SharePlay Newsletter
No. 7, September 8, 1998, Tuesday
Dear SharePlay Newsletter readers,
In this issue you can read about:
1. Number of Space Merchant users reaches 4000
2. New T1 line and servers
3. The Magellan Conflict beta is postponed
4. SharePlay sponsors Monarchy
5. Panumbra update
6. SharePlay signs up with 24/7 advertising network
7. Office expansion
1. Number of Space Merchant users reaches 4000
Space Merchant went through an explosive growth in the last month. We have over 4000 registered users, and 60-70 people are online almost all the time.
We are patching Space Merchant every Tuesday. We have fixed a lot of bugs and made a lot of changes based on player suggestions. We are shooting for a stable version by the end of September, and hopefully a 1.0 release by November 1. Check the webboard for regular updates.
Thank you all for your valuable feedback!
2. New T1 line and servers
With 60-70 people online in Space Merchant all the time, our ISDN line is almost always completely saturated, and the lllllaaaaagggggg is bad. If you are looking for the best time to play, try between 12:00 am and 3 pm CST - when people in America are sleeping or are in school…
Trying to catch up with the lag monster, we managed to secure enough financing to lease a faster network connection and purchase better servers. We ordered a T1 line, which will increase our network capacity by about 12 times, and we are also buying two new database servers for Space Merchant and Panumbra. The T1 line installation will take 4 to 6 weeks, depending on the telephone company. You should see a lot less lag by mid October.
Moving to the new line and servers will cause some downtime, check the webboard and the website for the exact dates and times.
3. The Magellan Conflict beta is postponed
Our Magellan programmer (Mike) has joined the stream of people leaving us last month. We had to stop development on The Magellan Conflict until we have enough financing (in addition to the money for the servers and T1 line) to hire a new Magellan programmer. We hope that this will happen by October and we can continue working on Magellan, and start beta testing by the end of December. We will keep you updated.
4. SharePlay sponsors Monarchy
We are happy to announce our new partnership with Monarchy. Monarchy is one of the best browser-based online games, a massively multiplayer strategy game taking place in a fantasy world. Check it out! You will notice that a SharePlay banner is displayed on the home page, and if you play Monarchy and run out of turns, you can play Space Merchant from any page with just one click!
We are happy to help out Evernight Design, the makers of Monarchy. We both regard the sponsorship as the beginning of a long-term working relationship between Evernight Design and SharePlay, one that will benefit both of us and all of our players.
5. Panumbra update
We are improving Panumbra continuously, but stability is still a problem. Server restarts are necessary about twice a day, but the game is usually well playable between restarts. Check out the web board and the list of known bugs for more details.
Our number one goal is to stabilize Panumbra 2.1 before we add any new features. Version 3.0, therefore, is lower priority, and the release date is shifting, probably to the first quarter of 1999. We will release interim versions with smaller changes before that. We will announce those versions once we have defined them.
6. SharePlay signs up with 24/7 advertising network
We have signed up with 24/7, one of the largest advertising networks on the net. We hope this partnership will increase our advertising income so that we can afford the necessary equipment and staff to serve our players' needs.
If you would like to support us, look at our ads on our site. You never know, you may find something that interests you…
7. Office expansion
We are expanding our office into the office next to us. Our current office is very crowded. The new office will add enough space for all SharePlay staff, our servers and network equipment, and a meeting room. The move will take place sometime within the next two weeks, and will cause some downtime due to rewiring. Check the website and the webboard for announcements.
Thank you for reading our newsletter.
Regards,
Marta Gabnai
and the SharePlay development team
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