| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173803 is a reply to message #173783] |
Thu, 06 October 2005 22:07   |
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Crimson
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| spotelmo wrote on Thu, 06 October 2005 18:30 |
| Crimson wrote on Thu, 06 October 2005 18:25 |
What that also means is that our client software will happily send over our serials, usernames, and encrypted passwords. But, what good would they be without WOL online anymore? What harm could be done with them? Pretty much nothing.
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ea has always said "don't give your serial number to anyone. if they get it you can lose your playing ability"
now, these strangers will have our serials and our usernames. they can also get our passwords easily enough with any brute force password program.
also, is this the only information they are getting? or are they getting info from our profiles or registrations also?
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I was mostly playing devil's advocate.
I'm the bawss.
[Updated on: Fri, 07 October 2005 01:51] Report message to a moderator |
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173805 is a reply to message #173743] |
Thu, 06 October 2005 22:58 |
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Crimson
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XWIS/StrikeTeam acknowledges they are probably not the best people to run the Renegade WOL server... that spells hope for us. I have already sent off an email to Apoc, so we'll see what I hear back. If nothing else, I hope that we can work out something to allow us to help them run things.
I'm the bawss.
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173818 is a reply to message #173743] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 01:09 |
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Goztow
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This is an exciting event and a huge step to take, also a big opportunity.
See it this way: EA could just have closed WOL, game over. Now they offer the possibility to change WOL that tiny bit but wothout anyone will ever see it. Players that aren't concerned with anything except the game (and many are this way and that's good!) will just continue connecting to what they think is WOL...
Now i'm not sure if XWIS can handle this kind of support. There are two ways for BHS to go now:
1. Contact Apoc, explain him what's the deal with all of this. But don't forget: XWIS had the infrastructure, BHS doesn't (yet) so this gives them prolly the main advantage.
2. Maybe the better option: contact XWIS, make a deal with them. Let them keep all RA but try to get an influence on renegade. Ask them if they are prepared to let you help them making their system up to the challenge, propose them to help out gestion of all this. Basically: let them have the infrastructure for all but get the gestion of Renegade towards you.
As you said crimson: this is an opportunity to kill all annoyance (script kiddies, ...) and to make WOL revive in a new system. it's just a matter of using the opportunity in a smart way. PM me if i could be of any help (which I doubt but you never know).
You can find me in The KOSs2 (TK2) discord while I'm playing. Feel free to come and say hi! TK2 discord
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173824 is a reply to message #173743] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 01:40 |
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Crimson
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Email to Apoc is already sent.
Main problem at the moment is that XWIS doesn't support NAT so that leave all of us (yes, me too) with a router (or basically anyone who isn't directly connected to their modem) out of luck.
I'm the bawss.
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173826 is a reply to message #173743] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 01:44 |
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Crimson
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Let me repost here what I posted over at the Strike Team forums.
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Hi guys,
I have been waiting for my registration email for a while, so I've been helplessly watching this thread slide into oblivion until I decided to make an account with a different email address.
Anyway, I am speaking as an official representative of Blackhand Studios (BHS). I learned about this change when I approached Apoc regarding a problem we've been having in the Renegade community about dedicated server serials.
I can say that we are VERY happy that EA is being more flexible, and Apoc has been doing a great job in his new role. I am really happy to see the community get the opportunity to support our favorite games. That being said, I am glad that you (Strike Team) recognize that your knowledge and participation in the Renegade community doesn't compare to your dedication to the other games.
I have already emailed Apoc a few hours ago regarding BHS making a "bid" or "audition" to be able to support the Renegade part of WOL. I hope that you won't see this as trying to step on your toes or anything. I believe everything we have done for Renegade more than proves our dedication to the fans and I do STRONGLY believe that you guys are the right folks to take over all of the other games, most specifically the older C&C RTS-style games.
That said, I am overwhelmed by the community support for BHS. Sometimes I feel like we're not doing enough or working too slow, so it's refreshing to see that the community DOES still support us.
I acknowledge that EA has been changing. Apoc is doing an excellent job. I hope that we can get things worked out that will be the best options for Renegade AND all the other games. I don't have a problem with you guys not knowing much about Renegade. I just hope that we can all amicably work out a solution to give the gamers what's best for them.
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I think only my negative feelings and not my positive ones have made it to this particular thread and I just wanted to balance it out. 
I'm the bawss.
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173827 is a reply to message #173818] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 01:48 |
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Blazer
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| Goztow wrote on Fri, 07 October 2005 04:09 |
XWIS had the infrastructure, BHS doesn't (yet) so this gives them prolly the main advantage.
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Actually we do. Even folks like Dante long ago took part in creating a WOL replacement (REOL). BHS also has it's own WOL clone on the back burner, ready to go in case WOL ever was shut down.
Even if WOL were to somehow go away forever (for the sake of argument that XWIS nor BHS nor any other third party would be permitted to support it), Renegade would still not be dead, for we could play on GameSpy. The biggest problem with that scenario is that we would lose lots of players who aren't "in the know" and would just stare blankly at their screen when they cannot connect to WOL, give up, and uninstall.
As someone else mentioned, I imagine that all of WOL will go to XWIS, as it would be too much "trouble" for EA to point just the renegade WOL servers to BHS counterparts (even though it would just be updating some DNS entries). I still hope that BHS gets a chance to further support Renegade. If not, hopefully XWIS has the capacity to support the Renegade community.
This could also be a good thing in that it sets a precedent for EA allowing third parties to support their legacy games. While I doubt we would ever get the golden fleece of Renegade source code, perhaps in the future we would be allowed to take on more support responsibilities.
[Updated on: Fri, 07 October 2005 01:50] Report message to a moderator |
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173828 is a reply to message #173743] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 01:49 |
Chronojam
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"EA is 100% dedicated to the Command and Conquer franchise and wants to ensure a strong and secure online gameplay environment. Long live Command and Conquer! We hope to see resurgence in the legions of NOD and GDI followers claiming ground online."
Fucking bullshit. Fucking, bullshit. They are not 100% dedicated. They did not make things secure. You know who made Renegade online far more secure than EA ever dreamed? Black Hand Studios. Props to the original Renegade coding team though; they managed to nicely encrypt and protect a lot of the internal workings and data passing, significantly reducing the existance of 'trainers'.
However, as EA has shown, they LOVE to screw over the online systems, shutting them down so only the bot-runners and hackers can even publicly chat anymore. They're so *committed*, they won't hire people part-time or even randomly give them any kind of moderator/admin status on the old chat channels. I'm sure it wouldn't hurt them to give somebody $5 an hour to just keep a little bit of order; hell, I do that kind of thing for free. Many people do. They're so dedicated to providing secure systems, one person named Adad has thousands and thousands of the Free Dedicated Server serials for Renegade... in fact, he has *every single one* that was left at the time when he launched his thievery attempt! And of course, EA hasn't provided more.. oh, no, they're too dedicated to do that. They're so wanting to provide for a secure environment that tons of serials were stolen or spoofed, and relays are in abundance.
This is, again, EA trying to take credit for the community's effort; claiming they've always been there. Fuck you EA. I'll give them 50% dedication points for continually caving to demand and PR concerns by periodically giving out free software to contest winners that they could buy for anywhere from $4 to $18 for the full damned set retail new and unused, and for periodically giving out various goodies they had spares of that were otherwise just piled up in boxes and IF ever sold, haven't been for a long damn time despite any demand (I want a damn GDI pewter soldier, but nope). I'll give them a couple points of credit for actually giving some support to somebody else who has to handle the running of servers and the day-to-day concerns. I guess though, this invalidates their bullshit claims of always going to fully keep WOL supported and secure until no longer needed. Fuck, they cheated by making it needed, to the point that a third party actually had to create an alternate place to play. Yeah, legally they're clear-- WOL is no longer needed. But that's like buying your buddy life insurance and then offing them. That's what happend in Free Willy from memory, right? Evil company has tons of money to gain from offing the friendly, gentle whale it no longer cares for (but yet everybody else adores). The fans come to the rescue.
They should make a movie called "Free Wolly" based on XWIS. Hmmm. Imagine if EA was the bad guys in that whale movie... the evil company would pay for the truck to haul Willy around and periodically give some $5 pails out for the rescuers to use to keep some water on the poor thing. They'd maybe print some cheap T-Shirts and such, and send out some free supportive "We Care" emails and messages...
EA is not "dedicated" to the Command & Conquer franchise. They are only dedicated to a lame attempt to steal credit for the fans' preservation of that reveared brand name, so they can apply it to future piles of shit under a false pretense of quality.
EA has finally killed WOL, as they pretend to be our friends and pass it off to somebody else to handle because they're so committed to us, they won't even do it themselves. Thanks, assholes.
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Me @ PPMsite.com several hours ago. Anybody who was in IRC knew I was having a ball. Anyway. I first tried using XWIS during a WOL outage, and found myself banned before I got my foot in the door. How's that for support? They gave me rather useless information, saying to register under a game that had WOL play instead of using TD. I'm sure the word Renegade was in my post at least 5 times there.
Call me biased or paranoid, but I won't trust anybody with my serial who can't spell well or dances around questions or feigns lack of comprehension or leads people on.. especially if they natively speak my language and have no excuses.
[Updated on: Fri, 07 October 2005 01:58] Report message to a moderator |
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173841 is a reply to message #173799] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 06:49 |
spotelmo
Messages: 273
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To me when you buy a game you buy support. Not the software
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well, what you think doesn't matter. the law says when you buy software, you are buying the software not support.
as for the non-return policy, you can fight that because like any product, when you buy it, it is implied that it will be in working order or they must refund your money. often there are extra hoops you must go through to get money back because of assholes who steal software rather than buy it.
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173858 is a reply to message #173743] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 08:27 |
Yuri
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Hello all,
I've read the majority of your posts here. I would like to pose a counter point.
Up until yesterday there was no one monitoring the Red Alert 2 lobby, the Ladders were non-functional, and tournaments were a legend.
That has changed. Handing off the online component to a team with the resources to monitor it is the right decision. Granted they are not as Renegade centric as BHS.
I was a strong advocate of this change when I heard about it. I was glad the online community was going to get the support they deserved. You guys have been true to the franchise.
Would you rather have Xwis have a chance to improve things, or leave them in the Bot-controlled land of yesterday?
Yuri.
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173874 is a reply to message #173743] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 10:22 |
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luv2pb
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Not everything is as it appears
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I am very concerned about XWIS not suporting NAT. Thats effects a HUGE majority or the Renegade community. I don't see though why that could not be fixed.
If that were to be addressed and BHS was given an ACTIVE role in the support and operation I would be 100% for it.
N00bstories Director Of Operations
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173877 is a reply to message #173743] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 11:23 |
Adj2400
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If bhs does get control of renegade, would the option of not running renguard be an option? or would players who don't run it be forced to or not play at all?
this is just a theoretical question because not everyone does run it nor have any desire to.
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| Re: EA Partners with XWIS Community Service [message #173879 is a reply to message #173743] |
Fri, 07 October 2005 11:40 |
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Crimson
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Don't put words/ideas into our mouths. The more likely scenario regarding RenGuard is that if we had access to patch the game, we would add things to FIX the parts that are broken that allow people to cheat in the first place. But that is purely speculation as I don't personally know what our team's knowledge is with regards to that.
The fact is, EA is very supportive of us and what we've done for this game, so good things are bound to happen. Our path at the moment is to at least get us in an active role of helping XWIS manage Renegade going forward.
The NAT problem highly concerns me though, for several reasons. First is that those of us with NAT won't get any useful feedback to tell us WHY we're unable to connect. This will provide a very negative experience. We'll have to use RenIP or GSA to connect to servers, and I do still like to see how many ladder points I can get... but kiss that goodbye if I can't participate on the ladder.
I'm the bawss.
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