Nihilinux » Computing, Gaming, World of Warcraft » Scapegaming falls short, again
Scapegaming falls short, again
The legalese is rather simple here: private World of Warcraft servers are illegal. Bottom line. However, private WoW servers are growing and spreading like wildfire because people see the game as aging and don’t want to continue to pay a premium for old content or for characters that they may or may not play for spans that extend beyond weeks.
I’m not terribly interested in jumping onto the attaboy wagon and squeeling for all to hear about how this “provider” is running a criminal enterprise on a global scale. Actually, I’m going to critique them. I have taken the time to experience the “Scapegaming Experience” in full and I must say, there are severe issues across the board.
Before I dip too deep into the waters of slandering and spewing – which I fully intend to do, I would like to sing some praise for the reverse engineering that goes on here. The “lead developer” that essentially fleshes out the “StormEmu” server emulater does a pretty good job. Not great, but not horrible. I’m not sure how the hierarchy behind the scenes fleshes out, but I have to admit that for one guy who knows what he’s doing mixed in with a bunch of amateurs, it’s not a bad deal. Ok, that’s all the good I can say.
The staff at Scapegaming is pitiful. I’m quite sure that the average age of the ’staff’ is at best 18. The maturity of decision made from the forum staff to the in game staff is foolish at best. As a player, it is best to simply keep your head down and accept that over half of the quests in the game (keep in mind that World of Warcraft is a ‘quest’ driven game) are broken (they simply don’t work – either the NPC is not spawned or a critical element is not written correctly i.e. go to quests). Complaints and concerns are either being ignored or if you get someone’s attention it’s associated with being removed from the game either as a kick or banned out right.
Cheating in the server environment by players is through the roof. One in three players uses cheats regularly. Not just to gain advantages, but also to make quests work or to be able to successfully travel to otherwise unreachable areas due to simple game mechanics failing, such as lifts and elevators. There are more speed cheaters in this server realm than in any other I’ve ever seen. As a player who has seen this realm in earlier days and then again in more recent weeks, I’m appalled. Granted, my ethics are a bit shady at times, I’ve been known to harbor an exploit for a while until it no longer serves me, then expose it, the rampant outright use of third party tools to manipulate the game are sickening in Scapegaming.
Sadly, most players accept all of these negatives and either partake as needed or just ignore these flaws and move on until it affects them. The next level of fail comes from the uptime issues. Due to pisspoor coding within the databases, the servers suffer from massive memory leaks which in turn cause substantial lag. The player community has created a name for long load screens, “fruit loops”. During a “fruit loop” phase, it can take players over an hour to pass the initial loading screen to join the in-game environment. The staff, on the opposite end of the spectrum react with pure apathy. If the forums are hammered with posts relating to long load times or down time, they are locked or deleted almost immediately. Granted there are times when posts last for hours, thus showing the inactivity and inattentiveness of the staff.
The most criminal element that I have seen in the Scapegaming environment is the “Donation Process”. Apparently, to maintain hosting fees, the staff have created a method of ‘gifting’ high end equipment to players who choose to ‘donate’ specific fee amounts. The double edged sword here, which actually amuses me endlessly, is that Scapegaming is actually being scammed by overseas players who use fraudulent credentials to get the equipment they desire and play for a period of a week or two, until the smoke clears on the fraudulent ‘donations’ – showing no funds available from that source. I can’t help but laugh when I think about it, as the whole system is corrupt.
So why stick around and try to muddle through it all? Surprisingly enough, the players. As with all MMOs, players develop friendships and relationships in game. They crave the time to hang out with one another and work towards common goals. The in-game community is both wholesome and corrupt. There are groups of individuals that make the time spent there worth the effort, but sadly, more and more of them are finally coming to their senses, forcing me to take account of my own time.
The end is nigh for Scapegaming, and I’m glad to be here to witness it. They grew to a massive size of easily over 50,000 individual players through less than favorable means and it pleases me to see them be taken down in the same fashion. As a person trained in how to spot and react to the types of attacks Scapegaming is taking, it saddens me that it’s run by fools. Then again, the reality of it all is that they had it coming. They created this facade by cheating, lieing and stealing, and funnily enough, that’s how they’re dying.
Written by Ed
Ed is a network administrator with focus on security in Linux and Windows Servers and Desktops. He currently works for a state University with a travelling instruction team that teaches Cyberterrorism Defense to first responders.
Filed under: Computing, Gaming, World of Warcraft · Tags: Fail, Scapegaming, World of Warcraft
You’re right, madatom. 100% right.
At the time of this initial post, Scape still had some clout on the private WoW server scene. Thanks to you and your compratiots, that is no longer the case.
I wish you the best of luck in your endeavors! Keep hitting em when they need it.
You have summed up everything I knew but couldn’t prove.
~Ed
To begin, I am amused to reflect that this thread has become somewhat a support group for those who too, were long deceived by their hope for a brighter Wowscape tomorrow.
Despite the lack of anything near loyalty to its player base, I remained hopeful, even desperate that the staff and owner cared enough to remedy the situation. This was not to be, and so after resolving to leave mass gold, a good guild and high lvl chars behind (by what I must call obscene staff mismanagement and almost laughable technical failure), I have found that even -lower ranked servers- offer 2 to 20x the comfort, support and ease of play sadly lacking throughout Scape realms. They will tell you that you will find equally woeful conditions where ever you go after Crack… but this is simply a desperate lie meant to keep you coming back.
After the initial ’shock and awe’ you will experience leaving all you worked so hard to obtain behind, you too will realize that even free servers (if they will term themself a server at all) must maintain some standard. The bar at Crack is set VERY VERY low at this point, and I dont care how ‘lucky you are to get free play at all..’ Everyone deserves better than that, even Wowscape users. Contrary to rumour, you can actually get it alot easier than you thought.
anyone can tell me exact when can we play again andwhy scapegaming site and all realm is down tnx
You’re in the wrong place for that kinda info.
None of us gives a damn about scape or IF it’s ever back up.
Feel free to email that twit peyton with plenty of emails her hotmail account is alysonn73@hotmail.com or even call her this is public information she provided on a whois to scapegaming.Or even mail or call her
Administrative Contact:
Self
Alyson Reeves ([Who Is Domain])
+1.2149381746
Fax: +1.5555555555
2509 Westridge
Plano, State 75075
Before the site was taken down (That was the victory for me) I had a poll running for a few days in the General Scapegaming chat. Thankfully it wasn’t closed because I insisted that it should run for a week at least so that Scapegaming community get a chance to speak for themselves. The poll was whether Peyton should be replaced or kept, and an hour before the site went down the votes were at 90ish% wanting her replaced and the rest wanting her to stay.
It made me realize how many scape players wanted change but wouldn’t speak out for fear of the banhammer (as mentioned before wielded by malleable, juvenile staff members).
Thank god its all over. It’s just a shame Peyton ran of with so much money before it happened.
Well I have no idea where that poll was I never saw it. Not sure how you could insist and anyone would care to follow your wishes either? The site isnt down its under a dos attack. You visit the url and it links to a site that handles that. Also if you log in several realms are still up though crack does not show up. So really not sure what your smoking even though I could hope for that wish also but its wrong. If they had a half a wit they would disapear wipe everything and start over with a working system. Course I dont think peyton has half a wit since she now thinks she is some super rock band manager even to the point of advertising that band on the forums with threat of permaban if anyone said anything negartive.
Madatom, if you wish to taste another server’s vintage, head to TenaciousGaming.com
The old management, GMs and everyone else is there now. Still corrupt as ever, proving once and for all that Peyton was just their temperamental scapegoat (pun intended).
Someone Send them a nice housewarming dos attack.
This is the talk on the servers. Peyton is on a “business” trip and forgot to pay the scape bills. So thats why the website is down and why we had to change realm lists. Thats probably why most of the staff quit also. If this is true when s …he gets back we will be back on the normal site and everything. Bliz didnt do anything to us nor are we going to go down. Apparently twobit it over the servers right now, till she gets back.
set realmlist 208.109.105.225
We’re NOT dead
[Ed replies directly: You are dead. You're just a zombie. DIE ZOMBIE!]
Private servers are not illegal. If they were they would not exist. there are over 5935903950295 posts onthis subject.
Just because you want them to be illegal doesn’t make it so.
It’s just as legal as dropping acid in the 60’s. Till a federal judge somewhere says it’s illegal, it will be legal.
The only thing playing or owning one does is break the EULA, which is the equivalent of breaking a school rule. Is it also illegal to chew gum? Since that breaks the schools eula?
[Ed replies directly: Actually, DooDah, that is your interpretation. The LAW, as in the written word which is viewed as the rule in the United States, clearly backs Blizzard. So while you may have been doing it long enough that it seems like you're chewing gum in school, it's clearly not that simple. Please don't spew your FUD here. Just because you do it, doesn't make it any less illegal. Just makes you numb to the consequences since you've never paid the fine. Be accountable man.]
another alternative is cachewow.com
tenacious is the same buggy ascent. Cachewow is a completely different core form what scape used. It’s more like a private retail than a private server there. Kinda scary too see how a private server can be so close to retail and not be retail.
Most owners don’t want you to know that there is a much better core out there then the one they use, so they spread misinformation on the subject. 1 hour in game will prove them all wrong.
http://cachewow.com
http://qchat.rizon.net/?&channels=%23CacheWow
i think scapegaming have new realmlist so if realy need new realmlist plz tell to us for use that.
Good news
scapegaming realy have new realmlist and now i can play so u must change your realmlist to { set realmlist 208.43.42.163 } now u can play game.
All the staff left for tenacius gaming although is the same laggy buggy server, with a difference, they have 0 donations so their future aint bright at all.
At least peyton will come back and have site and realmlist back up and pay 2bit so he can give us a playable server.
YES TG has some money, but lets see how much will the founders last by taking money out of their pockets for the servers.
Okay thats funny doodah who is marcello from scapegaming and he created cachewow. So you have a new emu server advertising here by the guy who some say destroyed scapegaming (if he did good job) though I dont believe he did he is just a scapegoat for peytons lies.
Well, I can’t get on thier servers anymore and I had over 2k of donations on there and nothing to do with them. If you would like to buy them hit me up on my E-Mail or Hotmail. Selling em for really cheap.
lirc09@hotmail.com
matt.donor@gmail.com
Let me know guys!
Ok apparently you are very misinformed john. Firstly, anyone can get alyson’s email, its called look on paypal. Secondly, doodah is in NO WAY marcelo genius, marcelo was a idiot Spaniard whom no one could understand. Doodah is an old man whom runs cachewow. I wub you doodah, but your old, if you have a problem with being old you know where to find me. Now it is also apparent that our friend stres here is also misinformed. Tenacious gaming DOES have donations up, we have an average latency of under 100, and dont lag, at all bud. Sorry but the numbers count more than your he say she say bullshit. Anyone cares to disagree with me, please join tenacious gaming vent and i would love to hear the lies you have been fed.
Not really sure why any of what you said matters your only advertising. And whats the email matter either her contact info comes right up on whois for scape using any search engine. So not sure why you would need to waste your time doing a login to paypal but if you like doing things the hard way knock yourself out. Also not sure if you think I am doodah or some such nonsense since he advertised here just like you did. Also I dont care if your site works or not since this is for complaining about wowscape not for you to advertise. Try paying for an advertisement like a real business not some hack. Now if your not here to agree with Ed on the stupidity of scapegaming get off and advertise elsewhere!
Personally I just find it mind boggling that there was ANYONE who donated for anything other than their last couple levels on scape! I remember looking at the donation item list and seeing crap like $150 for a t6 set or something in that ball park. Anyone who actually put real money into that server deserves our pity because of their bleak and meaningless existance.
I agree completely but I keep hearing over and over of some kids paying 1200 bucks for full sets of gear. I cant recall which server but if you looked each server had different prices for donation gear (never could figure out why) but I do recall seeing items at the $300 range. Now if they could not of been getting that price it would of not been that high so to me that means its true. But mostly I think it was the kids blowing parents money. I have been hearing the reason the site is down is she is out of the country and forgot to pay the isp. Honestly I find that hard to believe since a setup like scape would have autopay setup. And unless she has been blowing her money on that idiot venture of hers to be a rock bank manager she could be out of money. Even with the low bills she should be seeing atm with so few players the bandwidth use would be almost nothing.
Haha! since twobit took over thing ARE actually getting better! well, other than that idiot hacker poorly trying to masquerade as 2bit and harassing players with that stupid summon. thing… but yeah, since peytons left the picture i do actaully see improvements happening. wherever she went i hope she stays there and hands over the reins to 2bit for good. at least he seems to actually give a damn.
i stand corrected… scape still needs work fixed
I find it fascinating the amount of attention you have drawn to yourself ed, 72 comments on this and nothing on your other articles
I found your article on botnets interesting
Ohh and thanks for ur support, but scape kinda acts like a terran building in starcraft, if you hurt it enough, it will eventually explode from the damage caused and that’s happening now so….
as for TenaciousGaming.com, do i care about them? my fight is with peyton and trinity (and thelard on the way) also cachewow looks like a nothing server full of nobodys so i dont care
also Gransus, peyton is over 40, thats way to old for a private server owner
Hey now woohh there on the 40 bit she is younger then I am and she was born in 73. You under 30 people love to average those on the late 30’s up. Now she does lie about being 24 on the forums thats funny.
yeah ur right john, i think shes like…. 41 or 42… ill ask silent next time i speak to him
She uses her birth year in her hotmail she was born in 73 thats under 40
Well a current update scapegaming.com and the temp site downtime shoutbox is still down. The realms though are still up with crack still off the realmlist. In this ago of cellphones’ pc’s etc there is no way that imbecile peyton could not of paid her isp (if thats the real story. With months of screwups I am thinking what I thought the only method of survival would be months ago. Dump everything disapear while repairing the realms then go back online with a new website and start over from scratch with no negative players. Keeping the realms up for the moment gives them a group of ignorant beta testers. But who knows if crack does not come back online I myself am done with wow. I am tired from 3 retail accounts, then 5 on wowstorm (closed with no word after 3 months of scape lying it was being repaired), to 9 accounts on crack. No point with no new goals since I have played every class on horde and alliance. Course lets not forget the idiots at scape wiped out every guild and guild bank on crack so that was a major community killer.
Well looks like I might be right on a hiding act the current scapegaming url is http://www.2bitgaming.com. Or he stole it or was given it by peyton who knows? But at this moment it’s mostly running on the devs site he just opened. I feel like I am watching an episode of days of our lives with these idiots.
Alright guys, it’s been an interesting mix to see the replies and information brought forward here, but the time has come. I’ll leave this post with all the current comments (minus a few stupid ones), as a reminder for others who may run across crap private WoW servers that they are out there…but I’m killing the comments here. It’s well past the point.
Cheers!
Ed
[...] “Scapegaming” that runs at least one private WoW server (and they’ve apparently been running microtransactions in-game — selling in-game items for “donations” of money). The law firm working for [...]
[...] “Scapegaming” that runs at least one private WoW server (and they’ve apparently been running microtransactions in-game — selling in-game items for “donations” of money). The law firm working for [...]
[...] “Scapegaming” that runs at least one private WoW server (and they’ve apparently been running microtransactions in-game — selling in-game items for “donations” of money). The law firm working for [...]
[...] “Scapegaming” that runs at least one private WoW server (and they’ve apparently been running microtransactions in-game — selling in-game items for “donations” of money). The law firm working for [...]