Curse

lursey · Apr 02, 2008, 04:05 PM // 16:05

if this is a gold/economy related issue, why TW server can't team with international server to form pve or pvp group as long as they are unable to exchange items.

although technically they can still drop items on ground in pve to exchange, in PVP this cannot be done...

if technical difficulty can't yet allow pve grouping internationally, I think at least allowing access in pvp outpost internationally for tw server should be done as soon as possible, I mean hindering tw district to team internationally has greater harm to the game itself than how economy in game is affected, given that for example, HA has already had population problem, and pvp playing has none to limited influence in guildwars economy if they cannot exchange item.

official statements and measure had stated that pve in a closed environment and pvp in a global basis, limiting pvp group forming in a closed environment is not pvp in a global basis.

every single day of restriction will lead to more people leaving the game...which I can't see why this should get prolonged in anyway.

I am in an alliance of TW players, and a lot of them wish to play competitively in pvp and careless in pve or items, limiting them accessing international pvp district leads to huge difficulty in international pvp forming with tw server players, examples in HA,alliance battles, Team arenas,etc.

furthermore, the tw server or precisely tw, macao, hong kong version, they are 3 different regions/countries or location regulated by different laws, and how will that be suitable for using TW laws to regulate other locations that are mentioned.

I understand the reasons of resources wastage of trying to control and overcome the problem of different laws and jurisdictions, and economically affecting a country GDP if much US dollars are leaking in the cyberspace to other country without being calculated, ultimately games are for fun, not for politics, letting licensed players to play the game fairly should be put in utmost priority.

Hong Kong Evil · Apr 02, 2008, 04:43 PM // 16:43

why i play guildwar?

no monthly fee, i can play whenever i like

and i can play with everyone from the world in the international server

now, everything is gone......i was cheated by anet...

seut · Apr 02, 2008, 05:03 PM // 17:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Darksun

The fact that they do it at the expense of an American company makes a sick sort of sense.. Messed up!

Anet is wholly owned by NCSoft.usa which is a subsidiary of NCSoft - a Korean company!

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

Anet can make up bannable case of anything by being creative with eula ... like, i.e. not logging in for 7 days could be bannable offense. Cruel, aint it.

Ridiculous EULAs like this would be void by default and NCSoft.tw would be fined for fraud.

Esan · Apr 02, 2008, 05:08 PM // 17:08

I think a bigger stink needs to be made of this. I'm off to submit this story to slashdot and digg. I encourage others to do so as well.

(Note: I don't mean that NCsoft's actions are objectionable, but rather that Taiwan's ridiculous new "law"-like thing needs to be publicly ridiculed.)

Azora · Apr 02, 2008, 05:26 PM // 17:26

1) i dont get really affected so i dont really care (just a little)
2) i think that that law just.. oh well.. i dont wana be murdered but ( s*uK**s)
3)are they tryng to get they citisens some work? so they kick out gw from their country?because gw doenst want to our bad economy become even worst?

god bless europe

ShoGunTheOne · Apr 02, 2008, 05:45 PM // 17:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by guolisong

If the independence of Taiwan's ever mentioned anywhere in a conversation between native Taiwanese and native China Mainland people, there will always be a flame war when Taiwan's a part of China's brought up even in the slightest sense.

you know, you do have a Very good point there. agree with you
the only possiable way for that solution might just be the change of Chinese party.

HawkofStorms · Apr 02, 2008, 05:45 PM // 17:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by redrum38

How could you know what Gaile say is true or not ?
Do you live in Taiwan ?
I live in Taiwan .
I don't know anything about the new law what Anet say .
Our new President Ma-Ying-Ju just got on , and no law has been changed . How and where and when did Anet to get the NEW LAW and rush on cut off Taiwan's server on 4/1 ?
If the new law is true , why not Gaile show us the change of the new law , or tell us where can we find the new law ?
If the new law is true , I think that Anet should know it a few months ago , but they didn't tell us anything , just tell us the reason after they cut off .
The action let me feel that Anet are lying , a very very big lie .
The fact is Taiwan's players paid for playing like as American or European players , but we have not full service .
That is not fair .

Read my post on this page again.

Dozens of laws are passed each and every day. Something so minor as some internet law involving NCSoft would not get a lot of public attention. Furthermore, the law could have been passed months or even years ago, but only taken affect reccently (and thus the very specific deadline of April 1st, this could also explain how you have a new government just take power and one law passed by the old admin could have just taken affect).

Angelic Upstart · Apr 02, 2008, 05:49 PM // 17:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hong Kong Evil

why i play guildwar?

no monthly fee, i can play whenever i like

and i can play with everyone from the world in the international server

now, everything is gone......i was cheated by anet...

This situation truly sucks for the legitimate players in Taiwan et al.
F$&%#in rmt/botters, still manage to bollox up the game for people when they are being removed.

Oink The Pig · Apr 02, 2008, 07:06 PM // 19:06

Non-Taiwan region players who are members of Taiwan-region guilds have lost the use of most of their own Guild Hall NPCs as a result of this stupid law.

Right now, our guild is following this matter pretty closely and would appreciate it if we can get some sort of word on whether:
1) Our 2-year-old guild, and all of its NPCs, will just disappear at some point
2) We would be able to seek relocation of the guild to a different region
3) We should forget entirely about carrying our guild over to GW2.

Frankly, it really sucks to even think about losing all the effort we put into our guild over the last 2+ years, but it's sounding pretty inevitable at this point.

Chthon · Apr 02, 2008, 07:17 PM // 19:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by michfho

Say in brief the bond indenture limited the right of the game provider 2 things:

1. The customers have their right to request a total refund (and they don't even need to provide any reason) within 7 days start from the buying of the game.
2. No matter what reason, the game provider cannot ban a player's account more than 7 days (for one case).

I thank you for the translation.

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

1. Resolution:

Legal resell: Make all copies sold to Taiwan are sold privately by local denizen (which you trust) who bought them all , waited for 7 days and then resold them.

Technically, refund is now void since buyers are not original customers, and 7 days passed already.

Play on fact that it is since purchase, not since game account activation.

That could work, but it would be a pain. It might be easier just to wait till day 8 before actioning the account anyway. At any rate, I suspect it's #2 that's got NCSoft worried.

Quote:

2. Resolution:

Wanna permaban someone with this kind of stuff? Follow these instructions:

a) Ban account for 7 days
b) Once ban expired, wait one minute (seccond, miliseccond ...).
c) repeat from a)

Anet can make up bannable case of anything by being creative with eula ... like, i.e. not logging in for 7 days could be bannable offense. Cruel, aint it.

I don't think this will work. Your pretextual ban for not logging in is precisely that, pretextual. What you're really doing is banning again (and again) for the same offense, and that's a direct violation of the law. As much as popular culture "celebrates" the creative use of technicalities in law, it's not really the way things work; any court that had to deal with repeated 7-day bans separated by one second each time would look at the real reason for the bans and not the pretext you provided.

Quote:

Originally Posted by lursey

if this is a gold/economy related issue, why TW server can't team with international server to form pve or pvp group as long as they are unable to exchange items.

THIS IS A BRILLIANT IDEA! Please permit me to build on it a little more.

Option 1: Reinstate district travel. TW accounts cannot trade or drop except on the TW servers. All other accounts cannot trade or drop on the TW servers. There, economic isolation accomplished, but you can still play together.
(Variant: Allow other accounts to trade on the TW servers, and then monitor them for gold-buyers. Since virtually no one goes to the Taiwan servers to trade for legitimate reasons, it would be very easy to catch gold buyers this way.

Option 2: OK, so we can't ban TW accounts for more than 7 days, but we can still action TW accounts in other ways besides bans. So, in place of a permaban, why not give a bot account a perma-cannot-trade-or-drop-stuff-status? That would screw a bot account just as effectively as a ban. Now, go reconnect TW to the rest of the world.

I particularly like option #2.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpiritThief

Not sure on this but Taiwan is a part of China right?

Short answer: On paper, yes; for all practical purposes, no.

History lesson: Up until the communist revolution, Taiwan was, without question, a part of China. As they found themselves on the losing end of the communist revolution, the forces of the previous regime retreated to Taiwan. Hostilities ended with the old regime holding Taiwan and the communists holding the entire mainland.
Today, Taiwan is a totally independent nation for all practical intents and purposes. They have their own governmental system, their own economic system, their own legal system, their own tax system, their own dialect of Chinese, etc. Moreover, the mainland government has zero authority over anything that happens in Taiwan. However, the mainland government has a serious irrational pride thing going on and just can't accept that Taiwan is independent, so they vigorously assert that Taiwan is still a part of China, even though that assertion is quite silly to the outside observer. Because of China's threats to throw a temper tantrum at the UN if other nations officially recognize Taiwan as independent, few countries have officially recognized Taiwan's independence, however most countries' behavior toward Taiwan reflects the practical reality of Taiwan's independence.

Darksun · Apr 02, 2008, 08:05 PM // 20:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by seut

Anet is wholly owned by NCSoft.usa which is a subsidiary of NCSoft - a Korean company!

Sorry for the semantic oversight; I meant American built STUDIO & the Korean COMPANY that bought them.

Nanood · Apr 02, 2008, 09:06 PM // 21:06

New government regulations in Taiwan, which take effect April 1, restrict game companies in that region from effectively suspending or banning accounts for participating in professional farming or real-money trading. Guild Wars is highly impacted by local regulations such as this, because Guild Wars operates in a seamless, connected manner between all territories. We cannot sustain a seamless connection when we are unable to effectively police the game in one territory, because professional farmers in that territory could severely damage the game’s economy throughout the world. Therefore, we are forced to disconnect Taiwanese service from the rest of the game world as of April 1.

Users in Taiwan will still be able to participate in their international guilds and compete in international PvP, but as of April 1, they will no longer be able to enter international districts, trade with players outside Taiwan, or play in PvE environments with players outside Taiwan.

Sucks.. But when the governments decide to step in and make LAW the people don't have much choice but to go along with it unless they kick up a big enough stink and I don't think the gaming community in Taiwan is going to affect the policy decisions of the Taiwanese government anytime in the near future.

Chthon · Apr 03, 2008, 02:05 AM // 02:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by guolisong

Irrational pride?...

I also forgot to mention: Referring to Taiwan as independent is a good way to offend a mainlander; and referring to Taiwan as part of China is a good way to offend a Taiwanese. No matter what words you choose, you can't help but offend someone if you even try to discuss the topic at all.

Prokiller88 · Apr 03, 2008, 02:43 AM // 02:43

Pride is something strange especially in southeast Asia. You just call all the asians over there rednecks, or those horses that have the cone over their head, or religious extremists, but they have no idea what those things are. People, over there, need to learn when to throw away your pride and the difference between pride and honor.

This new no trading with taiwan region should NOT have any effect on hk or the other one. Taiwan is independent while the other 2 are SAR(special administration region). This is the craziest thing, one of them should took over the other a long time ago and going by numbers it would have been most likely the communists.

afya · Apr 03, 2008, 03:20 AM // 03:20

Thank you Gaile and friends from the other side of the world for your awareness of this incident. At this point, we at least found a law that would affect the ability of Anet punishing bot/pro farmers. It forbids game company to ban accounts for more than 7 days. (Note:no official confirmation that this is the new law which Gaile/Anet is talking about.)

I'm not a lawyer or legislative expert, so I wouldn't give any suggestion on how Anet could take to avoid the law, but here is another problem. The law was passed in Nov, 2007. There are 4to 5 months from now. Why did the independent declaration so late? Only NCTaiwan and Anet would know~lol

There is nothing I can do now but to send a "begging/complaining" letter to support and wait for further notice from Anet/NCTaiwan.

Wynthyst · Apr 03, 2008, 03:44 AM // 03:44

The reasons for this are numerous, for one thing to avoid having to comply with various national laws in the various countries, but mostly due to the total disregard for the EULA and ROC developed for this game that has been shown by vast numbers of people in these places (i.e. bots and rms). Remember that these agreements and rules were designed to keep the game fun and as fair as can be for the majority of the player base.

I do feel for the legitimate players in these regions, but I can't say I miss the gold seller spams or the lag caused by the thousands upon thousands of bots running on GW servers.

redrum38 · Apr 03, 2008, 05:06 AM // 05:06

I think we found the "new law of Taiwan" which maybe is Gaile/Anet talking about on google .
There is a very important point in the new law of Taiwan , "No matter what reason , the game provider can't ban a player's account more than 7 days (for one case)".
We can understand this point maybe will restrict game companies in that region from effectively suspending or banning accounts for participating in professional farming or real-money trading .
But I think that Anet need to do is trying to think how to solve this question , not aggrieve the right of legal players in Taiwanese district .
Why not let the accounts that belong to Taiwanese district become to belong to American district , then the players need to observe Anet's game rules not Taiwan's law .
And there is another question , I don't know when did the new law passed , when did Anet know the new law , when did the new law need to be observed .
I only know that the new law be advertised on 2007-11-16 (found on google) , and we be cut off on 2008-04-01 .
But Anet didn't tell us anything during 2007-11-16 to 2008-04-01 , they only posted an announcement at afternoon on 2008-03-31 and cut off on 2008-04-01 , then tell us "in response to recent changes to Taiwanese law" after they cut off .
When GW came to Taiwan , there is a very important point on their advertisement video (I had the video in my computer and anyone can downlord it on Taiwan official web) .
"GW is different with other online game , it is not independent or regional , only have one consolidated server , even your account belonged to Taiwanese district , you still can play PVE or PVP with other countries players in international district" .
Why I bought GW ont paid every month , because of this , and as the same as other Taiwanese district players who bought GW .
We paid for playing as the same as other district players , but now we are be cut off , we can't go any other district , we can't whisper and trade with other district players , but other district can do that .
Now Taiwan's GW is not primitive GW anymore , I feel my right be aggrieving , I just want to protect my right .

Dr Strangelove · Apr 03, 2008, 05:34 AM // 05:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by redrum38

But Anet didn't tell us anything during 2007-11-16 to 2008-04-01 , they only posted an announcement at afternoon on 2008-03-31 and cut off on 2008-04-01 , then tell us "in response to recent changes to Taiwanese law" after they cut off .

It probably wouldn't be the smartest idea to go telling everyone to transfer their farmed gold over. That would defeat the point. It sucks, but your problem is with your own government, not Anet.

Quote:

Originally Posted by guolisong

Lol...you are not in the mainland are you loooool..... If you are you know to avoid talking about politics in general =). 明哲保身.

On another note though I wonder if Taiwanese people consider them to be Chinese? 台湾人是不是中国人?

Taiwan refers to itself as the Republic of China. Taiwanese people I know in the US refer to themselves as Chinese, but as a Taiwanese subset, just as Cantonese people refer to themselves Chinese and Cantonese. Taiwanese and Mandarin are fairly similar to each other, enough so that they can generally understand most of what each other say. By contrast, Mandarin and Cantonese speakers can understand almost nothing.

As an Irish-Mexican American, I don't feel that your ethnicity has anything to do with your nationality, and Asian immigrants here feel the same way. However, I am aware that this idea still exists in older countries with a less variable population.

I'm somewhat surprised to see a person from the PRC person referring to politics. I could be wrong on this, but I was under the impression that the average PRC citizen had zero influence on government, so politics would be of no consequence. Am I wrong, or do you feel a certain involvement with your government?

SAQ · Apr 03, 2008, 05:42 AM // 05:42

I will call myself Taiwanese rather than Chinese to be more specific and I am currently in Taiwan.

I have an account bought in Australia, and 2 accounts bought here in Taiwan. Like I have mentioned before in the other forum, if Taiwan server becomes one on their own.. then we will be literally playing an offline game! If you have ever had a chance to visit a Taiwanese district, most are deserted! So International District is the only way to party up and have fun..

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr Strangelove

Taiwanese and Mandarin are fairly similar to each other, enough so that they can generally understand most of what each other say. By contrast, Mandarin and Cantonese speakers can understand almost nothing.

I must say you are very wrong to assume this, Taiwanese and Mandarin aren't very similar at all! They are quite different..

Dr Strangelove · Apr 03, 2008, 05:51 AM // 05:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by SAQ

I must say you are very wrong to assume this, Taiwanese and Mandarin aren't very similar at all! They are quite different..

It's not assumption, a grad student I worked with from Western China spoke Mandarin, and was somewhat able to understand our boss, who spoke Taiwanese. However, neither of them were able to understand the Cantonese spoken by the lab manager.

I could certainly be wrong on this, since that's the only group I know where all 3 mixed.

Also, dim sum is a horrifying experience when your food is being ordered by other people in a mix of foreign languages.