WE'RE BACK!
by Hazed
Here we are, back in the Fed2 Star office, ready to go with the first issue of the newspaper for the new year. I hope you all had a great Christmas and New Year, and that your appetite for news was kept assuaged by Dot Matrix's bulletins. She did a good job of keeping you up to date, and I was hoping to congratulate her in person, but for some reason she had left the office before I got back. All she left was a brief note saying she was going undercover on the trail of a story. Oh well, I am sure we'll hear from her soon!
Meanwhile, we'll start this issue with a recap of what happened while we were away.
TECHNOCRAT BUILDS
Before the break, the test team were artificially promoted to the next rank, Technocrat, so that they can test the new infrastructure builds as Bella puts them in. Over the Christmas break, three more builds were added:
COMPANY CAP
The long-dreaded cap on company balances came into operation, following a week of scrabbling by CEOs who were over-burdened with wealth, as they rushed to spend their money, or to promote to Founder. As a result, there were a large number of new planets linked into the game.
Those who weren't paying attention got hit by massive tax bills on the morning the cap was first enforced, and the taxman raked off enough to build not only a luxury villa by the beach, but his own planet upon which to build the villa! The poor CEO who was taxed the highest amount has landed him, her or itself a mention in the Hall of Fame (and Shame). Congratulations, or should that be commiserations, to Cooly!
DISAPPEARING SYSTEMS
About twenty star systems were taken out of the game. These were systems where the owners had not reappeared after the big disaster back in August. The systems were therefore ownerless. They had never been opened up for trade and were just clogging up the price check lists and other displays.
Should one of these POs come back and want to have their character restored, we will put the planet back in - Bella has kept the files so they can be linked in just like a new Founder's planet.
There may be other star systems where the owner exists but hasn't been seen for a while - but we won't be taking those out. In future, the only time a system will be removed is if the owner vanishes, either by dying without insurance, or (as happens very rarely) being banned from the game. A system will never be taken out if SpyNet gives a report on the owner.
That's what happened over the past three weeks: now onto genuinely new stuff!
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