The Apology Letter TNT Will Never Send

To: The Dedicated Altador Cup Players

From: The Neopets Team

Dear Neopian Players,

We would like to extend our most humble apologies for this Altador Cup season. It has been filled with mistakes that are mostly of our own making. Since we strive to please you, the players, we felt it was in everyone's best interest to explain what occurred this season and why.

It began several months ago, as we began planning for the Altador Cup. As we discussed which players to add or switch and whether or not Dasher would REALLY retire, we asked our team if anyone had ideas that would improve the season.

A programmer that we'll call Fred* raised his hand. "I'd like to upgrade Yooyuball." (*Name has been changed)

We were enthusiastic, but skeptical. Fred hadn't been with us for long. We explained it would be a large project that would require plenty of help. We explained the high standard that each season procured. We emphasized the amount of site traffic that the AC creates. He assured us he was more than capable of the job. We gave Fred a week to plan his upgrade. He would give us a presentation with his proposed changes, and we would make a final decision in the best interest of our players.

Fred proposed power-ups that would be available during the game. He suggested improving AI, making the game a little harder for the seasoned players. We agreed to the AI, but suggested that we would need another feature to help the players regain control of the ball. Fred had anticipated this. "I call it the slide tackle. You can steal the ball from your opponent. You get a little speed boost. They can even steal from you. But don't worry. That won't happen too much. Just when you score over 13 points." It was the first of many lies that Fred sold us.

It wasn't until a month before sign-ups were set to begin that we ran into the biggest problem with Fred's "upgrade." He had designed the game to be used with arrow keys instead of the mouse. We explained our reservations over the drastic control change. "Think of the masses who are used to the game. You have to power up your kicks, the AI is still too aggressive, and sometimes the arrows you press don't work with the selected player. A control change as well? That's asking for trouble."

Fred was unconvinced. "They'll adjust. And it's for the best. You can score up to 18 goals in a single game! My upgrade is AWESOME!"

We tried to reason with him. "What about the lefties? How will they play the game? The arrow keys are perfect for right-handed people, but that's it. And what about our handicapped players? You need two hands for the game now."

He nodded. "I'll add adjustments for both. And once I get this auto-select working properly, the players won't even miss the mouse. The game will automatically select the player closest to the ball."

We gave him a strict time line. Yooyuball 2.0 was to be working in no later than two weeks.

And it was. Fred rolled out his upgrade right on time. We gave our selected staff members a day to play with the new game. They came back to Fred with another complaint – the game was too long. The timer didn't count down until the animation scenes were finished. The more goals you scored, the longer your game ran. We went back to Fred and added this on his growing list of things to fix. "All right. I'll get right on that."

It took him another two weeks to find the solution to the timer issue. Though we had assigned other programmers to help Fred with his list, he stubbornly insisted he could do everything himself. He sent all his extra help to the animators who crafted each AC player scoring goals and looking triumphant.

Then sign-ups began. We released the games for practice – with what we thought was the fixed timer version of Yooyuball. But Fred had sent us the wrong version of the game. By the time we realized our mistake, it was too late. Fred apologized and vowed to fix it.

You, the loyal Altador Cup fans, responded in droves to our new version of your beloved game. Some of you, like Fred, loved the game and the new features. But the majority of you missed the mouse. You were frustrated with controls that wouldn't work, AI that was too fast, and the auto-select feature that was more of a hindrance than a help.

Our support staff forwarded your comments and complaints to management. The sheer number had us worried. Some of you even threatened to quit. We didn't want to lose anyone to a new game.

We eventually went to Fred and read him the long list of complaints you players had compiled. We told him it was his problem, and he had to fix it. We suggested bringing back mouse control to appease the masses, but it was up to him.

We also told him he would need to draft a response to the complaints. When he finished, he was to send his suggested answer to us. If that was approved, we would send his response back to you.

Fred drafted a response that defended his upgrade to the core. He had a friend from Support look over his answer. The friend approved and gave no mention of the fact that it did not address the game's faults. Fred fowarded us his response at the same time he sent the answer to Support.

The Support Staff, thinking this was the approved response, sent out his reply to all complaints. We reprimanded Fred for the infraction. Some suggested firing him, but others reminded us we needed him to finish fixing the game. We gave him a long list of things to fix.

Yooyuball bugs were reported and tacked onto Fred's growing "To Do" List. Players wouldn't follow directions. Goalies were afraid of the ball as it approached. The large window version of Yooyuball wouldn't work in Firefox. We assured our players it was being worked on.

Fred had sent us the wrong version of Yooyuball for sign-ups. The timer hadn't been fixed. When we discovered the mix-up, Fred tried to retrieve the fixed version. But he had accidentally deleted the fix. It took him a week to recreate the properly working timer.

We received several complaints about players not being able to control their goalies. We passed it onto Fred as something to fix.

We were given word of a petition to bring back the mouse control for Yooyuball. We gave the task to another set of programmers. They reported to us after a week that the old version had somehow been deleted. Thanks to Fred.

As you can imagine, we were just as annoyed by Fred's upgrade at this point as you were. We gave him an ultimatum – fix the game or lose his job.

It took another week before Fred admitted he needed help in order to fix Yooyuball. It was two weeks after that admission before a fix for the goalie was discovered. Fred was so excited that his job was safe, he forgot to check his fix on other internet browsers. He gave us his upgrade and celebrated his accomplishment.

As you know, the goalie fix just messed things up more. It added lag to the site, gave scrolling issues to IE users, and even more lag to FF users.

Fred was finally fired, and a team of programmers worked tirelessly to fix each issue Fred had left unresolved.

As you know, some issues like the large window for Firefox were never resolved. We do apologize.

We hope you return to Neopia next year for another season of the Altador Cup. We already have a team of programmers intent on bringing the mouse back to the game and fixing all the rest of Fred's upgrades so that they are actually upgrades.

Here's hoping Yooyuball 3.0 will erase the sad story that Yooyuball 2.0 currently is.