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Game News

The Rocketeer News feed is now available as an RSS feed .

03/02/2008 - 12:16:00 : Server Move (continued)
Forgot to mention above that as the server has moved back to a UK server, all in game times will now of course be UK times, not PST.

03/02/2008 - 11:32:00 : ROCKETEER HAS FINALLY MOVED SERVER
Our brand new server (dubbed Davros - we seem to have a Dr Who theme going on) was sucessfully commissioned on Friday evening. The new server is a significant improvement over the old server, in terms of processor and memory which should deliver a signficant performance boost.

As everything went so well on Friday I decided to move the game as quickly as possible on to the new server so it too can take advantage of the speed and power of the new server. Oh and believe me the new server is FAST! It has certainly exceeded my expectations.

Unfortunately it may take up to 48 hours for the DNS changes take effect across the internet, so until then you may be prompted to click on a link to new.rocketeer.org.uk. Sorry for the inconvenience but was the only way I could achieve the move with the minimum of downtime.

If anyone has any problems accessing the game please contact me at matt@mattbohan.com.

21/01/2008 - 20:20:00 : Server Upgrade Update
I have purchased a new server! If I've been quiet lately it's because I've been configuring/planning the big move of all our domains over to the new server. It's a big job. I can tell you that the new server is fantastic, very very fast and has the very latest versions of software etc so it is actually a dream to configure.

To be honest as the game appears to be running fine on DreamHost I'll probably leave it there until we have completed the move and we know everythign is working. We'll also iron out all the problems so hopefully it will be a smooth migration. Hopefully you should notice enhanced levels of stability and performance in game after the move. More updates to follow as and when I have them.

21/01/2008 - 20:14:00 : Today's Update
The weekly competition didn't run when it should have. I'm in the middle of investgating what happened. In the meantime I have run the offending script manually. Sorry for the inconvenience!

10/01/2008 - 20:41:00 : Update
Just to keep you updated I've been a bit busy this last few days looking for a replacement web server. You remember the farce with our existing dedicated server provider we had when trying to upgrade servers? Well anyway I've found a smaller company who seem pretty good, which look likes a viable option. Anyway a nice Xeon quad core 2.4Gz processor would be very nice indeed ;). I hope to place an order soon. Of course there is lots of work getting the new server ready but it should be really worth it. Dreamhost (the current host) is OK but having run on a dedicated server I do miss the freedom of being able to configure things exactly how you want them. I'll keep you all informed as and when I know more. Thanks.

08/01/2008 - 20:01:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a bug in the bank whereby interest was being capped at 1000 instead of 100,000 credits. Thanks to fluffy for reporting it to me. BUT: [there is always a but!] I have also changed the rules, interest will now be payable on a WEEKLY basis only. The bank has been paying out too much money allowing players to generate massive incomes, and is something I need to address to make the game more balanced. That said I've also increased the interest rates to compensate.

I'm going to monitor how this change goes and if necessary will make further changes. If you have any comments about this change please let me know in the normal way.

03/01/2008 - 21:30:00 : More Changes
Fixed a small mistake on the opening text when you first log in after creating a new character (the number of credits was wrong).

In addition to this I've added a reminder notice about the bug report/question/suggestion buttons. They are there to be used. This has given me an idea, and may well turn in to a tip of the day type of affair.

One last change for tonight, when you use certain items and consume them, sometimes you are left with another item. HINT: Rocketburger drinks!

03/01/2008 - 21:19:00 : Today's Changes
Made some changes to the core security/login script which have improved the security system immensely. For example the game will now work just as well using www.rocketeer.org.uk or rocketeer.org.uk without any of the annoying session errors when logging in. This should also make it much easier to move servers or set up workload balancing if the need arises in the future.

01/01/2008 - 20:32:00 : Today's Changes
Did some work on security as it appears the default apache security settings on Dreamhost (who are are now our temporary web hosting company until I can get a new server) are a little bit too lax for my liking.

I have also removed all references of the rocketeer.me.uk domain from the code now that the move over to dreamhost has been completed. This should have stopped the occasional annoying session error messages when logging in.

31/12/2007 - 21:30:00 : HAPPY NEW YEAR!
I'd like to wish everyone a very happy new year and to thank you for playing Rocketeer.

Matt!

31/12/2007 - 21:09:00 : Today's Changes
Thanks again to fluffy for reporting a problem with the weekly competition scripts. This has been fixed now, and has been run. Sorry it's late.

30/12/2007 - 20:00:00 : Today's Changes
Thanks to fluffy for reporting a problem with the bank interest. The automated job that runs to pay interest to players wasn't running since the move of server. This has now been rectified, and I've manually run the script several times which should make up for any loss of interest.

29/12/2007 - 17:04:00 : Today's Changes
You can now make your own rocket nosecones in your shed!

28/12/2007 - 21:00:00 : Today's Changes
Not too much to report today, the biggest thing I've done is I have made the game news available as an RSS feed. This is my first attempt at my own RSS feed so there may be problems, so please feel free to report these in the usual way!

27/12/2007 - 19:27:00 : Today's Changes
20 additional items added to the game's internal database.

New items are available in the shop of the future and the industrial district.

Removed defunct forum link from navigation bar (from main site).

26/12/2007 - 18:00:00 : Today's Changes
I've fixed the weather! I suddenly feel very powerful...

The weather doesn't have any impact on gameplay yet, but will at some point in the very near future.

I've also made some performance improvements to the back end database.

I have also made a minor change to the site navigation bar on the login page.

26/12/2007 - 16:47:00 : Password Resets (Multiple Accounts)
I've fixed a bug with the password reset functionality that meant it didn't work for people with multiple character accounts using the same email address. Hopefully this should now be working. Amy problems please let me know.

25/12/2007 - 18:00:00 : Resend Password Problem Fixed
Fixed a problem with the resend password and new player registration forms which was a result of the hasty server move. My sincere thanks to Astre for reporting this to me.

24/12/2007 - 20:50:00 : Christmas Goodies
Log in to your account for a little Christmas treat....

24/12/2007 - 19:30:00 : HAPPY CHRISTMAS
As it's Christmas Eve (well here in England anyway) I thought I'd wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy new year!

24/12/2007 - 18:00:00 : DNS Issue
There was an unexpected DNS issue which might have prevented the site from working as a result of the move of servers. This has now been sorted out.

Sorry folks, it was completely my fault! Sorry for any inconvenience that it may have caused.

23/12/2007 - 16:30:00 : Forum Link
Removed the now defunct ‘Forum’ link from the game interface.

23/12/2007 - 16:19:00 : Rocketeer has moved!
Due to continuing issues with our dedicated server which hosts Rocketeer I have taken the decision to immediately move the game to a new shared hosting account. This should mean that the game is much more reliable. You might notice that you are redirected to ‘rocketeer.me.uk’ when you log in, this is nothing to worry about, it just means you are using the new version of the game on its new server. The other significant difference is that as the game is now being hosted on servers in the USA the game will now operate on Pacific Standard Time. Today’s turn update will take place at 18:00 GMT as before, but from then onwards it will move to 18:00 PST. Please can you report any issues to me using the report bug link or by email to matt@mattbohan.com.

22/12/2007 - 17:27:00 : Server Trouble
It looks like we've had more server trouble. Thanks to Astre for emailing me to tell me that the turns hadn't been updating. This was caused by a server issue which has now been resolved. Please accept my apologies for this, and I have added some additional turns/credits to everyone's characters by way of compensation.

02/09/2007 - 09:42:00 : Server Update Postponed, but not forgotten...
As you may have gathered the server update never happened. The reason for this was at the 11th hour the company which looks after our servers dropped a bombshell on us which scuppered all of our plans. Basically right up to the moment we were to start work the company told us “yeah no problem we can move your existing IP addresses over”. Until of course it came round for them to do it, when they changed their mind. Changing IPs for us at the time wasn’t an option so we postponed the upgrade and commenced an epic struggle for a full refund from our hosting company. After much unpleasantness we did finally get a refund.

I apologise for not updating you sooner, but to be honest I was so angry I’d have probably have said something I would later regret. Because of my bad experience with the current hosting provider I am currently looking for an alternative company who is a little bit more trustworthy. This will mean we’ll have to move our IP addresses, which means more planning and work for us but hopefully won’t impact on the game too much.

I hope to acquire another new server within the next couple of months. Once we have migrated Rocketeer over to the new server I can start development again. The main reason for the lack of progress on development is that the current server is so unstable that I’m scared of making any changes. Hopefully when the replacement is available work can commence. Rocketeer is still an important part of my life and it will remain so.

Thank you for your continued patience and understanding.

12/06/2007 - 22:12:00 : Server Ugprade latest!
Between Friday 15th and Monday 18th of June 2007 we will be performing a major upgrade to our web server. The upgrade will involve switching services to the newly commissioned server which provides additional disk space, bandwidth, processing power and RAM. This is fantastic news for the Rocketeer game as it should allow for further growth and hopefully speed up response times as well as being a little more stable.

To facilitate the upgrade the Rocketeer website (and game) will be suspended temporarily at approximately 17:00 BST on Friday 15th June to facilitate the data transfer. Service should be restored between 20:00 and 23:00 BST on Friday 15th.

After the upgrade the automatic scripts will run properly again, at the moment they are a bit haphazard due to the current server showing it's age!

I apologise in advance for any inconvenience this may cause. Any questions please send an in game email to 'admin'.

01/06/2007 - 20:12:00 : Server Upgrade
The order has been placed for a new Server for Rocketeer! Yes after complex negotations and a lot of uncessary stalling from the hosting company we will soon have a new server. I think we'll get our hands on it sometime early next week. It will take us a while to set everything up but in the next 7-14 days we should be up and running on our super server.

29/05/2007 - 22:41:00 : Server Update
The server upgrade is progressing. We are in the final stages of scheduling the upgrade. The upgrade should give us a massive increase in processor speed, double the present amount of RAM and unlimited bandwidth which should a nice performance improvements. The old server is showing it's age so hopefully we can replace it as soon as possible.

29/05/2007 - 22:40:00 : Update
Still manually running the update script. We should have now caught up and there should be an extra days money/turns added on to make up for the randomness of the turn updates. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible. Thanks for your understanding.

23/05/2007 - 19:44:00 : News...
I have disabled the forum for the moment as we were getting a large amount of spam. This spam was generally clogging up the server and was serving no purpose at all apart from annoying everyone.

I am thinking what to replace the forum with, as I think some kind of social meeting place is a good thing, but I suspect I’ll integrate this within the game and build in some safeguards against spam. Hopefully you will see an improvement in game response times as a result (as more bandwidth will be available on the server). In other related news I have talked before about a server upgrade. I’m in negotiations at the moment and I hope to be able to share more news over the coming week or so.

Once again I'd like to pass on my thanks for playing Rocketeer.

Matt

02/01/2007 - 19:53:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a typo on a Mount Kevina adventure.

31/12/2006 - 23:59:00 : * * * H A P P Y   N E W   Y E A R * * *
I'd like to thank all of you for playing the game and to wish you all a very happy and prosperous new year.

31/12/2006 - 13:20:00 : Today's Changes
I have dramatically lowered the maximum amount of interest paid per day from the bank. This is to balance things out a bit. This may be unpopular with the few players who are trillion/billionarires but I have a responsibility to make the game as fair as possible.

In other news the General Store has some new items in stock.

30/12/2006 - 12:14:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a couple of annoying cosmetic bugs.

29/12/2006 - 22:39:00 : Mince Pies for All
All players should have received some extra special mince pies, as a gift. Hope you all had a fantastic Christmas!

19/08/2006 - 13:43:00 : Today's Changes
A new shop has opened - for level 10 players and above.

In other news a new ranking table now exists which takes in to account the cash, bank balance and the value of items in their inventory!

15/08/2006 - 20:26:00 : Todays Changes
Thanks to all those players who reported problems with the rankings, you reward will be on it's way after I finish typing this. I looked at the rankings to discover a player with 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 credits. I couldn't really ignore such a massive problem. The player didn't really have that many credits but the ranking scripts thought otherwise. It took a while but I found the problem in the end. It's funny how the smallest bugs result in the biggest effects! The ranking scripts should now be working properly again. If not let me know via the usual way! Oh as I was trying to find a bug I've put an upper limit on the amount of credits you can have on you and deposited in your bank account. This limit is 2,147,483,647 which I think is enough. I know there were two players who exceeded this limit, so I apologise to them, but I needed to set a limit somewhere. Please note that although you can temporarily go over this limit, the cap will be applied at the daily turns update.

13/08/2006 - 21:48:00 : Todays Changes
Made a couple of very small changes to some items.

10/08/2006 - 20:42:37 : Todays Changes continued
Although I haven't posted an update in the last few days I am indeed working on things. My week away gave me time to think things through which means I have to go back and re-work a few bits and pieces to enable other bigger things to happen properly. I am also working on a range of new adventures, which will be rolled out shortly. Arrrrrr. Shiver me timbers.... Sorry slipped in to pirate speak there. Its definately not a clue or anything. Ahem.

10/08/2006 - 20:36:45 : Todays Changes
It would seem that our server was about 7 minutes fast when I checked today. It would appear the server we used to sync our clock with no longer exists, which is why this problem has returned. I've messed around with the config to use a different server so hopefully it will be the end of our time problems. Maybe...

07/08/2006 - 01:30:00 : I'm back
Just a quick note to let you know that I have safely arrived home from my holiday in Wales (at 1am this morning). I've just logged on just to check that everything was OK.

29/07/2006 - 09:57:00 : Today's Changes
Bug reports, suggestions etc are now emailed to my phone. Just so I can keep an eye on things this week whilst I am away. Have a good week everyone.

28/07/2006 - 23:24:00 : Holiday
As you may already know I am on holiday from tomorrow for a week. Therefore there will be no changes for the next week. I am back on the 7th August at which time I'll catch up and hopefully do some more stuff. It's one of the very rare occasions I get to actually chill out and relax for a whole week. I hope to come back feeling refreshed and able to continue to improve the game. A lot of the game's strange abstract ideas come from my experiences on a NASRA holiday so hopefully they'll be a whole load of new stuff creeping in to the game soon.

28/07/2006 - 22:10:00 : Reboot
Server was rebooted sucessfully.

28/07/2006 - 20:00:00 : Planned Outage
There will be a planned outage at 10pm British Summer Time whilst I reboot the games server. The server has been running fine lately, but we are doing a reboot just in case. As I won't be around next week I need to do all I can to ensure things run smoothly whilst I am away. I will still be able to monitor things remotely, and should get a text message to tell me of any problems. In addition to all of our monitoring, we do have someone who is going to keep an eye on things for us as well. All of this means that, touch wood, that you won't notice anything different.

25/07/2006 - 22:29:00 : No changes today
I'm trying to make sure that I at least post something each day. I've managed to catch a bug somewhere and I've not been feeling well. So I can only apologise and I hope that I feel a little better tomorrow so I can get some more stuff done...

24/07/2006 - 20:40:00 : Today's Changes
I have re-instated the bank interest payments. Interest payments should of gone through as normal (if a bit late today). From tomorrow onwards the maximum interest payable will be 100,000 credits per night. Sorry folks - some players are very near the maximum possible number of credits that are physically possible in the database. Strange things started to happen so I had to do something. Next week while I am away on my holidays I will try to think up some cool (but very expensive) stuff people can use their vast fortunes on.

I have finally made the Richest rankings reflect savings as well as cash. I've also added Most Cash and Biggest Saver rankings just because I could. Sorry it's taken so long, thanks to fluffy for originally raising this one and DJDY for reminding me.

23/07/2006 - 11:12:00 : Today's Changes
The Lemtrac racetrack, at long last, now has a photo. I've also made a couple of very minor cosmetic changes to the adventure pages. I've added a new adventure in the industrial estate, as well as two new in game items. There is a new item available in Ken's rocket shop.

21/07/2006 - 22:25:00 : Update
I'm working on another chunk of cool new functionality which is part of the big upgrade which should be released at some point over the weekend. Slowly but surely we'll get there!

19/07/2006 - 17:49:00 : Today's Changes
The game's server was having trouble telling the time (it was about 15 minutes too fast). It has now been corrected so the turns update will run when it's supposed to again.

19/07/2006 - 17:44:00 : MY BIRTHDAY
Today is my birthday which is why you all should of recieved a slice of birthday cake!

18/07/2006 - 20:22:00 : Today's Changes
As today was very very hot here in the UK, Rocketburger now serves ice cold milkshakes. Sorry it's a small change day today it's just too hot to be stuck in front of a computer.

17/07/2006 - 21:17:00 : Advance Notice
I am going away from 26th July to the 6th August for the 4th annual NASRA rocketry holiday. So I won't be around to answer emails, bug reports or do any work on the game during this period. Hopefully there won't be any major problems and the game will run as usual. I am looking forward to it for several reasons, normally it's a lot of fun, it's an oppertunity to relax and hopefully will give me plenty of inspiration for the game when I come back.

17/07/2006 - 20:00:00 : Today's Changes
The bank interest payments have been temporarily suspended while a full audit takes place. It is alledged that certain financial irregularities (or bugs) have occured which need to be looked in to. This will be re-instated as soon as possible.

danper suggested that it would be a good idea to put the number of turns making fins will take somewhere on the screen. I agree totally so I've done it.

16/07/2006 - 13:51:00 : Today's Changes
You now have the ability to make your own fins, in your shed. The number of fins you make out of a single piece of material is dependant on your characters level. The theory is that the more experienced you are, the less wastage there is, and thus the more fins you actually make.

I have also increased the size of the item title field as it wasn't big enough for some of the new fin objects.

In other news, Rocketburger has opened a new restaurant in Rock City. Thanks go to rocketeer for suggesting it back in December.

15/07/2006 - 14:43:00 : Today's Changes
As you probably have already noticed Rock City now has weather! This currently has no effect on gameplay, but it will do soon...

14/07/2006 - 23:31:00 : Today's Changes
The industrial district has been 'tweaked' slightly. It is no longer possible to get junk from this area, but don't worry you get some other useful items. The cardboard fin material and a couple of body tubes have been removed from the shop of the future, because they are now available today. Please bear with me as it might take a day or two before you are able to do anything with these new items . This is part of the gradual roll out of the bug upgrade.

Thanks goes to Trace13 for reporting a slight typo on the shed. I've corrected it...

13/07/2006 - 18:54:00 : Today's Changes
The concept of a house (and shed) has been added to the game (and is your new starting point when you log in). The garden shed will become your workshop, where you build rockets and their components. I think it makes much more sense, and also gives me a nice new starting point for putting in the new construction type stuff.

12/07/2006 - 21:29:00 : Todays Changes
Corrected a couple of typos in an item description (thanks danper for reporting them). No other changes tonight, as I am trying to think through the implications of a fairly major change planned for tomorrow. I have a day off work tomorrow so hope to get a lot done. Actually thats not strictly true as I do have to go to work for my mid year appraisal. It's a long story. Of course how much I get done probably will effect my motivation afterwoods and therefore how much I get done. Lets hope I have a good mid year appraisal then... ;)

11/07/2006 - 20:59:00 : Today's Update
I have just loaded the new rocket motor engine data in to the game. The new items are in available in the shop of the future in case you are curious. The prices or whatever may change, I just picked fairly random prices. Each type of motor has it's own characteristics (like average thrust and weights etc) but again I'll probably have to fiddle with these as I'm developing the new launch code. So with the boring stuff done I can start to work on proper exciting new stuff.....

10/07/2006 - 20:07:48 : Newsflash
It looks like the Value-Right Supermarket have some new stock in...

07/07/2006 - 22:38:00 : Todays Changes
Today I did a whole lot of database changes (adding new tables etc.). Hopefully you won't notice anything different yet (if you are seeing differences then it's probably a bug ;) ).... But you will soon. In other news I'm doing some real life rocketeering on Saturday (tomorrow) - I can't wait, the last rocket launch I went to was back in April.

05/07/2006 - 21:37:00 : Todays lack of changes
Happy Wednesday to you all. Today was a bit hectic as we had family over for a meal so didn't really get a chance to do very much today. However it's not been a complete write off as I did a lot of thinking about the game on the bus on the way home from work. I've made a decision to add yet another element of real life rocketry in to the game. I'll probably put this in before the major upgrade and to start with it won't effect gameplay. Although it will after the complete re-write of the launch rocket part of the game. Yes I know I'm being cryptic, I don't want to ruin the suprise. In theory I should be able to get this little change built before the weekend, and to stick to my plans for the ugprade stuff. I think I'm suffering from a major case of scope creep. OK I'll give you a clue it's something I've talked about before as something I really want to add in....

04/07/2006 - 12:00:00 : Happy Independence Day
Happy Independence Day for those that reside in the USA.

03/07/2006 - 21:35:00 : Today's Changes
Today I started work on the database changes needed to support storing the new rocket engine characteristics. I also started working out the specifics on the various types of engine you will be able to use. You won't notice anything different yet until I actually load them in to the database. I've found that it's a lot easier working in Excel than directly with the database. My sort of plan is to get the new engines fully defined and in the game by the end of the week. I think after that, all of the boring preparation tasks will be over with and then I can start the actual interesting bits when I create all the new rocket building forms/pages.

02/07/2006 - 12:23:00 : Today's Changes
I have updated the link at the bottom of each in game page to my website. The new address is www.mattbohan.com. It was pointing at my old website domain name which doesn't exist any more. I have also tinkered with the database a bit, when I designed the game I underestimated it's popularity a bit!. In other (and more important) news, Disco Pete has a new vehicle in stock...

01/07/2006 - 12:22:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a bug with the 'Next Level' stat bar, it wasn't working correctly for people who are over level 30. Thanks go to DonkeyHoatie for reporting it. Whilst I was there I have improved the formatting of the numbers you get when you place your mouse over the level required statbar.

29/06/2006 - 22:11:00 : Today's Changes
I have defined 48 extra items in the games database (fins). They may be previewed at the Shop from the future. As you can probably see there are different shapes and fin material which should make the game slightly more interesting, the aim is to create 100's of possible combinations of components to build rockets with. Yes you've guessed it, they are post-upgrade items only. They are pretty much worthless so don't buy them. Oh and just a reminder I would advise against pre-emptively stockpiling items from the shop of the future, as any items from the rift will disappear when the rift closes, thus would be a waste of credits.

29/06/2006 - 20:00:00 : Maintenance
Players may have noticed a short period of slower than usual response times. I was running a one off complete backup of the entire database. Sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused.

The one off backup was just in case I mess something up as part of the big upgrade. Obviously I’ll try my best not to screw up - but you never know ;).

28/06/2006 - 17:50:00 : Today's Changes
Some more components have been added to the rocketry shop of the future.

27/06/2006 - 20:42:00 : Today's Changes
More adventures have been changed very slightly. Fixed a couple of typos (thanks trace13). My main focus today was to work out some of the fine details about the ugprade. It seems very likely that making fins (e.g. cutting them out of cardboard or balsa etc.) will become a separate task to rocket building. I'm trying to work out the best way to implement some of the things I want to do as part of the ugprade. I hope to make the new fin making interface available within the next week or so. All things being well.

26/06/2006 - 20:53:20 : Today's Changes
Today sees the addition of a new location (for those of you who are level 8 and above). Have done some more behind the scenes tinkering with the main database. Perhaps the most radical change is that you can now gain or lose rocket karma points when out adventuring. To this end, two existing locations have also been changed slightly. Thank you to wwattles for suggesting the adventure karma idea.

25/06/2006 - 10:54:00 : Today's Updates
The ranking script will now run every 10 minutes, instead of every hour. The run frequency was reduced a couple of months ago because of server trouble.

The session bug which effected people using IE7 BETA 2 has now been solved. I believe this behaviour was fixed in IE7 BETA 3, but I fixed it anyway.

I also have made a change to the behind the scenes database to increase the maxmum amount of credits you can store in the bank.

25/06/2006 - 00:54:00 : More changes
I've fixed a spelling mistake in one of the hermits cave adventures. Thanks Alex for reporting that one. Also a cosmetic issue was fixed on the bank page, thanks to wwatles for reporting it.

25/06/2006 - 00:43:00 : Free cake
You all should have recieved a slice of wedding cake to celebrate the wedding of two rocketeer players back in April.

24/06/2006 - 23:45:21 : I'm back
Sorry for the lack of recent updates. Things have been quite hectic for me the last few months, in real life.You really wouldn't want to know how busy I've been. However things have settled down a bit and I intend to finish the big upgrade (rocketeer 2.0), and of course keep the game ticking over with minor updates until then.

Today's changes I fixed the spelling error in the bank. Thanks to all those that reported that one.

Please stay tuned for further updates. Apologies once again for disappearing of the face off the planet! Matt

29/04/2006 - 22:00:00 : Congratulations
Congratulations to justin and amy who got married today. Justin and Amy are rocketeer players and part of my rocketry group.

I can confirm that the bride, groom, best man, myself and two other people did stop off during the journey from the church to the reception, to launch rockets. Fantastic!

29/03/2006 - 20:58:00 : Server Trouble
Just thought I'd let everyone know that I've been having server trouble again! Luckily due to fairly constant monitoring [I was up at 5am this morning just so I could check the server!!] and through manual intervention, I've managed to keep the game up and running. However I'm busy sorting out server problems instead of writing new content, which actually is depressing me slightly as I wanted to get so much done this week. Anyway, to help us reduce the general load on the server, and for us to do some testing the ranking scripts will now run hourly (instead of every 5 minutes). This is a temporary change only until we can find the root cause of the problems and fix it. Sorry for any inconvenience this may cause, and I am doing everything I can to resolve the issue so we can actually move forwards. Thanks for your continued patience and support. Matt

26/03/2006 - 17:15:00 : Today's Changes
Small tweaks made to odd jobbing outcomes to balance gameplay.

22/03/2006 - 20:14:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a slight bug in the sell items which, when selling very large amounts of an item, was causing the game to misbehave. It should be sorted now though... Also I apologise for any problems earlier today, we had to do an emergency reboot of the server this morning, which may of caused the game to of been down for a while. Oh well only two more days of work to get through and then I have a whole week off work, which I'm hoping will allow me to make some fairly big changes....

20/03/2006 - 18:46:49 : Today's Changes
Fixed a bug where players who had bank accounts were not being notification of interest payments. You should have recieved the extra credits it's just that you wouldn't of been told. Everyone who would of been effected by this problem should of recieved some extra money in their bank accounts as an apology for a 'banking error'. Thanks to danper for reporting that one.

Also you can now buy more than 999 of items in the shop, if you so wish.

19/03/2006 - 14:52:00 : Today's Changes
Corrected a typo on the arrival page of the Hermits Cave (thanks to Wormsey bon Broom for reporting it).

17/03/2006 - 18:31:00 : Today's Changes
Aparently some of you didn't get your interest payment last night. I've fixed the problem and those who didn't get anything despite the blue message should of got their interest (and another blue message). Sorry about that - was my fault.

16/03/2006 - 19:30:00 : Todays Changes
Cosmetic changes were made to the interest rate display (now limited to 3 decimal places) and increased the field sizes for the deposit/withdrawal pages in the bank.

The very first bank interest payments should of been made. Hurrah!

Have also changed quantity sizes in both the sell items and new shop interfaces.

Sorry folks I had planned more stuff for tonight but after a very bad day generally, I seem to have run out of time.

Today's changes are brought to you in association with a well known brand of Irish Stout (which I happened to be drinking at the moment). Oh that reminds me it's St Patricks Day tomorrow......So for all those who celebrate it - HAPPY ST PATRICKS DAY !!!! ;)

15/03/2006 - 21:45:00 : Today's Changes
By popular demand theThe Norwich and Lowestoft Bank has opened a new branch in Rock City... (please note interest payments may be a little late tomorrow as will be running manually to make sure it works!). Thank you to everyone that has suggested this (which includes tbonerocketeer, rocketeer, wwatles, Mach and djdy)

14/03/2006 - 18:56:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a small bug in the ranking script which was causing strange results (it would of only effected two or three player id's.). I apologise for any confusion this may of caused. The player experience player rankings should match up with the characters actual experience points fully. Hopefully.....

Made some changes to the database schema to support a new feature which will appear tomorrow..

14/03/2006 - 17:49:00 : Advance Notice
Just a quick note to say I will be rebooting the server at some point this evening, after the 6pm GMT turns update. This may mean the site might be down for a couple of minutes. The reboot is a preventative measure designed to ensure everything runs as efficiently as possible.

Update: Server has been rebooted successfully...

06/03/2006 - 18:59:00 : Yesterday Turns Update
There seems there was a slight problem with yesterday turns updates. The script only got about half the way through all the characters before dying. I manually run yesterdays turns update earlier today to make up for it. Tonight's automatic turns update has gone through without incident. Sorry for inconvenience this may have caused.

05/03/2006 - 12:00:00 : Today's Changes
New items have been added. There is now a limit to how many rockets you can carry around with you. This limit will range from 5 to 30 depending on individual circumstances. This makes things a bit more realistic, it also makes exploiting the build rocket bug pointless, which is a welcome side effect.

The number of rockets you can/are carrying is now displayed on the My Rockets page.

As promised the more rockets you sell in a day, the less you can sell them for. Also rockets aren't worth quite as much money as they were.

Some players (4 to be exact) may find they now have significantly less rockets than they had yesterday, sorry about that but had to clean up the database a bit.

I've also added an adventure scenario.

02/03/2006 - 18:00:00 : Announcement
It has come to my attention that a small number of players are using automatedtools/browser extentions etc to literally hammer the server. This is bad for two reasons, the first is these people will be causing the game to perform slower for everyone. The second is that as a side effect bandwidth usage has gone through the roof andf it continues at this rate I will be forced to shut down the game as it will be costing me way too much money in extra bandwidth fees.

From today onwards anyone caught hammering the server will in the first instance will face a temporary ban. Repeat offenders will have their characters deleted.

01/03/2006 - 07:03:05 : Problems
We have just recovered from a MySQL problem on our server which probably caused players not to be able to log in to the game. We have resolved the problem and everything should be working as it should. My apologies for any inconvenience this may of caused.

23/02/2006 - 16:05:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a slight typo on the hermits cave. Thanks to Alex for reporting that one, the reward it on it's way!

19/02/2006 - 19:39:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a couple of spelling mistakes at the Winerberia crag. Thanks to Wormsey von Boom for reporting them.

15/02/2006 - 16:00:00 : In memoriam
Today marks the 1st anniversary of the tragic death of Leigh Herring, a friend of mine and a founding member of my rocketry group. My thoughts are with his family and friends, who I'm sure, will be thinking about the many good and happy times we shared.

14/02/2006 - 20:02:00 : URGENT: Server Maintenance
Sorry for the short notice but I plan to reboot the server at 20:30 GMT. This is likely to cause a 5 minute outage. This is a precautionary measure, aimed at stopping any further server anomolies ocurring and effecting the game.

Update: Reboot completed sucessfully.

14/02/2006 - 20:01:00 : Turns Update
Due to technical issues with the server the game runs on, the turns update ran slightly later today. I am very sorry about this.

14/02/2006 - 19:34:00 : Today's Changes
You may of noticed some very strange looking characters in the player directory - it seems that spammers are targetting the registration form in the hope that they can send spam. For now I've deleted the rubbish accounts, but will be monitoring this closely and willt take further action if deemed necessary.

13/02/2006 - 20:53:00 : Today's Lack of Changes
My personal guilt level has gone gone through the roof because I haven't done a lot on the game over the last few days. The reason for this is I've been busy recovering from a catestrophic hardware failiure on my US based dedicated server (a disk crash). Rocketeer runs on my UK based server (thank goodness) so was uneffected by the problems. Normal service will be restored soon.

11/02/2006 - 22:46:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed bug which meant the players id number was being poulated in the 'to' field, rather than their player name. Sorry about that everyone, thanks to Trace13 for reporting it.

09/02/2006 - 22:50:00 : Todays Changes
Fixed a spelling mistake on "Miniature Bottle of finest Scotch Whisky" item.

08/02/2006 - 19:02:00 : Today's Changes
I have just run a data fix to ensure the character statistics matched the flight log, after a report from james that the character statistics were not the same as the flight log. I don't think this is a massive problem, but it does indicate there might be a bug in the launch code. Luckily I'm re-writing the launch code completely, so the proper fix will happen during "the big upgrade".

07/02/2006 - 16:25:00 : Today's Changes
The first of the many skills needed for the big upgrade is now available. The skill is not learnable through the SRS Academy. I'm not giving any details of it because it would ruin the incredibly easy puzzle. This skill will only work after the big upgrade. I have also added some new items in the shop of the future.

06/02/2006 - 20:03:00 : Today's Update
As we've had our first level 30 player, I've added 5 extra levels which have the same title but do give a small max HP advantage, to make it worth having! Actually there are a few things in the game which rely on the level, so more levels should have other positive effects (not just max HP).

06/02/2006 - 19:55:00 : Congratulations!
My congratulations go to wwatles for being the first player to reach level 30 and level 31.

05/02/2006 - 12:01:00 : Today's Changes
The rocket sale price algorithm has been changed slightly so that finished rockets are worth quite a lot more. The economy will now also effect the rocket sale prices. Thanks to Mike_8-{> for his input which resutled in this change. Also you can now view the game's economy factor in the Game News page. Negative % will result in lower prices, and a positive percentage will result in higher prices.

I reset the time on the game's server at 3am this morning. I've also added some regular ntp updates to run every day, which *hopefully*- won't get badly out of sync with reality again.

04/02/2006 - 09:50:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a bug which caused the old store system not to pickup the new economy based prices. Firefox must handle session data slightly different to IE. Thanks to wwatles for reporting it.

03/02/2006 - 14:31:00 : Today's Changes
The game now has a very simple economy, prices at stores/shops will now change from day to day. I've finally gotten round to this, as it's been on my to do list for months! The economy will also effect the selling price of items from your inventory (this makes it possible to make profits from buying and selling in the game). This doesn't yet extend to services (such as rocket painting) or selling your rockets.

Have upped the HP gain from the congac. Have added a scenario to the Lemtrac Racetrack adventure, as well as modifying an existing one to balance things a bit better. Thanks to bakadude for the feedback which lead to these changes.

By popular demand, there is now a summarise output check box on the oddjobbing screen. Ticking the checkbox will mean only summary statistics will be displayed. Thanks to caseman and DJDY for suggesting these improvements.

Fixed rounding error when buying items from stores, caused by new economy changes. Also fixed a bug I noticed with Firefox which didn't always apply the economy "fiddle factor" in stores.

Blimey I've been busy today! There is definately a correlation between progress on the game, and me not being at work. So if any players win the Euro millions lottery jackpot tonight, I'd appreciate a million or so, so I can give up work and work on the game full time ;)

02/02/2006 - 16:40:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed the a typo on the Ken's rocket shop page (thanks Mike).

31/01/2006 - 19:45:00 : Today's Changes
Updated the ranking pages to say they update every 5 minutes (I did this yesterday but forgot to copy that particular page live). Have added some more future items. I have also deleted a number of test characters, which I've been meaning to do for a while.

30/01/2006 - 15:36:00 : Todays Changes
Changed the shop interface slightly to cope with some changes I've added as part of the big upgrade. Also a rift in space and time has opened up, and is now accessible by all players (with a car and MattNav that is). In other news, I've corrected a spelling error on the Mount Kevina pages (thanks jaq). I've also fiddled with the library XP gain algorithm again, don't worry it's in the upwards direction. Also the player rankings should now update every 5 minutes (instead of every hour). The library page has now been updated to reflect the XP changes (thanks wwattles).I

If you have auto-refresh of the statbar turned on, when using the popup inventory to eat/drink/use items, it will now refresh your statbar automatically. Thanks to Mike for reporting the bug, it's really nice to be able to turn a bug fix in to a game enhancement.

I have hopefully fixed a big bug with the login page, which messed up some peoples username. Hopefully this problem is now fixed, but you may have to login and then back out again for the fix to take effect. Any problems please let me know via bug reports or an in game message to 'admin'. Of course if you can't log in you can email info@rocketeer.org.uk and I'll do my best to help.

29/01/2006 - 16:02:00 : Today's Changes
I have beefed up the XP gain from reading library books quite a lot, which hopefully you will notice at today's turn update.

Login page will now store your character name as a cookie, and will automatically fill in your character name the next time you login. In addition if your character name has been retrieved from the cookie, the focus will be set to the password input box, otherwise focus will be set on the character name field. Hopefully this should make logging in to the game slightly easier and save some typing anyway!

28/01/2006 - 21:25:00 : Todays Changes
Following a suggestion from DJDY I have changed the MegaCorp Salary algorithm to include a loyalty bonus (this is based on how many continuous days you have worked for the company in your current employment period). The game didn't keep track of when people applied for megacorp jobs, until now. Those of you who are employed should notice a very slight increase in salary the longer you stay employed. The changes take effect at tomorrows turn update (at 6pm GMT).

27/01/2006 - 18:00:00 : Today's Changes
Ginger Beer will now appear in the drink section in the supermarket rather than the food section (thanks to jaq for suggesting this).

24/01/2006 - 20:28:00 : Weekly Competition
It has been brought to my attention that the weekly competition script didn't run on Sunday. I've manually run it this time, sorry it's a couple of days late! Thanks to wwatles for reporting it....

23/01/2006 - 21:33:00 : Update
Apologies for the aparent lack of progress latley, things have been a bit hectic for me, as it was my first day back at work today. I am still tinkering away with the new build process. At the moment I'm adding all the various components in, deciding on a pricing structure etc. Because of the flexibility of the new system I need to add hundreds of components. It's hard and fairly boring for me but hopefully will be worth it in the end. I think it's important that different diameter rockets can be built, as well as other factors which influence the rocket flight. It should make it as close to real life as I'm willing to get. I'm also working in a seperate development version of the game, to ensure I don't mess things up too much whilst I'm tinkering.

I have had some good suggestions in latley, again sorry for not responding to them straight away, real life things have distracted me. I will get around to them soon I promise. In fact I may have a blitz on implementing them soon, as I'm getting bored with adding items to a spreadsheet. :)

19/01/2006 - 09:00:00 : Today's Update
Last nights turns update script didn't run properly which would of caused unemployed players not to get their turns, and would also explain yesterdays fullness reset not happening. I've found the problem and fixed it. Sorry about that all. Everyone should now of gotten everything they were supposed to! It turns out it was my fault as the problem traces back to me renaming a couple of the tables! I think I'll leave well alone now...

I've fixed a bug with the launch rocket code that let you carry on launching when you ran out of turns (thanks chrisc for reporting it). I also have a proper working development environment which replicates the live server. Hopefully this will mean less distruption caused by me making changes!

18/01/2006 - 21:07:00 : Today's Changes or lack of them
Due to continued connectivity issues with my NTL Broadband I am still unable to do as much as I'd like to or indeed anything at all. The technical support technician I spoke to tonight wasn't able to help me and told me to ring back in 24 hours. I'm convinced the problem is a capacity issues (the guy said that there is upstream capacity issues, although he said that it wasn't causing my problems). Hmmm. Yeah right.... So I appologise for not being able to investigate the bug reports which have come through in the last couple of days. I had hoped the new core rocket building/launching upgrade would be almost finished by now, however I'm now well behind schedule. [So if any of you work for NTL you couldn't just plug me back in could you?!!!!?!] It's very fustrating. OK rant over. Lets all hope normal service will be resumed soon. Thanks for bearing with me. Matt

UPDATE: I've had reports that at least two players didn't have their fullness reset at today turn update. I've now manually set all players fullness to zero now, in addition to adding some code which should stop this happening again. I'll do a more thorough investigation tomorrow. I've also changed some of the wording on the main rock city map screen.

17/01/2006 - 19:29:00 : Today's Changes
I've renamed some of the database tables to allow me to do a whole load of other stuff. This is a simple change, but a very high risk one. If anyone notices any problems please submit a bug report! Many thanks.

17/01/2006 - 19:17:00 : Connection Trouble
I'm having intermittent broadband connection problems at the moment so I might be a bit slow responding to messages/bug reports. It's a complete nightmare for someone as internet dependant as myself!

17/01/2006 - 00:00:00 : Engine Design Competition
Are you familiar with the NAR motor datasheets? Do you fancy "designing" the ultimate rocket engine to use in the game? If the answer is yes to these questions you may be interested in reading this forum thread.

15/01/2006 - 13:43:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a possible bug in the SRS training code.

15/01/2006 - 12:03:00 : Server Reboot Update
Server is now back up after it's reboot.

15/01/2006 - 11:28:00 : Server Reboot
Please note the games web server is being rebooted at midday UK time. This will mean a 5 or 10 minute period where the game and it's website will be unavailable. Sorry for any inconvience this may cause.

15/01/2006 - 02:07:00 : Turns Update Problem
I'd like to apologise for the turns not updating when they should of done. I've manually run the updates, so hopefully everythings back to normal.

I can only assume the problem was a server issue rather than an application issue. I make this assumption because very strange things were occuring on the server. I had problems SSHing in and found a load of services which should of been running weren't. I've done my best to search for the root cause of the problem and couldn't find anything obvious. However tomorrow (well later on today when I've slept) I will investigate further. I will also schedule a reboot the server as a precaution after the investigation as a precautionary measure. This might been 5 or 10 minutes of game downtime sometime tomorrow.

It's typical luck that all these problems happened about 5 minutes after I left my house (I went into the city for my first proper saturday night out since I've been ill). Anyway I'm glad I thought I'd log on to check everything was OK before I went to sleep. I'm going to keep an eye on the server for the next ten minutes or so and assuming it doesn't doesn't die again will get some sleep.

To summarise, I don't really know why things went wrong (at the present time). I have done my best to ensure the problems were rectified (things should be back to normal in the game). I will do my best to investigate the root cause of the problems and see if there is anything we can do to prevent the same problems happening again. I am really sorry this happened.

14/01/2006 - 12:14:00 : Todays Changes
Yet more preparation for the big change which is coming soon. Have added some more items and have updated one of the adventures. Have also fixed a bug with the new pop up inventory system which was letting you go above the 10 fullness limit (thanks to chrisc for reporting that one).

13/01/2006 - 10:32:00 : Today's Changes
Today's major change is the addition of a pop up inventory (obviously this means you need to enable pop ups for this to work). It allows you to see how many of an item you have when shopping or even to eat/drink/use a first aid kit when doing anything. Thanks to wwatles for this suggestion. :)

OK We are back to normal service following the denial of service attack the MySQL server suffered. As a quick fix we disabled access to MySQL through TCP connections (which meant rocketeer and the other sites would still work fast and foil the hacker). It also stopped me from making any changes. It's been sorted out properly now with a new firewal ruleset, so hopefully it won't happen again! I apologise if you saw any strange MySQL connection errors or suffered poor performance today.

12/01/2006 - 13:16:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a bug in the create account script which prevented new players from logging in. Today's big change is the inventory. Your inventory now has icons instead of full text, which works better with the longer item names. You can also now sell items directly from your inventory. I've just noticed the sell icon in the inventory had a gray background, sorry about that it is now fixed. Also when you sell items directly from your inventory, the sell pages now link back to your inventory.

11/01/2006 - 13:33:00 : Today's Changes
Have made a fair amount of changes regarding the security of logins. It is now no longer possible to log in twice and be in two places at once as way of cheating. Thanks to wwatles for pointing this loophole out. I doubt many people would do this, but I've fixed it anyway. I've also made the logout function completely destroy the session information (just to beef up the security a bit). Apologies for any strange errors which you might of seen as a result of implementing these changes. Also the mailbox icon will change depending on whether you have unread messages or not.

In other news as I have a pretty good idea how the new build/launch system will work I've started implementing some changes. I will try to do this in such a way to not effect gameplay until I'm ready to switch over the new system. I have also decided that as the changes are too massive to go in all at once. There will be a phased approach. So I'll get the single engined rockets working right first. Staging and clustering will follow soon afterwards. There may be a few new items appearing in the shops, don't worry they will have a use soon.

Fixed a bug in SRS code to do with levels. You might find you have access to new skills one level earlier.Thanks to astra webgeek for reporting that one.

10/01/2006 - 15:28:00 : Today's Changes
Bug with new odd job code fixed (which effectively meant you could get hurt millions of times, but only have the HP taken off you once). Thanks to bfo for reporting that one.

09/01/2006 - 08:19:00 : Today's Changes
You can decide how many turns you want to go odd jobbing to make things slightly less tedious (thanks to bfo and rocketeer for suggesting it). I have also fixed the shop problem with items with commas in the title properly (e.g. goat cheese, herb and tomato pizza). Thanks to danper for reporting it.

08/01/2006 - 16:36:00 : Today's Changes
Messages over 1 month old will now be automatically deleted.

06/01/2006 - 22:20:00 : Today's Changes
It's been a fairly quiet day today. I've been doing a lot of planning and research for the staging/clustering changes, as well as going in the city to meet with my boss to discuss my return to the world of working for a living. I fixed one bug and several typo's though. Thanks for the great suggestions, there have been some really good ones (thanks to Abaddon and Wwatles especially) I'm sorry I can't acknowledge them individually as I'm focussing on the clustering/staging changes. I've done an awful lot of research today and I have a much better understanding of how things will work. I think it's going to be very good, although a lot of work for me (but I think it will be well worth it). The changes shouldn't effect the current game at all, if I do my bit right! Once the current lot of changes are in, I'll then try my best to implement as many of the suggestions as I can.

05/01/2006 - 12:00:00 : Today's Changes
Events (blue messages) older than 7 days will be automatically deleted, so that they don't build up and overwhelm someone who hasn't logged in for 2-3 weeks. Have performed some work on the database to keep things running smooothly.

04/01/2006 - 15:14:00 : Today's Changes
The shopping interface has been tweaked slightly. By popular demand there is now a quantity box next to each of the green + add to basket buttons so if you want to buy large quantities of stuff you can do it all in one go. Added a simple player directory, again by popular demand! I have added some extra questions in the My Account page. You can now optionally include your real life rocketry group on your public profile, and some other stuff too.

03/01/2006 - 14:32:00 : Todays Changes
I have made a lot of changes to the new shopping cart/basket interface to fix a couple of bugs when using Internet Explorer. Whilst I was testing I found a few other little bugs, which I have fixed as well.

Major changes made to the games interface. The changes should give more importance to critical things, and also cleans up the interface a little bit (thanks for wwatles for suggesting the new layout).

Rocket Karma now effects your launches.

02/01/2006 - 16:10:00 : Today's Changes
You may of already noticed the 'Rocket Karma' stat bar, this is a new aspect of the game to make it slightly more fun. There are things you can do which get you good karma and some other stuff that will give you bad karma. The karma rating is basically a guide to how the rocketry gods are feeling about your character. This rating will become more important as time goes on. I have added rocketry karma as a ranking measure (both highest and lowest).

The look and feel of the main game interface has changed slightly. I needed more space on the main menu bar so had to revert to graphics. I also sneaked in a couple of graphics to the character status area. The forum is now linked to from the game interface.

01/01/2006 - 00:45:06 : Happy New Year!
Just to officially wish everyone a happy 2006. I hope you enjoyed the small gift. -- Matt

31/12/2005 - 10:12:00 : Todays Changes
Sending money to other players has now been disabled due to one player (who I won't name and shame - but they know who they are). This feature was brought upon partly a player suggestion and partly an experiment on my part. I'm working on the player to player sales system and wanted to guage the number of safeguards that would be needed to stop this kind of cheating (e.g. selling a ham roll to a multi account 10,000 credits etc.). I think I have no choice to delay the implentation of the new trade system, until I have introduced certain safeguards.

This is just a friendly reminder that if I catch anyone deliberately, blatantly and obviously cheating again they may have ALL of their accounts deleted. Cheating down to a game bug is fair game, but using multiple accounts to farm credits is just plain rude!

Unfortunatley I won't be around much this weekend, so the only change to speak of is that I have added a new item, which you all will have to wait until after today's turn to see. Keep the bug reports/suggestions coming though - I do appreciate them. Thanks.

UPDATE: Fixed bug in new shopping interface which meant the browser returned to the top of the page when pressing the +/- buttons in shopping cart.

30/12/2005 - 11:37:00 : Today's Changes
The new shopping interface is back. People who have javascript disabled will now get a link to take them to the old style shops. Also, in case my changes haven't fixed the problem for the two players who were experiencing problems there is a link to the old shopping system at the bottom of the page. I hope my "fix" worked. Also fixed a few CSS issues causing many css errors written out to Javascript console in Firefox 1.5. Fixed a build rocket bug which meant some players could build rockets with zero turns (thansk wwatles for reporting that!). Fixed adventure bug that let you get away without having any credits if you were charged them. Also corrected a load of spelling errors. Have removed the Carol Singing odd job, but have added 3 more to replace it (special credit should be given to ben_ for his suggestions). Fixed a bug in the new shopping system which meant the shopping basket was cleared when you examined an item. As today turned out to be a bug fixing day, I haven't had time to do anything big, so I'm working on the smaller changes. Players can now 'swing test' their rockets (available on the rocket information page). Players can now also send credits to each other if they wish).

29/12/2005 - 11:12:00 : Today's Changes
I've changed the new store interface slightly to stop the annoying scrolling back to the top every time you add something bug! Thanks to "rocketeer" for suggesting a new level progress statbar which has just been added. Have also added a discard item button in the inventory giving you the chance to throw useless items away (thanks jointly to wwattles and bakadude for suggesting this one). Made a small change to the welcome to rocketeer message new players receive, to tell them about the forum. Fixed a bug which meant new players got some xmas pressies when they weren't supposed to. Fixed a javascript error in the auto-refresh code which was introduced when I added the level stat bar. I also tweaked the level stat bar a little bit. New players will now have auto-refresh turned on by default.

The supermarket is selling mince pies for 5 credits (as they are clearing their Christmas stock). Mince pies and other seasonal fayre will disappear from shops in the next day or two. From tomorrow's turn update all employed players will recieve an event message (blue message on the main Rock City map screen) to confirm exactly how much they were paid.

Have had two bugs reported for the new shop interface. I've switched back to the old shop system while I sort it out. Sorry about this. Update: This is caused by javascript not being enabled in peoples browsers. So for the people that want to try the new shopping system, that have javascript enabled, I have added a temporary link to the new style shops at the bottom of the old style shops (if that makes any sense whatsover). I will be fixing this properly tomorrow morning.

28/12/2005 - 10:59:00 : Today's Changes
The rocketeer forum is back! I have also made some small cosmetic changes to the main rocketeer.org.uk site. Updated the library so that it is a bit more specific about what you haven't got credits/turns for.

Today's big change is the shop interface. It now uses a shopping basket/cart type interface. The new interface should mean you can buy multiple items/different quantities on the same screen, only having to pay for your goods once. I know a lot of you wanted to see an improved shopping interface, so here it is!

There were a few messages that I got today that I haven't got round to yet. I will respond to them in the morning. Bakadude and wwatles - yes a drop item function is a great idea. I'll make this my first job tomorrow.

27/12/2005 - 20:40:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed some major display/formatting related bugs involving firefox. Hopefully all of you using Firefox will now see an improvement. Thanks to Dave for pointing out how ugly it looked which shamed me into fixing it. I have made some slight changes to the database schema which were needed to create a way to notify players of things that happened during the daily turns reset (the one that happens at 6pm GMT).

Todays big change was the addition of the library which has just been made available.

I have also cleared all of the typos/spelling errors which have been reported. I have also fixed a few which weren't reported! As of now I don't have any outstanding bug reports or spelling errors so I call it a day without feeling guilty. Just for information I have 22 open suggestions from players, which hopefully in the next couple of weeks I can close (as I would of acted on the suggestion). My new years resolution is to spell check everything before I put it in the database! Thanks to all those people who reported them btw.

26/12/2005 - 10:00:00 : Boxing Day Changes
Fixed bug with shovel not showing up in inventory. You can now access top 20 player rankings through your flight log. Fixed an annoying bug with shops/stores you drive to, there is now a back to car link instead of a back to Rock City link - thanks to danper for reporting that one. Also fixed bug with launch rocket code which sometimes didn't pick up the fact the rocket was painted. Tomorrow I'll have a typo blitz and clear the 7 (and counting) entries on my bug list.

25/12/2005 - 21:39:00 : Automatic Refresh of Stats
Following a request from wwattles, I have added the facility for the stats bar to update itself automatically when you do something (like adventure, eat, odd jobbing etc.). If you want to turn this feature on you can using your 'My Account' link. I was intending to do a lot more today, but I got distracted by this particular technical challenge and then couldn't stop working on it till I had sometihing working! I've given this message it's own section because it's a fairly major upgrade in itself!

25/12/2005 - 09:48:00 : Christmas Day Changes
Have added the time and date to the bottom of the stat bar to make it easier for players not from the UK (thanks wwatles!) . I've now made the time/date display slightly more clever and will display any special days. The good news is that there is that I have added another 15 levels (making the total 30). The level scale has changed slightly so there are more intermediate steps, making things more interesting hopefully.

24/12/2005 - 21:28:00 : Merry Christmas!
It's Christmas day in Rock City!

24/12/2005 - 00:00:00 : Christmas Eve's Changes
Happy Christmas! Today I have fixed a bug which happened when launching a rocket with zero fins (thanks danper). Thanks to wwattles character fullness has been added to the statbar (also I've added some progress bars because I thought they looked cool). The maximum HP has changed slightly as at the higher levels made the game too easy. It should be a little more realistic now. Max HP is now based on level (not XP), which makes it nice and simple. Also fixed bug with building rockets without any fins (thanks to myself). As I've been messing around with the max HP per level, all characters have been set to 999 HP. The game will correct this down to your max hp setting automatically. This is just a fair way of ensuring that everyone has their max HP In other news, the public profile now shows a players skillset. A new skill has been added 'Advanced Rocket Construction'. Available to players over level 10. Also fixed a bug to do with Whiskey/Brandy consumption and HP. Thanks again to wwatles who reported a serious bug with the build rocket page (now fixed!). I also noticed a cosmetic type bug with the over 200 turns message when eating or drinking. It's also fixed! Blimey I've been busy today, hope you all have a lovely Christmas.

22/12/2005 - 10:07:00 : Today's Changes
A rockets stability will now effect it's sale price. Thus the value of all rockets has gone up slightly. Fixed build rocket bug which meant you could build a stable rocket with zero fins (if you had a laptop). A new launch system has been implemented. There is a slightly simpler launch system in place, which should give slightly less random altitudes.

21/12/2005 - 00:00:00 : Even More Changes
I'm currently working on the new rocket launch code. I have added a new shop and several new items, some of the items have an impact on the new launch system. You can now decide how many fins to attach to a rocket in addition to what type, obviously fins have an effect on the rockets stability. There is now a new rocket stat called stability which is a measure of how stable the rocket will be in flight. The game will now let you build a rocket with no fins, but the stability will obviously be effected!

20/12/2005 - 17:01:00 : Today's Changes
If your rocket is destroyed when launching, instead of getting 'junk' you will be able to salvage actual components used in your rocket. This will only work for rockets built in the last few days, so if you have an old rocket you will still get the junk. Also as an added bonus you can now view detailed information about your rockets from the My Rockets section of your inventory. Fixed a nasty bug in the launch rocket code, which meant some people could buy a single high powered motor and hitting refresh on the launch rocket screen meant the rocket could be launched again and again. Port William has had a name change, as it appears there is a real place called Port William, and I didn't want to offend anyone! Oh yes whilst I was changing the name I've added a rare item drop. I've fixed some typos and spelling mistakes on the proposed changes page (and have updated it with my current progress). Improvements are happening, allbeit slowler than I would of liked. Have also changed the prep rocket page, to allow you to change your mind about which rocket to launch (no need to press the back button).

19/12/2005 - 11:36:00 : Monday's Changes
Game News has been changed to display the last 10 news items only. Turns update has been brought forward 6 hours to 6pm. Player Guide has been updated once again to account for turns update change (v.1.9). I think everyone who was employed accidentally got a free turns/credit bonus.

19/12/2005 - 09:00:00 : Turns Update
Some players didn't get their turns for today (the midnight update). This was due to a database problem, which has been resolved. All players should of recieved their extra turns (a few hours late, but you got them). I'm very sorry about this.

18/12/2005 - 13:01:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed some spelling mistakes when launching rockets (thanks danper). Have increased the MegaCorp Salary slightly, and your pay is dependant on your level. the higher the level the higher your pay. The Evil Megacorp will show your current salary, if you are employed. You can now buy E engines, provided you have an explosives licence.

17/12/2005 - 22:15:00 : The future of Rocketeer!
I'm still working my way through the many messages players have sent me. I'm hoping to get through the current batch tomorrow.

As a lot of suggestions have come in I thought it might be interesting to show you a list of the things that are on my list to implement in the game. A lot of these have come from player suggestions. Although the interesting thing is a lot of the suggestions seem to fit in with what I was planning anyway so it's worked out quite nicely. Anyway please click here to see the proposed changes page. I will try my best to keep this up to date. Some of the suggestions that I have recieved are on this list, but I haven't had time to reply personally to each one yet, but I will.

17/12/2005 - 18:40:00 : Saturdays Changes
You may of noticed some new icons at the bottom of the screen. These buttons allow you to report bugs, offer suggestions, reporting spelling errors or contact us with a query or question. This is now the prefered route of contact, as it makes responding to these easier, which hopefully will mean I can actually get more done.

I am assured by our web hosts that the servers clock has been updated to reflect GMT. This means that the turns/credits update will now run at midnight, as I had originally intended. This also means the times of your flight log and messages will now be accurate. Thanks to everyone who has contacted me so far. I've currently got around 35 suggestions, bug reports, or queries to look at I will be working through these one by one in order, so hopefully I'll clear the backlog as soon as I can. Increased maximum fullness from 6 items of food and drink to 10. Player guide is now included on the main navigation bar (thanks armageddon!).

16/12/2005 - 00:00:00 : Friday's Changes
Fixed various typos.

15/12/2005 - 14:24:00 : Today's Changes
Thanks to a fantastic suggestion from Will, you can now launch multiple rockets when you find a launch site (if you have enough supplies). Fixed a spelling mistake in the police station. Your level now also effects how many credits you get from adventuring/odd jobbing (thanks to Abaddon for suggesting this). Some minor cosmetic changes to the flight log. Behind the scenes, the game is now keeping track of the type of engine used for each rocket launch. This will eventually lead to some really cool features, and will be very helpful for me to monitor the rocket performance for each type of engine used. I will be using this data to tweak the altitude algorthim to make it more realistic. The other big behind the scenes change, is that now the game will store what components you used to create your rocket (this is preparation for another big change - a more realistic junk salvaging from a destroyed rocket).

A big thank you to all the people who have submitted bug reports and suggestions.
I'm probably going to be slower replying to these over the next couple of days due to real life commitments, but that doesn't mean I'm not listening. I hope to catch up on things over the weekend though. Thanks Matt.

14/12/2005 - 09:42:00 : Today's Changes
Police Station will now make sure you have enough credits (it wasn't doing that before, thanks stopper14). Have done a major overhaul of the launch rocket code which makes the chances of a CATO or Shred a lot less likely to happen (your level also influences this, so the more experienced you are the less chance there is of something going wrong (thanks for danper for all his help on that one). Added a christmas themed activity when odd jobbing in Rock City.

13/12/2005 - 14:29:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a formatting problem when reading in game messages. Fixed a slight bug with the rocket igniters which made them less reliable than the cheap igniters. Added 4 more recovery devices to the game. Due to popular demand, every shop is now divded in to sections to make finding a particular item easier. I've added a link on the page which tells you that you have arrived at your destination, to give you a chance to get back in your car and go somewhere else. I've also made a couple of changes to the social security office. One of them was minor and cosmetic, but the important one is that you can no longer resign from a job and collect dole money on the same day. I think it makes things a little more realistic. Oh yes, I've added a new location (police station) which is where you can get your explosives license.

12/12/2005 - 10:18:00 : Monday's changes
You may of noticed that your number of rockets launched may of gone down slightly this morning, this is because I have fixed everyones stats to reflect what they are in the flight log. The reason why they got out of sync was an earlier bug which caused the stats bar to sometimes double count launches. The plus side of this is, of course, is that your success rate should go up. I've done some behind the scenes tidying up of the database, which should keep things running efficiently. I have also fixed the bug in the odd job script which wasn't taking away health points when it should be (thanks to jazzguru for reporting that one). Thanks to stoppper13 who reported a similair problem with the SRS Academy, which is now fixed. Thanks to myself for noticing that at the artists studio you could have destroyed or sold rockets painted, which didn't make any sense!

11/12/2005 - 12:00:00 : Today's Changes
Thanks to player suggestions I have created a couple of new rocket stats - rockets sold and successful (which is an indication of how many rockets you launched 100% successfuly. The competition will only award prizes for sucessful launches. The good news is that I have increased the daily payment you get when you are employed to 125 credits. The bad news is that I've also reduced the amount of money you can get from odd jobbing slightly. The player guide has been updated again to reflect these changes - we are now at version 1.6. Oh yeah I've added a few more odd jobs you can do. I've also made a nifty small change which should prevent a certain display issue which sometimes occured.

11/12/2005 - 09:00:00 : Competition Catastrophe
The weekly competition script went a big out of control last night. I have fixed and tidied things up so hopefully there was no long term damage done.

10/12/2005 - 12:05:00 : Today's Changes
The rock city imagemap has been completely re-done to prevent nasty irregular lines appearing if you held your mouse button down on an area. This wasn't really a bug, but more a 'feature' with Internet Explorer. I hope it looks nicer now! I have also tidied up some of the HTML (XHTML standards wise). The weekly prizes for the biggest number of launches and highest altitudes have been increased from 500 credits to a whopping 1000 credits. Added a link directly back to the 'My Rockets' section of the inventory from the repair rockets page. You can now sell your rockets from the 'My Rockets' inventory page.Players Guide has been changed (updated the screenshots to account for the new logo as well as adding in section on selling rockets).

09/12/2005 - 20:07:00 : Thank Goodness It's Friday
Modified nightly update script to hopefully add some more locking measures just to ensure the nightly update runs smoothly. I've also done the same locking trick on some of the games core functions (especially around the inventory management) which I hope will clear up a reported bug.

08/12/2005 - 18:20:00 : Today's Changes
The Players Guide has been updated. Some minor cosmetic changes have been made here and there. Also it is now possible to eat the Eccles Cake.

07/12/2005 - 12:31:00 : Today's Changes
I have hopefully fixed the bug to do with the number of rockets launched being double the number of what you should have (it will now be correct from no onwards). I have changed the old black and white favicon to something even more phalic looking than before, but at least it looks in keeping with the site. Oh yeah all players would of recieved some extra credits (because I upped the number of credits given to you when you start the game). I have also fixed the bug where destroyed rockets were showing up in your inventory. I have fixed the flight log bug which was showing the incorrect rocket name of your highest altitude. I have also renamed the MattNav to make it obvious it's an add on for a car, not a car itself. All but one of these changes came from player suggestions, so my thanks go out to all those who have made suggestions or bug fixes. Have also spell checked every single page of the game and corrected numerous typos! It is possible there still could be typos in the database, but is a little bit more difficult for me to find these, and it may take time to iron these out.

06/12/2005 - 14:40:00 : Today's Bug Fixes
I have fixed the bug where you could go above your maximum HP when using first aid kits (my thanks go out to chrisc for reporting that one).

06/12/2005 - 10:00:00 : New Logo
You may of noticed Rocketeer now has a nice looking logo. It is my hope to have this displayed within the actual game soon. I've also noticed a few people complaining elsewhere on the net about not being able to log in. If this is the case please email admin@rocketeer.org.uk and I'll do my best to help you.

04/12/2005 - 16:49:00 : Today's Changes
Have increased the effectiveness of the Cheap Igniter, after a review of the number of misfires players were getting. Hopefully things should be a little more balanced. This change should result in fewer misfires when when using the cheap igniter. In other news Rocketeer now has a favicon (little picture to the left of the address bar in your browser). I have also modified the countryside (it now only costs 2 turns to visit the countryside if you do not have a car). Also new players will get 100 turns to start with, not just 40. I've also increased the starting number of health points. These changes are meant to ensure the game is more fun for characters just starting out. Please feel free to contact me at matt@rocketeer.org.uk if you have any feedback or suggestions.

02/12/2005 - 15:57:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a little problem which could of resulted in players exploiting the game. Added some more novelty items for the advent calendar. Some of the "novelty" items are also available from the shops in Rocket City.

01/12/2005 - 00:00:00 : Today's Changes
Fixed a bug which prevented people using Firefox from clicking on the general store (Thanks to Amy for reporting that one - your reward is on it's way). In other news the Christmas pixies have given every player an Xmas surprise.

29/11/2005 - 20:15:00 : Today's Changes
Sorry folks I was distracted for a little while by real life stuff. I also wrote a new image browser for my rocketry club. So if you want to see some cool rocketry pictures go to NASRA media Browser. I've added 4 more food items today

29/11/2005 - 19:46:00 : Weekly Competition
The weekly competition was late this week. It normally should run on sunday nights. I also accidentally ran it twice. Please ignore the second weekly result message (although the winners can keep their prize money as it was my fault). Sorry folks.

21/11/2005 - 14:07:00 : Today's Changes
Modified some internal game functions to remove hard coding. Added a new shop, a new location and adventure, 4 new items and 2 very rare items. The rare items are available somewhere in the game by adventuring. Some of the new items can be used to get more XP by either building or launching rockets. Oh and I fixed a small bug that sometimes prevented you from getting XP if your rocket CATO'd

20/11/2005 - 20:39:18 : Today's Changes
From now on the social security money has been raised to 25 credits per day. The Evil Megacorp salary has been increased to 50 credits per day. Several small cosmetic changes. Added 1 location/adventure. Added several new items. Changed the adventure system to make it possible to sometimes find rare (and expensive) items at certain locations/adventures. I've also fixed a player raised bug to do with the rocket launching code.

20/11/2005 - 12:07:52 : Ooops
The rollover script ran twice last night. Consider the extra turns a bonus to celebrate the first day of the beta being available to anyone on the internet.

19/11/2005 - 22:00:00 : Rocketeer Beta Goes Public
A week later than originally planned, we are now accepting new player registrations, effectively the game is now live.

19/11/2005 - 15:56:00 : Saturday's Changes
Following on from yesterday there is a new location which allows you to buy training in other skills. Currently there are three skills you can learn to help you play the game, but more will be added in the next week or so. Have added one more item (which heals you and give you extra turns). I have also revised the player guide and added a new area to Rock City to assist new players.

18/11/2005 - 19:57:08 : More changes
Have changed the launch rocket code again to prevent cheating. Well most of it anyway. I've also added another 3 locations.

18/11/2005 - 12:00:00 : Today's Changes
Read the all new Rocketeer players guide.
The shop interface has been re-written as a result of player feedback. You can now buy in bulk. I also fixed a small bug I found in the shop code which would prevent certain items from being shown.
The big news today is that I have implemented the beginning of a skill system in the game. As of now players should start to accumulate skills. You can now view your skills by clicking on the View Skills link in your character stats bar.

17/11/2005 - 12:43:24 : Thursday's Changes
You can now only eat and drink 6 items per day to make the game slightly harder. It makes up for the changes yesterday which added loads of food to the game. The flight log now contains summary information about your flight history and the details of your last 25 launches. Numerous miscellaneous bugs with the driving/adventure system sorted. A proper bug Report link will now appear in the games nav bar. The other announcement is that there is now a 'New Players Guide' which will be available from the website very soon.

16/11/2005 - 16:49:00 : Even more changes
Fixed a slight bug in the countryside. Have added a new location which you can use to make your rockets better.

16/11/2005 - 09:34:00 : Todays Changes
Login script changed to fix a security issue which would only effect people using shared computers. I have also added some more validation around the launch rocket code, so you can't cheat anymore. Hopefully anyway. (Many thanks to Dave for reporting that one). 2 adventures from the pub have been removed. To make up for it, if you have a car with a SatNav you can now drive to a rocket shop. Many locations/adventures/items have been added.

15/11/2005 - 21:00:00 : More Updates
You can now get hold of D engines and extra strong extra light body tubes in the game. Where exactly is a secret. I've tweaked the success rate of the cheap igniters following player feedback. Keep the feedback coming it's great.

15/11/2005 - 16:41:04 : Today's Changes
There are some new food items in the supermarket. Yummy.
In other news today the countryside launch rocket code has been upgraded today. Another fustrating and true to life aspect of model rocketry can now happen. This possibly may make launching rockets slightly harder, but slightly more realistic. Remember you get what you pay for!

14/11/2005 - 17:11:00 : Motorway Changes
The motorway has been completley redesigned. It's much much better. Also two locations have been added.

14/11/2005 - 14:00:00 : Player suggested items
Two new items have been added based on player suggestions (thanks Alex).

14/11/2005 - 13:00:00 : Game Announcements
A new announcement system has been built which will mean announcements (like this one) are much more organised and will be much less work for me.

14/11/2005 - 12:00:00 : New Items at Disco Pete's
Disco Pete has just received new stock at his showroom in Rock City.

05/11/2005:Fixed bug in the countryside which prevented you from launching rockets if you had igniters and only D engines.

04/11/2005: Tweaked launch rocket code (again) to ensure estimated altitudes for ready built rockets are more accurate and fair. The inventory has been split up in to categories (as requested) to make it easier to find stuff. You can now sell stuff from your inventory. Fixed tiny bug in view messages screen to ensure messages are always sorted in the correct chronological order.

02/11/2005: Tweaked launch rocket code to ensure estimate altitudes are slightly more random. Have added a weekly statistics page, accessible from the flight log within the game.

31/10/2005: It's Halloween in Rock City!

30/10/2005: I've written a script which will allow the players to have adventures. The type of adventure and the rewards/turns used are 100% database driven, allowing for new adventures to be easily added. It should make adding new areas pretty easy. Player to player messaging system added. There is now a flight log which is where your rocket flights are recorded for competition purposes.

29/10/2005: Almost a complete re-write of the rocket launching code. Estimated altitude is now shown if launch goes OK. XP gained from a successful launch is dependent on stuff (I'm not going to tell you what exactly as this would spoil the game.) Forgotten password link added to login page (will email forgotten password). Players can now change their passwords and emails via 'My Account' link in game.All rocket flights are now stored in a database in preparations for the "flights mean prizes" weekly/monthly contests.

28/10/2005: Updated screens on the about page. If you have the right tools and stuff you can now build rockets from your inventory. Updated the the back end database to allow for the launch rocket code to reflect the quality of components used. You gain XP when building rockets. The better your rocket is, the more XP you get (and of course the higher it will go when you launch it!). I've changed the countryside to make it slightly more likely you find a place to launch rockets. I've fixed a few very minor bugs, as well as added rockets repaired and rockets built to the main character status area.

27/10/2005: Added hundreds of new items (all of which are available at the hobby shop). This is the first phase of implementing the new build rocket interface. The motorway now actually goes somewhere! Also you can now sort through your junk to find useful items!

26/10/2005: Fixed a massive bug which gave people more turns (bringing their turn count in to negative figures). This should now be closed but if the game exhibits any weird behavior please tell me. Anyone that gives me a cool idea or report bugs will receive some kind of reward (credits, XP or rare items).

25/10/2005: After a lot of messing around with CSS last night the rocketeer.org.uk finally has a proper design. I've also changed the in game design slightly to match. So hope you like the funky new image (it's almost as funky as funky Pete).

In other news the launch rocket code has been changed to reduce the chance of having a CATO and loosing your rocket completely. However the chances of your rocket being damaged in flight have increased. Rockets can now be repaired from the inventory. There is one new item available in the hobby shop. Some of the shop prices have changed to make them more realistic.

Two new stats added to character status area: rockets launched and rockets destroyed.

24/10/2005: There is now a page which documents the character level system (level no, required xp and the name). It is available by click on the Level name in the game. Also in the various shops, you can now examine the goods before you buy. The inventory screen will now show a list of rockets you own. The countryside has now been updated. IF you have the right equipment/items you can launch rockets from there. Also one final thing, all players will receive a rocketry starter set the first time they log in.

The inventory eventually will include facilities for building and repairing rockets.

23/10/2005 : New items are available in all of the shops. The hospital has been fully implemented. As of today you have the ability to start advancing through the levels (because you can earn experience points (XP). You can pick up extra cash, items and experience points at the Industrial District (sometimes anyway!). You can now purchase cars from "Disco Pete's used car emporium". The motorway also sort of works (warning: THINK before visiting the motorway!). Eventually some very cool and exotic locations will be available from the Airport and motorway. As soon as I think of them! Also fixed some problems where header and footer looked strange using Fire Fox.

UPDATE: The countryside now works too (although I'm working on the ability to launch rockets when you find a suitable location.

21/10/2005 : Good news!! The character inventory now works (with the. As does the 3 shops in Rock City. You can now spend your hard earned cash on a variety of interesting things. There are only a few basic items defined in the world but don't fear there are lashings of ginger beer and wet blankets!

20/10/2005 : The main user interface has been designed and built. Also the map of "Rock City" has been completed (the city name is subject to change). It's starting to look like a real game now.
40 turns (20 if you are employed) will now be granted each day at midnight. There is a maximum limit of 200 turns. You can now also apply and resign from a job at Evil MegaCorp PLC as well as collect your dole money from the social security office.

19/10/2005 : The game logon interface has been completed. Only authorised testers will be allowed to log on (because I had to manually create the characters in the database.

 

 

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Rocketeer has been developed in association with the Norfolk and Suffolk Rocketry Association.