A.I. Why do like to play games? How would you describe yourself as a player?
Spirit-Fists : For me, gaming is my way to relax, I work hard most of the week and like to unwind by throwing myself in to a game that I enjoy. I don’t know how I would describe myself as a player, I suppose I would consider myself a semi hardcore player who lives by the honour system, “do to others as you would have them do to you”
A.I. : You have played a long time, felt many emotions. What would you identify as the essence of 9D?
Spirit-Fists : I feel the essence of 9Dragons is the community and how you respond to others. I would probably have left 9D a few months earlier if it wasn’t for the large amount of friends I have made over the years in 9D. Friendship and respect are things you must work hard to get and it’s not always easy to just turn your back and leave, which is why I am still connected to SR even if I’m no longer playing 9D.
A.I. : 9Dragons back in 2007, was better than it is now?
Spirit-Fists : It was much more fun back in the earlier days of 9D. I feel that Acclaim have sort of lost the plot over the last year. They are too concerned with taking players money in the Item Mall and don’t spend enough time and concern over the huge amount of bugs still plaguing the game. Back in 2007 and 2008 many players were still playing for fun and enjoyment of the game, nowadays since the game has stagnated with nothing new coming in the near future, many players only care about the imbalanced PVP and abusing this to annoy and disrupt other players games.
A.I. : Why did you quit playing 9D?
Spirit-Fists : I had reached the Endgame of 9D. After hitting each and every level cap, I felt there was nothing left for me do in 9D. It also had a little to do with Acclaim and Indy’s lack of communication with the player base and lack of patches that actually fix bugs, without bringing more bugs to the game. It got to the stage that the excitement and enthusiasm that I used to feel was no longer there.
A.I. : What is you opinion on the management of the game? What do you think of Games Managers?
Spirit-Fists : Acclaim and Indy have let themselves and the players down by leaving the game full of bugs and proving that they don’t actually know much about the game in general. Take the Webinar’s for example, on a few occasions I posed some perfectly good questions that many players wanted the answers for, but they never knew anything and could only reply with “ we’ll have to ask the devs and get back to you” and they still haven’t answered these questions. As for the GM’s I have had good times and bad times with them. I have all the respect in the world for Nathan (DragonHead) he helped me soo much in the early days with a serious lag and DC issue I had, and I’m so glad he was promoted to Head GM when Phew left for Spellbound. Then there was Max (Phew), we clashed multiple times due to his lack of communication and the fact that he kept telling us lies and I was catching him out. Even as a VGM he was unhelpful and unreachable 99% of the time, when I needed him for serious reasons. He didn’t like it when I posted the true IP and location of Bardo (in LA) when he was telling the player base that it had already moved to the EU 2 months earlier. I didn’t like being lied to by the man who was supposed to be our leader and mentor.
A.I. : What was your funny and tragic moment in 9Dragons?
Spirit-Fists : I’ve had many funny moments in 9D, most of these in PVP with United Forces, specifically early on at the start of the War with UF when I hounded and terrorized Evil Homer with Onslaught in the cave. The War with the Dragons in CC3 and CC4 was also great fun, I loved that they thought of me as a “Warmonger” xD
My saddest moment was the day I finally decided to leave 9D for good. After making a shout to inform all my friends and enemies that I was leaving, I spent over 2 very emotional hours replying to the many messages I was getting wishing me the best and asking me not to leave.
A.I. : What you think about the 9Dragons forum? Did you visit it often? Is it worth to spend time there? What about the moderation team?
Spirit-Fists : The forum is a great tool for players to learn and ask questions, but there are also many players who use it purely to abuse other players. The moderation team needs to become more neutral, there were times that posts that needed locking right away were left open to abuse because it was a friend of a mod who had started the post, or the mod was in the a band that was at war with the posting player.
A.I. : You were a VGM. How was your experience as a VGM ? Why did you leave the VGM team?
Spirit-Fists : I joined the VGM team on the basis that we would be helping the player base communicate with the GM’s and Devs, but it quickly became clear that our thoughts and advice were rarely acknowledged or taken seriously. I also had a problem with other VGM’s from opposing bands who would start flaming posts in the VGM forum just because they were unable to do so ingame or on the general forum. For a long time, all the VGM’s did was report gold spammers and chat to players, getting asked questions that we ourselves did not know the answers to because the GM team didn’t give us much information. My VGM char was also placed on a different server from my playing server and due to the time zone difference between the US server my VGM char was on and my time zone in the EU, the server was normally very quiet at the times I logged to help.
"Leadership can be thought of as a capacity to define oneself to others in a way that clarifies and expands a vision of the future." (EDWIN H. FRIEDMAN)
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