Mass Bannings in Sociolotron! Is it political???

There have been mass bannings from Sociolotron in recent days (over 50 gamers banned), and once again it appears that an overly restrictive TOS has been used to execute the bannings. What makes the banning particularly interesting is that the banned players are all leading players in the most powerful gangs/guilds in Sociolotron. What, you may ask, could possibly get one banned from Sociolotron? ? a game in which gang rape is an accepted part of role play? To hear Gamemaster tell it, players were ::cough:: ?griefing? ::cough:: -- but to hear many of the other players tell it, the story is rather different?

As one anonymous gamer put it: ?The truth behind this what?s really going on though is that [Gamemaster] has many staff members close to him that play the game same as regular members and a lot of the regular members don?t even know they are staff and if you piss off one of his staff members they are so close to him and kiss his ass so much and he?s so unaware of what?s really taking place in game that he listens blindly to the staff which gives them an enormous amount of power over the regular players they play with.?

A second gamer concurs, offering this further thought: ?its really sick what?s going on because the staff in my opinion should not be allowed to have that kind of contact with the other beta players they also make rude comments about the beta players in forums calling them whiners if they express disapproval with any rp and they just generally in my opinion are overly involved w the game play of the beta members and to have that type of power on top of it? creates an oppressive atmosphere in game for the beta member and expressing any type of disapproval with staff or the Gamemaster is also considered griefing and a violation of terms of service.?

As is usually the case, the company line is something else. I post the statement from the Gamemaster in its entirety below.

[official statement from Sociolotron?s Gamemaster]

As announced I have banned several accounts today. The list of banned characters on thoise accounts can be found below.

I want to point out again, that these people were deliberately acting in a disturbing way, threatening characters with groups, going after alternate characters of a player, using yahoo and other programs to call in help in order to gang on a character, blocking strategic rooms in order to create lag, disrespecting game staff when asked to move along and so on. At least one of this groupo has already been banned earlier becasue he was not yet 21 and he sneaked in under a false name which in itself is bannable.

So I want you all to understand that these bannings were done for the good of the game and for all other players. None of these characters is a loss for the game since they were neither testing (which is still supposed to be your duty) nor contributing to the RP as either good or evil players, they were simply disturbiung the game and that's why they have been banned. We had discussions in the past what to do in such cases, but the situation has changed within the last year. We now have a game staff that can watch over griefer situations and we can act by banning people who are identified as troublemakers. If ppl are asked for the tenth time to move on because they cause lag and give a "We sit where we want, because you dont want us to" as answer, that's certainly not RP. I have spend the better part of these past 3 days reacting to discussions about lag, implementing crowd control code to counter those ppl, answering to posts in the forum, some of them obviously from ppl who feel their gameplay is affected by crowd control (go figure) and anything but the stuff I should be working on. These people were not onlyu disturbig the game but also my daily work. I also want to point out, that the past policy about RPing has not changed. Play good characters, play bad characters, it doesnt matter as long as your goal is not to disturb the game itself. These bannings were made to make the game enjoyable for the rest of us. Please underatand that I have to act sometimes and can not just let everybody do whatever he wants. many of you have come from TSO with a remark like "Those people ruined TSO" and I will not stand by and let them do the same here. If I see disturbance, I will remove the people in question. I hope you uderstand my reasons here and wont fall for people spreading fears that RP can get you banned and such. You should realize that it took a long time and great efford to talk with those people first before I acted. I don't ban anybdoy from one moment to the other and without trying to reason with him first. Those people had more than one chance. The situation was explained to them over and over again but they flat out refused to cooperate. Their only goal was to wreck havoc here and that's why they were removed.

I hope we can get over this and go on now.
[banned]
Diamond Stephens
Fallen Darkness
Kestrel Divine (a.k.a Remedy)
Mistress Jeckyll (a.k.a Surrender)
Kali Daisdaughter (a.k.a Lupe'sLover)
Mistress Hyde (a.k.a Whippit)
Somasece Britt (a.k.a Soma)
Arthur Pendragon (a.k.a Art)
Black Mumba (a.k.a Envy)
Bounty Hunter (a.k.a Fuck You)
Lilly Stephens
James Stephens
Daniel Stephens
Mat Banks (a.k.a whatcha missen)
Mike Seagrem (a.k.a Homeless Bum)
Lacey Daniels (a.k.a Cutie)
Madison Valentina (a.k.a Madi)
Heather Peace (a.k.a Dream)
Heather Sweet (a.k.a DoubleTrouble)
Bam BamBam
April Dawnn (a.k.a april dawn {Skah})
Dallas Darling (a.k.a tahme)
ApriI Dawn (a.k.a Dr. Dawn)
April Dawn (a.k.a april dawn {Brandy})
Kandy Kiss (a.k.a Zombie)
Bippy Bambam
Creamy Nature
Sean Cronan (a.k.a **Sean Cronan**)
Cyrus TheVirus (a.k.a Q)
Montana Xan (a.k.a ~Xan~)
Kaihulauni Adoniia (a.k.a Hypnotiq')
Cory Monvichi (a.k.a Diablo)
Lilith Daemon (a.k.a RipperAngel)
Paris Morgan (a.k.a Paris)
Ravenn Wolf (a.k.a IceCream)
Huntress Xan (a.k.a Buffy (aka. Slayer))
Liquid Lust (a.k.a Punani)
Busta Brick (a.k.a Rude Boy)
Liquid Lust (a.k.a Punani)
Busta Brick (a.k.a Rude Boy)
Stephan Soul (a.k.a Rude Boy)
Judas Caine (a.k.a Alucard)
Hunter.Hearst Helmsly (a.k.a Scare Crow)
Roman Montague (a.k.a Empire)
Vlad Tepes III (a.k.a Vlad The Impaler)
Paris Morgan (a.k.a Paris)
Ravenn Wolf (a.k.a IceCream)
Huntress Xan (a.k.a Buffy (aka. Slayer))
Stella Stoker (a.k.a Stellsy)
Matt Hunter (a.k.a Troller)
Morpheus Pilumnus (a.k.a Mole)
Morpheus Pilumas (a.k.a CANDY ASS)

Comments

[Storm Armone]

Someone tell [Quote] Gamemaster [End-Quote] that I suggest a spell check :)

[Johnny Lace]

Gosh, that is one of the most unprofessional official publishments Ive seen from a game company.

[mafioso]

Wow. I have ready MANY interesting things here and never posted, but that was by far the worst jibberish I've ever seen. Why, it actually makes EA look good now doesnt it?

[Ezhar Fairlight]

"These people were not onlyu disturbig the game but also my daily work."

Wait a second - isn't dealing with abuse behaviour part of a game masters work?

[Fritty]

I was one of the guys banned (Bam Bam) and I must say they were right. We were complete assholes, blocking everything, yelling at staff and such, so I guess they were right. It's a boring game anyway and the graphic sucks. I'm back to TSO

[CherryBomb]

At least they are paying attention to how people are playing the game. EA seems to be completely clueless about what people are actually doing in TSO.

[Storm Armone]

At least they are paying attention to how people are playing the game. EA seems to be completely clueless about what people are actually doing in TSO.

Posted by CherryBomb at July 2, 2004 12:18 PM
________________________________________________

True...In way's, I think it's more of a matter of EA not caring anymore though, they have failed miserably in the MMORPG category, and there way out is to let the games die on there own.

[Cocoanut]

I don't know what you all are upset over. I can see that you might be upset at having game guys playing alongide you (are they incognito, or can you recognize them?) maybe, but aside from that, I don't get it.

Seems perfectly reasonable to me to kick people out of the game who are distrupting the game. There is a difference between playing good guys and playing bad guys . . . and just not "playing right," and every kid in the universe knows what I mean by that.

As for the transposition of a couple of letters in the statement, I don't think that amounts to calling the whole thing gibberish. It seemed quite clear and straightforward to me.

coco

coco

[Maria LaVeaux]

I read through the promotional material on Sociolotron.
I am having a little trouble imagining a situation in that game that Could lead to banning.
Read it again yourself, criminal empires, rape, drug trafficing, prostitution. In a game where antisocial behaviour is not only allowed, but encouraged, I don't find it surprising that some have gone to extremes. It is the nature of the game. It seems to me hypocritical for the creators of that game to set up that sort of environment, then act aphalled by what they created.
Ultimatly, the responsibility for all that goes on there (And in the perifery) falls to them.

If you choose to live in a sewer, don't complain about the stink.

Maria.

[Cocoanut]

Good point, Maria. I imagine it probably is often rather difficult for the player to determine which sorts of vile play are acceptable and which are not.

coco

[Purity]

I am a player in Sociolotron and in TSO and I have seen many far worse players that create lag, call out of game for help, log off one character to grab another character to go after the player that attacked their other character, log off and get their other character to help their first character who may be chained or racked. Log off after grabbing and racking or chaining up a character to gain a more experienced or stronger character such as a demon to attack the one you had chained up. Calling grief in a not grief situation to get out of rp, there is much more and still they have remained, beta testers have been banned, I know this for a fact since some are my friends we have been there since the beginning together.

Point is banning one for one reason and not someone you are close to or staff is close to is very disturbing and has me questioning if I'll stay, I have canceled 3 accounts with this game leaving one open for the time being, giving up founder accounts because of the lack of effective staff and a GM that only listens to his friends and staff.

[Lady Vamp]

What most have failed to notice or are too blind to have seen is that the game is rigged from the get go. Im surprised that more havent taken notice of it. One of the forum moderators leads the biggest gang in the game; he plays footsie with the creator; and Gamemaster has on more than one occasion done rollbacks to correct errors some of the key players in that gang have made. Gamemaster has even gone so far as tweaked coding in order to give a significant player in the game a much needed heir quickly because he was targeted by many in game that learned of his buddy buddy system with the game creator. Gamemaster uses many excuses to ban players, but many of us that played during the beta period and were close to the mainstream characters, know exactly who runs the game.

Everyone and anyone that pays in to play this game is paying to play by the AE gang and Marcelli rules. They run the game, no one else does. That is also another of the reasons alot of the beta players were banned because they spoke out against the Gamemasters favoritism to this person and those who followed him. The rules only apply to the rest of us, but not to the key players and those that Gamemaster is close to.

Bad business, bad ethics and poor sportsmanship.

[Amazed]

I was directed here by a friend who took what is being written here about Sociolotron, its creator, staff and players as gospel, when in fact most of it is presumptive at best.

It sounds to me like the choice of play by those who were banned was such that it was in direct violation of the game rules. When accepting the TOS, each player agrees to accept the rules as set forth not only upon their account activation, but as the rules change (as rules do in the changing environments of MMORPGs).

A game like Sociolotron, having such a dark theme, cannot be compared to things like TSO. It attracts a wide range of people. It doesn't have to be anyone else's cup of tea; that's why there is variety in gaming.

Sociolotron has a relatively small (in comparison) player base, and as such, the community comes to know one another on a far more intimate basis than would be the case in something like Second Life. It's truly apples and oranges, especially since role play is not something that's enforced (or even suggested) in platform like SL.

The real shame is that an in-depth role play experience, where one's character is affected by another character, can have such long-reaching ramifications. Truly, if it extends this far into your life outside of that game, it's probably best, healthwise, that you uninstall.

[Gengis]

I can't help with smiling reading that anonymous comment about staff playing their own kinder garden and gamemaster having no idea of what really happens. That was on 2004 beta and four years later, nothing has changed.

I think (or I wanna think) that the gamemaster imagined of a very personal virtual experience for everyone but he never thought that the ones supposed to be there to enhance the game experience were going to enhance their own play, inside and outside the game.

I've read here about that so close of him friend and, in my opinion, I don't think he had influenced the game the far some people believe. I rather find him the visible head than the devil himself. Keep in mind that there are at least ten gamemasters and gamemistresses forming the staff and here you are talking about a single person like he was leading the whole ingame society.

This could be a game you could enjoy in a little dose, being involved to a sort of domestic roleplay, but never try to reach too deep into, everything is already done, the entire society is built up and there is no room for drammatical changes. Dishearting but true.

Ethic professional proccedure? Oh god, no, not at all. Could this game become further interesting? Maybe. When staff spend their time working on the game instead playing it.