Current News - June 15th, 2009

[Eliza Creststeel]

Father's Day Quest Returns!
June 15, 2009

Back by popular demand, the Father's Day Quest returns starting June 17 and will be available through Father's Day, June 21. Complete it and you'll earn a limited time x2 Reputation reward! To start the adventure, visit Captain Jack Sparrow in the Faithful Bride.


Calling All Testers!
June 15, 2009

Bad language of any kind is never acceptable in Pirates Online. We have added a feature that will detect if players use bad language and will automatically suspend your account if you continue to attempt using foul langauge .

It works like this: If you use foul language in chat, you get a warning. If you insist on using bad language, you get one more warning. After that -- your account will be automatically banned from the Caribbean. The length of time you are removed from the game depends on your account history. If you?ve had previous violations, you could be banned from the game permanently!

This feature will be on the Test Servers to start and will eventually be introduced to the Live servers shortly thereafter.

[Sven Osymthe]

I feel sorry for some people in game, lol. Well, at least some stuff is being cut back on... still no major updates though -.-

Woohoo! Another minor quest

[swashbuckler II]

I wonder if they reset it so everyone that did it last year can do it again this year.

[Stephen O'Malley]

YES!!!!!!!! We need more double rep days! Those grenades are mind numbing!

Now as much as a good thing I think the bad word filter is, I have a problem; Many people don't say text cursing, they use innocent words which, used in context, is phrased as a bad word. Now, when I use the same word, in G-Rated context, does that mean I should fear for a suspension?

[Augie Doodle]

I would not be surprised if the new foul language system reached Toontown as well, there have been some problems with filter bypass there since SpeedChat Plus was added.

[jason davy]

So... what does that mean? We should curse up a storm on Test to make sure the feature works?

[CaptainGreenGene]

Originally Posted by Eliza Creststeel

The length of time you are removed from the game depends on your account history. If you?ve had previous violations, you could be banned from the game permanently!

About time, this is great new to all of us who never use bad language and dislike those that do. And to all those players who have questionable account histories beware. This seems to be fair warning by Disney.

I'm thinking this is a feature that requires no testing.

[Will Badbreaker]

I agree with jason_davy, how do they expect it to be tested? I doubt very much most testers swear, but if they do this enough and find out it works, do they get a free pass on the possible ban? Would have something like that go into a persons record simply because they were testing it.

[Juliana Maria]

Like the update, like the new quest (need that extra rep for me second pirate) But like Sven said.. still waiting for the major update.. I HOPE it comes around summer (or now actually since summer is pretty much here)

[The Skirata Clan]

A bigger question or concern is... What is going to be consider "bad language". People have been banned for numbers or signing. This is skipping the most obvious ones. What about racial comments? I have heard quite a few in game. Bad, Foul, and obscene are three very different things. I hope they have a group of people that goes over who said what and what was the context of such words. This if not done right and without extreme caution WILL cause a major issue. With most of us getting banned for a very dumb reason such as saying "Four".

[swashbuckler II]

I wonder what is going to be consitered foul language.

[Stephen O'Malley]

In that case Skirata, EVERYONE FEAR FOR YOUR CHAT LOG!!!!!!!!!

[MacIronhawk]

This is probably the biggest safety update so far this year.

Like I submitted on the POTCO site, we may be pirates but we don't need to talk like them.

[wmah]

I have not been suspended yet. But sometimes I do wonder what they consider to be foul and then why. While on guild chat I was chatting about flavors, and then I notice that the chat would appear on my screen but then on everyone elses it would not. So then I wondered what the word was as in my context everything was clean. So I started trying all the words singly. And I came up with "cherry, raspberry, and even orange. When those words were in a sentence the sentence wouldn't appear in anyone's chat log. It would appear in mine as if it went through.

I wouldn't like a suspension or a ban for saying how I like a certain flavor of candy or even that I got up to get an orange or some cherries.

I know this cause I do still use a basic account for double play. Well it is kinda basic as I used one of them 14 day passes on it.

[Commodore Larence]

This is completely goofy to set the chat filter up like this.... We all know the standard curse words, but I don't know what Disney is going to consider as foul language and ban me over. I do not see why they can't just make the standard curse words show up as Arrr all the time along with vulgar words that could be used to describe adult actions. I don't see any point in doing this other than to further cheapen their efforts with POTCO and eliminate the chat monitoring people's job. I refer back to earlier statements I have made about them "dumbing" the game down to a point to get people to actually leave so the higher ups can have an excuse to fire the developers and end the game. The only way this will be fair is if Disney posts a list of the words they consider as "bad" and make them public for all to see. I don't curse in the game, but I do say certain phrases that could be picked up and banned by automated software that can't understand the context of what the word or words were used in; I would say this goes for just about every person who plays the game.


Larence Tuppington