MHWiki:Current events/Archive/2010/June

Archive for updates taking place June of 2010 in Reverse Chronological Order.
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New Titles and Gnawnia Mice

30 June 2010

This update contains important info for Novice and Apprentice MouseHunters!

The most frequent feedback we receive is that progression feels slow in the beginning of the game. It feels like Novice takes an eternity to complete.

To address this feedback, the King has added two new titles! They are 'Recruit' and 'Initiate'. Recruit now comes after Novice and Initiate comes after Apprentice. Please note that we have added these titles by dividing up the amount of experience needed to complete Novice and Apprentice. The total amount of time it takes to achieve Journeyman has remained unchanged.

With the addition of these two new beginning titles, Larry has changed the way he introduces hunters to Gnawnia. A Novice now begins hunting in the Meadow, where a Trapsmith and Cheese Shoppe have been added.

After completing Novice, hunters gain titles, and unlock locations as follows:
- After Novice comes Recruit, unlocking the Town of Gnawnia
- After Recruit comes Apprentice, unlocking a new location, the Windmill
- After Apprentice comes Initiate, unlocking the Harbour

Because the two new titles were added by dividing up the experience of Novice and Apprentice, your title, or title progressed may have changed (upwards) if you were a Novice or Apprentice. Please note, that due to the changed title travel restrictions, if you are a Novice in the Town of Gnawnia, or Apprentice in the Harbour, you will be unable to return to those locations should you leave.

To accommodate a brand new area, several new mice have been added to the Indigenous Mouse group!

Spread across the Gnawnia region, hunters will find these new mice:
- Magic Mouse
- Spud Mouse
- Tiny Mouse
- Fog Mouse
- Cowardly Mouse
- Scruffy Mouse
- Pebble Mouse
- Silvertail Mouse
- Field Mouse
- Fast Mouse
- Pugilist Mouse
- Farmhand Mouse

Some existing regional mice in Gnawnia have also been added, or moved to different areas to add more variety and unique mice to each of the locations in Gnawnia.

Good luck hunting these new breeds of mice!

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A few small things also in this update:

- Marketplace claim now displays properly in Internet Explorer 7
- Extra confirm button added to marketplace
- Furoma Student and Master mice once again drop satchels of gold
- Lycans are slightly more attracted to moon cheese
- Bionics and Granite are carrying potions slightly more often in the lab
- Gold transfer cap raised to 10,000,000
- Cheese types with long names were sometimes being truncated inconsistently on the heads up display
- Gnawnia Plankrun Notes now dropped by Dwarf in Town of Gnawnia
- White, Grey and Brown mice no longer drop cheddar cheese, and instead drop Marble Cheese in both the Meadow and Town of Gnawnia
- We've been addressing small teething issues since the launch of Longtail, most of which are now taken care of. Soon we'll need the help of hunters to catch those few remaining Glitchpaw Mice!

-- Dave Vanderburg

King's Gauntlet Tier 4: Bard Mice Now Released!

29 June 2010

Tier four mice of the King's Gauntlet are now released! We are now half way to the top hunters! The King will now allow hunters to use their Tier Four Gauntlet Potions to produce the cheese required to hunt the next tier of mice!

The music-making mice on the fourth tier of the King’s Gauntlet rely on this cheese blend to make their taste buds sing. Bards can be quite wily, so using a strong tactical trap will help the aspiring hunter stay on-key.

Tier four now makes the following mice available:

Cowbell Mouse
Drummer Mouse
Dancer Mouse
Fiddler Mouse
Guqin Player Mouse

As you move through the tiers of the gauntlet, the mice become more and more profitable!

Good luck with Tier Four and collecting potions for this Friday, when Tier Five will be available!

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As outlined in the recent news post titled "Important News for Novices and Apprentices", a change is coming to the beginning of the game. Tomorrow (Wednesday, June 30) this update will be applied.

This means that tomorrow there will be new travel restrictions on the Town of Gnawnia and Harbour. Hunter's will require the rank of Recruit to hunt in the Town of Gnawnia and the rank of Initiate to hunt in the Harbour.

If you are currently a Novice in Town, or an Apprentice in the Harbour you will remain in your current location tomorrow when the update is applied. Should you leave however, you will be unable to return until you acquire the proper title.

For more details about this update, please read the recent news post titled "Important News for Novices and Apprentices".

-- Dave Vanderburg

King's Gauntlet Tier 3: Melee Mice Now Released!

22 June 2010

Tier three mice of the King's Gauntlet are now released! The King will now allow hunters to use their Tier Three Gauntlet Potions to produce the cheese required to hunt the next tier of mice!

When you equip Tier Three Gauntlet Cheese, you can expect the sword fighting mice on the third floor of the King’s Gauntlet to slash their way through just about anything to try and get it. To counteract their amazing swordsmanship, make sure to use a tactical trap.

Tier three now makes the following mice available:

Fencer Mouse
Page Mouse
Berserker Mouse
Knight Mouse
Phalanx Mouse
Cavalier Mouse

As you move through the tiers of the gauntlet, the mice become more and more profitable!

Good luck with Tier Three and collecting potions for next week, when Tier Four will be available!

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A few small things also in this update:

- Centaur mice are more abundant in the Great Gnarled Tree.
- Ghost mice had mysteriously snuck into the Acolyte Realm. Local necromancers have taken care of the problem and removed them.
- Your profile privacy settings are now applied to your name on your hunter's profile. If someone viewing your profile does not have privileges to see your name you will appear as "A Shrouded Figure" to them.

What we're working on for the next update:

- Getting the friends online count working again.
- Optimizing how we write journals to reduce how often a trap check journal fails to appear.
- The marketplace claim is broken in Internet Explorer. In the meantime try another browser. We suggest: www.getfirefox.com

The game may be unavailable for for a short time sometime tomorrow (Wednesday, June 22) while we apply some optimizations. We'll post a warning message ahead of time at the top of the game, along with an estimate of how long the game will be down for.

We want to thank players for all the constructive feedback we've been seeing on the discussion boards, keep it coming and happy hunting!

-- Dave Vanderburg

Father's Day Sale -- All Weekend Long!

19 June 2010

Hey hunters!

Father's Day is this weekend and to celebrate we're having the first ever sale on SUPER|brie+! Save 15% all weekend long. The sale ends Monday at 2pm EDT (6pm GMT).

Happy Father's Day!

-- Dave Vanderburg

Important News for Novices and Apprentices

18 June 2010

Hello Mousehunt Communi-TAY! We need feedback from Novice and Apprentice hunters!

A very common piece of feedback we receive from new players is that progression feels very slow at the beginning of the game. We see a lot of Novices feeling like it takes an eternity to graduate to Apprentice.

To address this concern, the King is going to be adding two new titles: Recruit and Graduate. The Recruit title will be after Novice, as you've joined the ranks proper. The Graduate title will come after Apprentice. Therefore the first four titles will be: Novice, Recruit, Apprentice, Graduate.

In addition to the new titles, hunters will start the game in the Meadow where a Cheese Shoppe and Trapsmith will be added. Recruits will unlock the Town of Gnawnia, an Apprentice will unlock a new area called the Windmill, and a Graduate will unlock the Harbour.

This is a little different from what we outlined in a previous news post. We've decided to add the new titles after Novice and Apprentice so that players will only gain a level, instead of losing one when the update is applied.

Due to this change you may lose access to the Town of Gnawnia if you remain a Novice and will lose access to the Harbour if you remain an Apprentice. Once the change is applied, user's titles will be checked at these locations. If you no longer meet the title requirement for an area you will NOT be removed from the location. However, should you leave the location you will be unable to return until you meet the new title requirement.

We welcome your feedback on the discussion boards within this thread.

Thanks hunters!

-- Dave Vanderburg

Longtail Updates - Round Two

17 June 2010

Hey everyone!

We've updated the game to correct a few problems that have come up since the launch of MouseHunt v3 "Longtail".

Here's a list of what has been updated:

• A link to view the full map image is now available on the travel page. We're looking for ways to make the full map page even better and welcome your feedback!

• The imbue quantity for Lord/Lady when using Greater Radioactive Blue Potions has been corrected.

• You may once again use Facebook Credits to donate for SUPER|brie+.

• Cheese effect was being displayed as an average instead of its actual value. We've corrected the problem so that the cheese effect stat of your trap now appears as it should be (ie. Very Sale + Very Fresh = No Effect, etc).

• A problem where the give to friends page failed to load with 1,000+ friends has been corrected.

• Golden Shield once again appears on hunter profiles.

• You may now publish journals to your Facebook wall via the green "Share" button. We'll be experimenting with the colour of the button, so if the bright colour is not your cup of tea, sit tight and it will likely change.

• Mouse difficulties were not displaying properly on the mice page. The adjective "Overpowering" was not being displayed, and instead "Near Impossible" was being displayed. This caused particular confusion in regards to the Acolyte mouse. To clarify, the Acolyte mouse is easiest to catch when using a Forgotten weapon, but can be caught, on rare occasions, using Arcane or Shadow traps.

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Marketplace:
We're still doing some final testing on the marketplace. The main focus of this testing is to ensure that the new system can cope with the large volume of trades that take place. Thank you for your continued patience while we make sure the launch of the marketplace goes as smoothly as possible.

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Content being worked on:
The most frequent feedback we receive from new players is that progression is quite slow in the beginning of the game, where Novice feels like an eternity.

To address this feedback, we will be adding two new titles to the beginning of the game, and splitting the titles of Novice and Apprentice roughly in half. After the update, the first four titles, in order, will be: Recruit, Novice, Page, Apprentice.

Upon being hired by the King, a hunter will start as a Recruit in the Meadow, where both a Cheese Shoppe and Trapsmith will be added. Upon graduating to Novice a hunter will unlock the Town of Gnawnia. After reaching Page, a hunter will unlock a brand new location, the Windmill. And finally, upon graduating to Apprentice a hunter will unlock the Harbour. To accommodate the new Windmill area, over 10 new mice will be added to Gnawnia and spread across the entire region.

Our main concern with splitting Novice and Apprentice is that this will drop some Novices to Recruit and some Apprentices to Page. We're particularly interested in your feedback on this issue, and welcome your constructive feedback and suggestions via the discussion boards.

Thanks to all our loyal Hunters! Until next time, good luck and happy hunting!

-- Dave Vanderburg

Longtail mouse painting video

17 June 2010

Hey everyone.

Just wanted to let you all know that I uploaded a new painting video of a cute little mouse for your viewing pleasure.

Longtail mouse

There might be some odd audio discrepancies but nothing to worry about. Enjoy the video!

-- Jacob Johnson

King's Gauntlet Tier 2: Thief Mice Now Released!

15 June 2010

Tier two mice of the King's Gauntlet are now released! The King will now allow hunters to use their Tier Two Gauntlet Potions to produce the cheese required to hunt the next tier of mice!

The thieving mice on the second floor of the King’s Gauntlet can't keep their hands off Tier Two Gauntlet Cheese. To keep the little pickpockets from getting away with too much of your cheese, use a physical trap to stop them in their tracks.

Tier two now makes the following mice available:

• Lockpick Mouse
• Impersonator Mouse
• Stealth Mouse
• Rogue Mouse
• Escape Artist Mouse
• Bandit Mouse

As you move through the tiers of the gauntlet, the mice become more and more profitable!

Good luck with Tier Two and collecting potions for next week, when Tier Three will be available!

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Since the Longtail launch, we’ve been working hard to implement all of the helpful comments provided by our users to make the game better. Here's the latest list of changes/fixes that have been put in place:

• The drop rate of Thorned Vine in Cape Clawed has been increased
• The drop rate of the Keeper's Candle in the Catacombs has been increased
• King's Rewards have been enabled
• Larry's hunting tips for the Laboratory and Town of Digby have been updated to reflect changes to how hunters gain access to the Mouseoleum
• A problem where some hunters were stuck in the Forbidden Grove has been fixed
• The effectiveness of luck has been slightly increased

Here's what we're currently focused on fixing:

• Ability to post journals to your Facebook wall
• Some heaviest catch stats are a little out of whack
• Getting Offerpal and Facebook Credits back up and running
• Give to friends page fails to load when you have a lot of friends
• Occasionally a journal fails to appear when sounding the horn

We want to thank the community for the great feedback we received, and we encourage you to keep it coming!

-- Dave Vanderburg

The King's Gauntlet

14 June 2010

As many hunters are already aware, a new location is now open! The Valour region is home to the King's Gauntlet, the King's challenge to MouseHunters everywhere! If you've been away, or are looking for a few more details about this new, exciting area, read on, hunter!

To access the Gauntlet, you will need to purchase floor plans from the Cartographer in the Harbour. Before the Cartographer will sell you the plans, you will have to prove your dedication to the King by capturing a Master Burglar and recovering a Crown Jewel. The Master Burglar can be hunted in the Town of Gnawnia or the Burroughs Bazaar by using SUPER|brie+ or Gilded cheese. Gilded cheese can be looted from normal Burglar mice scattered throughout the world.

The King’s Gauntlet works on a tier system, where Hunters advance to the next floor by hunting with cheese that they collect on the current floor. The King is paying close attention to which hunters amass the most potions before opening the next floor. By order of the King, the potions you collect cannot be used until specified dates. The poster below outlines when each floor of the Gauntlet will open.

Now, the entire Kingdom is wondering: Who will collect the most potions, and be the first to catch the mysterious Eclipse mouse? The King is offering a 300,000 gold reward for the Eclipse Mouse’s capture, and that Hunter could be you!

[1]

-- Dave Vanderburg

Longtail Updates - Round One

12 June 2010

Hey Hunters!

As mentioned in the initial launch post for MouseHunt v3 "Longtail" there were sure to be a few problems that come up, or features that were not 100% as they were in v2.

We've been hard at work correcting problems and improving some of the new pages and features based on your feedback. Thanks for all your help and your patience as we work to make MouseHunt better than ever!

The following fixes/improvements have been made:

The mice page has had its first round of improvement. There are now two sections under the "Your Stats" tab. One displays stats by mouse group, the other by location. We're still working on implementing other player suggestions such as a list of all your catches, a link to the high-res mouse image and the ability to sort by stat columns.

The Master Burglars lurking around Gnawnia have been under siege from MouseHunters looking to reclaim the Crown Jewels! All this pressure has made them a bit weaker and easier to catch. A few have even been seen running off to the Bazaar in the Burroughs region where they are trying to sell the Crown Jewels! If hunting for a Master Burglar in the town is not quite your style, perhaps try tracking one down in the Bazaar.

Luck has been corrected to work as it did in version two. Luck both increases the chance of catching a mouse, and increases the odds of a mouse dropping loot when caught.

A couple bugs with timed environments have been fixed. Balack's Cove and the Forbidden Grove now open and close as expected. We also fixed a problem where players were being moved shortly after traveling out of the Cove or Grove.

The MouseHunt Wiki is back up and running! You can once again access the wiki by clicking the "Hunter's Wiki" link under the Lore section.

A bug where the detailed journal was not paginating two pages at a time is now fixed. Clicking the detailed journal link on the camp page will bring you to a page displaying pages one and two of your journal. Clicking next page now shows you pages three and four, then five and six, etc.

The order of cheese has been changed from alphabetical to generic "best to worst". At the top of your inventory (and camp page trap selector) will be cheese you use later on in the game, such as Vanilla Stilton, Havarti, Ancient, and at the bottom will be the early on cheese, such as swiss, marble, etc.

Based on player feedback, we have renamed Gauntlet Potions (+2) to Gauntlet Potions Tier 2. We hope this clears up any confusion regarding the number of potions dropped. Discuss what you think of the new on the boards!

We still have a long to-do list of improvements we're working on. As always, we welcome constructive feedback and suggestions via the discussion boards!

-- Dave Vanderburg

Welcome to MouseHunt v3.0!

8 June 2010

Hello MouseHunters!

As you have probably noticed, MouseHunt v3.0, aka: ‘Longtail’ has launched! The focus of this update was to gradate a lot of behind-the-scenes code that runs that game, in order to help us build new content more quickly and easily than ever before!

With an update of this size, some problems are sure to surface. The entire development team are working hard to take care of any problems that come up, but it's going to be a bit of a bumpy ride until the dust settles and the new game version is stable. We're excited to get through this together and end up with an even better MouseHunt!

Missing/Still to come

Journals and cork boards have been rebuilt from scratch. This unfortunately means that we had to clear journals and cork boards for the update to be applied.

A recent Dragon attack has left the marketplace slightly singed. Once the dust settles from this update, the King will promptly have it repaired. Check back in a few days.

We have temporarily disabled Facebook Credits, Cherry Credits, Rixty, and offers while we fix a couple of unexpected problems. We have also disabled the Wiki. We'll have them back up and running soon.

Your travel map may appear blank, although you can still travel to different locations. Map images are rendered on-the-fly. Once a few players load the travel page to generate the images it will correct the problem.

You currently cannot publish catches/journal entries to your wall (you can only post crafting/convertible/hammer smashes right now). We're working out a few kinks. The feature will make a return soon!

Tournaments and tournament teams have been shutdown. We're still working on when, if, and how they will make a return.

The iPhone App and Toolbar is ready to go, but will be released at a later date.

There are bound to be a few small features/quirks of the game that are not quite as they were before. Based on player feedback we'll be working on bringing these features back to their original state.

So what's new in Longtail?

King's Gauntlet!

The King has finished building his Gauntlet, which serves as a challenge to MouseHunters everywhere! Located in the new region of Valour, entry to the Gauntlet can be obtained by purchasing a floor plan from the new Cartographer in the Harbour. The Cartographer is under strict order to only sell the plans to those who prove their loyalty to the King by first capturing a Master Burglar that ran off with some of the Crown Jewels. Master Burglars are only attracted to Gilded Cheese or SUPER|brie+. Burglar mice from all regions have been rumoured to be dropping gilded cheese.

The Gauntlet works on a tier system, with Hunters advancing to the next floor by hunting with cheese that they collect on the current floor. By order of the King, the Gauntlet is being opened slowly. He'll be permanently opening a few floors every few days. Check the news section for announcements.

To enter the Gauntlet a hunter must first prove their loyalty to the King. To do so they must capture a Master Burglar mouse from the Town of Gnawnia and get a Crown Jewel as loot. Once you have a Crown Jewel in your possession the Cartographer in the Harbour will sell you floor plans to the Gauntlet, granting you access.

Good luck!

Instant-Updating Journals

Sounding the Hunter's Horn no longer reloads the page to update your journal. Your journal entry will automatically be added to the your journal when sounding the horn from the camp page. If you happen to sound the horn from a page other than camp, your journal entry will appear just below the heads up display.

Camp Page Trap Selector

The camp page now has a quick-change trap selector to make changing your trap setup (including bait) quicker and easier than ever before. Just click the icons below the image of your trap on the camp page to pull up your inventory. From there, you can change your base, weapon or bait.

New Travel Page

The travel page has been given an overhaul and a new interface. It's now easier than ever to navigate the MouseHunt map and see what types of shops a location has! Traveling also no longer reloads the page. Just click the ‘Hunt Here’ button to travel instantly!

There is also a Larry's Travel section on the travel page to take you to locations free of cost! Currently it takes you to the Town of Gnawnia for free!

Inventory Page Changes

We've reorganized a few things in the inventory, and removed the need for a page reload when using/arming items from the inventory. Bases and weapons now have sub-tabs under the traps section.

The crafting interface has also been vastly improved with a new ‘Recipe Book’ added to the page. With the Recipe Book, it's now much easier to craft previously crafted items in any quantity you wish. We've also moved all novelty items to their own section. There is NO chance of failure when you now craft (no red slots).

The convertibles and potions page have also been improved upon so it is easier to use.

Mice Page Changes

As the number of mice in the game grew, the ‘Mice’ page became cumbersome and began to load extremely slowly due to the number of mice being displayed. We've reorganized the layout with sub-tabs to make browsing mice easier.

Mice no longer have power types. As newer, more unique areas were added to the game the power type system became inconsistent. For example, although all the mice of Derr were listed as Physical, you could not use Tactical weapons to catch them like you could for most other physical mice. To correct this inconsistency, the mice are now all organized into groups that have similar weaknesses in similar areas.

Lastly, on a hunter's profile page you will now see a cumulative total of all mice the user caught. This includes the previous 165 plus the rare/bonus mice.

Extra ‘Give to Friends’ Items

We've expanded the functionality of the ‘Give to Friends’ page to allow players to send more than just SUPER|brie+ and gold. At this time, we've added Moon Cheese and Maki Cheese. We may add additional items in the future, based on user feedback.

Other Changes

Based on player feedback and plans for the future, we've also used this opportunity to adjust a few existing things in-game.

Please click here to read a detailed list.

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Detailed Longtail Release Notes

Based on player feedback and plans for the future, we've also used this opportunity to adjust a few existing things in-game.

Hunting:

The same type of mouse is now always worth the same points and gold. Weight no longer effects the value of a catch. The slight difference in gold/points proved to be a source of confusion without adding anything unique to gameplay.

Sounding the horn always awards 50 bonus points as well as 25 additional points per additional friend on the hunt. The maximum bonus points for sounding the horn is 250.

Hunting summary logs are currently missing. They are being improved and will be re-added to the game in the future.

Journals no longer state "my trap was effective/less effective". This statement will be replaced by a new feature in the future, to make it easier to judge if mice in an area are weak or resistant to your weapon's power type.

King's Rewards currently only award gold. We're planning to revamp the system to allow hunters to pick from more substantial prizes.

Cheese effect has been reworked, as a result some trap combinations may have a different net cheese effect stat.

Travel Page:

The Acolyte Realm's location has been moved to the west side of the map.

We have implemented much greater control over exact travel costs between locations. Travel now follows linear paths between locations, and as a result, the cost of traveling between some areas has increased.

Cartographer:

The Cartographer no longer returns your original damaged map piece. Instead, the new repaired map pieces unlock the same locations as their damaged counterparts. If consider yourself a collector of maps, you'll be able to re-collect the same map piece.

Content changes:

A few mice have been given extra loot, or now drop the same loot in all locations instead of the drop being area-specific. A couple of examples are: The Treant mouse drops the Splintered Wood in any location and the Tattered Mousoleum Map Piece is now dropped by Zombie mice in Digby instead of the Laboratory.

By popular demand, Gnarled Cheese, Wicked Gnarly Cheese and Limelight Cheese have been added to Unstable Curd 'poke' results.

Some potion conversion rates have been slightly changed to be more consistent/linear.

Some mice that used to drop several different items at once may now only drop one item (of varying quantities) at a time. To keep the drop-rates the same, the chance of them dropping nothing has been removed or dramatically lowered.

The Ambrosial Portal and NVMRC Forcefield traps are slightly less expensive.

The price of cheese has been adjusted in shops outside of Gnawnia to be more consistent. Many cheese shoppes now offer more varieties of cheese.

The price of many crafting items have been adjusted and are more consistent across all locations.

Encounter roll functions now operate differently in order to increase efficiency. Due to these new limitations, a few mice have been added to existing areas in order to maintain similar balance. These new encounters have been added to replace chances of your cheese failing to attract and/or turning stale:

• Mutated White and Mutated Grey mice can be encountered in the Acolyte Realm when hunting with Radioactive Blue Cheese.
• Pinchy Mice can occasionally be encountered in Elub Shore when not using Gouda or SUPER|brie+.
• Chameleon Mice can occasionally be encountered in Nerg Plains when not using Gouda or SUPER|brie+.
• Sylvan Mice can occasionally be encountered in Derr Dunes when not using Gouda or SUPER|brie+.

The Lagoon General Store has been moved to the Great Gnarled Tree in preparation for future crafting updates.

When opening special items, the resulting items vary in quantities and are restricted between a certain range. For example, when you open a Mysterious Box, you will not get either 6, 12, or 24. You will instead get a random amount between the min/max range.

The Acolyte no longer drops a frozen scroll. Instead the Mysterious Box now always gives a Frozen Scroll plus one random item.

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There were a few exisiting features that did not get quite polished enough to launch with Longtail.

These will be fixed at a later date:

• A larger view of the map and mice is currently unavailable.
• On the map, the Forbidden Grove is always depicted as open. We're still sorting this problem out.
• Some catch stats are not displayed, such as total catches by all hunters. These (and more) stats will be added in the future.
• The dragon mouse image is slightly squished. It will be restored to its former glory in the future.
• Many players have suggested the stats be sortable or the ability to filter the stats. We're brainstorming a good way to add this feature.
• The ability to see all mice caught in 1 tab is being considered for the future.
• Some popup windows appear too high on the screen. We'll be tweaking them to appear closer to where you click.
• Occasionally a hunter's title will be displayed as "101%". Reloading the page corrects this problem. This bug will be fixed in the future.
• Various pages have slightly less-than-polished interfaces. We'll be fixing these up in the future.

-- Dave Vanderburg

Tuesday Downtime - HUGE Update Coming!

8 June 2010

Hello MouseHunt Communi-tay!

The day is almost upon us. After months of hard work, we are finally ready to launch the MouseHunt v3.0 "Longtail" update!

Towards the end of last year MouseHunt began to grow a bit too big than the existing code could support. Adding new players to the game became a challenge and the amount of content (mice, cheese, locations, etc) was becoming bloated, making adding new content cumbersome and slow.

It was clear a rebuild was needed so we could continue to develop the game into what the community began to expect. Now, several months later this rebuild is ready to launch!

This Tuesday the game will be unavailable for the day as we apply this update. We know downtime can be frustrating, but this update will help us build more robust, creative content faster than ever before! We have the best players in the world and you deserve MouseHunt to be the best game it can be!

The game will become unavailable at approximately 8am EST and will then be down for the remainder of the day. If you're the type that likes to know what's going on behind the scenes we'll be keeping in touch via updates on the application about page and perhaps the occasional live-feed video.

With an update this massive there are sure to be a few hiccups and glitches. We'll be hard at work addressing anything that comes up. It will be a bumpy ride, but we know we can all get through it together and reach a major milestone in MouseHunt history!

When we first launched MouseHunt we never dreamed it would grow to where it has. The devotion of you players remains a constant compliment and source of inspiration to this day!

If you're interested in talking with your fellow hunters about the Longtail update we've made an event page! Check it out for more details.

What to expect in the v3.0 "Longtail" update:

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Opening of the King's Gauntlet!

This many-storied tower is the King's personal chalange to MouseHunters everywhere: anyone who can reach the top is among the kingdom's elite. The King's Gauntlet works on a tier syste, with Hunters advancing to the next floor by hunting with cheese that they collect on the current floor. The Gauntlet is meant as a chalange for hunters of all skill levels, but in order to ascend to the very top, a Hero's rank will come in handy.

Here's what to expect from this MAJOR update.

A NEW BACKBONE FOR A BETTER FUTURE

New User Interface
More creative/Robust features
Able to support more mousehunters (to help the king)
Better traveling
Faster more regular content
and much more...

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Original message

Look forward to Wednesday, and a new, better than ever MouseHunt!

-- Dave Vanderburg