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Originally posted by Admin
The bottom line is I don't feel right about sending people to a game that I feel treats people badly or with dishonesty.

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This is what this all comes down to.. Your job Admin, is not to "send" anyone anywhere. Your job is to inform, and let people go where they wish. On the same point, your job is not to stop or hinder people to go anywhere either.
That's the most important reason why Mourning should not have been removed. Press ethics.

There is something called press ethics. Whatever you call MMORPG.com it's obviously widely viewed as the customers main MMO-news site. Strict press ethics is the only way you can keep from becoming corrupted over time, when offering this kind of services. What you've done here is a step on such a path. I would urge you to plan your site-policy for the long term, Admin.

You have probably done this with the best of intentions of course. I can easily see how the behavior of the Mourning staff would be offensive. I can also see how you might have thouht this move would be good in making the statement "behave" to every potential miscreant.
But did you consider what this would do for your credibility? It took but a few dis-satisfied forum-trollers to create the first landslide of Mourning dis-creditation a few months ago. So even though most people just shrug or say "good riddance" when recieving the news of Mournings removal, it doesen't really take all that many people pointing out the true downsides to this decision (press ethics) to really hurt MMORPG.com's credibility.

There is a multitude of reasons why a site such as yours would make such a move, many of which are very bad indeed.
You could be on the payroll of a competitor of Mourning being paid to discredit it for example. While I don't particulary belive such is the case here, the possability in itself strongly suggest you shouldn't have done this. Also, while I don't particulary belive that you are taking money for discrediting Mourning, many things suggest to its probability.
First off you're in this for the money (or so all the adds imply). You'd have to make this a rare event to remain credability (and thus stay on the payroll). Mourning is a perfect target because it has severely bad underground reputation (many people would just be glad hearing someone is fighting back against the terrible community abusers), and as such no suspicion would be considered. Mourning has some new unique features and possably a combat system to ravish the best of them, potentially making them a very dangerous competition to the big boys (whom would be your true employer, and whom would have insiders in Mourning).

Another example could be Admin on a powertrip, using your media-power to manipulating the market forces for whatever reason.

Historically such media abuse where pretty common before press ethics became enforced.
As such it is highly probable such is the case here as well, however sympathetic you may seem Admin. It's simply part of human nature.
Again, true or not, such possabilities are a big reason press ethics is so important for credability. While you may call your site "promotional" instead of "news" there is no doubt you are a major (maybe the biggest, I don't know) MMORPG media site.

Ok this is what ive learned.

Some potential players went to mourning.com and brought the "bnet kiddie" attitude which has been banned from mourning. They got permanently kicked off the site, got upset and began to tell their friends to go to the site and flame it, which they did. Some people began accusing mourning of beinga scam and all sorts of rumors started to surface, the devs attempted to address the issue pointed out some facts but the Evil that is "bnet kiddies" endured and continued their bashing, finally it seemed that the mods had gotten control of the the people involved and got them off the site. The site went back to what was important and everyone began anticipating the game.

A few unfortunate incidents however prompted some more speculation and the return of the Evil "bnet kiddies" who began some more flames and attempted to spread some fires. though they could not do it on the Mourning website as they had been banned they came here to a free reign of terror. The "bnet Kiddies" ranted with absalute nonesense about the events that happend at mourning.com, they spread there venom to the boards of mmorpg.com untill finally the mourning team could take no more... and through poor judgement and im sure blinding rage threatened some of the Evil "bnet Kiddies" with legal actions.

Nnow this of course is completley uncalled for on the MMORPG website, the mourning staff have tried repetedley to contact the MMORPG website in hope to moderate people flaming there company name and game image, but to no success. This prompted some anger between MMORPG and Mourning, through some rash descisions and due to unfortunate Evil "bnet kiddie" influence, mourning was removed from from mmorpg.com.

The bnet kiddies are coming... lock your doors.... hide your children.... get large explosives... no mmo is safe.

the fact that due to influence of these kids, they where able to manipulate both mmorpg and mourning into doing some pretty dumb things is a sad blow to mmorpg's everywhere....

Don't believe me, do a little research, read some of the posts of these guys. Its absalutley insane what they are claiming. And the level of insults and discrediting of the game Mourning is incredible. It really should have been delt with by the MMORPG admins, but agani due to some poor judgement calls on both sides i think some bridges where burned.

I just hope the both of them can work it out, its truly a sad blow to the mmo community as a whole.

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Originally posted by Drakex
People look to mmorpg.com to be a complete listing of mmo's ont he market, and coming to the market. (..)Rkalia - Rabbi - Drakex

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Well apparently people that have accounts here for a entire year but dont post until now(!?) expect a complete listning, othervise you people must be psychic to be able to speak for "all" people.

If a dev/publisher for a game goes to a third party forum & starts yelling "Ill sue" when somebody posts something negative (real or not doesnt matter) thats a good indicator that something is fubar. There is always nonsense/rumors/hype in any forum because of the whole "express your opinion.

Mmorpg.com can remove every game of the listning except WoW & EQII if they want since its a private business (why I choose these 2 for example is becuase they both have HUGE companys behind them). If you think thats bad business, well so be it.

aww, people flame games all the time..I don't see other companies threatening legal action and going around trying to tell other sites to moderate bad comments towards their game...its gestapo tactics and ridiculous

MMORPG is a site I go to see different games and their information. If a game is out and about, I usually can find some blurb of it here.

Granted, you as admin and those that run these boards may not care for the attitude expressed by those from the Mourning boards, and vice versa; however, I think you do yourself a disservice by putting yourself now in a position of saying "we cannot" in reference to anything representing Mourning. It is a double edged sword you cast yourself upon. Taking a stand against them in what you perceive to be your "justice" and casting credibility upon yourself (MMORPG) as a site to get the unbiased news about games.

Granted, not all the games you have listed here have their own forums. So, that can be let go.

What you did do, in my opinion only, was you allowed yourself to be manipulated in to doing exactly what they wanted at Mourning. They could not control what is said here. You provided that for them.

I hope you reconsider your position, but your boards your call

You're funny, Fidus.

As one of those people you're labeling as a 'bnet kiddie,' I am no such thing.

I was a fan of the game. I've been following the game since July 04. I saw flaws in their public relations. I was thoughtful, and I was productive... I wrote a post about it:
http://www.realmsoftorment.net/forums/showthread.php3?s=8afce40e30a9baac4f79dd9be2805e21&threadid=17386

Shortly after, I realized Mourning was beyond saving. In your entire post, you did not ONCE allude to exactly what it was the Mourning devs did to prompt all of this. You have obviously 'learned' everything from a very biased informant. Are you even aware of the events surrounding the spring ban fest? That is essentially the straw that broke the camels back, and that same night I went into their chat to challenge their manuevering where that was concerned - I was kicked from the chat, and within the hour I came here to make my first posts on the Mourning boards informing everyone what had happened. It all went downhill from there for Mourning.

We are not random people that came out of no where with the intention of sinking this game. We were once fans, who became disillusioned after having witnessed mistake after mistake on their part. Do you think ANY of this would have happened if we were random 'bnet kiddies' with no grounded complaints against the Mourning team? It happened for a reason. If the Mourning team was not guilty of such poor social skills, we would have been kicked out on our asses and laughed at. Instead, people saw the truth in what we were saying and it culminated from there.

If Mourning make it past Beta, I am sure it will be in the list, but to actually have a forum is a privilege at the solo discretion of the MMORPG.com staff.

Until they make it past beta, look like a dead horse to me.

added to tiamats post claiming that they ASKED to be removed

The .bnet kiddie-heathens are a species all of thier own, and anyone who is capable of dealing with teenagers on a regular, daily basis can handle the .bnet babies. It's simple, really. Explain to them what you percieve to be the error of thier ways, in a calm and rational manner, and then /ignore thier bombastic lil butts when they spaz out in thier vaunted fashion. You have said your piece, getting it off of your chest, and now you can turn your attention towards other matters. However, if you choose to NOT ignore them and continue to lower yourself down to -thier- standards, then you are not much better than the trolls you claim to abhor and you deserve the hassle of thier returning presence.

Feeding trolls is NOT productive, and after a very, very short while, it loses any and all of it's purported entertainment-value.

As for the Mourning forums, if you read what was posted there on a fairly regular basis, you learned quickly to recognize some of the posters, as well as thier rather 'colourful' posting styles. I registered over there back in 2002, and managed to hold my text-based silence until today, on thier poll. Never managed to make it into the game's beta-test, and have decided to not pre-order at this time, because I prefer to experience, first-hand and with my own eyes on my own computer system, a game before I shell out the hard-earned cash.

I'll continue to follow-up on the whole Mourning situation, because I'm a work-at-home mom-type with a bit of free time in the mornings, and I'll eventually make my own decision as to whether or not to buy it....and that choice will be made without any influence from this site or Mourning's site.

...btw, this whole situation reminds me of a game from long-ago, named Lords of Empyria, which was being created by a fella named Fred Arbona....anyone else here remember THAT lil bit of Hades??

I feel the need to defend myself. I've been on the fence with LHE and Mourning forever. I still have my preorder in but I'm just reporting the news. It's up to the audience to translate it. I didn't encourage them to do anything, I simply told them the exact same thing MMORPG.com told them to do, which was post their comments in this thread.

Your worship is noted.

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Originally posted by Bitey
Just to let the staff of mmorpg.com know that anyone who posts on this thread with 1 post and is bashing our forums is from mourning. FL encouraged them to this

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You may comment on their decision to remove the game by posting in this thread on their site.http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion.cf.../1/loadclass/35

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Anyway, good move on mmorpg.com part. If you are not updated, the admins of mourning were threating mmorpg.com users on the forums. They went and asked mmorpg without court order to hand over the information of users. This is on top of them on the forums flaming paratropper in representing mmorpg.com. Last of all, mmorpg.com was giving mourning free presstime while being flamed by the Romanian Staff.

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Again FL is encouraging people that have never been invloved in mmorpg.com to come and post how crappy mmorpg.com is for doing this. Please ignore people with 1-5 posts, they are fanboys sent here to make it look like it was not a popular choice on mmorpg.com. However, if you look at people that have been here a month and over, it is a popular choice!

Thanks mmorpg.com

-from left field

having seen brief snippets of comments posted by people affiliated with the game Mourning I was appalled by the attitude and expressions with which they communicated, and their utter and complete lack of professionalism.

I know nothing about the company producing this game, and only know marginally more about the game itself, however any company that would allow itself to be represented in that manner in a 'for public consumption' area of viewing is not one I would ever, and will not at this point, support in any manner Consider for a moment if Kraft or PepsiCo or on a more related scale, Microsoft or EA games presented a face of that sort to the public....

I think they have a bit to learn about what hats they should be wearing when dealing with the public and execs should be mortified by the behaviours exhibited by any person under their umbrella regardless of their status of 'CS' or 'Dev'

Good move MMORPG, your decision and behaviour on this matter was the correct one.

To any who will lecture that opinions Mourning voiced contained fact, that is not the issue, for me at least. What matters is the way they handled things, in which they utterly failed, and I feel MMORPG did the best thing in disassociating with them

Just some guy with an opinion

And as soon as you can point out WHERE I'm telling them to come and post how crappy MMORPG.com is I'll give you credit. Until then, your comments mean nothing. Like I said, I've been on both sides of the Mourning fence, I saw the news article and posted it. Then updated it when what was said in the thread and told them that the MMORPG.com staff wanted comments and linked them to this thread. What they post when the come here is solely their discretion.

Again, your worship is noted.

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Originally posted by Bitey
Again FL is encouraging people that have never been invloved in mmorpg.com to come and post how crappy mmorpg.com is for doing this. Please ignore people with 1-5 posts, they are fanboys sent here to make it look like it was not a popular choice on mmorpg.com. However, if you look at people that have been here a month and over, it is a popular choice!

Thanks mmorpg.com

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SPRING BAN FEST = when Mourning banned a number of perfectly peaceful community members for such things as not reporting a bad post, saying 'WTF', etc...

Apparently they covered their tracks and deleted the original post, can't seem to find it... so here's what I copied the day it happened (also, they deleted their "rules" so you're gonna have to fill in the blanks based on the reaction thread):
http://syn-con.com/mourning/showthread.htm

Spring Ban Fest Reaction (immediately following tiamat's post):
http://www.realmsoftorment.net/forums/showthread.php3?s=8afce40e30a9baac4f79dd9be2805e21&threadid=17391

There's so much more stuff out there you first-time visitors are missing out on because the Mourning forums were deleted. Chat logs, etc... showing just how badly Mourning devs lack professionalism.

Just my worthless little opinions in here with very little fact (if any). I don't post much, and I don't think I had looked at Mourning much as a game to play.

However, I am disheartened to see a game pulled from the listing while it still may be a potential game to choose from at some point. I don't come to the site for the forums or much other than the game listing and the information from those listings. The removal of any game makes me question the whole list and it's usefulness when I can not objectively go through and look and news and information for all the available options. I don't care that a discussion forum was removed. I do care that the game list is not as complete and therefore a less useful tool in helping me to find where I might chose to invest my time and money. It also makes me wonder what other reasons a title can be listed/not listed/delisted for. The fact that it brings such questions to mind (founded or not) affects the way the site is viewed.

I do hope the game is at least added back to the listing.

Thanks for listening to my ramble.

P.S. - According to Bitey this post should be ignored. I'd like to say that Bitey's post should be the one ignored.

P.P.S. - I spent way to much time in Pre-Searing this weekend.

Edit: After seeing some of the posts (and reasons they banned people) I would have to say I almost definately would not play that game). However, I still don't like that it's not on the list.

fdash go away, your hoping to make mmorpg.com look bad even though this hurt your site horrible. You lost where most of your traffic comes from, look at the pull from the mourning forum.

Sorrow/Julie/PCGamer/Whoeverthehellyouare, give it up. I have read the Mourning forums a lot over the past few months and your slide from objective industry journalist to LH apologist is complete. Your credibility is on a bus to New Jersey and your left standing on the sidewalk. As for considering who is on the other keyboard...... If you cant stand the heat, then you should know by now where the kitchen door is.

Draxshared, I see you managed to tear yourself away from whatever you position at LH/Mourning is to come and post some poison, good for you I expect you could use a break. As for your "revalations" about MMORPG.com being "in it for the money". Well spank my monkey if you hadnt have pointed that out I dont think any of us would have realised. In fact Im surprised you failed to point out that Mourning is a charity organisation with no interest in making a profit from the game at all. Its obvious from all the free MMO's listed on MMORPG.com that they are just tools of SOE and Blizzard and IGE isnt it ?

Im guessing from Julie(insert surname)'s post that the amazingly visionary and dedicated individual behind Mourning is just doing this to prove a point that he can write a better MMO than anyone else. Well Im not sure if anyone else has noticed but things aint exactly going to plan. Which I guess wont matter since you have spoken for them and let us all know its not about money anyway. Save all that nasty profit stuff for these capitalist pigs at MMORPG.com huh ?

What joke... honestly... thats the most comprehensive 2 pages of complete BS I have read in some time. Congrats to both of you.

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Oh and it just gets so much sweeter as the day goes on. Sometimes I cant beleive my luck and others complete idiocy.

So Julie, "think about the feelings of other people huh". So explain this little lapse in your own standards please ?

Quote : By Julie Blue from Mouring Forums 03/21/05

MMORPG admins are a buncha wieners, plain and simple.

I filed a complaint with them about the imposter there registered under my established nick and claiming to be me.

They told me I would need to fax them a photo ID that I was JulieBlue.

I was like ummm its a nick dick, you think JulieBlue is my real name?

I'm seriously considering asking my editor to burn me a new press ID that says JulieBlue, just to see if they would really act as they claim they would, if I provided photo ID that I was really called JulieBlue. : P

Frankly if you ask me MMORPG wouldnt be a big loss for gamers or the industry.

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And thats your profesional opinion as an independant industry reporter is it ?

SPRUNG!!

[quote]Originally posted by fldash
[b]Just because I own you is no reason to get pissy.[/quote]

Typical kid thinks hes above everyone else. Now bringing out his cool "1337" words.

So we can get an easier to read idea of the community's opinion on the matter...

Go here and vote! :)

Please, step in line behind everyone else. This 'kid' is old enough to be your dad.

[quote]Originally posted by Vullcan
[b][quote]Originally posted by fldash
[b]Just because I own you is no reason to get pissy.[/quote]

Typical kid thinks hes above everyone else. Now bringing out his cool "1337" words.[/b][/quote]