2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): Hello Everyone and welcome to our very special chat with the team behind 2Moons! We're lucky to have them here today, so let's let them introduce themselve and they'll start taking your questions!

dperry (shinydp): Hey, I’m David Perry, the Director of the game (here in the USA) and I work at Acclaim. Thanks for taking the time to join us. Xfire has done a good job rounding up the folks that live at breathe 2Moons at Acclaim.

DeMaria (demaria99): Hi, I'm Rusel DeMaria. I helped David as his Assistant Director and also rewrote the text.

dj9d: Hi this is David Jun, Brand Manager at Acclaim working on marketing. Glad to be here with you all!

Historian (thehistorian): Hey it's historian... I want to thank Xfire for throwing this birthday chat for me.. I know they had to say it was for 2Moons but we all know what it is about

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Hello, I'm Sungsoo Khim, managing the game behind the scenes from the cold cavern of wires and noise.

dj9d: by the way everyone, it's Historian's birthday today. HAPPY BDAY!

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: Justin (justintoms): There have been a lot of players in the past that have suggested an auction house (like WOW) like feature put in the game, it has been acknowledged previously by the team but as far as I know there has been no effort put into actually creating it, are you guys working on it or even considering it?

Answer: We love the idea of an auction house and will be discussing it next week with the developers of the game. They have a lot of new features on the way, so this will end up getting slotted in, when it’s time to do that the Advisory Board of players for 2Moons will pull together the features they want to see.

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: HellsSaint (saintofhell): Have you considered putting teleportation strings together so players don’t have to hop?

Answer: That's a cool idea. We haven't implemented it, but it's somethiung to consider.

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: XFUBX (xfubx): Wow, 2Moons is Yet Another Great Free MMORPG...I would Like to know If you think Free MMORPGs are better than P2P MMORPGs. Of course with a P2P MMORPG, You Would Get more Content...

Answer: I think free used to mean horrible, but as time goes on and games get better and better, suddenly free starts to be a cool thing. Free + great = why the heck not??? Why pay when you don’t need to?

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: Justin (justintoms): What current content upgrades are currently in the works?

Answer: We are currently working with the siege mode . No date is set, but the feature itself is implemented, and we are waiting for the conditions to be right, so we can enable for the max enjoyment.

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: Shooter (sirdiealot08): when is seige wars gonna be activated ?

Answer: As answered above, the opening date is not yet set, since some of the conditions are not set for maximum enjoyment. But we are working closely with the developers to enable it so that our players can enjoy without having to grind as much.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: HellsSaint (saintofhell): Guilds - more information available? Does staff chat work? Can last log-in date be added for viewing? More logo options?

Answer: At the moment we don't have a staff planned. Last login is a great suggestion so I will pass that along.

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (cala4): What’s your greatest achievement so far with 2moons?

Answer: The greatest achievement so far has been getting the game released! It was a significant challenge as Acclaim was a relatively new company being built from the ground up. As every week goes by, we get more staff, more experience and better systems for handling stuff. So overall I’m pretty happy that millions of players signed up for our games, and plenty of them are addicted to 2Moons. (I glad we chose this game to release!)

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: [t]lol,robert~ (ace0725): 2Moons was created from the idea of Dekeron will 2moons keep fallowing the path or will 2moons branch off a bit?

Answer: For noww, we are working with the Korean team to keep updating the game, and it will remain in synch with Dekaron for now. But you never k now...

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: HellsSaint (saintofhell): Have you considered an in-game reporting system for bugs, hackers, and misinformation?

Answer: We have suggested it to GameHi. And they have said that would at least work on getting an ignore feature to us so that you can at least not hear the the gold spammers.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: Justin (justintoms): Are there any plans to stimulate the economy since argates and such are just getting plain impossible for poor players to buy?

Answer: Actually we run event to help out with this.. matter of fact while you sit with us, there is a double drop event running.. It will run for 5 hour tomorrow and sunday too.

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (ace0725): 2Moons was created from the idea of Dekaron will 2moons keep following the path or will 2moons branch off a bit?

Answer: Our intention was to catch up with Dekaron and then branch off. (We have an entire presentation of new ideas to add, many from our gamers, however many of these new ideas won’t be added until we completely catch up with all Dekaron content. The development team is relentless, so this has kinda surprised us how difficult it has been to get all caught up. We will discuss this with them in person next week, when they feel we will be able to start veering off with our own stuff.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: Justin (justintoms): Is there any reason that DF is not running around the clock at 2 hour intervals or even at like 4 hour intervals.

Answer: The way it is currently set it runs over a 12 hour period.. hitting times before our peak and carrying thought past it.

Historian (thehistorian): We can't please everyone so we try to please as many as possible.

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: Cana (Trieste) Segnail (c4na): Are The Bots Unstopable ? doing anything to keep them away?

Answer: the bots are unstoppable. period. -Joking. Actually, we are dealing with more and more complex botting schemes everyday. But we have recently implemented many tough security measures to ensure such botting players cannot connect to the game itself.

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): But this being a cat and mouse game, we are working very hard to find and implement fix for such issues.

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (xfubx): How Do you Like To Make 2Moons Unique From Other Free MMOs?

Answer: 2Moons is edgy, arcade style, MMO. It’s the kind of action style MMO I’m attracted to (with plenty of depth also.) I think it’s cool that anyone that hasn’t played the game yet gets to step into a game with so much content. Just imagine stepping in a year from now. Regarding the edgy nature of the game, I think we actually went too far as the users said there was actually TOO MUCH profanity in the game. How crazy is that in this GTA world, where gamers ask the developers to step DOWN the profanity. That edgy nature I’d like to keep evolving by updating the fighting system etc. I can’t promise that will be 2Moons or 2Moons part 2, but I’m certainly going to work on a hard core fighting MMO at some point.

 

dj9d: Question: [Xf Helper] Supercop007 (supercop007): Being a community-oriented game, what is the best way players and fans can relay ideas to the developers themselves?

Answer: we have a player advisory board (PAB) that meets to go over ideas for game improvements. we take their advice and present the ideas to the dev team. you can have a chance to win a spot on the PAB through this Xfire contest!

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: 2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): How did you guys come up with the "17 years or older" recommendation when the ESRB is everyone?

Answer: The idea was to do something for more mature players, so we put in some "blue" language, and there was already lots of blood and body parts. So we made it a game that was distinguisshed from the others by assuming that they would like something a little more edgy.

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: HellsSaint (saintofhell): When servers come down can we get a 30 min warning? Because of lengthy dungeons and boss battles?

Answer: Well, actually we try to warn players as much advance as possibly can. But like all unfortunate accidents, time is very scarce in such cases. But for regular maintenances, we are working hard with our customer support/ web team to have enough notification for the players. Yes, we are working on it..:>

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: HellsSaint (saintofhell): Upgrading weapons - is it really necessary to have the gold gems fail and destroy weapons? Isn’t going back to 0 painful enough?

Answer: Ye sit is painful, but we want those hi end items to be rare... and people to be very proud that they have created such awesome equipment.

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (artaxs): Mr. Perry, is there any chance that we'll see a subtle "Earthworm Jim" reference in any of Acclaim Games' MMOs? (I loved that game!)

Answer: Hehe, or a cow? Yeah we gotta get one in there… I think there will definitely be more Earthworm Jim games. In 2005 I re-formed the team to make it, but Atari couldn’t afford the game. So rest assured it will happen. (Just ignore any that don’t involve the entire original team.) In the meantime, there’s nothing to stop me sneaking in references. (Good idea!)

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: (TTK)Mercenaries (viciousbloodlust): ever thought about making the text options electable, for instance hitting Guild and Party buttons allow you only to view only messages from guild and party, while leaving global and general chat unviewable in the text box?

Answer: It does do that.. there are tabs you can click to filter it out.

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: Justin (justintoms): Would it be possible to implement a chat system where the chat does not go to the bottom as soon as somone talks, if i want to see a message in a gold spammer infested town for intsance it is virtually impossible

Answer: We are working hard with the developers to implement sany measures to fix the chat systems. For example, we implmented the shout limiting feature, and more chat related features are on the way to ease with the chattings. But relating to the gold spammers, we are working with the GM/ developers to prevent them from being to roam around the game messing the game play.

 

dj9d: Question: -=|TDL|=-[GoA]-Magicman (karazypally): is there an idea of coming up with gamecards to buy items from the store?

Answer: we currently have prepaid cards available at Target retails stores nationwide(US), and 7-11 (canada) and Mac's (Canada). We will also have cards in rite-aid coming soon... and more to follow!

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (xfevinco): Where do you see Acclaim moving to with free to play games?

Answer: Acclaim has already been successful with these games, so now we are investing into new games that we are funding ourselves. (I’m directing three brand new games right now!) Those games will cover a VERY wide range of audience. My personal challenge has been to try to make Acclaim like Satellite TV, so that there’s a channel for everyone. Meaning, you can be sure that there’s a channel with a game that is EXACTLY the kind of game you personally like (for free). We are very serious about that, and if you find an amazing game you think would fit on our MMO network, that hasn’t been released in the USA, then we are all ears. (All games must be free to play however, that’s the core rule we won’t break.)

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: XFUBX (xfubx): Going Back to Supercop007's Question... You Said That [PABs] Are A Community of Members that come up with Ideas for the game. What does it take To become a [PAB]?

Answer: At first we took our top players. The best of the best if you will. Then we brought in our top forum posters. Now I tend to watch the forums for players that really seem to have an opinion on what they want to see, with the qualification that they communicate their concerns in clear terms with our resorting to flaming.

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): What type of servers does Acclaim use to host 2moons? and what kind of Internal and External netspeeds are being used

Answer: We use expensive servers to host 2MOONS, and very fast network speed.

Sorry, those are obvious data, but we can't tell to outside people.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: Luci (luciferdk): hey.. when would the new skills for like segnals and other classes be released.. any date???

Answer: It will most likely be at the next major version. Which come about every 3 to 4 months.

Historian (thehistorian): We are about a month and a half past BMR

Historian (thehistorian): Bad Moons Rising that is..

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: [Xf Helper] Supercop007 (supercop007): How does the dichotomy between Korean and American developers help or hinder further revisions and updates of the game as a whole?

Answer: There are certainly some difficulties with language, translation and overall communications. But we all look to make the best game possible, and over time our methodology has been improving. In the beginning it was difficult to get everything worked out. Now we work together more smoothly, and changes should come more quickly and more smoothly.

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: XFUBX (xfubx): How did you come up with the name "2MOONS"?

Answer: Well, there's more to reveal about the 2 moons. So stay tuned...

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (godjonez): How much does it take time and resources to maintain the current game world and servers, compared to the time taken to develop new features?

Answer: Acclaim is initially a service company, our goal is to publish and service games, and we are now moving into a development company as well. Most of our time has been spent in that area (service and running), but as the company grows and we hire development and production staff, that will naturally shift. We will start adding more content to current games (working with partners), and then make games we are completely in control of. Personally I’m a control freak, so I love not having to “ask” if a feature can be added. I much prefer to just get it done. (And I know the gamers do as well.) That’s coming.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: Razial-The Crimson Knight (greatfreedom): does the auto banner on maps actually even work at all like you originally said? cause hackers still roam the servers freely going thru walls

Answer: We put it in place and honestly it worked very well.. In fact players that experianced a lag were flagged and banned. We don't want to keep good players from playing so we've turned it off untill it can be fixed

 

dj9d: Question: DaRkFeNiX32 (drako33): are you going to add more mounts to the game becouse there are only 4 and going to change the mount sistem????

Answer: there will be no new mounts in the near future, but there will be several new pets released in the upcoming game updates

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: <CNN>DGMurdockIII (dgmurdockiii): with 2moons ever alow you to custmize your keys so you can yses your keyboard to walk not the mouse?

Answer: You actually can use wasd to move, and you might want to hit the options and switch to control type "B". Most players use it.

Historian (thehistorian): But at the moment that are no plans for configurable key settings

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Will there be a new graphics engine to allow lower quality settings, or a faster loading graphics engine for low end computers, or preformace based users

Answer: As most of the games, a complete overhaul is not realistic. But we have worked and will continue to work with the developers to lower the burden for low end systems as well, as this is important with the upcoming massive contents. But realistically, even built in Intel Graphics run the game at decent level, these days..:>

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Will there be a Controller/Joystick implementation, instead of using keyboard and mouse?

Answer: Some controlers allow you to map keys to the directions so those will work already.

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (artaxs): Mr. Perry, what can you tell us about project "Top Secret" ? Is it a developer's contest of some sort?

Answer: Top Secret is the biggest development team in the world (over 60,000 people) I’m going to make one of these people the USA director of a future Acclaim MMO. I’m getting pretty close to a decision at this point, on who that’s going to be. We had planned to hire a team to make the game (had even signed the contract) but the game design was very different from what I had expected, at the same time, the users asked if they could try to make the game themselves. So we offered up a $1M prize to cover the costs that would normally stop an indie developer from shipping a game like this (they can use any state-of-the-art 3D engine in the world.) Right now there are teams making the game, so we just have to be patient and wait and see what they end up with. If we like what they

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: 2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): Was 2Moons modeled after/ inspired by any previous games?

Answer: 2Moons was based on the Korean game Dekaron. We wrote a new story for it, but otherwise, it’s the same game. We’re working to improve it all the time.

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: Justin (justintoms): Are there any plans for the game not to close when you get a dc? just bigng you back to the character select screen for instance

Answer: Well, that is a tough issue. We are working with the developers for such features. But current implementations is to provide a better clean up of connections between client and server. We will be working on for a fix regarding DC, with multiple approaches, to it.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: <CNN>DGMurdockIII (dgmurdockiii): have you thougt about getting SwitchBlade for contorler support?

Answer: Honestly, we haven't

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: 2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): How did you guys come up with such a variety of monsters? Was there a brain storming session? or were ideas submitted?

Answer: The monsters and player character models were all part of the original game Dekaron, and were designed by the Korean team.

 

dj9d: Question: HellsSaint (saintofhell): I believe DC's have improved greatly since I started playing, great job guys!!

Answer: thanks!

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: XFUBX (xfubx): Will you be Adding More Servers To The List?

Answer: Yes, and or No. In fact, we are working on more exciting features even right now with some of the servers. Thou will be able to see those results soon.

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: icyreaper: What seperates 2moons from any diffrent generic grinding mmo ?

Answer: Right now, 2Moons is more grind than it is anything else, but we are working toward some changes in that structure. It might take some time, but we’re definitely on it big time.

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: <CNN>DGMurdockIII (dgmurdockiii): will there be support for linux or mac?

Answer: Sorry, no official support for those platforms.

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Also no unofficial clients for those asa well.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: [Xfire] Artaxs (artaxs): Is the "Bad Moons Rising" expansion material new to the game in the English version, or has it also been ported from the Korean game?

Answer: It was translated, then the text modified to fit our story line... so not 100% direct port.

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (artaxs): Is Acclaim Games the spiritual successor of more than just the Acclaim name and logo?

Answer: Acclaim used to be the #1 games publisher, when you ask a room of people how many have played an Acclaim game, the answer is ‘most of them’. So it’s a strong brand (in awareness), but we are completely re-defining the games, it’s not about NBA Jam anymore, it’s all about PC, Online, Free games. We are also into taking risks, some of the games coming are truly ‘out-there’ (even I think we’re crazy) and I think that’s important. Risk = Reward. So I promise one thing, you won’t ever be able to predict what our next move will be.

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: Razial-The Crimson Knight (greatfreedom): mr perry recently there was a pettion to see how many people thought the increase the amount of exp on maps would be a good thing to do toincrease amount of peopel wanting to level and enjoy the game, yet it was declined for what reasons?

Answer: Increasing experience levels is connected with the overall issue of balancing. It’s always nice to reward players , but it’s also no fun if you finish too fast. Remember, it takes time to add new content, and we don’t want all our players at level 150 before we can develop advanced game material for them. Ultimately, it’s a game, and we want you to enjoy the ride. It doesn’t have to be all instant gratification. But seriously, we really look at a variety of factors before we change the balance of the game, and in this case, we didn’t think it was a good idea. But we do run events with extra XP!

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: Justin (justintoms): Do you guys have any intention of doing more interactive stuff such as this with the community even for eexample in the game in loa castle lets say

Answer: We have a lot of great suggestions.. trivia contests, Dueling tournaments, and sometimes a nice boss spwan or two.

Historian (thehistorian): Spawn...

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: HellsSaint (saintofhell): Have you considered other in-game mini-games, other then fishing - perhaps you can make 'bets' a type of card game maybe

Answer: Yes. Definitely! No specifics yet, but we are working on it.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: Justin (justintoms): I know you have all of those events and such but I was moslty reffering to discussions like this, I mean I love those events and a participate in them whenever the lag is not to great but talking iwth the team is nice in the sense that you can get your questiosn answered.

Answer: We at one time tossed around the Idea of a Podcast... but one where the community could call in. Like a radio talkshow.

 

dj9d: Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Will there be any sub skills or professions? eg weapon crafting

Answer: no immediate plans for this, but it may happen in future updates. we'll bring it to the discussion table as well

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: GODJonez (godjonez): Is it at all possible to have a version of the game you could play privately with your friends without interacting with other players at all?

Answer: It’s not in our plan at the point to have a single-player version. Acclaim is pretty committed to the free-to-play multiplayer experience.

DeMaria (demaria99): *this point

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Honestly, do you enjoy playing the games you create?

Answer: Yes

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Honestly, do you enjoy playing the games you create?

Answer: I love the games we have.. I totally suck at Dance though. But keep in mind that I'm a game colloctor so I love gaming in general.

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (2weeksofmoons): As 2Moons continues to gain popularity, what are you most looking forward to next?

Answer: My team is scared that I will answer this question… My goal for 2Moons is to firstly get a game so that people use it as evidence that free can work, that we don’t need to make people climb over a ‘money wall’ before playing our games. I think it’s frankly the most honest business model there is. If you don’t like our game it costs nothing, in fact people will only start buying stuff if they love our game. That’s cool, it keeps us on our toes! So I’m looking forward to the game growing dramatically over the next couple of years. The more popular it becomes in the USA, the more sway I get over the development team. So I’m most looking forward to have a very popular free game, that makes the developer so much money, that when we ask for changes, it’s put at the top of the list every

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: [t]lol,robert~ (ace0725): People are leveling and getting higher everyday, Are there any plans on higher level skills?

Answer: Actually, with each updates, more skills are poured into the game. But with next update expected in next 3 ~4 month, we will see significantly more skills for high level players as well.

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: [Xf Helper] Supercop007 (supercop007): With an engaging back-story behind 2Moons, has there been talk of a novel or an extension to the 2Moons universe in written form?

Answer: At the moment, I am working on some expansion of the back story, but it is still in the development stage. In time, it’s entirely possible that we could write some novels about different periods in the 2Moons history. Nothing is on the schedule yet, though.

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Do you guys play anyother games than Acclaim games?

Answer: Are you kidding?

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (artaxs): Mr. Perry, "Enter The Matrix" was released to consoles as well as PC -- With the focus on free online PC games, I suppose we won't see any more MMO PC-to-console crossovers from Acclaim.

Answer: We don’t mind what platforms our games run on, I’m personally a big console & handheld fan, and I guess PDA’s too! Even Facebook/Myspace is now a platform. So there’s no reason at all why we would avoid any platform as long as they let our games be free.

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: G2Wolf (g2wolf): Are they any plans to put a level cap?

Answer: The current level cap is 150. No plans to extend it at this time.

 

Historian (thehistorian): Question: [Xf Helper] MasterRen (masterren): Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Do you guys play anyother games than Acclaim games?

Answer: I'm currently playing GTA IV, Halo 3, WSOP on Xbox, Seaman on my dreamcast, FF I4 ps one, a bunch of snes, poker on my gameboy, Endles ocean on my wii... how much time do we have here?

Historian (thehistorian): REZ on my xbox and DC

 

dperry (shinydp): Question: (ocelot1633): Do you guys play any other games than Acclaim games?

Answer: Yes, I pretend not to be from a game company (competitors won’t let us play their games) and sign up for most games as a woman called Mary. (Well I tried my name, but got blocked.) As Mary, I get invited to just about everything as they want girl gamers. So I play a lot of stuff!

 

DeMaria (demaria99): Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Do you guys play anyother games than Acclaim games?

Answer: <- SHAMELESS PLUG -> I just wrote a book about Spore…

 

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Question: Leopardus Pardalis (ocelot1633): Do you guys play anyother games than Acclaim games?

Answer: YES. Old school. FAMICOM, DREAM CAST...SAKURA DAISEN 1~4

 

dperry (shinydp): Someone is ringing the 5PM bell, so thanks everyone, this was fun!

DeMaria (demaria99): thanks everyone

dj9d: thanks guys!

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Thanks for joining!

ServerGuy (acclaimtechteam): Now it's time for beer!

Historian (thehistorian): Alright everyone.. have a good night..

2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): Alright everyone thanks again for coming to the 2Moons chat. Now for the prizes!! (woot)

2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): if you're one of the winners be sure to PM me to claim your prize. If you can't -- try adding me as a friend!

Historian (thehistorian): I can haz prizez?

2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): 10 winners at the chat will each receive the Ariel pet and a Veteran's Amulet (90 days)!

2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons):

Justinleopardus pardalis

Godjonez

razial-the crimson knight

Ingram DoD

Linkburrz3

HellsSaint

XFUBX

qus

tol robert~

DGmurdockIII

 

2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): Thanks again everyone!

2Moons Raid Leader (2weeksofmoons): Don't forget to PM me winners!