MPGH News (9/7/12)

[[MPGH]Psychotic]

8th Edition
9/7/12

MPGHCraft
MPGHCraft is coming back! Thanks to Ahmad, J, and some other members here, have been driving to bring MPGHCraft back. There has only been 1 official confirmation from Ahmad himself explaining the server, the rules, and how to join. We have yet to hear another for the official release on MPGHCraft. If you would like to read more on MPGHCraft, visit this thread.

Applications and Changes
In the past few weeks, Liz, has been keeping up to her word. Staff applications have opened up in more than 5 sections in the past 3 weeks, for the following sections: (note: some may be closed by the time you read them).

Dragon Nest
Call of Duty - MW3
Vindictus
AVA
Need For Speed World

Middleman applications closed about 1-2 weeks ago. Though, Editor applications are still up. If you would like to apply for Editor, go here.

Congratulations to any newly promoted Minions, and good luck to anyone applying for Minion. Specifically, congratulations to @.Cereal, @Lehsyrus for being promoted to Minion for the AVA section. Congratulations to @Stevenom for being promoted to Minion for the BF3 section, as well as @maddoggy00 being promoted to Minion for the Vindictus section. Once again, congratulations to all newly promoted staff, and upcoming promoted staff.

Promotions and Demotions
@Thunder was demoted from his long-lasting staff position, Global Moderator.
@Disturbed resigned from being a Global Moderator due to school, and other life related happenings. Good luck.
@Stevenom was promoted to Minion for the BF3 section. Congratulations!
@.Cereal was promoted to Minion for the AVA section. Congratulations!
@Lehsyrus was also promoted to Minion for the AVA section. Good luck!
@maddoggy00, a well known Contributor, was promoted to Minion for the Vindictus section. Well deserved! Congratulations.
@Hero, @Time, and @Nico were promoted to Moderator. Good job, guys and good luck.
@Cosmic had gotten Resource Team a while back, and about 2 days he got Contributor. Being a cocksucker, that's quite a good achievement. Congratulations, Cosmic - you deserve it.

Postbans
@mslol hit his first postban, 1337. Congratulations, mslol.
@FrosK had also hit 1337 posts earlier this week. Good job!
@Hero the spamming bitch reached 16,000 this week. Congratulations!
@Xien hit 3k this week! Congratulations! @ryakhawk, our very own Global News writer, had hit 1337 posts as well. Congratulations!


Sorry to anyone that I missed in User News. Especially for postbans, I know I didn't get everyone. Sorry if I didn't include you as MPGH News hasn't had an edition for 3-4 weeks as we've been adjusting and doing stuff like that - I can't go back 4 weeks and get your postban. Sorry. Contest News will be merging with User News as it has great relevance, and the section is dead either way.

Interview - [MPGH]Rhett

 

[MPGH]Hero: So Shane, tell me a little about yourself.
[MPGH]Rhett: Well, I'm 16. I'm a junior in high school.

[MPGH]Hero: How did you stumble upon MPGH?
[MPGH]Rhett: I was playing CF back in '09. And back when MPGH had the best VIP, someone joined my game and started spamming MPGH.net, so I went to check out the site.

[MPGH]Hero: You were a minion of CF before, when exactly did you get minion of CF?
[MPGH]Rhett: Uhh, I got CF minon on Octorber 28, 2010.

[MPGH]Hero: And at which point did you resign?
[MPGH]Rhett: I resigned on October 4, 2011.

[MPGH]Hero: Why did you resign? School? Maybe personal reasons?
[MPGH]Rhett: Mostly because of school, but I regret resigning from my minion position.

[MPGH]Hero: Do you ever plan on getting minion again?
[MPGH]Rhett: Of course, everytime Liz posts the minion thread I would always apply, but I would never get it, I WILL try hard enough to get minion back.

[MPGH]Hero: What's your most favorite thing about MPGH?
[MPGH]Rhett: DavRunIz ;]

[MPGH]Hero: What are your hobbies?
[MPGH]Rhett: I like going skating in my freetime.

[MPGH]Hero: Do you have a favorite video game? If so, what is it called?
[MPGH]Rhett: Mostly FPS. CoD, CF, BF3, etc.

[MPGH]Hero: Alright, before we wrap up this interview, do you want to give a shoutout to anyone?
[MPGH]Rhett: I would like to give a shoutout to my best frand Dave.

[MPGH]Hero: Alright, thank you for your time, sexy. I'll miss you.
[MPGH]Rhett: NP WANCE

Interview - [MPGH]Alen

 

[MPGH]Time: Hi there, Alen!
[MPGH]Alen: Hey there, Time!

[MPGH]Time: How are you today?
[MPGH]Alen: Absolutely fantastic! What about you?

[MPGH]Time: Im great thanks. So Alen, When did you first join MPGH?
[MPGH]Alen: Some time around spring or early summer in 2007, just as I was finishing my primary school exams for the year.

[MPGH]Time: Nice and How did you stumble upon MPGH?
Alen: At the time a game called "War Rock" was quite popular, and MPGH was a great source of relatively cheap retail codes (in-game item promotion codes).

[MPGH]Time: I see ;] , What was your first impression when you joined MPGH?
[MPGH]Alen: Well I was what one would call a "leecher", so I didn't really connect to anyone or join any MPGH groups or the likes. It was pretty much just that website that gave me codes.

[MPGH]Time: hehe , On the time you stayed on MPGH , did you find anyone who might serve you as an inspiRation or role model?
[MPGH]Alen: There have been quite a few people during my stay on MPGH that have inspired me in one way or another, I don't really feel cool with throwing out names though since I don't want to accidentally forget someone or hurt any feelings.

[MPGH]Time: mmkay, Do you remember exactly when you got staff and what was the first position you got on MPGH? And how long has it been since you got staff. ?
[MPGH]Alen: The first position I held was VIP Support, way back in like 2008 or something. I think I was like the second generation or something, not quite sure. After the VIP hype kind of died and school got a bit more intensive I left, only to regain VIP Support some time in 2010, I think. From then on I've held my staff position.

[MPGH]Time: Very nice ;] , Did you do any sort of contributions prior to getting minion? If so, what kind of contributions?
[MPGH]Alen: As negative as it may sound, I don't really feel like I contributed much to MPGH in terms of hacks, guides, resources or the likes. Most of my contributions come in the form of me trying to help individuals out, and that's pretty much what I've been doing since I first got VS.

[MPGH]Time: I see , What's the weirdest thing that has happened to you on MPGH?
[MPGH]Alen: Aside from the numerous ... different ... people you meet if you're active on MPGH, I think the spontaneous shifts in themes and topics perhaps weirded me out the most when I was still new.
MPGH does like to really focus on something every now and then, and sometimes it's just ... weird

[MPGH]Time: Do you know any one who you think is particularly weird or does crazy sutff? .pls
[MPGH]Alen: Again, I don't really feel like throwing specific names out there, but I'm sure everyone can remember more than a few staff members in high ranking positions that were known for their "crazy" obsessions and general behaviour.

[MPGH]Time: Alright, Do you have any hobbies outside of MPGH?
[MPGH]Alen: I used to have quite a few, though I've had to let a few go when I had my high school finals. I've done everything from tennis, squash, languages (English, German, French & Italian at one point), a _lot_ of "nerdy" stuff like physics, maths, chem, biology preps for competitions but mostly just compuer-related stuff

[MPGH]Time: Nice nice ;;D, Do you have any favorite games?
[MPGH]Alen: At the moment I'm obsessing with Tribes: Ascend and Firefall, though I still love to play the occasional game of TF2, QL, CSS or even perhaps some Warcraft every now and then. Oh and Minecraft with some mods can really make one show his creativity.

Time: Sweet. Do you believe you are perfect in your work ?
[MPGH]Alen: By no means perfect, but I think I've show myself to be quite knowledgable and capable of resolving pretty much anything that was within my power to resolve.

Time: Oh you sure have mate , Do you have any favorite music artists or bands that you listen to or any quotes you would like to share with us?
[MPGH]Alen: Too many, dear Time, too many. However because I'm just listening to him now, Dub Fx. Awesome guy, awesome music and definitely worth listening to if you don't mind some funkier vocals-only stuff. As far as quotes go most of my favourite ones are rather cruel towards some people, so I'll keep them for myself.
PS:

[MPGH]Time: Very nice tast you got thurr as always ;] , Before we wrap this up would you like to give a shout out to anyone?
[MPGH]Alen]: On a completely unrelated note, yeah. My old philosophy teacher was awesome, props for everything he's done

[MPGH]Time: Great, Thanks for your time mate .
[MPGH]Alen:

Clinton Takes On Terrorism
Secretary of State (USA) Hillary Clinton told congress on Friday that she is designating the Haqqani network (Pakistani) as a terrorist group. *Doing this can help us find the terrorist organization but can also hurt our already 'not so great' relationship with Pakistan. Clinton signed the report while on her trip to Asia. "Both houses of Congress have taken up the issue, calling for the Obama administration to add the Haqqani network to the State Department's terror organization list." - CNN The group has been intertwined with deaths of both American and NATO soldiers. For more info on the Haqqani group, go to -*The Haqqani Network, a family and a terror group - CNN.com

Quakes hit China.. Again!
731 injured, and estimated amount of 80 killed in the latest earthquake in southwestern China. All 4 earthquakes that had hit, had a rating of 7.6, and each was said to have a depth of 10 kilometers. 6,600 homes destroyed by this earthquake, and about 430,000 were damaged in some way. On Saturday, President Hu Jintao had called for, "immediate relief efforts" according to CNN and the China Central Television. If you would like to read more on the southwestern eartquakes that happened on Friday in between 11:19, and 2:12, go here.

Steam Greenlight is Live & Other Greenlight News
Valve announced the launch of Steam Greenlight, a new platform feature that enlists the community's help in selecting some of the next games to be released on Steam.
Steam Greenlight allows developers and publishers to post information and media about their game in an effort to convince the Community that the game should be released on Steam. Greenlight is heavily based on the Steam Workshop's flexible system that organizes content and lets customers rate and leave feedback.

Visit Steam Greenlight to make your votes.

A week later, Greenlight has seen over 700 submissions, but as some of you may know there's a large amount of noise and clutter being submitted, either as a joke or by fans not fully understanding the purpose of Greenlight.
Valve made two updates to Greenlight:
The first update is a $100 fee for someone to post to Steam Greenlight. The proceeds will be donated to Child’s Play. Valve mentions that they have no interest in making money from this, but it's necessary to cut down the noise in the system. Note that people who have already made a submission will not have to retroactively pay for any existing submissions, but will need to do so for any future submissions.
The second part of this update is to improve your window into Greenlight and help you find “your kind” of games. The next time you visit Steam Greenlight you’ll be shown a smaller, manageable list of games that you haven’t rated. This view is a mix of popular games and new games to Greenlight.


EA Celebrates the 17th Anniversary of Command and Conquer

Command & Conquer: The Ultimate Edition, a compilation of all 17 titles in the series, will release this October in celebration of the 17th anniversary of the long-running strategy gaming franchise.
This compilation will be available for $50 and will give fans a chance to re-experience all three award-winning Command & Conquer universes; in addition, they will also give have early access to the upcoming beta for the new Frostbite™ 2 powered Command & Conquer, coming in 2013.
Command & Conquer: The Ultimate Edition will include the following titles:



Black Mesa Coming Soon

The project leader of the Black Mesa mod made an official post on their forums today letting everyone know that Black Mesa will be available on September 14th. It will include their re-envisioning of Half-Life all the way up to Lambda Core.

You can download the Black Mesa Soundtrack, courtesy of Joel Nielsen, at whatever price you want.
Black Mesa: A Half-Life 2 modification


Call of Duty: Black Ops II System Requirements

Treyarch announced today the system requirements to run the upcoming COD. Even if Black Ops II uses the same engine as the first Black Ops, many improvements have been added to this second episode.
Here are the system requirements:
- OS: Windows Vista SP2 or Windows 7
- Processor: Intel Core2 Duo E8200 2.66 GHz or AMD Phenom X3 8750 2.4 GHz
- RAM: 2Gb for OS 32 bits or 4Gb for OS 64 bits
- Graphics Card: Nvidia GeForce 8800GT 512 Mb or ATI Radeon HD 3870 512 Mb


PAX Coming to Australia in 2013

Founders of PAX, Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins have announced that the next Penny Arcade Expo will be coming to Australia in 2013.
No specific dates and locations have been discussed yet. This expo will mark not only the first ever international expo but it will also be extended to four extra days.
Stay tuned for more information on PAX Australia.
Source: PAX coming to Australia in 2013 - News at GameSpot


Valve Leaps into Hardware Development

Valve made a job listing for an industrial designer on their website, and in there they confirm they are going to develop hardware.

I'm keeping an eye out for more details along the way.


Steam Community Update Now Live


Maybe people were already testing the new Steam community beta but today Valve announced the public launch of the new Steam Community with features focused on finding and sharing the best community content.

Day 1
Every game on Steam will have a new Game Hub. The Hubs highlight the most popular user-created screenshots, videos, and Steam Workshop items as rated by the community and combine it with related news, discussions, and comments for the game all in one central location.

Day 2
A completely new layout that makes it easier to see what a group is really about, who’s in it, and what they’ve been up to recently. They’ve added a group overview, friend showcase, and more.

Day 3
One big wall that nicely shows all your screenshots and where you will have a couple of different viewing options. And now you can favorite your content so you can find them later and share them with your friends.

Day 4
Friends are now visually rich and have a more interactive feed where nearly everything can be rated and commented on. Share your opinion, taunt or help your friends, save the best content to your favorites, and rate up your friends’ content to get them to the top of the Game Hubs.


Skyrim: Hearthfire DLC Announced

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is coming with a new DLC named Hearthfire. In this DLC, you can purchase land and build your own home from the ground up - from a simple one-room cottage to a sprawling compound complete with an armory, alchemy lab, stable, garden, and whatever else you can come up with.
Use all-new tools like the drafting table and carpenter's workbench to transform quarried stone, clay, and sawn logs into structures and furnishings. Even transform your house into a home by adopting children.
Hearthfire is now available for download for 400 Microsoft Points on Xbox LIVE. And although there is no release date for PC it will be probable after a month or so. 400 MS points equates to about $5.

Bitfloor Compromised
On Tuesday night, Bitfloor, a major bitcoin exchange, had its servers attacked and compromised by unknown attackers. Having compromised the servers, the hackers gained access to unencrypted backups of wallet keys, encryption codes which allow the transfer of bitcoins. 24,000 coins were taken off the floor by the hackers, and at about $10.40 per coin, that comes out to about $250,000. Thankfully no records or other information was compromised and Bitfloor is down until further notice. Roman Shtylman states,

“Last night, a few of our servers were compromised. As a result, the attacker gained accesses to an unencrypted backup of the wallet keys (the actual keys live in an encrypted area). Using these keys they were able to transfer the coins. This attack took the vast majority of the coins BitFloor was holding on hand. As a result, I have paused all exchange operations. Even tho only a small majority of the coins are ever in use at any time, I felt it inappropriate to continue operating not having the capability to cover all account balances for BTC at the time.”


Foxconn Done Goofed
A disconcerting story has begun to spread. First reported in The Shanghai Daily and CNR News radio station, thousands of Chinese students were pulled from Universities to work to work in Foxconn factories, to make components for the upcoming iPhone 5. Apparently Foxconn was in dire need of workers. These controversial “internships” did not require student’s consent, and did not notify the parents, and some schools went as far as suspend classes to two months. Students work 12 hours a day, 6 days a week, and were compensated for a measly 1550 yen a month. That’s $243. Apparently some institutions went as far to punish students that tried to leave, according to one student. Teachers from local schools claimed that the program would “experience working conditions and promote individual ability.” Thankfully, an updated news report states that students are being returned to their schools after much controversy and pressure. I seriously wouldn’t want push these students too far, right Long? Viva la Resolucion!

MPGH News Team

• Head Editor
  
  • Psychotic

• Editors
  
  • [MPGH]Hannibal
  • [MPGH]Ravallo

• Writers

• Psychotic
  
  • MPGH Headlines

• Dawgy Dawg
  
  • User News (Reporters)

• Katy
  
  • Contest News (Reporters)

• [MPGH]Hero
• [MPGH]Time
  
  • Interview(s)

• ryakhawk
  
  • Global News

• Nitekillr
  
  • Gaming News

• Azathoth
  
  • Technology News

• [MPGH]Paladin
  
  • Entertainment News

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Welp, there it is. MPGH News is back after a 3-4 week break. We were adjusting, changing, and also working on a new aspect of the MPGH News. We're going to start working on a MONTHLY Newsletter that will be sent to everyone's email - thanks to Ravallo for giving the great idea (and Doc, and anyone else). I hope everyone liked it. If you have any questions, concerns, suggestions, or feedback feel free to post it! Thanks.

[Ahmad]

Nice It was thread

[The Hobbit]

Gratz to all promotions + postbans, sad to see the demotions.

I won't be needing to care about the system requirements because I got duh PS3

[[MPGH]Hennessy]

Great! It's nice to see the interviews @Alen <3

[.REZClone]

nice job once again.

[FrosK]

We should have a minion in Social Game Hacks & Trainers section.
Blitz and I are the only contibutors and to get something approved it takes like days, because we have to talk to GMODs.
What do you guys think?

[StupidFuck]

Nothing about me 1337 Sorry again btw.

[Stevenom]

Minion again.

[[MPGH]Time]

@Alen the video is there just like you asked .

[[MPGH]Shane]

thank you for interviewing me.

[Mshine67]

Your news threads always amaze me.

[The XXX Devil]

Another great edition. And as always, mostly loved the interviews section. More of that please.

[Janitor]

Good job as always.

[[MPGH]Psychotic]

Glad everyone likes it! . If anyone has any suggestions to add, remove, or change the News in any way, tell me. We're always looking to improve.

[Azathᴏth]

Minion again.

Grats on minion bro.