Pax Galactica

New Address

2007-05-19T05:35:00.000-07:00

Right. It's been over a month since we moved but from what I can tell, we're still getting hits to this blog and not the new one. Do not continue visiting here, it will not be updated. Instead, visit here to view the new and improved blog.

Thanks.

This Week in OGame

2007-04-21T07:37:00.000-07:00

(Yar, I guess I slightly copied the title style from EUObserver.com, but still . . . )

This week has been a relatively slow news week in the world of OGame.org, but there have been some news, such as the new-stlye newsletter, a new universe (31) as well as - actually, that's about it. But to make up for a slow news week I'll also include some of this week's more popular topics, new GNN reports and reporters and some important links relating to the past week's goings on. (Oh, and from now on, posts like this shall be published on either Mondays or Fridays.)

The first and perhaps most important point of news this week has been an update to the periodically (monthly) published newsletter. The newsletter is still (I assume) being translated by forum administrator Cassandra_Vandales with the original being in German on the OGame.de forum

From the information given, it is still going to be published on the forum (that is, the standard newsletter) but new features will be given to e-mail subscribers or by visiting the blog that has been set up, but still in its infancy. New features added to the newsletter include interview with players from different versions of OGame around the globe, overviews of other GameForge games, and there are planned international competitions (perhaps something akin to the international avatar competition a while back). It waits to be seen how popular it is and we'll be monitoring the story.

Universe 31 was announced and opened on the 24th of April. Announcing the story, Fever informed the community it would be normal speed, utilising the ACS battle system from the start. It opened at 1 PM, server time.

A new universe six report from Cute Kitty detailed the latest goings on in the universe, including an overview on the alliance [wayne]'s domination of the 'Hall of Fame', high profile bannings, statistics/rankings of both players and alliances, etc.

The Galactic News Network is honoured to welcome Ezekiel, Fiery_Angel and Cute Kitty to report on universes five, seven (?) and six respectively

And in another slight update, I've been transfered from GNN univ. six to the forum - it kind of fits with my role in the blog, really.

[Comment] April Fools 2007

2007-04-05T13:05:00.000-07:00

So 1/4/07 has passed, and so too has the second staff-led April Fools. This time, the GA's had taken over, wiping out all of the staff with one fell banning, before going on a pink parade. Now, looking round, users noticed one thing...banned people posting. The joke fell quickly, but it led to a cheap laugh.

As a joke, it was still good - some newer users were fooled good - but it paled in comparison to the huge conspiracy that was 2006. Mr Leo Bloom still affects people today, and there are still some skeletons in the closet...

However, the day took a turn when Causa and F_F led a revolution, supported by the Galactic News Network. Dark matter and SOLID managed to find expose's on the GA Dictatorship, F_F found their secret base and with a crack squad, overran the GA's. Kodiak was powerless as Causa haxed his way to glory.

Now again, it was a bit obvious, but for cheap laughs, 2007 proved good in the end. But it paled to 2006, and users wait for another year to pass...

*end transmission*

[Comment] A Way to Save OGame?

2007-04-02T14:56:00.000-07:00

In recent months, as many have noticed (one, two)
or indeed caught on to the fact that the number of
players in almost all universes in/at OGame.org
has been declining for some time and shows now
sign of slowing with many dropping below the
2,500 mark.

Several people have offered potential solutions
to what many people see as a crisis within
OGame and the community surrounding it.
These range from changing the boundries and
rules surrounding protection of new players to
people being given more resourses at the start
of the game and removing the steep learning
curve surrounding players as they begin their
OGame career.

Now, "what's wrong with that?" I hear you ask.
Well, nothing is wrong with them as a temporary
stop-gap. Which is really all they are. An attempt
to stop the flow of players leaving the game and so
ceasing what mant see as the decline of OGame. They
are the response of a community that feels shunned
by GameForge. A community that feels it has lost its
voice and that the owners of OGame are doing nothing
to stop the stream of players becoming bored and leav-
ing.

Don't for a second think that I am saying that these
ideas are bad or wrong. In fact, I support many of them.
I just think it's futile and does not tackle the underlying
flaw in the mechanics of OGame, and in some cases, the
leadership in Karlsruhe.

The success of OGame can be narrowed down to
two basic factors. a) The community. The game has a
strong and vibrant forum community (which does not
seem to have been effected by player loss. Indeed,
many retired players are remaining on the forums to
contribute, give advice and talk with friends). It is full
of interesting people with varied opinions on all subjects
ranging from the war in Iraq to the price of Coffee. It
counts amongst its group artists and writers, all of whom
are friendly and always willing to help.

And b) the game itself (AFTER the intial learning curve,
once a player has settled in). The fact that each universe
appears to be its own self-contained political system
with shifting alleigences, grabs for power. They're
places where peace and trade flourish. Where
mutual cooperation is common place (even in war)
and the strategy of warfare can be played out on
a galactic scale with millions of ships battling it out,
vieing for control. With each alliance having its own agenda,
its own plan for conquest and each being different
and unique, it all makes OGame a game worth playing
and celebrating. But . . .

Despite all of this, there is still an underlying flaw in
the way OGame works. The reason player numbers are
falling. Many people have many different ideas on what
is wrong with the game. Arguments often include the fact
that 'once someone has been "crashed"[the term for being
basically, destroyed] it could result in potentially years of
work being lost in what is a infinitecimally small period of
time for reasons beyond the defender's control.' This often
results in players quitting the game. Others say that
OGame's steep learning curve puts players off joining
or staying to foster an account into a formidable one
able to strike other players. Critics of these arguments retort
that it's a war game, these things are to be expected but this fails
to account for why OGame is losing popularity, when other war
games are seeing a surge in popularity based on what is, to some
extent, the same formula.

Another common reason many put forward to explain the
decline in popularity is just the fact the game is simply boring.
They cite the fact that doing something repetatively for two
or more years becomes tedious and that OGame doesn't have
the depth to present new challenges to dominant and experienced
players. This results, goes the argument, in the process by which
original players are leaving and not being sufficiently replaced at
a rate high enough to maintain the number of players in a universe
at any one time.

But you know what I think is causing a dramatic drop in player
numbers? I simply think that OGame is not providing a
dynamic enough gaming experience for a modern person
with over 10 billion internet pages at their fingertips. When
it comes down to it, the game is simply some text on a screen
with some pictures. Granted, there is plenty of strategy involved
in creating a successful empire but a large percentage of new players
never get to that stage. They simply realise they have to wait hours
for an attack to land and get bored. They're off to find something
more engaging; OGame has serious competition in the MMO market,
with many free games offering graphical interfaces while using a
similar set up. In order to save OGame, GameForge needs to
(and has to some extent) realised that the status quo is not enough
to maintain an effective player base. They needs to realise, as have
members of the community, that in order to have a large, loyal fanbase
they need to entice the MySpace Generation to the game - to conv-
ince them not to play some game with shiny new graphics "because
it looks cool" but to play OGame; to use strategy to outwit their
opponents and to have the satisfaction of a large battle.

As mentioned, thre are signs GameForge has realised this, but has
perhaps not made the best decisions in relation to communication
and consulation. Recent months have seen the introduction of
the Battlecruiser which has been widely accepted but did nothing
great to increase player numbers and the extremely controversial
"officers" which saw more than 25,000 people sign a petition
against their introduction. One of the most controversial aspects
of this feature (apart from the concept) was that of its introduction.
It received all of one day's testing at ogame.pt before it
was introduced in .org. This lead to questions regarding how much
attention GameForge pays to the opinion of its consumer base.

Now I'm sure someone will have stopped there and said "hey, aren't
you contradicting yourself there? Didn't you just say they should try
and attract a new consumer with features that would appeal to them?
Surely they can't cater to both 'old skool' and new players alike." But to that
I argue that they can do both.

I believe that GameForge should have a consultation period
with the worldwide community of OGame. They should define
and realise what makes the game great and what attracts players
to it. They should also ask peoples' ideas on how to attract new
players while preserving the spirit of the game. This would not
be logistically difficult and would give the community a voice
through to which to channel criticism and suggestions.
A way to express ideas on how to save the great game. Maybe
together, both the community and GameForge can help make
the game be more popular than ever.

Search for Translators

2007-03-31T10:21:00.000-07:00

A quick note;

Game Admin (?) Amakir has requested translators
for unspecified GameForge projects. (For all we know
it is for new versions of OGame, or something else entir-
ely.)
The languages requested are:

Bahasa Indonesia/n
Japanese
Korean
Czech
Hungarian
Romanian
Bulgarian
Slovak
Norwegien

If you can help and have moderate proficiency
in any of these languages, it is requested you contact
localisation@ogame.org.

Name Change

2007-03-25T10:27:00.000-07:00

Just a little note to tell you we've changed the name
of the blog. Since 'Galactic News Network Blog' soun-
ded rather bland, we thought it needed a change.

Pax Galactica (Latin for Galactic Empire, or some-
thing to that effect) sounds a bit more cool, don't
you think?

Game Section Change [Forum]

2007-03-16T16:52:00.000-07:00

Well, as I'm sure most of you know, the
lovely board admins on the OGame fora
announced that the 'Game' area would be
reorganised to allow easier navigation and
to facilitate universe-relevant discussions.
The decision to reorganise the forum came
after the administrators and staff felt that
many had become indifferent to the previous
system whereby forums were listed by subject
and not by universe.
The new format was decided on by discussions
between staff members and user input.
Cassandra_Vandales noted that:

"I know this breaks a kinda tradition. The old layout
though seems not to be liked anymore by quite a few
people and to provide a section where the Universe
communities can develop "their" universe stuff soun-
ded like a good idea."

[ . . . ] And now takes the form; "Universe 1
(main forum)

Subforums: HoF (Subsection: Top 10), Trades,
CR section, Diplomacy, Headhunts, Acc Trade,
Archive"

To those thinking that this idea will make the
forum too long for a game with 30 universes and
do not wish to scroll for aeons in order to reach
the fora toward the bottom of the board, there is
an 'expand' and 'compress' button which can show
and hide the forums. It is the little white box next
to the 'Game' heading.

(I'm aware of the seemingly interchangable use of
'forum', 'forums' and 'fora' all being used to describe
both the main board and individual sections. I shall
attempt to reach a concensus on the correct gram-
matical term.

New Ticket 'oSupport'

2007-03-14T11:48:00.000-07:00

In a drive to increase efficiency and effectiveness of
the ingame support system, a trial has begun in uni-
verses 1 -4.
The system allows you to directly raise a problem
with a game operator without sending an e-mail,
and thus getting a usually faster reply.

Here is a link to the system and the discussion and
help threads.
Hopefully there'll be more on this soon from a reporter
in one of the aformentioned universes.

Universe Six Breaches the One-Billion Damage Mark

2007-02-21T12:39:00.000-08:00

On the 21st of February at 06:43 (sever time), the fleet
of Graf Zhal approached NoMeAmeS' moon on a cross-
galaxy moon-to-debris field attack at a total cost of 41
million dueterium.
The attack (which was wonderfully time to two seconds)
caused 1.021 billion damage. Yep, you read it right, over one
billion. Impressive, huh?
The hit was described by 'Graf Zhal's Secretary's Office' as
a "revenge-hit [sic]" for destroying my probes [ . . .] with
buying an officer".
The total profit was around one hundred million metal on
the standard [wayne] ratio.

NoMeAmeS's resulting rank drop was over one hundred places
in fleet score and almost sixty places in points.

RF_WDA Speaks, Staff Leave, Officers, New Style, and more in a Slow News Day Roundup

2007-02-20T10:55:00.000-08:00

Here are some small nuggets to hold you over
until a report on the 'Battlecruiser' is posted
in the coming days.

The introduction of officers has caused outrage among the .org
community (report here) with a world wide petition attracting
over 20,000 signatures.
For those who have been living on Pluto, here is a rundown of
what officers are in one sentence; a way of paying for an advantage.
They allow players to pay for additional fleet slots, more capacity to
mine and the like.

RF_WDA (OGame.org's community manager) has written an
open letter to the community on the subject of officers.

The introduction of officers has lead many staff to top players to
leave the game or put their account(s) into 'vacation mode'. This
is an understandable response which's [sic] sentiment is echoed
by the community. Players that have left include DanCake, Delo,
Majin, Ine (with others - the list would be far too long for the blog.
I've included only a few for content purposes).

A number of 'apache' bugs have been reported and are being
investigated, revealed game admin Jona a post on the forum.

As a final note, we're experimenting with a more minimalistic style
with lighter colours. If you have any comments or suggestions, email
us on galacticnewsnetwork@googlemail.com.

Commander Offer

2007-02-11T09:16:00.000-08:00

Gameforge now has a special offer on 3 month's [sic] of Commander.
Rather than the original price of 6.99 (euros), one now
pays 4.99 (euros). For keen students of mathematics, this equates to
a saving of two euros.
There are only two requirements, you have the 5 euros required
and a credit card.

We'll keep you updated on the offer including expiry dates and
the like.

A New Ship and Version

2007-02-04T08:43:00.000-08:00

That's right folks, there's not only a new version (0.75)
there's also a new ship, the battlecruiser.

The new version's features are as follows;

[] A new ship (expect to say a GNN report posted here and on
the forums in a couple of days).

[] Rapid fire changes (see: the second post in this thread)

[] The cost of a battleship is now 45,000 metal and
15,000 crystal.

[]Moons are now namable.

Version 0.74e

2007-01-27T06:37:00.000-08:00

For about a few days now, the new version 0.74e has
been online, but even we need the odd breaks. Don't
worry though, this blog'll be back to full pelt in no time.

Yeah, back to the new version . . .

features are as follows;

For Commander Users:

You are able to create standard fleets. The maximum number
of standard fleets is your research level of "Computer
Technology" plus one.

For All:

-- Planets can be sorted by the following;

[] Name

[] Coordinates

[] The date of 'colonization'.

-- The description of Sensor Phalanx will show the numbers
of system you are able to scan.

-- The statistics will show the time of the last calculation.

Questions can be asked or answered relating to these new features in
this thread.

New Diplomacy Rule

2007-01-14T14:18:00.000-08:00

New rules have come up due to alliance declaring war on everyone to aviod the bashing rule. The new rule is as follows:

An alliance may only declare up to 10 wars at a time. A war is defined as one alliance (or one allianceless person) versus another alliance. If multiple alliances have war declared on them in one thread, then each alliance counts as one declaration. So, for example, if alliance A declares war on alliances B and C in one thread and alliance D in a second thread, that is three separate wars, and alliance A make only declare war on up to seven more alliances before they must end a previous engagement in order to declare a new one.

Please note that this restriction only applies to the declaring alliance. If alliance A has already declared war on 10 alliances, then alliance D can still declare on them, so long as they have not declared on 10 other alliances already.

These rules will start to be enforced in one week, so if you got more than ten wars going you may want to start working on the diplomacy to get some of those wars finished. The punishment for breaking such a rule has not been made public yet. However the bashing rule will play into effect after the limit of alliances able to be at war with has been reached, even if you declare war on the alliance.

Moderator Feedback

2007-01-11T08:22:00.000-08:00

The oGame forum administation is seeking feedback
on the performance of the forum's moderating
team.

A note on how the forum structure works;

-Moderators (manage individual forum sections.)
-Super Moderators (moderate the entire forum,
moderators report to these people.)
-Admins (they, well, adminstrate.)

The link to the topic re the feedback is here.

Expect an article on the forum staff's work and
responsibilities soon.

Version .74c Online

2006-12-14T08:55:00.000-08:00

Version .74c is now online in all oGame.org Universes (1 - 27). This version mainly contains bug fixes;

- Order by coordinates in the alliance memberlist is now working
correctly.
-The session ID won't be transmitted in the buddy list anymore.
- Buildings from level 1 onwards will always be displayed,
even if the requirements for the building have been demolished.
The link to upgrade the building is displayed red and is inactive.

The Bugs of Ogame

2006-12-14T08:41:00.000-08:00

I've posted my report on the bugs of OGame. It
details many of the major account-crippling bugs
that are present in OGame from no-fire to server
crashes.
The report can be found here and the dicussion thread here.
Enjoy it, more reports from me and the GNN soon.

Slow News Grips the Universe?

2006-12-05T02:55:00.000-08:00

We here at the GNN have diligently been at work, pursuing stories and incorporating hard-hitting investigative journalism for our readers. Despite rumours on the contrary, it is never a slow news day as events are constantly happening and people have the right to know about them. It is only a matter of reporters finding out about happenings and putting what they find in a readable format.

While our reporters, and even editors, have been somewhat lacking in the news department lately, we can only assure you it is to ensure that the highest standards in journalism and professionalism are followed and only a few articles survive the countless tests and drafts that are necessary for our articles to come to you, the reader. So, we invite you, the reader, to have a conversation and work with us to promote news and have your voice and opinion where it really matters.

Galactic News Network. Your source of information for the Universe.

just chillin

2006-12-03T18:39:00.000-08:00

working on a big huge report tbh

currently in uni 2 Fury an allaince in which i have been part of since the early stages will be disbanding soon

i will be doing a report on this and will be posting it as well

any problems contact me

Welcome from an Editor aka WTF?!

2006-12-02T09:42:00.000-08:00

Welcome!

This here blogger has been setup by 2 of 9 as an easier way of getting the ONews from us holed up in the GNN to you the reader. Each reporter will setup here, and drop in with snippets of news and mini'views from the World of OGame. Also, whenever possible it will be in an RPG style, as the GNN was first created to be. But no sport. What are we, the Wall St Journal?!

Now for the first report...just to get things rolling. Keep rolling rolling rolling...<_<' size="3">That is...when I get round to it. I know its easy, but y'know...AS work, volunteering, plotting a kidnapping...it all takes time, y'know?

Laters, Kei_Kun

--------------------------------------------------------------

Ogame.org Newsletter

2006-12-02T05:00:00.004-08:00

Thanks to the oGame.de information team, oGame.org now has a periodically published newsletter.
The newsletter, of which all relevant information for .org is
translated and published, includes updates on the game,
status of bug fixing and news relating to worldwide oGame operations.

It is originally posted on the oGame.de forums by Zedicus and translated by Cassandra_Vandales.

The newsletter can be found here.

Further details to be added as they arrive.

New Staff Member, Article News

2006-11-25T06:18:00.000-08:00

Please welcome Zek to the GNN Blog Staff. His username is the same
on the oGame.org Forum and is GNN reporter. Welcome!

Also, Kei_Kun is working on an article for the blog describing to
newcomers what the Galactic News Network is, does and aims for.
Expect that up in a few days.

GNN Blog Staff Expanding

2006-11-18T03:30:00.000-08:00

It's only one day old and we're already expanding. Many members
from oGame.org's GNN forum presence have shown an interest in
helping this  new venture (either that, or have way too much time on their hands!).
We hope that the increase in staff will allow far more dynamic and
comprehensive coverage of the GNN and related happenings
at oGame.org.
With a small amount of luck we should have our first content driven
stories up any day now, stay tuned.

New Staff (subject to change):

Kei_Kun         (GNN Editor)
ScarletMyst   (GNN Reporter)
inevitable_    (GNN Reporter)
windstalker   (GNN Reporter)
2 of 9            (GNN Reporter)
keylarion   (GNN Reporter)

Galactic News Network Blog

2006-11-17T06:06:00.001-08:00

This is the start of what I hope will be a blog for the oGame.org Galactic News Network (GNN).
It will be run by the members of the GNN who are willing and have the time to take on such a venture to enrich the GNN experience for readers and reporters alike.
This blog will allow readers to contribute ideas to reports, make comments and find out what the GNN is like and the work that goes into creating the success that it is. We hope you enjoy this new blog and watch it develop with more features, news and articles.