I Musta' Missed The 'Big Bang' O_o

I was extremely excited about Uru going truly 'LIVE' on the 15th of this month - February.

I've never made any secret .. on any forum .. about how much I just love the entire 'history' of 'Myst' .. not only of Atrus and his family .. but of the entire D'ni world .. even into the 'pre-earth' era of Garternay .. which particularly catches my attention for some reason .. maybe because so little is known about it. It's engaging and intriguing and I've always wanted to learn .. to experience .. more of it. Not to mention the mystery .. to me anyway .. of where the rest of them are. I mean .. they existed in that cavern how many thousands of years .. and there was roughly 1 million of them in there? That makes NO sense when you measure that against the enormous population of Terahnee that grew to over 200 million .. in the same time span. It suggests that there could be many .. many more of the cavern D'ni out "there" someplace .. just waiting for us to stumble upon them. Groups who had been out of contact with the cavern people for so long they had forgotten it even existed .. or had left because they no longer wanted to live the simple unadorned life in a stone cavern .. or .. or .. or .. so many possibilities. I would love our ultimate mission .. our final act in our long and loyal friendship with Atrus .. to be to bring these "lost" groups together .. it'd just be kind of a cool thing to reunite the Ronay after so long. :)

We had already been told what to expect content-wise .. no new great and wonderful ages .. but the addition of a second, smaller age .. called Eder Tsogahl .. which is a beautiful 'sister' age to Delin. It contains the same puzzle as Delin .. and is the means to get the second 'half donut' that rotates above the well on our Relto island. So .. certainly .. no over inflated sense of expectation in that regard.

HOWEVER .. I WAS expecting the kick off of .. in some super cool .. grab your attention and hold onto it kind of way .. THE storyline. The very storyline .. as so intriguingly intimated by Yeesha .. in that very attention grabbing opening sequence that we get to see when we begin our journey. I still get chills when I hear that ominous turn in the opening !! :D

And other people had posted their belief that there would most likely be something super to kick off the 'new' Uru Live .. like the storyline and maybe even a t-shirt logo to commemorate the 'event' of the Live kickoff .. which would have been rather a nice touch. :) So .. I haven't been the only one with a sense of expectation that SOMETHING was going to happen on the official opening day.

There has been .. nothing .. nothing of note at all.

For all the fan hype .. for all the expectation .. for all the 'hints' of an 'arcing story' .. Myst Online : Uru Live .. has begun with the merest of whispers .. and a second tiny age .. much like the other.

Oh yes .. and we got a second 'sparklie' from Kadish .. but that was at the first of the month .. so .. doesn't really count.

We've been told to shape the story by our actions .. O_o

Right before Live kicked off .. there was a 'sit-in' to get back the DRC forums .. which had been killed (rightfully .. in my opinion .. for a number of reasons) by the IC character of 'Cate' .. when the new .. and very nice looking .. DRC site came back up. The sit-in was a 'mess' shall we say .. accomplishing nothing but irking the IC character. But .. the DRC forums DID go back up .. and .. considering that the 'trolls' who live under *that* bridge had migrated over to the MOUL forums .. and were raising the ruckus that only they are capable of .. I say 'Thank God, Cate' or whoever .. because one forum like that is MORE than enough. O_o

Then .. we get yet one more .. peaceful .. sit-in .. that elicited a 'visitation' of Yeesha in the hood .. greatly exciting those involved with that .. yet .. truthfully .. only being a reaction on Cyans part to, perhaps, illustrate their statements that 'we the people' can 'make' things happen ingame

Within a couple of days .. a few people started posting their feelings on the MOUL forum .. and .. as per the usual forum reactions .. got roundly dissed for daring to say .. 'hey .. what gives?'

Lots of good posts expressing confusion .. and disappointment .. in the underwhelming opening of Uru Live. And .. I'm right there with those opinions .. I just know better than to post on any of those forums .. :D

Someone I've known across the forums for a few years now .. Zardoz .. and God luv 'im, he's one of the funniest, most intelligent, level thinking, well 'written' people in the Uru fan arena .. made the best post on the DRC forums .. of ALL places .. summing up .. in a beautifully presented example of what we get .. as opposed to what people were expecting .. storywise .. with the opening of Live.

It is EXACTLY what I had been expecting .. not that actual story, of course .. but that KIND of story. One that grabbed my attention .. engaged my senses .. and my puzzle solving abilities .. made me WANT to be online to catch the buzz .. and work with it .. seeing it all unfold .. I'm STILL looking for that.

Instead .. we've been given 2 mini-ages .. and a couple of sparklies .. with absolutely NO reason for any of them .. nothing to connect them to what has been .. no whispers of what might be .. no new notebook found lying about in either of the new places .. or even entries in existing books .. little to anchor any of the new things ingame. Just 'here ya go' .. drop them and watch the feeding frenzy as lots of people log in for the first time in a week .. having found out about the new thing on a forum someplace .. hunt it down .. use it up .. and then go back to 'lurk' mode. I did that very thing when I read there was snow in Delin .. and so had just about every other person I ran into online that evening.

Which BEGS an answer to the question ....

What kind of 'gaming experience' is THAT anyway ?? O_o

Frankly .. being the 'cause' of some 'effect' .. isn't exactly what I had in mind when I read the words 'arcing storyline' .. O_o

It's been just over a week now .. and STILL nothing storyline at all. And my disappointment .. as well as an 'unease' .. has begun to grow.

Most of us are acting like my fish. They swim happily in their tank .. content to be in that space busily doing nothing .. but going NUTS for about 1 minute when some crumbs of fish food hit the water and disperse .. only to go back to happily swimming about doing 'nothing' once the food is gone. They have NO idea where it comes from .. or what it means .. they just devour the tiny tidbit and go back to quietly swimming about .. their entire lives spent doing nothing but react to food bits.

This is NOT what I expected Live to be .. this online 'fishbowl' that Uru Live seems to be .. I wanted riveting .. involving .. 'arcing' storyline. Something that made me go 'Whoaaa .. how intriguing .. and .. what's next .. ?? O_O

And I expected it to begin the first day Live flung it's arms open to us.

It's still early days yet .. I'm willing to give them some more time to pull this off. Goodness knows .. I've waited this long .. :)

In the mean time .. I'm off to play Guild Wars. I finally gave in and bought it .. after trying it out using one of my daughters buddy passes .. and .. though very light on the 'engaging puzzle' side .. it DOES have a pretty good story with it .. that at least gives you the feeling of being a part of what's happening. You DO get to play a 'hero' .. helping to defend and protect the various Tyrian people from great trials by forces bent on their enslavement or destruction .. traveling an extensive map area throughout the story. And .. killing beasties aside .. LOL :D .. I'm REALLY enjoying it .. who knew ?? O_o

Besides .. it beats doing nothing while I'm swimming in the fishbowl .. waiting for the next tidbit of food to fall in so that I can devour it .. ;)

Closure At Last :)

I went onto D'mala last night .. sort of a final farewell walk in the city. Despite it all .. I have a special fondness for the shards. Thanks to the indulgence of my dear friends tolip ydob and Ashtar .. both of whom I just love so much .. I was given the special privilege of helping to set up Private Idaho and The Great Tree shards .. by 'playing' guinea pig for them. Designate .. bestowed upon me by tolip .. CGP.001 .. and CGP.002 respectively. CGP = Cierdwyn Guinea Pig .. LOL

As well as playing guinea pig when they set up their regular UU shards .. thanks to them .. I got to be one of the first non-techie types to be able to visit both the H'uru projects and then Alcugs .. when just making it past your avvie set up screen and seeing the desert was a HUGE accomplishment.

I figured a final walk through the city .. then my ages .. alone .. closing things down .. then finally my relto .. again to shut things down would be fitting. I couldn't bring myself to do this on Great Tree for some reason .. I wanted my full on relto to go down with GT I guess .. intact .. a piece of me always to be there. :)

You cannot imagine my shock when EricL showed up. O_O Yet surprised though I was .. no sick feeling .. no butterflies .. no nervousness of any sort. I really HAVE come a long way in the last 2 years. :)

Someone there asked him if he knew when the shards would be cut off.

Sitting hunched at the top of the great stairs .. he seemed .. sad .. almost morose .. yet in a bitter kind of way .. about the closing of Until Uru. Even expressing that his final act in ANY capacity in Uru .. would be to shut them all down as soon as he was given the word to do so .. and that it would be the releasing of a 'burden' that Uru had become for him. I sort of wondered what that meant in terms of him looking after the age builders project .. but refrained from asking. He said that he would then be going back to the job he had at Turner et al .. and he would be glad to be there.

I decided to offer him an olive branch .. maybe some peace for us both in the ugliness that had sprung between us .. fed through the words of another. So I told him that I wanted him to know that I was in a good space now .. better then I had ever been .. about all that had transpired .. and that I truly hoped that he might also know that one day himself.

He replied that he didn't think he could ever get to that point. That Uru brought him no joy .. and he was glad to be rid of it.

I suggested that perhaps once there was some space between him and Uru .. that he might find something that did bring him joy .. and through that some peace .. and that I hoped that one day we might run into each other in Uru Live and that we might have tea and pick up that chat we had once started about the movie "What The Bleep?!" that we were both interested in. That it'd be a conversation I would really like to finish with him. :)

What I got was .. 'I had better not say anything more'. Meaning him I guess.

Then .. he said publicly that he needed to 'get out of there' .. and go listen to some 'calming' music.

And he poofed.

I left shortly thereafter myself.

He once said to me .. seems like such a long time ago now .. that I should not worry about a hand being slapped away .. before I even offer it. And I guess that's what I did .. offer it .. fully realizing that he might just reject it rather then accept what was so sincerely offered. Sadly .. reject it he did.

So much for trying to mend fences and release us both from a bitter episode.

He has lived in a misery of his own making from numerous fronts for a long time now. His 'issue' with me was/is small potatoes to some of the other stuff that's gone on with .. and because of .. others. I hope in time he really DOES sort it all out and move into a happier space .. carrying that crap hurts no one but himself .. so .. I do still wish him the best of luck in his journey.

Immediately after I left .. I dismantled and uninstalled my Until Uru client .. I used a vnode_cache extractor that a'moaca' made to extract all of my KI pics and .txt files .. and deleted all that was left. My Until Uru experience is done .. and I move ahead into the future of Uru Live.

I thought about this a long while last night .. then slept well. I'm glad I offered what I did .. and recognize it as that last final step I needed to be completely free of all of that. It was a HUGE step for me to make .. and I am glad that I made it.

I move forward now .. knowing that I've truly moved past all of that .. and am a better person .. not for having experienced that awfulness .. but .. for having made it through it to a whole person again.

I'm ready to fully enjoy my Uru Live experience now .. bring it on :D

Turning A Page ..

Cyan announced a few days back .. that they .. with GameTap .. have decided that not only D'mala shard .. which was expected .. but also ALL of Until Uru .. would be shut down on the 5th of February. Cyan has firmly declared the decision 'final'.

I was told last year .. by someone who's word I absolutely trust .. that Until Uru was a dead duck regardless of which way this went. If Uru Live flew .. then UU was gone as it had served it's purpose. If this attempt at resurrecting Live failed .. UU was still gone .. as Live was never going to happen .. so .. no 'until' existed. And it all seems a completely cut and dried way of handling it.

Unfortunately .. it has caused a HUGE uproar in the community .. and many are upset at losing the shards. A bunch are just leading the debate for the pure pleasure of being disruptive .. but others are legitimately and deeply grieving at it's loss.

I had a feeling something was coming when Tapestry was unexpectedly resurrected for a week .. I even said so to my friend tolip and my daughter MC. It's not always pleasant to be right.

I took the news of the temporary opening with a roll of my eyes .. and not that sick feeling I used to have at the mere mention of the place. So I'm pretty pleased I've put so much of THAT behind me. :)

For the entire Until Uru closing .. I've had almost a feeling of .. relief .. for some reason. I must have still had so many bad feelings from what's gone on associated with UU as a whole .. I'm guessing .. that seeing the back of it is like finally getting away from my in-laws .. the relief is totally freeing .. O_o .. LOL

And please .. these are only MY feelings as they relate to ME .. the result of some of MY UU experiences. This does NOT minimize in ANY WAY the painfully raw feelings of ANYONE ELSE in the community .. who's experiences were far better than mine !!

Truthfully .. I feel so badly for those who are losing their close connection to Uru .. those with shards who've worked so hard to 'make a home' for so many. Their sense of loss must be deeply felt and overwhelming. Just as some of my UU identity was wrapped up in a painful experience .. their UU identity is wrapped up in their far more pleasant experiences .. so the pain of their loss is something that must seem unbearable to them. :(

The arguments have all been made by many .. in a long and often overblown thread .. for and against the closing. For me .. in my very logical thinking .. we were initially only ever guaranteed 1 month .. that was it. We got 2 and a half years. It was also clearly stated .. that Until Uru was meant to keep the heartbeat of Uru alive .. until Uru could live again. Despite the flogging of the 'it is not our intention to take away what was given' statement made LAST YEAR .. when things were very different .. the Cyan 'Giant Gnarly Disclaimer' clearly stated .. at any time .. at their discretion .. they owned it .. they could pull it .. and they have.

Yet .. as many times as you say those things .. it seems to not even come close to recognizing the human hearts that have put so much into it .. and loved it so dearly.

It is true .. Uru no longer needs the 'life support' that Until Uru was .. it really HAS been reborn as Myst Online : Uru Live .. and that IS what we've ALL been dreaming .. and hoping .. and waiting for all this time. I just don't think that anyone ever really considered what that might mean .. that word Until .. and the giving up of so much .. for the gaining of something else so desperately wanted.

I'm hoping that EVERYONE is able to move on .. and that EVERYONE gets the opportunity to get into Live .. one way or the other .. there are some *cough* 'interesting' options being suggested. ;)

Good luck .. not only to Cyan .. but to all of us. :)

*waits impatiently for February 15th .. the OFFICIAL launch of MO : UL*