MHWiki:Current events/Archive/2009/July

Archive for updates taking place July of 2009 in Reverse Chronological Order.
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Today's Downtime

28 July 2009

Hello MouseHunters.

Today we had a problem where the amount of mice caught became too great for our records to keep track of. The solution required the game to be unavailable while we increased the size allocated to these records. We have now made the necessary changes to allow the game to continue to grow as we add more new mice and areas.

Due to the unexpected downtime, Glitchpaw mice have been released. You will also find that this time they are carrying a small surprise.

We are aware that some hunters may be missing thumbnail images in their journal. The changes we made this evening will fix this problem going forward, however it will not fix the problem retroactively.

We are discussing our options and will give everyone another update tomorrow.

Thanks once again for your patience and understanding. It was truly amazing to see just how many mice hunters have caught and how far the game has come. As always thanks for playing MouseHunt, happy hunting and good luck catching the Glitchpaws!

-- Dave Vanderburg

New Format for Recent News and Updates

27 July 2009

As you have no doubt noticed both the Recent News and Updates and Nibbler discussion boards have been re-vamped. At the top of both discussion boards is the newest post which cannot be replied to. These changes are necessary due to various bugs and security flaws with the Facebook discussion board system that allows others to post within boards that are restricted.

The flaws have been reported to Facebook as bugs for several months and are still being worked on. Should these errors be resolved by Facebook we will consider re-organizing the discussion boards once again. One benefit of this new format is that we will now be able to post richer format for our updates such as embedded images, different font sizes and colours, and embedded videos, among other things.

We understand that this new format may take some getting used to and that getting used to change may create some frustration. Unfortunately due to the extremely high traffic of the forums we are unable to afford the hardware required to host our own forum system at this time. We are certainly open to suggestions on how to improve this system within our own technical limitations.

-- Dave Vanderburg

Banner ads, toolbar, trap checks

23 July 2009

Hey everyone!

I just wanted to clear up some things!

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Banner ads:
We are aware that some of the Google Ads have been less than tasteful as of late. We're looking into disabling some of these because we like to keep it clean around here. =)

Toolbar:
First of all, please be aware that we do NOT sell user info to ANYONE! This is completely against the Facebook ToS AND our morals! There was speculation of this and I just wanted to clear that up. Some players believed this was how we made money from the toolbar, but that's achieved from the sponsored searches that appear in the results (which is how you get free SB+ in return!). Our users' privacy is one of our TOP priorities and we would never compromise that.

Secondly, the warning messages about "fraud" have been intimidating some users, and we were surprised when we saw them as well. It seems our affiliate has chosen some rather strong vocabulary in "warning" users. I wanted to make it clear that your MouseHunt account is in NO RISK whatsoever. What the message is trying to say is that searches should be valid and wholesome, not just gibberish, but it seems the filter for picking this pattern up is a little sensitive.

Again, your MouseHunt account is NOT at risk. The wording used in the warning message is confusing and can lead you to believe this, but it is not the case. We are speaking with our affiliate to have this cleared up.

Trap checks:
We've been looking into the "missing" trap checks and it might just be a case of the journal entries not showing up, but the trap checks are still actually happening. We'll see what we can do to get this sorted out.

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Thanks for reading, and I hope this answers some questions! =)

-- Giorgio Sintichakis

A Very Gouda Update

21 July 2009

Hello MouseHunters!

Today's release adds more features and content than you can shake a DrillBot at!

As you have no doubt noticed, a new section has been added to the Camp page called Hunting Tips from Larry. You may remember Larry from the beginning tutorial of the game or perhaps seen him on a few of the help pages. These tips are designed to provide hunters with the "need-to-know" information for each area in the game. Previously, there was no straight-forward way to know essential information, such as the bait to use in special areas, which led to many confused and angry emails and forum posts. We hope Larry will help hunters avoid frustrations like wasting SUPER|brie+ in the Mousoleum.

Some hunters have also noticed the mice of the S.S. Huntington II carrying a compass and other navigation tools. If a hunter is able to collect all three tools they will be able to assemble a kit that will allow them to safely navigate their boat further into the open ocean. The journey will no doubt be dangerous, but with great risk comes great reward!

Four traps are now able to be dismantled with your Hunter's Hammer: the Digby DrillBot, Venus Mouse Trap, Harpoon Gun and Net Cannon. If you smash these traps and then decide you want them back, you may reassemble them by entering their parts alone in the crafting menu and pressing "combine items". An exception is the Net Cannon which requires one coil of rope to be used should you wish to reconstruct it.

This is by far the largest update we have ever applied to the game and this is only phase one of the new storyline. Due to the massive amount of content, we decided to break up the release into three smaller parts. This update is part one and includes four new areas, 36 new mice, new types of cheese and traps, new crafting combinations and more!

Look forward to the next two updates, each adding one additional area, along with new cheese, mice, and traps!

-- Dave Vanderburg

Dev Q&A

17 July 2009

This week's feedback video covered five questions we asked players. At the end of the video we also answered three questions asked by players.

You can watch the feedback video here: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=107582846253

The three questions we answered at the end of the video were:

* What do we think about more upgradable traps, much like the obelisks?

We definitely plan on adding more upgradable traps! You may just find a few sooner than later...

Would we ever consider a 'Greater Gnarled Cheese Potion'?

If Whisker Woods was expanded further and a greater need for Gnarled cheese was created then, yes, potentially.

* Do we plan on making additional use of fan ideas and submissions, like we did with the Hydra Mouse and NVMRC Forcefield?

Yes. We're always reading the ideas and suggestions forum and love to hear what creative ideas the players come up with.

Once again, thanks goes out to MouseHunter Dane Koster for organizing a list of questions both for us to ask players and for players to ask us!

-- Dave Vanderburg

Answers to Frequent Questions

10 July 2009

At the end of this week's feedback we answered some questions that are frequently asked. Thanks goes out to MouseHunter Dane Koster for organizing this concise list of questions, concerns and curiosities for us to address.

You can watch the feedback Friday video here: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=99248164245

* Radioactive Sludge and Stale SB+

A use for Radioactive Sludge and stale SUPER|brie+ will be available in the next major update.

* Missing MouseHunt 1.0 Stats

Due to the radically different data structure between the old MouseHunt version 1.0 and the current game, old game stats were imported with a 4% margin of error. We apologize for any frustration this may cause. The statistics were imported as best they could with our budget and resources available.

* Hunting parties

The party cork board is currently lacking notifications for when a member posts to it. This was an oversight that is planned to be fixed for the next update. We are also adding additional token rewards for parties finishing in fourth to tenth place. These additional token rewards will not be retroactive.

* Tournaments for specific ranks

Some tournaments are for mice only available in certain areas which has the same effect. We asked this question during feedback Friday and received some mixed response.

* Uses for Champion's Chest and Tournament Tokens

Dev Jeremy is hard at work implementing items for both chests and tokens. The plans for these items include new bases and cheese. We also plan on adding new uses for these items over time.

* Some traps perceived as useful everywhere

Some players have expressed concern that some traps such as the Partybot and ACRONYM are useful against nearly all mice in all locations. The power of a Partybot is often exaggerated by those who own one. As stated in the past, luck is the absolute last stat you should worry about when trying to maximize the odds of catching a mouse. The ACRONYM is an incredibly hard trap to acquire and is meant to be an adequate reward of being able to hunt Physical, Shadow and Forgotten type mice. However, as future updates bring more powerful mice you may find that a more powerful Shadow or Physical trap will become more useful than the ACRONYM.

* Concerns with JavaScript links

Some of the links on the site rely on JavaScript for functionality. We try our best to usually have a non-JS version of the link that will provide the same functionality with a page load. Providing non-JavaScript support is not the most important priority because Facebook itself is very JavaScript-reliant and only a very small portion of players use outdated browsers with poor support for JavaScript.

* How we decide on storylines

What usually happens is one person has a basic idea and if everyone likes the idea it then slowly evolves with the input of the entire team.

-- Dave Vanderburg

Tournament Prizes

22 June 2009

Today marks the release of the much-antipated tournament prizes!

Members of the top 100 teams shall all receive a new unique item called a Tournament Token. This new crafting ingredient will be a multi-purpose ingredient for use in several new and existing recipes. We would love to hear from the community regarding the use of Tournament Tokens in recipes. We have a few ideas of our own but are also looking for fun ideas from MouseHunters! So, put on your thinking caps and swarm to the Ideas & Suggestions forums to have your suggestions heard!

Tokens are awarded to each member of the top 100 teams as follows:

(1st) 5 tokens
(2nd & 3rd) 4 Tokens
(4th - 49th) 2 Tokens
(50th - 100th) 1 Token

In addition, members of the team that finish first will also each receive a "Champion Chest". We would also love to hear from players regarding the contents of this coveted chest!

Prizes will be awarded within 60 minutes of the tournament's end.

We have also added these much asked for tournament features:

Party cork board on the "Organize Party" page
Basic date search function for the Tournament Scoreboard
New streamlined tournament join page
Clearer success and error messages

A big thanks goes out to Dev Jeremy for all his hard work in creating the prize system!

-- Dave Vanderburg