Over the past few months we have all seen Sky complete a lot of updates to the game. A lot of people may argue that these updates aren't major game changing features, but many of them have been outstandingly brilliant. Others are helpful towards the game as a whole. But the question on every ones mind is when will we see some of the major updates we have been promised? We at the Buzz decided to track down Sky and ask him about some of the major changes we are all waiting for to improve Bootleggers as a whole.
We asked him when we would see some major updates completed on the game and he gave us a very detailed answer, “I've got some bigger updates waiting for approval, most of them I wouldn't feel comfortable releasing without getting an OK from above. But the major updates will be all BSF, with the entire EG chipping in with ideas. If asked to, I will gladly help BSF with them, though I doubt he needs any. I suspect he's like me and once he knows what he wants to do he'll be able to visualise it, but unable to put into words his vision, so wouldn't even be able to ask for assistance anyway, even if he did need any. In the mean time I'm here for the smaller things that bother players daily.”
Very detailed and interesting. But we wanted to know more. We wanted to know what the delay was in waiting for approval. If Sky has good ideas and is ready to implement them, why the delay? He told us the way the approval process works and he explained, “It's essentially just a case of creating a topic in the Elite Guard Crew Forum with outline of changes/update. I'll then take feedback from the others and incorporate it, and wait for BSF2000 to give it a thumbs up.” Since the process is so simple we wanted to know why there was a delay at all. Sky explained, “It started out quite quick but it's slowed down of late. Obviously people have been busy with family (over the holidays) and now with studies/work obligations. I don't mind waiting, I just hope the players don't mind either.”
We changed the topic there and asked the question he is probably sick of hearing! We all want to know when we will see Sky in a red coat or if BSF had discussed this with him? He told us, “He hasn't and really one isn't necessary. Administrator does not necessarily mean programmer any more, and hasn't really for quite a while. Besides which, Riserva is far more likely to turn red than I am.” Interesting that he brought up the head moderator. We haven't seen him very active recently and we asked Sky if he knew what was happening? We were told, “As far as I'm aware. He's supremely busy with work and obviously that comes before Bootleggers, but still as dedicated as ever to serving Bootleggers.” Hopefully we will see him more frequently helping out in the near future!
We asked him what he felt about the state of the game in the New Year and what he had noticed about the activity of players on the site. His answer was, “I'm not really sure what's going on... activity seems to have peaked again, and the forums are dead... where the hell has everyone gone? Have they all been lost to the horror of exams? I'm hoping that a combination of renewed enthusiasm in the Elite Guard and players, constant smaller updates, and total reworkings of the bigger features will encourage old players to return and entice new players to begin their criminal careers.” We then asked him how players could help the game to grow (after all, the more players Bootleggers has then the more fun we all have) and his simple reply was, “Don't get discouraged. This is a healing round. We'll get some big updates out of the way and then start all over again from scratch, a new and improved Bootleggers. And tell your friends!”
This provoked a serious question, is there a reset due in the near future? He cautiously told us, “It hasn't been discussed, so this is just my interpretation of the way things are going, but I suspect we'll see one later this year, yes.” Well that answered all of our serious questions so we turned to a few more personal questions about Sky. We asked him which was his favourite update out of the recent ones and we heard, “Since the New Year? Well there haven't really been that many... I like the busting statistics, it's nice to reward hard work like that. But I've got some real crackers waiting, I'll be more pleased with those.” But he refused to comment on what any of those might be. We will all be waiting to see that update page go yellow ready to see these “crackers” he has due to come out.
Our final questions were ones he has heard many times! Does he think he is worthy of his award “Bootleggers Superhero of 2012” and he told us, quite simply, “Well my fellow nominees were Klere and Betty, and while they are both valuable in their own way, I'm afraid they look stupid with their underwear on the outside, unlike me. I actually look better like it.” We're sure we'd all like to see what that looks like! The final question was to ask if he had any closing remarks and he gave yet another strange closing remark, “The clock ticks backwards for those with green hair.” If any of you can understand what that means your doing a better job then we are at the Buzz! Thanks Sky for a very informative interview!
