Content Release 2010.5

Menace said:

That statement would make perfect sense of Planet Calypso would have been sold as was the intention outlined in the last financial statement. However, evidently FPC is still running the joint. FPC is just a name. Developed by MindArk to be used as financial security.

A friend of mine has got a Numbered company for his building, and a numbered company for the business inside it. The business inside it has NOTHING to do with the building other than the fact that it rents space from the building. But... guess what.... they are both owned by the same person. And even though on paper one is separate from the other, they are physically the same business. Only difference is... when a tenant in the apartments up-stairs has a plumbing problem and goes down to the storefront below to speak to the owner, the store employee's don't kick them out and tell them the owner answers all his mail!

Menace

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It's common for large businesses to creat parent and subsidiary companies.
In my country a company called Nestle is known for producing chocolate drink and other eatable products.
They also own L'oreal cosmetics (among other things)

If I wanted to know where I could buy chocolate, I wouldn't go barging in to my local cosmetic store and demand answers and whine and howl because they didn't have any in the cosmetic store. Yes the staff in this cosmetic store could probably tell me where I could buy chocolate products, and they would probably be wondering why in the hell a crazy person associates chcoclate and cosmetics.

Certainly I wouldn't go and stalk one of the people on Nestle's board of directors until their cosmetic stores stocked chocolate.

Immortal, you are absolutely correct about the Nestle vs. L'oreal thingie, but...

A while ago we had MA officials visiting the former EF - they werent exactly talky and left most questions unanswered, but at least we had some kind of contact to those responsible for EU

Then, they had that splendid "FPC" idea, and well...
tell me, when have you seen the last MA representative?



Q&A threads would now look like this:
80% of the answers would direct us towards MA - and well, this is where the story ends , because there is no MA official - they all turned into FPC officials (which tell us nothing but "not our scope" about all the interesting questions, like bugfixes, ETA on new features, yada yada)...




So, if the only one i can bug about the missing features within reach is an FPC official, well, i will do so, hoping they forward our requests to the "hidden MA people" whenever we manage to be annoying enough.
(I am quite sure Marco still rings up the MA guys every now and then... )

I agree that MA's customer service seems to be nonexistent. I just think FPC staff deserve not to be continually bugged with the same questions to which even they don't know the answers. I experienced something similar when I worked for the government, handling enquiries with regards to Water Licencing in my state. I would continually get calls and complaints from people who wanted to complain about tap water (related, but not relevant to my department). I would continually get fallout of people who were unhappy in regards to regulated tap water - the best I could do was redirect their enquiry, or find the person they could complain to in person. At present, MA is that water company that doesn't call the customer back, and the customer service personnel have been outsourced to FPC/RT.

wizzszz said:

So, if the only one i can bug about the missing features within reach is an FPC official, well, i will do so, hoping they forward our requests to the "hidden MA people" whenever we manage to be annoying enough.

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"Being annoying" is generally speaking not a good strategy. Usually, it's a lot better to be polite than being annoying. Being annoying just makes us annoyed (well, duh!).

See, I'm as annoyed as you are by the bugs, and I'm seriously considering a new angle of attack to get MindArk to fix them (FYI: I have a couple of good replica 12th century swords). But "being annoying" just means that I get second thoughts of where to aim.

Please tell us about the bugs. Send us support cases. Post on the Bugs forum. We want to know about bugs so that we can fix them (if they're ours) or lean on the right people to have them fixed (if they're MindArk's). But please, be nice.

Pioneer|FPC said:

(FYI: I have a couple of good replica 12th century swords)

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So you're saying the only way to get MA to do anything is threaten them with violence?

Hijacker27 said:

So you're saying the only way to get MA to do anything is threaten them with violence?

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Well, as the old saying goes, you can get much further with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone.

Don't read too much into it. Seriously, don't. I'm just saying that incentives are good.

Pioneer|FPC said:

(FYI: I have a couple of good replica 12th century swords).

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When the time comes, remember to hold the sword behind your back, tip down, sword arm over your shoulder. This is "Oldcastle style". From this position, you can attack overhanded, or hit the opponent's left side, or you can come around and under to give them a little "love tap" to the side of the thigh, and your body will hide the weapon during the initial motion of the attack, giving your opponent less time to respond to any of these three attacks.

Need practice? www.sca.org and find your local chapter. They'll help, but don't let it get in the way of your work, Pioneer!

I like, where this thread is going...


... just kidding, lol

Marco|FPC said:

Would that be something you guys would like to see?

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Yes, since apartments at Port Atlantis would have a meaning!

BUT, I hope you first make our apartments at Bilton Towers meaningful in anyway please.

I have a wild idea, what about making New Oxford the city of Culture? That would make the place live up, and thoose apartments at Bilton Towers would finally get a meaning!

I hope to see both updates soon, but please just dont update Port Atlantis FIRST and in the rush, forget about Oxford/Bilton!!

I DO like all the new updates (graphicly) your coming with! Keep up the good work, and looking forward to see what will happens around the Bilton Towers in the future!

This was a very nice update indeed. I love the new Swamp Camp thus far (disliked the VU 10 "wide open space" feeling) and PA is quite nice as well.

As for the concept of apartments in PA, maybe it's just me, but I don't really feel the idea. PA just doesn't seem like the proper place; PA is everybody's home but nobody's property (Ace and Neverdie can be special). I dunno, it seems like a neat idea, but when I think of Port Atlantis from VU 9, putting up housing just seems...improper. As I said, it might just be me.

New camp swamp camp is cool, ne PA is great....where is mentoring ?

Please tell us about the bugs. Send us support cases. Post on the Bugs forum. We want to know about bugs so that we can fix them (if they're ours) or lean on the right people to have them fixed (if they're MindArk's). But please, be nice.

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so they really do read the bug forums. Maybe that could be made more clear by actually posting in there and explaining status on various bugs posted there.