Curse

Kalendraf · Aug 07, 2007, 06:54 PM // 18:54

Although this relates to Guild Wars, I feel this is best posted here in the Off-Topic Forum. As some of you may be aware, sometime within the last 2 weeks, the OGaming site was officially shutdown. This includes the guildwars.ogaming.com site.

I was a member of that site since the late 2004 timeframe, where I served as a moderator and staff writer. By the end, I had the highest post count, having made well over 6500 posts, none of them spam. I dedicated at least an hour or two every day for the last 3 years answering questions, deleting evil gold spams, and playing sheriff when needed (which was thankfully rare, since we had such great members).

Along with my original Gamer's Mantra column, I wrote a series of Character Build Evolutions, Skill Focus articles, and a variety of technical analyses regarding various aspects of the game. I got tons of positive feedback, and apparently these articles helped at least a few new players get off to a promising start in Guild Wars.

Unfortunately, all was not well at OGaming. It was once originally deemed an Elite GW site, but it then lost that status when OGaming was purchased by (or became connected to) IGN. Although we had nothing to do with IGN, ArenaNet treated us like a pariah ever since. Initially that was merely a speedbump as our membership group considerably during the Prophecies and Factions timeframe. However, not being listed on the main ArenaNet links eventually began to impact us as fewer and fewer new member joined.

More recently, OGaming joined the Zam network. At first we were hoping this would save the site, but as time went on, it became more and more obvious that we did not fit into Zam's long term plans. Several months ago, we lost our admin, and they were not replaced. More recently, the site began to experience almost regular interruptions over the weekends. Sometime within the last two weeks, it was shutdown for good.

I contacted the Zam network to try to find out what happened, and here is their response:

Quote:

Hi Kalendraf,

Sorry it's taken so long for us to get back to you. As far as I know,
Ogaming.com is being shut down. I don't know the reasons for sure, I
think there just weren't enough page views to pay the hosting costs.
I'm sorry that you had to hear about it this way, that was INCREDIBLY
poorly handled on our part.

I'm not quite sure what else I can tell you. I apologize again for the
way this was handled.

Casey Monroe
ZAM Content Manager
The ZAM Network

From all indications, all the helpful posts, detailed articles and artwork from OGaming are now gone. Countless hours of input and gigabytes of knowledge and information are lost forever. It is a very sad day.

I know several former GW Ogaming members have migrated to this site, and I'm hoping they see this message. Let's share a few moments of silence to remember a once great site.

amish lifeguard · Aug 08, 2007, 04:46 PM // 16:46

Noooooooooooooooooooooo

Kalendraf · Aug 09, 2007, 02:45 AM // 02:45

Good to see you Amish!

Quote:

Originally Posted by amish lifeguard

Noooooooooooooooooooooo

That's how I felt too when I first learned it was gone.

Hopefully other former GW Ogamers see this and reply.

amish lifeguard · Aug 09, 2007, 03:05 AM // 03:05

Nice to see you too Kal, it really is a shame ogaming went down, that's really what kept me playing. I haven't played for months, but I still like to look at the forums.

Looks like I have more posts that you! I weeeen wooo

Silly Warrior · Aug 09, 2007, 06:15 AM // 06:15

Hey Kalendraf!

You don't remember me, but I remember you...from a long...long time ago.

I remember beginning to play the game in Summer 05, and looking around for some help. I found that help at GW OGaming. To be honest I had completely forgotten about the website, and I started playing again in 06, using Guru, just out of chance really. Back then it was a great site, and I mostly just read for information, still very helpful!

I only remember you by your Avatar, perhaps it was just a very easy thing to remember?

Anyways, on behalf of the entire Guild Wars Guru staff, welcome in, and perhaps you can get a moderating position here eventually as well!

-Silly

Kalendraf · Aug 09, 2007, 02:13 PM // 14:13

Thanks.

Actually being a moderator had become a burden back at OGaming. You would not believe how much gold spam we had to clean up some days. It ended up being like a 2nd job for me, and one that didn't pay me anything either. Toward the end, there were only a few active mods, and I suspect I was probably the most active of them.

Since early 2005, I probably devoted/donated about 2000 hours of my time toward helping that site. To put that into perspective, a normal 40hr/wk job equates to 2080 hours in a year. Thus, it is like I devoted an entire year of full time work toward that site, but never saw a penny from it. Even at the previous U.S. minimum wage ($5.15/hr), those 2000 hours would be worth over $10K...and if I earned my day job's rate for that many hours, it would be several times more than that. Of course, I never expected to be paid for the modding and writing work there, but it puts it into perspective.

While I am going to dearly miss the site, it's a relief to not be bogged down with the mod duties at this point. I'll probably be much more of a lurker here, and possibly make a few of my notoriously long-winded posts from time to time.

Jeremy Untouchable · Aug 09, 2007, 02:41 PM // 14:41

notoriously long-winded posts ftw...bring them on..

Divinitys Creature · Aug 09, 2007, 10:25 PM // 22:25

It's gotta suck when somewhere on the net you called home just gets wiped away

Kalendraf · Aug 10, 2007, 01:45 PM // 13:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Divinitys Creature

It's gotta suck when somewhere on the net you called home just gets wiped away

Yes it does.

With no advanced warning, it was just like having my house get destroyed by a tornado and having all of my belongings get demolished along with it. I managed to find a few precious scraps here and there (google cache ftw!), but besides those, all I am left with are my memories of the place.

My hunch is that the shutdown was broadcast to admins a while back, who then notified their respective forums. However, since we no longer had an admin, that message never reached us.

Divinitys Creature · Aug 11, 2007, 11:46 PM // 23:46

Ya know this happened to me with my old guild's forums and since I knew the owner I asked him to keep it alive as an archive for me and he did, which really helped. Can you ask to like take it over or something? Like get the database and see if anyone wants to pay for bandwidth. It's gotta be worth asking.

The Herbalizer · Aug 13, 2007, 03:50 AM // 03:50

I had the same on a forum I used to post on. Except there was no warning whatsoever and noone to contact to know why it was removed. It was a really active site too.

Sorry for your loss. It must suck to lose so much information that you have contributed. Maybe it is accessible from cached google search?

Rokan · Aug 13, 2007, 06:51 PM // 18:51

So that would explain why I can no longer get to Ogaming...a little notice would have been nice, no?

Although I have only been a member of Ogaming for just over a year, I realise how much effort kal (and Harith) put into the site...and it is annoying just to see it go like that...

Met some great people there, and hope they all have fun doing whatever they do

On the plus side...I just hit 1k posts before it was shut down, so yay! hehe

Cheers kal

Shinryuu.

Rokan · Aug 13, 2007, 06:53 PM // 18:53

And sorry for the double post first up...great first impression...but quick reply killed my net (it is only New Zealand net...ie, almost the worst in the world), and it said I never posted...so, there ya go...

Kalendraf · Aug 14, 2007, 09:02 PM // 21:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Divinitys Creature

Can you ask to like take it over or something? Like get the database and see if anyone wants to pay for bandwidth. It's gotta be worth asking.

If someone out there is interested in resurrecting GW Ogaming, they have my blessing (for what that's worth). Despite being quite technically-oriented, I know nothing about website hosting or what would be involved in transferring the SIZEABLE database of GW OGaming onto another site. More importantly, I have no free time to devote to this.

Since the merger happened, I believe that all of the OGaming forums became the property of the Zam Network. Even if they have killed it off, they may not be so willing to easily part with the archived database. Essentially, you'd be dealing with a corporation...not just some friend's forum that went down.

If anyone is interested in pursuing this, you can contact the Zam network via this e-mail: [email protected]

Divinitys Creature · Aug 14, 2007, 11:22 PM // 23:22

I'll send a link to this thread to MeatMan at The Guild Hall Forums.

MeatManTGH · Aug 15, 2007, 02:10 AM // 02:10

it seems i have been summoned to this thread...

it's very unfortunate that the GW OGaming site is no longer online. what's worse is that no one from the network bothered to post some sort of announcement to let the forum members know ahead of time.

what happened was this: any OGaming site that didn't get merged into an Allakhazam site was left to die on the old OGaming server. Allakhazam didn't have a GW site, and they eventually decided not to make/have one. that old OGaming server was finally taken offline recently. since TGH was an independent site of the OG network, it was on that same server, but because TGH was a long-time established GW site and still had a network employee running it (me), they decided to move TGH to a different server so that it may continue to exist.

i can send an email to my supervisor at the network about whether the gw.ogaming forum database is still accessible, but i seriously doubt it.

MeatMan
guild-hall.net

Kalendraf · Aug 15, 2007, 01:48 PM // 13:48

MeatMan - Thanks for the update. You helped fill in some of the details.

I can understand their reasons for ultimately closing the GW OGaming forums, but their abrupt shutdown of the site without any advanced warning exhibited extremely poor etiquette.

Devaberiel · Oct 15, 2007, 05:23 PM // 17:23

I miss Ogaming so much!
It felt like I lost my foothold when that site went down

Croco Clouds · Oct 15, 2007, 08:51 PM // 20:51

No one is gonna be happy about the news, sigh