Reinstatment of the development of the MMORPG Dragon Empires.

To:  Gamers of the world

Here is a petition to reinstate the development of the highly popular MMORPG Dragon Empires - this is not a 'one man' attempt to get the game reinstated -but an attempt to reinstate it from the whole community. Please take the time to read and sign this petition.

The following statement posted on September 3rd 2004 is taken from DragonEmpires.com

"Dragon Empires development ceased due to technical issues
Codemasters has taken the decision to cancel further development of Dragon Empires, the company’s massively multiplayer online role playing project.



Dragon Empires received incredible support from its online community and won acclaim from PC and online media while in development. However, technical issues have resulted in the project’s discontinuation.



Many of the game’s development team, including programmers and artists, are being transferred to Codemasters’ internal development studios to work on current and future titles.



The decision to close Dragon Empires’ development does not impact on Codemasters’ long-term ambitions in the massively multiplayer online gaming market and the company remains very active in evaluating future opportunities.



The Dragon Empires website and its popular community forums will remain live at www.codemasters.com/dragonempires for the immediate future."

This is the statement released by Codemasters regarding the cancellation of Dragon Empires. Dragon Empires has been in production for 3 years - and I as far as I know - it was within its final year or so of being developed, having already started Beta-0 and 0.5 and it was on the verge of Beta-1. The 'technical issues' mentioned in the above news post was the server code - which was a problem, but a problem that I have learned was not un-fixable - it would just take a little time and more money to fix - with the possibility of calling in other developers to fix it.
The popularity of Dragon Empires was huge - with hundreds of active community members and around 40 pre-release clans - and I also know there were around one hundred thousand people registered for the Beta testing. It has been noted already on the forums that many people will NEVER trust codemasters again unless Dragon Empires was reinstated it has also been stated that the credibility of any further MMORPG's released/developed by Codemasters has already taken a servire knock before they even start. Dragon Empires was hyped by many websites/fans/gamers to be the greatest MMORPG ever, and one of the greatest games ever! So why cancel it so close to when it could of been finnished? Are the "fat cats" of Codemasters not true gamers? After all - shouldnt that be what games development companies should be all about - gamers. I for-one at this moment will never purchase another Codemasters game again as I have lost all faith and respect for Codemasters as a company - as if they cancel such a popular game 3 years into development than is any game really safe? I know many other people share the same feelings as I. Dragon Empire's cancellation is a severe blow to the development of the MMORPG genre, one which might never be cured, at least it wont for Codemasters. I will send links of this petition to many popular gaming websites and fansites and I would hope thousands of people will sign it - for the good of all gamers. As how would you feel if the game you had been activly following for 3 years was just cancelled in the blink of an eye? So please take the time to sign this petition. Thankyou.

Further references and thaughs on this matter can be found here
www.dragonempires.com
and in various here threads here
http://community.codemasters.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=29

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

The Reinstatment of the development of the MMORPG Dragon Empires. Petition to Gamers of the world was created by Dragon Empires Community and written by Tom Hanson (kanesace@aol.com).  This petition is hosted here at www.PetitionOnline.com as a public service. There is no endorsement of this petition, express or implied, by Artifice, Inc. or our sponsors. For technical support please use our simple Petition Help form.

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