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DNL/AD spreading the excuses
Cholayna
Member Posts: 1,604
Seems the blame for the outrageous, totally unprofessional and unethical ways of the moderation team , Alchemic Dream, has allowed for the following belief in its fans:
http://www.darkandlight.net/forums/showthread.php?t=67338
"However, I think you should be aware that these forums have been subjected to coordinated flame-swarm attacks, which is understandable given the development history of dnl and the treatment of its fan base.
Given these attacks it is, again, understandable that the mods are trigger happy, paranoid, and suspicious of certain post topics, and yes it is a shame that this stifles and sweeps under the carpet legitimate criticism.
IMO what is more reprehensible (in relation to forum moderation) are the ways in which the fans are incorporated into information gathering endeveures that, from a particular perspective, are guistapo like."
Instead of allowing that the game is horrible, the fan base frustrated and angry, and truth is not allowed there, it seems AD is allowing the illusion of an imaginary "coordinated" attack to excuse their totally unprofessional, unethical and completely gestapo ways of moderating a forum. Seems to me AD is just as bad as NP3/Farlan and I do hope other game forums watch AD's actions closely. Of course we know some of the mods are delusional fanbois, some are of the DNL staff themselves.
Forum moderation has gone, like their own hype, over the top of the "Only those who post good things will be allowed here". Strict censorship, bogus banning and locking, complete and utter unprofessional and unethical sleazy actions on all aspects of the forums of DNL.
Comments
I will agree with you completely. I was just recently "permanently" banned and accused of being other registrants. I am not those others. I have one account and one account only. There is another with a name quite similiar to mine however. I have this name in several games and have never strayed from it. As with others, I was not contacted beforehand. I was not warned. This was not discussed with any moderator beforehand.
As a result, I took this as a "final straw" coming so soon after the server downtime and sent a copy of the banning post by the DNL staff to my credit card company and requested a refund. I have also seen other posts in which the treatment by these companies, both NP3 and Alchemic Dreams to be both tremendously unprofessional, unethical and absolutely the most reprehensible actions I have ever seen in any gaming portal.
vbmenu_register("postmenu_1087492", true);
Can I ask a simple question here..? Why doesn't NP3 know their own servers are down ??
-Zvorak
ROFLMAO you have to ask???? I seriously hope you are joking Zvorak or you have lost it my friend.
The attitude shown by this bunch of people (Farceland/NotProfessional/Attention Deficet) sure doesn't help destroy any sterotypes about the French and Canadians. It is people like _Pix_ that reminds us that not all of his countrymen are like these reprehensible slime.
...Pika
However, I think you should be aware that these forums have been subjected to coordinated flame-swarm attacks, which is understandable given the development history of dnl and the treatment of its fan base.
I too think this is a great exageration. Had D&L delivered what the end user paid for people would have been playing the game instead of finding other ways to entertain themselves. Trolls such as myself would have looked at the forums, said 'eh, just another MMORPG' and moved on.
When a company not only delivers a shoddy product but shines that product with the turd of incompetence, that's when the internet buzzards start to circle overhead. But to say that the efforts have been coordinated, insinuating some sort of organization or leadership, is not true.
...Pika
"DnL" The acronym itself is flame bait now. Nothing they have done is right and every little tweak they add has become a disaster. It truly is a shame that their official boards are almost dead now. The "blood in the water" is rapidly dissapating. It is a shame really as I was having fun "bobbing and weaving" on their forums.......
Haha thank you
. I'm just a blue collar guy with a big mouth.
I too feel sad that D&L is gasping it's last. But hey, Mourning's relaunch is coming soon. While I wish for no company to fail, the new taskmasters obviously have a rocky road to plow.
...Pika
I have a hard time feeling sorry for AD in any way, shape, or form. If they were keeping an eye on Farlan, from SoG to beta to release and beyond, any smart company would have said "screw you, we out." a long time before they posted this. It is their own fault, no one to blame but themselves.
I think that's an equally valid mindset as well. It's just my opinion that Farlan sold their snake oil so widespreadly that AD got snookered along with the D&L community. While it would be impossible to ascertain at this time, were AD able to go back in time I don't think they would have returned Farlan's phone calls.
As a business though they do need to be held accountable to their ventures. Is their sin on the level of 100% complicity? I would have to say no simply because who in their right minds would back such an abomination if they knew all the facts?
But I could be wrong. Money can make people do questionable things.
...Pika
ROFLMAO you have to ask???? I seriously hope you are joking Zvorak or you have lost it my friend.
The attitude shown by this bunch of people (Farceland/NotProfessional/Attention Deficet) sure doesn't help destroy any sterotypes about the French and Canadians. It is people like _Pix_ that reminds us that not all of his countrymen are like these reprehensible slime.
You don't post here much do you...? lol That was a sarcastic question !
-Zvorak
My post simply questioned the legality of banning a paying customer from a forum that is the only means of contact to farlan, and which is that way by farlans own choosing.
Serpico's reply in the thread is inept,attemting to belittle the comment with remarks about the vatican, and highlights exactly how little is understoood about dealing with irate customers.
If I actually played the game and had a vested interest, I may even have taken offence.
As it is, its just another example of exactly how rediculous and unprofessional the whole thing is.
http://darkandlight.net/forums/showpost.php?p=1087724&postcount=69
Serpico
vbmenu_register("postmenu_1087724", true);
Bien sûr la différence est que je connais mieux , de mon côté, les
membres de notre équipe et surtout, leur dévouement envers la
communauté. Je pense d'ailleurs que la communauté anglaise , dont j'ai
la charge, saurait te confirmer ce point dans sa grande majorité - je
doute très, très fortement qu'ils aient l'impression que je me "foute
de leur gueule", pour reprendre tes mots
"Of course the difference is I know the members of our team and their devotion towards the [DnL] community.
I think that the english speaking community, which I am in charge of, would largely agree with me on this point: I very *very* stongly doubt that they have the feeling that I am (let me use your own words) taking the piss."
Serpico seems to think that everybody agrees on the way he handles the official english forums.
No one is blinder that the one who does not want to see.
You don't post here much do you...? lol That was a sarcastic question !
-Zvorak
AD - Uhm, Farlan, your login server is down...
Farlan - We have servers that are up? Weird..
AD - Well, yeah people have been logging in to play for the past few weeks..
Farlan - Wait, people are still playing? ROFL! I mean, oh, right. Ok, we'll check on it.
Hours later...
AD - Looks like the login server is up, good work. What should we tell the community the problem was?
Farlan - Erm... A pandemic on the island?
AD - Nope, you used that one already...
Farlan - Hm.. A bug?
AD - Nope, they already know you can't fix bugs.
Farlan - Damn... How about a massive flame attack by haters from MMORPG?
AD - Hm.... ok. So what really was the problem?
Farlan - Hamster died.
AD - Ah, gotcha.
You don't post here much do you...? lol That was a sarcastic question !
-Zvorak
AD - Uhm, Farlan, your login server is down...
Farlan - We have servers that are up? Weird..
AD - Well, yeah people have been logging in to play for the past few weeks..
Farlan - Wait, people are still playing? ROFL! I mean, oh, right. Ok, we'll check on it.
Hours later...
AD - Looks like the login server is up, good work. What should we tell the community the problem was?
Farlan - Erm... A pandemic on the island?
AD - Nope, you used that one already...
Farlan - Hm.. A bug?
AD - Nope, they already know you can't fix bugs.
Farlan - Damn... How about a massive flame attack by haters from MMORPG?
AD - Hm.... ok. So what really was the problem?
Farlan - Hamster died.
AD - Ah, gotcha.
Sigh.....Wow, that was the best laugh I have had in a LONG time.
I started the thread, It got edited , even the topic, to make it look like something it wasn't
I was complaining about AD not locking the server problem threads like they normally do, They were just editing the last post and locking, in attempt to not bump it to the top of the page, because they can't explain why the server was down for 4 hours with no updates
And I got a 3 day ban for this
Whats laughable about serpico is, he can do whatever he wants on the forums, he answers to no one. I've already tried to get ahold of his supervisor. The project manager of DNL for AD, he refuses to give me the info.
Let me give you a background on serpico here
I couldn't log into the game for 24 days, because of some screw up with my account, I had a member of AD tell me I'm sick of hearing about this problem rick
Yea thats a helluva thing to say to a customer
Then Serpico says I'm being emo about not being able to login
Then I get ahold of the hochka (who used to be the project manager of dnl) the guy that is supposed to take care of AD members not doing their jobs and he tries to spin it in a way to make it sound completely different till I show him the logs and proof it was said then I just get a shallow apology that didn't even seem sincere
Just so you can read and decide I'll post the emails below
Hello,
Thanks for bringing this matter to our attention.
I just read the threads you mention, and while I can understand your
concerns about getting a virus on your computer, AD was aware of the
issue but cannot shut the website down - Only NP3 can do this. Our
webmaster removed the threat as soon as we heard about it.
Moreover, although I can understand your frustration with regards to
how
email support is handled, you are, as any other Dark and Light member,
bound by the community rules each time you send a message on the
official forums. Serpico's intervention was mostly focusing on that
part. Encountering several bugs and issues is not a reason for not
following the rules.
With regards to the poll thread about customer satisfaction: it has
been
removed because of the many non-constructive comments it created, and
because each time someone posted a favourable remark, they were asked
to
justify their answer, whereas negative comments were left alone. This
shows the general, biased orientation of this thread.
The general purpose of this thread itself however, i.e. rating the
quality of Customer Support, is not against the rules. Otherwise, this
thread would never have reached the 3 pages mark, but would have been
deleted at once.
Now, in order to address your support requests, I'd like to check their
current status and get back to you with some information. Please reply
to this email with the ticket IDs you got from us. Check the automated
response you get after submitting a request - this ID looks like
ABC-123456.
I'm waiting for your reply.
Regards,
Hochka - Dark and Light Community Representative
> Dear Sir or Ma'am
>
> I bought the game Dark and Light, which AD game masters and is public
> relations for, I paid for the game 8 months ago and have not been
able
> to play it, I have been insulted time and time again by AD trying to
> get this problem resolved. Serpico being the main problem. I would
> like whoever is the project manager to look at a few things seeing as
> how serpico will not give me any information on how to get in contact
> with his superiors to tell them how he's been handling things.
>
> In this link you see where AD is telling people not to make a big
deal
> about getting virus's on their pc's as a direct resualt from the
> game's webpage, also calling people "emo" about it
>
> http://www.darkandlight.net/forums/showthread.php?t=64298
>
> Oh and another poll that was deleted but fortuneately I have
> screenshots of which I will attach since the post made AD look bad
> they deleted it
>
> this was the link
>
> http://www.darkandlight.net/forums/showthread.php?t=63990
>
> but it was deleted because of the screenshots found attached to this
email
>
> If you could please tell me where I need to send this message or
> please forward it to the correct person I would be most appreciative
Watch as hochka tries to spin this in a way that favors AD
Hello,
Complaints related to our moderation team reach me because I deal with
these matters.
I briefly investigated the issue with Artaryl being "tired of hearing
me
complain that I couldn't login", and from what I know, he meant that he
was tired of hearing about this bug, which is slightly different.
Now, with regards to this specific matter, my intention is not to play
the cop and to decide who is right and who is wrong, especially since
this IRC chatroom is not an official chatroom, and that our presence
here is therefore not required.
I do understand your frustration and confusion, since I was explained
how this bug occurs, but unfortunately, an unofficial IRC chatroom is
by
no means appropriate to identify a customer and resolve personal
account
issues on the fly, and therefore, the help you can get on this channel
is, by definition, very limited.
As far as internal discipline is concerned... We do not disclose
information with the community when we suspend or ban a member, and for
the same reason, I will not disclose any possible penalty applied to
one
of our moderators here either. Suffice to say that we have suspended
moderators from their duties in the past, and rules apply to everyone.
Now, like I previously explained, I would like to check the requests
you
sent to the support department, as well as their current status, in
order to get back to you with some information. Please reply to this
email with the ticket IDs you got from us. Check the automated response
you get after submitting a request - this ID looks like ABC-123456.
Regards,
Hochka - Dark and Light Community Representative
Now this one is a bit long and I apologize for that btw my replies are below hochka's replies
Hello,
I am sure you will easily understand that, as this is an unofficial IRC
channel, we have no possibility of controlling what is actually said,
as
the control tools are not available for us to use. What is said on this
channel is not under our control. If this had been an official DnL
channel, the matter would have been handled differently.
Now if this is what Artaryl said, I sincerely apologize for this, as
this is not the way we intend to run our business.
With regards to Serpico and the way he handled your request, I
apologize
for this as well if you took this remark at a personal level. Be
assured
that this wasn't the original intent. Now, as I previously explained,
we
handle internal discipline matters internally, which means that I will
not disclose any information about what comes next.
Now back to your original issue - I have checked your support request,
ELF-550903, which you updated for the last time on June 13th. This is
part of a more general issue, which currently affects several users. I
don't know what the status on this issue is, but I emailed NP3 about it
and will hopefully an answer tomorrow.
I cannot guarantee any date for a resolution, although I am perfectly
aware of the importance of this issue, and of the frustration it
generates. I would rather have you enjoying Dark and Light instead of
waiting outside. However, the issue lies within NP3's responsibility
and
AD does not have any tools to address the situation.
As soon as I have an update on this issue, I will let you know.
Regards,
Hochka - Dark and Light Community Representative
My Reply to get the response above from hochka
I can't believe you just said that so please explain to me by what
you ment
"Complaints related to our moderation team reach me because I deal
with these matters."
then you say
"my intention is not to play
the cop and to decide who is right and who is wrong, especially since
this IRC chatroom is not an official chatroom, and that our presence
here is therefore not required."
then you go on
"but unfortunately, an unofficial IRC chatroom is by
no means appropriate to identify a customer and resolve personal
account issues on the fly, and therefore, the help you can get on this
channel is, by definition, very limited."
So what you are telling me is, you are the person to deal with these
problems but you don't intend to find out who is right or wrong (which its still wrong in any context a CSR saying "I'm tired of this") but then you justify it by saying, oh thats because thats irc and its unofficial
Is that good customer service in any forum ? or because its not official they don't have to follow the rules and the AD tag really means nothing
and I have the logs right here from an IRC mod that AD appointed
<ricklowdis> not that he didn't help, because him and eisen have been helping
<ricklowdis> but serpico believes ad can do no wrong
<ricklowdis> and i'm sick of being accused of making this shit up
<ricklowdis> i have it in my logs, but if you have it in your log
then
thats 2 people and he really can't deny a mod having the same log
<Lahari> [12:39] <ricklowdis> e pointed me in the right
direction after 5 minutes of me telling him the problem
<Lahari> [12:39] <ricklowdis> where as, not even support
has even got back to me on the issue
<Lahari> [12:39] <ricklowdis> nor has serpico answered his
pm
<Lahari> [12:40] <ricklowdis> and obscura who was trying
to help as well forgot about it
<Lahari> [12:42] <ricklowdis> or at least i haven't heard
anything from him in 3 days either
<Lahari> [12:42] <ricklowdis> nah e doesn't deserve being
prez
<Lahari> [12:43] <ricklowdis> it doesn't pay enough
<Lahari> [12:43] <Lahari> around that time?
<Lahari> [14:38] <[AD]Artaryl> rick, kind of tired of hearing you
about this but i'm pretty sure you wouldn't like to hear what exactly
is the matter and why it's so long...
<Lahari> that it?
<ricklowdis> yea around that time
<ricklowdis> thats it
<ricklowdis> save that you're probably going to need to show it, to
serp
As you can see
<Lahari> [14:38] <[AD]Artaryl> rick, kind of tired of hearing you
about this but i'm pretty sure you wouldn't like to hear what exactly
is the matter and why it's so long...
He wasn't talking about the bug, So you wanna reply to me with
another line of BS "and from what I know, he meant that he
was tired of hearing about this bug, which is slightly different."
Doesn't look slightly different in fact right there "*_rick_*, king
of tired of hearing *_you_* about this"
Would show otherwise
But I don't want to see Art in trouble, because he did help me after
that
But judging by the way you've already handled this matter and your
views from your last email shows you don't know what having good
customer service is. What I picked up from it was "hey they can say
whatever the hell they want because its unofficial" and even tho its
clear, he ment he was tired of hearing me complain about not loggin
in
you added "bugs" to his statement and claimed its slightly different.
Which I'm sure NP3/FARLAN would love to know the people they outsourced to handle their customers problems were "tired of hearing
about the bugs they've created"
Am I making sense yet hochka ?
"Complaints related to our moderation team reach me because I deal
with these matters."
You don't handle these matters you twist whats factual and turn it
into something you believe is favorable like you did with that art
thing
Now I would like the project managers contact information please
Which btw he never contacted me back after that
Also whats in green, how can you call someone emo and not mean it or take it on a personal level ? I can log in to a game I paid for 8 months prior and wanting the problem fixed is EMO in Serpico's eyes
So there tell me how professional AD is now, and that they are doing a great job
Some of them yes, they go above and beyond what they need to do, but for the most part AD is what it is cheap PR for companies that can't afford to do it themselves or just don't want to handle it themselves
If AD did such a stellar job, all the top games would use their service
Those scum bags even edited my posts stating how they wrongly locked my thread. I hope AD goes out of business shortly after DnL goes down.
Sorry to hear about your bad experience with them, rick. It sucks when the customer suffers (more) because of amateurs that just don't give a shit.
Rick, sorry to hear about your misfortune... All I can say is, there are many people in the same boat as you. It's a small consolation, but there are a lot of people who have been shilled by Farlan, and we are all doing what we can to prevent other people from being scammed.
Welcome to the club. Would you like some popcorn?
People thought I was nuts months ago when I posted a link that I told everyone that had been scammed by this bunch of whale crap (nothing lower comes to mind) to contact.
I will post it again, and I suggest that if you have been wronged contact these people and let the wheels of justice have more grease to hang these clowns. _Pix_ is working it from the civil side, I want for the crminal fraud side.
The web site is www.ic3.gov that is the internet crime complaint site of the FBI and they work with Interpol. I have filed formal charges against Farceland / NotProfessional and listed Crooked and Borked as co-conspirators. Guess I need to add Attention Deficit to the list.
If you really do care and aren't just posting lip service, it can't hurt to file a formal crminal complaint against these hucksters. No guarantees that anything will ever come from it but it sure helps _Pix's_ case if he can point to criminal complaints in a civil suit.
"The web site is www.ic3.gov that is the internet crime complaint site of the FBI and they work with Interpol."
anyone who actually goes there and fills this out for a video game is the biggest loser there is
do you really think the FBI gives a shit about video games.
--
Note: PlayNC will refuse to allow you access to your account if you forget your password and can't provide a scanned image of the product key for the first product you purchased..... LOL
REPOST FROM ANOTHER THREAD:
Ellear, guess what? THey used my colleagues names in your banning post. Coya and the others work together. They used a email account to register at the DNL site so that they had one place to get the info when they all bought the preorder (the preorder of course they used their own personal email). There is an Ellyear in the bunch, not Ellear. There was also a problem with Ellyear and his inability to log in..I am wondering now if this may have been a source for his problems? He refunded long ago. There were 6 total. 5 jumped ship in SOG with one we all agreed would stay ingame. Hes still there.
The email account is a "junk" account used at a place of business for the employee "fun" stuff. So many internet jokes, etc etc being sent to the biz accounts, we allowed a employee "junk" email account for any number of employees to access. 5 used that same email account in registering at the boards (and again but not when ordering the game) and a 6th used a personal one.
Although many posts had been made by this group, different times, different forum members, etc etc. it wasnt a problem until Aratomin made the refund threads in the beginning of SOG refuting the illegality of the "no refund" Farlan tried to pull. While this was going on, the group made other posts, etc. etc. Since they worked in different shifts, many would read and respond to what their coworker posted. All this without any problem at all...until..
Coya came in and saw that a post was made by Aratomin. It was an extremely well thought out, informative and "constructive" posts regarding the no refund policy and refuting the idea that Farlan was trying to pass out. Several other nonaffiliated persons made agreeing posts, added to it, (and of course flamed it).
Coya posted a "kudos" to Aratomin commending him on delivering correct and well written post regarding the consumer rights, refund eligibility, etc. etc. Now mind you, all this time, allllll of the group had been posting other posts in other threads, etc etc. No problems at all.
Within a day, one of the moderators locked the thread, BANNED Aratomin, accused Coya of being him and BANNED Coya. No warning, no discussion, nothing. Just like you. However, they have now added YOU to the group which is totally out of this world and I dont understand how Ellear got into the group that had Ellyear.
Makes you wonder what they have been doing with the forum registry accounts now doesnt it?
The one person left out of that group has since changed his email in the forum and was forwarded this post as well as the one made by DNL forum moderator. I do not know what he plans to do but the last thing he suggested was pulling himself from the forums altogether.
Again, makes you wonder what the hell is going on with the forum registry accounts.
Yah dont complain if you bought a crappy product & lost money, I wonder on whos side you are on