Saturday, September 13, 2008
Ok this is gonna be an interesting post.... well at least for me, i feel that way....
Here is what i read on the net...
link for the following text :
http://www.todayonline.com/pdf_open.asp?id=1109HNR003incase you do not wish to read such a long post, visit this web, finish reading it then read my comments
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Games outcry
Hackers spoil MapleStory funPlayers, who have spentas much as $2,000 on thegame, file police reports
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HAVING sunk time and cold, hard cashinto building up their virtual characters inan online game, some frustrated gamershave lodged a police report after seeingtheir accounts instantly depleted becauseof recent hacking incidents.
IT engineer Jordan Tay, told Today hewas trying to rally more gamers in onlineforums to file reports.
“I’ve been playing the game for overtwo years, and I’ve spent over $700. Now allmy time invested has gone down the drain,”he said. “I’m frustrated that AsiaSoft hadn’tdone much to stop the hacking incidents.”
In MapleStory (picture), gamers defeatmonsters to increase the skills and abilitiesof their characters and earn the game’s currency.
Character enhancements, or “assets”,can be bought from the game’s online shopor sold between players using the game’scurrency or real-world cash. Items for saleinclude virtual pets, hats and shoes tochange the appearance of their charactersand weapons. A rare weapon, for instance,can cost up to $70.
According to AsiaSoft Online, the game’spublisher and regional distributor, the gamehas 87 million accounts worldwide, with 2 million accounts from Singapore alone.
AsiaSoft marketing director Ng Kok Khwang said the online attacks took place in August. “We were under attack by Chinesehackers from China, and we have sinceblocked IP addresses from China and aremonitoring the situation,” Mr Ng said.
“We are conducting our investigation,and will assist the police if necessary.”
Police told Today their investigations are ongoing.
A rampant problem worldwideMr Ng pointed out that “such incidents are quite rampant in successful MMORPGs(massively multi-player online role-playinggames)”, and the problem is worldwide.AsiaSoft also distributes the popular Worldof Warcraft online game here.
Another gamers’ favourite, GranadoEspada, sees about five such hacking casesbeing reported every month, from countries like the Philippines and Malaysia. Ithas more than 118,000 players here.
Ms Danielle Kuek, Granado Espada regional community manager, said incidents reported from Singapore are rare and mostly occur in countries where gamers arecareless with their account details.
“Most of the so-called hacking caseswe encounter were due to users playing atcertain cybercafés that have keyloggers ortrojans,” she said. These are hidden computerprograms that enable hackers to recordor farm information from computer users.
Ms Kuek said gamers here are educatedon how to safeguard their accountsby changing their passwords regularly andplaying only at endorsed cybercafes.
Meanwhile, AsiaSoft is taking stepsto prevent the problem from reoccurring,working with Korea-based game developerNexon. “We upgraded our IT security measures,increased the number of firewalls forgame servers with the latest technology,and are currently working with third-partyexpertise,” said Mr Ng.
“We’d like to reassure the communitythat security has been stepped up and newmeasures are in place to eradicate futureattacks.”
Ms Young Siew Yim, a teacher, wasone gamer who has filed a report with thepolice. She spent more than $2,000 overtwo years on MapleStory.
“I was careful not to do things thatwould reveal my password to hackers,yet my account was hacked. It’s AsiaSoft’sresponsibility to handle the problem. WhenI visited their support outlet, they could notdo much to help me,” she said. “It’s a reallynice game but I’ve got no mood to play.”
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Comments:that's the whole chunk i read.... ok now to comment on them....
firstly, Asiasoft sucks, they should have already banned China's IP right from the start
this is because, Maple
SEA AND WAD DOES IT STANDS FOR? it means SOUTH-EAST ASIA!!!!therefore, only SEA peeps should be allowed to play! Not some bastards and bitches from CHINA.... wad a slut...
and don't Asiasoft think that it is now too late to try and prevent what has already happened?
the game developers are at FAULT as well... if they made the game that does not require cash to get certain items, people would not spend thousands of dollars just to get better.
not that i am siding runescape, but i feel that their system is good, member = p2p but able to get extra benefits compared to non-members... that way, they are able to earn enough to carry on the game.
But, for maple's style, it sucks. cause you are able to send the cash items to others which in this case, people abuse the system. They rules and regulation said they should not.
However on the other hand, people can choose to buy items using the actual cash.
It is the game developer's fault that there are hackers, cause people feel that the game is under-rated.
I have personally spent time playing this game before and i realised that most higher levels people are simply NOOBS! (flame me all you like) cause they simply buy a high level account with their stinking money and go into game, boasting to everyone how good they are.
We play this game to enjoy and relax not to get scolded by high leveled noobs and low lvl idiots. Some simply do not have any life and can go to a very high level in just matter of days or weeks. If they said they trained on their own but with the in-game bought item "2x exp gain" then, they would still be using that stinking money of theirs to gain lvls.
This simply defeat the purpose, people in the game get scolded and bullied (virtually) this are the cause by cyber bullies. But that is another thing.
As for maple, the developers should have thought of the consequences beforei mplementing something. Like say, they added in the "super-megaphone" this causes spamming of rich idiots who just simple needs and wants attention. The developers did not spare a thought for others by implementing an option for us to off that bloody chat.
And they are simply too slow when patching and having server checks and it is hardly possible to contact any of the Game-Masters in game unless you have cash to contact them and in most cases, you hardly get a reply. So, it is hard to report a hacker.
The events they conduct, i would give a rating of 2 out of 10. Yesh 2 only. the 2 points come from them having the effort to simple conduct and the time for organizing it... the other 8 points i deducted is because most of the events are lame, needs cash to participate and some others which i do not wish to list out.
The wedding system also sucks! it takes 40-50 SGD just to conduct a wedding by buying all the things to have a nice wedding. They also have rules and regulations for weddings. Well, overall this game sucks with dumb developers, stupid intellegence of theirs of not having security earlier, they GMs who simply love to have dumb event, those dumb events that cost real cash, even in real-life event they have, they want you to register using cash and many more even that sucks the money out of gamers. BLOODY BLOOD SUCKERS!
"IT engineer Jordan Tay, told Today hewas trying to rally more gamers in onlineforums to file reports." yes i agree with this line and hopefully maplesea closes. they are dumb enough to remove certain games which does not have such high rating of hackers take DAL (darkness and light) for example. it is a tactic game, does not require to be high levels to be strong. If you know how to play, you win. Not like those games that requires high levels to be strong.
for all those who disagrees with me, flame me all you like if you feel that flamming me makes you feel better.
QUOTE OF THE DAY "God made mankind, all others are made in china"
guanfeng @ 9/13/2008 01:51:00 PM
