Dear ecc

Dear ecc,

I have been a member on this server for three years. I am aware that many of you do not know me, and some of those that do may dislike me because I can be opinionated. All I ask is that you put any prejudice you have against me aside and try to read what I have to say in an impartial manner.

I remember on the first day of spring break three years ago getting a text from my buddy birdnerd47 saying that he had found a really interesting and fun server, the focus being on how

cool the “hunger games” minigame was. So I rush over to my laptop, get on skype with him and log on to this new server. Upon logging on, I saw right away that this server was a special one. Hundreds of people were online, chat was bustling with excitement, and everyone seemed like they were part of a giant family. I had never seen a server with such a tight-knit community, and I couldn’t help but feel ecstatic to become part of it.

When I played my first SG match, I remember my heart racing as the countdown began. Never before in my life had a game made my adrenaline rush like that first game of SG did, and I have not gotten that experience from a game since. I must have spent the entirety of my spring break glued to my computer, enthralled by what I believed to be the greatest server around.

So pretty soon I have enough money to apply for resident. At the time I didn’t understand the point of it, but the idea of having the ability to run a shop made me decide to spend the 15k. I had actually not spent any money on the server before this, and I felt like it was this moment that I actually became a part of the ecc family. I had signed up on the forum and was committed to being a member of the server, and that was a wonderful feeling.

Many months had passed since I first became a resident and I had finally amassed a decent amount of money from SG. I had also made a couple of friends through SG, and it was always fun having a teammate to help out in the arena. But around this time kits were becoming more and more popular in SG, and I was having a much more difficult time winning. It was around this time that I wanted to look into getting a melon sword to have reliable income. So one day I see an ad in the trade channel by Blowtube123 and he is selling his melon sword for roughly 250k (keep in mind, this was about two years ago). I only had 120k at the time and was only a resident, but I told Blowtube123 that I was interested and he decided to trust me. I can imagine he was feeling was pretty sketched about selling it to me since I wasn’t even a mayor, but I used all my money as a down payment and spent the next couple of weeks farming to repay him. I will never forget the joyous feeling I felt as made my last payment on the melon sword. I finally had a way to consistently get money in an honest and reliable way. I say this because many people will get lucky from the lotto and win big once to get rich, but that was never the way I did it. All of my money was earned through harvesting melons, mining, building, and other odd jobs.

I want to fast forward the end of the summer of 2014. At this time I was a mayor, I had a bunch of wonderful friends on ecc, and my own community of people living in my town. This was undoubtedly the happiest I ever was on the server. People in my town looked up to me and I was responsible for making sure they had their needs met. If there was any trouble, I was the one they were going to. I took immense pride in my town, and I was happy that something I was able to do in a game could actually have a positive effect on real people. But like all of us, life gets in the way. I was starting my junior year of highschool and I knew that I would not have as much time to play. Often times I was only able to go on for a few hours over the weekend, but it was very satisfying to return on school breaks and catch up with all of my friends. I would come back, and each time I would notice how the server was changing. First, SG kits took off completely to the point where the SG was not even fun anymore. By the summer of 2015 cookpots had been removed, and shortly after town portals were gone. I didn’t like all of these changes, but I trusted that the staff knew what they were doing and were addressing the complications made by these changes. This past year of school has been utterly hectic for me. I was working part time and was taking many difficult classes and I rarely had time to go on and play. Despite this, I would log on every week for at least a couple of minutes to say hi to friends and ensure that I didn’t become deleted from the server’s memory. As it turns out, that was not enough.

When I logged on today I was excited at the prospect of enjoying another summer with my second family. Sure, some people were gone but many of my old friends still played. Most of the time spent on the server over the past few months was spent addressing citizens of my town and making sure everything was okay and I did not have time to try and make any money. I hadn't been to my house or farm for ages. You can only imagine the dread I felt as I looked through my chests to see that they were all empty, and the locks were gone. I felt like I was being punished when I had done nothing wrong. I had logged on every few weeks and I had made sure my inventory never wiped. I was always very careful about locking up my things to keep them safe. Yet today I realize that I have lost absolutely everything I had worked so hard to get over the past three years. All my enchanted diamond tools that I had spent thousands creating, my melon sword that I was so proud to own, and all of my items, including player heads of friends that no longer play on the server, were all gone.

Today I am filled with a horrible empty feeling. How is this allowed to happen? I have played on this server for three years, I have donated hundreds of dollars, and have spent thousands of hours on this server. Yet today when I logged on and saw that I had lost everything and no mods can help me. I feel abandoned. I don’t know if this is the same server I signed up to play on three years ago. I don’t know when the individuals behind the screens lost their value as humans and became worthless money making devices. I really do hope that Andrew cares about his customers, but tonight I can't help but feel completely betrayed.

I don’t know what can be done to help my situation. I just want you all to remember that there is a human being behind each username. I have quite literally lost everything. I really don’t want to leave you guys, but I can’t imagine trying to start over.

Thank you for listening to my story,

Flamingforce