***Notice***. Just for the sake of conclusion, I will not hold back with names. I know who did it, their name is going into this thing.
To be honest, I don't even know what this is supposed to be myself. Rant? review? terribly convoluted ravings that shouldn't go on this forum at all? Anyway, here goes:
There used to be these fine, boring, rutine nights. Where I would sit at home, and just check twitter once in a while. I remember this time, when I was just getting done with most of the games that had been newly released at the current time, and it probably was either a friday or a satturday. Either one of these days, another one of these nights, just checking twitter. Pg13 plays wasn't streaming anything that night it seamed, but then I saw this tweet from Sam Tupy, this person who created that survival game not too long ago which was a decent game, but I hadn't been fully into it at that time. So it says that there's this db folder for beta testing his games, that he's developping something, and he's sending out invites. Naturally, cause I like to help games in their final development stages with bug smashing and the like, I send in my email, and get to try a ruf outline of this new game. It was called redspot. Blood and paril, and was apparently going to be a full on fps. Since there were a few other people on at the moment, I had a good time trying out the beta and giving some feedback. Then new versions got released, and different items were added. At 0.22, we already ahad some real nice things added like the machinegun, timebombs, pipe bombs, grenades, claymores and the like, then development just... stopped for a while. So I completely forgot about the game for a bit, but occasionally logged on anyway to see if other beta members might be playing. Sometimes there were, and sometimes they weren't. And I was thinking, You know, this thing is good for being in an early beta stage, and I can see a lot of potencial with this. I think this can truely turn into a great fps. So after a while, development continues with all sorts of stuff being added like jets, shields, and whatnot to make the gameplay more interesting and strategic. Little problem here, the rocket launcher was added before the ammo system was, so you can expect what was going on back then. So a few versions later, and sam releases this thing. Huge amount of players get on, and they seam to enjoy it aside from the distant shot noises all playing at once making it way too loud. So that's fixed, and sam throws out some more versions where the game keeps getting better with things like the towers to fortify, robots, new types of bombs... you name it. And I'm thinking, cool, a nice game to hang out and unwind on. And back then, it truely was. Everything was perfectly balanced from my standpoint. Everyone lost their stuff when they died, everyone started on equal terms, unless you had a team of course, then it was a lot easier. But even then, things were still balanced because even if the team wasn't eventually killed off, they all had to log off some time, which would reset them. It was the perfect game to just pick up and play for a few minutes after work or school to release stress. oh but wait! Of course, it can't stay like that forever. While people have just been randomly murdering each other, tupy's been working on two new stw updates, then he turns his attension back to redspot, trying to get it payed, but kinda failing at it. So he goes and makes this update, and look! now it contains this feature called bases! Back when they were first introduced, bases didn't do anything really. You could go inside, turn the power off and on, and add wood and gas to it. Bomb defusers, food, those things get added. He goes off to do other things for a while, and I'm like... This is real interesting. Wonder what he's gonna do with this? But then, a few weeks later, I'm just randomly chatting away in the beta skype group. And There was this malik person, who just pissed me off. Just a little tiny bit. So I said fuck to him a few times. This resulted in a kick from the group and no more inclusion by them in any beta related activities. This included team wars, balance tests, introduction of new features, and just about everything else. For saying fuck to malik a few times. You guys getting this? Because at this point, I'd be pretty confused. So I, of course, try, and yes, really try! to talk it over with both tupy, and his testers. And I get mixed reactions. Tupy doesn't seam to have a problem, because it really didn't have anything to do with him as a whole. Oh but there's all the others. StonerFour2O, Kerry, God, Probably a few other people I'm forgetting. And these, btw, are people who weren't even involved in the whole thing, and just saw it happen. I meet them a cupple of times on the beta and main servers, and both times, I'm hated on by them. now, if this only happened on the main server, I would understand. Shiznet like that always went down there, and it was widely accepted that usually someone would insult you, your religion, or your family, and you'd either kill them till they shut up, insulted them back, or just ignored it. However, on the beta server, this usually didn't happen. And get this guys, this was for uttering swear words a few times. So meanwhile, what does sam do with the update? Well first, he adds an item storage area so people who have a base now can go about the game not having to worry about starting from square 1, because they can just store everything they need! and even better, they can now buy all their shiznet on the black market so they have a huge amount of healing items, shields, and weapon ammo waiting for them when they log in and their base is still there! So this tupy person goes and adds a whole bunch of new features, including the ones we just talked about, and releases the thing to the public. Oh, but guess what? $100 prize coming up! Ok, I'll just spoil it for the people who haven't played it yet. Just so you know, this is what I believe went down, I don't know the following for sure but its the closest theory I have from what I've been told. He's the first one online when the update comes around. Good for him! He goes on teamtalk, and of course, all the beta members, cept me of course cause that thingy I mentioned above was still happening, are online with him in a heartbeat. And they all go Hey! lez like... build dis base mahn! So the redspot tactical unit, which is what they call themselves, go build the formentioned base in a new part of the map, lets just call it the mountain. Anyway, so people start getting the update and logging on. They now face a team of... about 6 people, not quite sure myself. Those people have been playing on the update since the start, so they of course know how all of the new items, and the team bases, work. So while some of them are bizzy trashing the new arrivals with sound grenades and bomb defusers and whatever else, the others continuusly grab for bitcoins, wood and gas, then use the money they got to buy more grabbers, wood, gas and machinegun ammo! and naturally this goes up exponentially, because the more money they are able to get from one grabbing session, the more new grabbers they can buy. Thus, they get huge amounts of barricade bombs, defusers, health items, and whatever they need just from grabbing at this point I guess. Barricade bombs get placed in an ever expanding parimitar around their base, while some others keep the newbies back from interfeering. Parimitar in place, they can now all devote themselves to the task of expantion! cool. So now they have so much money that they can pretty much buy whatever on demand. 5000 wood is bought, and the base is reinforced, and reinforced, and reinforced... few hours later, its got a million health and no one can even get close to it. Because, and this is another little tidbit thrown in just for good measure, they always got at least one person on the server to ensure no one tampers with their bombs or bases. And I actually know this, because I've really been logged on and checking just about every diferent part of the day. Its morning for me? Tupy, stoner and all the other americans are getting offline, some are still here though. Through the day, I see people like sito and hamata online, with god sometimes making an appearance. And towards the night, shiznet gets crazy with a lot more r t u members logged on at one time, making it impossible to do just about anything. People begin to find out about this ultra powerful base, and you can actually take a look at it without being shot if you go to 750 750 50 on the map. But, people learn pretty quickly not to say anything that may put them on r t u's hitlist, because then they'll never be able to propperly play the game again. So by now i've also found out about, and downloaded, the new update. Guide's all updated, over the next few days made a few more modifications to it to suit the last few code changes tupy's made, and I play the game in its updated form. You see, I've never listened to commun sense. I'm just stupid that way. So when I see this monstrocity of a base that r t u has created, its natural that I might just get a little ticked off that such imbalances are allowed to happen. And guess what? R t u's expantionism hasn't stopped there! here are just some of the things I've wittnissed.
1: Almost instant kcullings of new teams. When a team, or solo player first creates a base, it is almost certain that r t u will come after you as soon as they find out its location. This is pretty easy to do, simply track the person and go to where they hang around most often. The player is ganged up on and killed and their base destroyed. Depending on how the base's defenses are set up, this may be over quickly, or it can take a little longer. R t u don't hezetate to throw themselves at barricade bombed bases in hopes of breaking the parimitar and being able to attack it or loot it from close range. Because most of the r tu members know each other outside of the game, when a base is being taken down there's usually more than two people involved in its destruction.
2: Control and purging of the mountain. A very recent development of the r t u is to claymore the entrance to the mountain, making it unable for anyone to enter without being killed, or losing a huge amount of health unless they are invisible. Even then, in a lot of cases I've seen an r t u guard hanging about waiting to tell others. Mountain entrance claymored. But that's not all! Because of this, they are pretty much the only ones who can safely come and go there. Now item grabbers transport a great many items to your location. The one thing they don't transport however is other item grabbers. Since most of the playerbase is always concentrated at the coord range north 0 to 500 and east 0 to 750, grabbers will become scarcer and scarcer as more are found and used up. Because of how the items work, more and more grabbers are going to start poppulating the mountain area, and the non r t u members will soon have to search for ages just to find one. The only way this balance is usually tipped back into the middle a bit is if someone somehow makes it through the blockade and manages to take and use enough item grabbers to replenish their numbers to the south a bit. Or r t u takes and uses them, which might give the south some more. However, do to r t u's large money reserves, they don't even need to go out looking for grabbers because they can just buy them and receive them right at their base within 15 minutes. This brings me to my next point.
3: Trade and extortion. While trading is not a bad thing at all in most cases, here's why its a bad thing in r t u's case. They have access to just about infinit resources. I have no inside info, but they probably have a lot of bitcoins converted into $, with which they are able to buy all sorts of random items that players may need. Those items are then souled at higher prices to the other players, which is profit for them, but since most players do not have a team, let alone a base, and most if not all bases are destroyed within a short time of their creation anyway, its overall a loss for the other players. I also mentioned extortion. Recently, r t u have started the trend of letting people into their "Terratory" as they call it, for generous amounts of bitcoin bribes and payoffs. The problem here is that once inside, you're just about dependant on r t u to keep their word. Because if they start to hunt you down in their, you can't really do much of anything because they run around with 15000 health, 300 shielded shots, and full gas masks just about all of the time, and getting out is impossible because of the claymores. There you have it. A situation which is impossible to escape without being killed. here's what it looks like now. Because of the new features, one team now holds a majority of the power within the game, and no other teams are able to get organized. I've literally seen teams be formed, bases be built, only to be torn down by the members of r t u minutes later. And lets just disregard the fact that even getting a base started is extremely hard with r t u in power, because most of the time they tend to kill members of other teams perfectly timed to make them lose their wood. To be fair, I don't actually know if this is in fact deliberate and an effort to stop those teams from getting established, or just random coincidences with the tracking menu. The conclusion of this whatever is that I, personally and myself, do not see myself returning to this game any time soon, or at least until the balance issues are resolved. I am fully aware that I have said this multiple times now, and I have given the game multiple second chances, but its time for me to move on. To what, I don't know, but it'll certainly be a more balanced game than this. Perhaps, I'll start playing core exiles again, and actually advance my character a bit more, because I really want a better ship :d. Or maybe just focus on finally beating manamon too, because of several save file and registering complications I couldn't yet do this. At least, I'm not leaving this game with only bad memmories, since there were a lot of days before the new update which just involved unwinding and doing a bit of vertual killing and yelling back and fourth after another stressfull day at school. Lets just say, redspot is not forgotten, its just way on the back burner and this is probably where its going to stay for a while.