Developer Admits Mistake in 'Dolphingate'

Controversy in the major MMO ArcheAge arose yesterday following the game's attempt to convince former players to log back in to its servers. For those of you not following the story, on March 18, all former ArcheAge players were sent an email as part of the game's "Win-Back" program to encourage players to return. To sweeten the pot, several in-game items were offered to those that did, including a rare aquatic dolphin mount. Originally, the only way to obtain this mount was through purchasing RnG boxes from the game's cash shop and crossing one's fingers until they would break. This caused quite the uproar among the game's playerbase as loyal subscribers who received nothing felt just a tiny bit slighted.

Cyafin the rare aquatic dolphin mount...
Does ArchAge have a non-aquatic
dolphin mount?

On the morning of March 20, GCD News' head "-gate" expert uncovered some startling news. An anonymous source within the game's studio has confirmed that an enormous mistake was made by sending former players in-game items. In fact, former players were never to be given in-game items at all. "The mix-up occurred in our outbox department, which is run by interns and handles all of our outgoing email, " explained the source. "Simply put, the wrong message was copied and pasted. The real target for those exclusive items were all of our Patron subscribers. We felt that rewarding their loyalty to our product was paramount."

So what was going to be used to lure former players back to ArcheAge? "Stock options," said our source. "We figured, what better way to get players to re-invest in our game than to actually invest them. Each returning player would have received 100 shares of our company, which would be valued in the thousands of dollars."

Whether or not the ArcheAge community will make it through this crisis remains to be seen. Regardless, players across all MMOs are canceling their subscriptions today, hoping to receive an email with free loot attached.