the interest of fariness, it seems like we should reset the database, but please voice your opinions here.

2) How are we going to pay for better hosting? As you may have noticed, I've been periodically turning off new user registration, in an effort ot hold down traffic. I'm taking steps to move the game to a more professional hosting environment (it's already partially on a new server). This is going to be fairly expensive, so the game will need to bring in some money to pay for that. Any additional money would allow me to spend more time adding game content. I welcome any ideas for how to bring in revenue. Although the prefered method would obviously be to sell advertising space on Sleuth, I don't think that's realistic considering our traffic dynamics. That is, online advertising seems to work better for sites with a lot of unique daily visitors, each of whom only spends a few minutes on per session. Our traffic tends to be a smaller number of unique users who return often and play a lot each month.

Apr-20-2004 10:10

Yes, I have my eye on that cheater Sirgarr.

Actually, I really like this voting thing. I'd like to add some kind of player goverment eventually. Say a city council, where everybody can vote for members. Those members than act as a steering committee for the game. Like they could decide the order of importance for upcoming patches, and maybe have some disciplinary authority over players who harrass others.

Anyway, I'm getting off topic.

Yeah or Nay! (except you sirgarr)

Apr-20-2004 10:38

Can I vote Yea! for the City Council? It really looks like a nice idea, I'll make sure to apply if it happens! Oh, and i just wanted to say that although, like other players, I'm a little scared about the game becoming a paying game(well for some features at least), I guess I prefer this than not being able to play this game anymore, or seeing it go bankrupt.. Just for the new server, which is really faster, I guess it's worth it.

Apr-20-2004 11:46

Yea.

I think. (Thinks some more) Yup - I think I'm slightly more inclined to support a reset...but don't really mind either way. And this doesn't matter anyway, because the nay votes are going to win.

A city council sounds like an excellent, excellent idea.

Apr-20-2004 13:58

There is one more idea, you could charge people to maintain their current characters (and not be reset with the rest of us) -- that would keep almost everyone happy.

Apr-20-2004 17:41

not so!!

Apr-20-2004 21:59

Yea! Then I could use the name that I first started off with! Instead of a clean wipe, reset everything then have those that were reset gain at a faster level

Apr-21-2004 01:44

NAY !

Apr-21-2004 08:38

Well, looks like 8 to 3 for Nay. I would have liked more people to vote, but I suppose it wouldn't make a difference to the outcome. There won't be a reset.

I guess if there is no reset, I don't really need to hold off on ending Beta, since it will sort of arbitrary anyway.

Sooo, I think I'll just end Beta tomorrow (thursday) night.

Apr-21-2004 09:36

Yea, to be contrary. I'm too late anyway. :)

Apr-22-2004 13:57

I play another online game where if you donate 5 dollars to cover server costs, you receive 2 skills, one of which you can only get through donation - just a thought.