Today, we have for you a Bootleggers Buzz exclusive! In the midst of Bootleggers, there is an underlying war that many of you are aware of, this is the war between The Black Horde and The Family. Some say the war is a struggle for power, to become the best and most feared on the game. Some say that it is a righteous battle, with one party trying to eliminate the other to save the game! Today we're in luck, both The Black Horde and The Family have agreed to speak to the Buzz on a one off basis, in an attempt to get their point across with regards to being a member of one of these notorious underground crews and their reasons for behaving the way they do!
First up, we spoke with Phuzz, general of The Black Horde, who's username is unknown for obvious reasons. We first of all thanked him for agreeing to an interview and then went on to ask him how he found the current state of the game? To which he replied: “It's disappointing, having to wait for features that were promised to us months ago is just forcing people to loose interest in the game, and don't get me started on the activeness of the Mods and HDO's I hardly see them online, its a joke”. We agreed that the lack of promised features was disappointing, but that's not what this was about. We wanted to know more about how it was to be a member of The Black Horde? “I can't complain, we have fun after all this is a game, but it can be hard work. The gym has made it a little more difficult to shoot, you have to be active enough to work hard. It can have its disadvantages aswell with so many haters out there.” We understood that being a part of The Black Horde must bring a lot of hate, but there is one crew who supplies the majority of hate for The Black Horde. I'm talking about The Family of course! Which brought us to our next question, what was his opinion on his current rivals? “It's simple, we have seen so many times in previous rounds TF ruin the game and rule it. We don't want that to happen so we are doing everything we can to prevent it happening. When ever TF shoot everyone moans, but they do nothing about it. I say it's time to put a stop to that don't you? You've already seen them starting, and as for them pretending to be TBH in the forum. Thats just pathetic.” Unfortunately, we couldn't answer the question Phuzz had put forward to us, as we had to remain an unbiased party, although we did like the idea of a big war with lots of kills! We probed a little deeper into what we had just been told and asked if he really thought that The Family were attempting to ruin the game for every one else or just playing the game and performing lots of kills in an attempt to become the most powerful crew around? “They have proven they can shoot yes, I can't deny that when they shoot they do it well, but there's a difference in becoming powerful and ruining the game for everyone else. I mean, how long is it going to be until it turns into last round, where nobody can rank past boss without been shot, nobody enjoys the game when it's like that. With that added on top of the lack of updates and inactive staff the game is sure to fall.”
So it seems as though The Black Horde are adamant that The Family are attempting to ruin every one else’s fun, but still, we had a big question for Phuzz, did he think it was possible for The Black Horde to do what no one else could last round, and defeat The Family? “Who knows. We don't know what resources they have, the same as they don't know what we have. I guess it will depend on who runs out first or who gets bored first. All I do know is we are determined and this gives us a purpose to play” said Phuzz, who then went on to say, “I doubt it will ever get to a point where someone wins. The war will always continue. I can't see TF backing down anytime soon”. So it looks as though we could be in this for the long run! We then went on to ask Phuzz if he had a response to what some Bootleggers users were thinking, if they were ever to over throw The Family then it would be just the same, but it would be The Black Horde performing all the kills in a quest for power, rather than The Family? Phuzz responded, “We have no intention of ruling the game. We would have already proven our strength if we manage to beat TF, what else would we have to prove? This war isn't about power for us, its about trying to save the game and prevent other peoples fun been ruined.” Interesting! So with The Black Horde believing that this war of righteousness to save the game, did they believe they are the “good guys” of Bootleggers? “Ha, I guess you could say that, or at least thats what we are hoping.” was his reply! This just about wrapped everything up with The Black Horde, so we asked if he had anything else to say and maybe even a message for The Family? “Stop pretending to be TBH members, it makes you look pathetic, and a message to the readers. TBH members will never do give aways or act like noobs in the forum. It's not our style.”
So there you have it, we have heard from The Black Horde and have found out the reason why they want to take The Family off the map! They believe they are trying to save the game! Our interviews were far from over though, we couldn't wait to hear what The Family had to say!
The spokesperson for The Family was the infamous Pannu! We first of all thanked him for agreeing to interview, and then dived in with our first question! We wanted to know what Pannu thought of the current state of the game? “Lovely, it’s nice to see some action. We believe it would be a lot more entertaining if crews on the stats would actually go after each other. Instead it seems like we're the target, but that's perfectly fine with us. However, we find it funny that a crew by the name of "The Black Horde" is trying to instigate this rebellion against us. This is a crew which claims to have 15 shooters, but continuously relies on others to shoot for them. Other than one recent shooting, they have done nothing since using an insider to kill Event Horizon (who is now an ally of theirs)”. This was a very interesting answer, and certainly different to what The Black Horde had answered to this question. The Family seemed to address the action rather than discussing features. We liked this! We then asked Pannu what it was like to be the boss of one of the most powerful crews in Bootleggers? He told us, “You flatter me with such a comment; I’m not the boss or the leader of our group. Most people question how we are able to stay so powerful for such long periods of time. They attempt to excuse anything we do on the basis that we somehow cheated. We’re successful because we truly play as a group of friends. Everything is done for the good of the crew and no one has an ego or a desire for self-accomplishment. We definitely have an inner group of individuals who direct our efforts, but you can keep guessing on who they are. If we do have a boss, I would say Kraake fits the mould because he’s actually social and friendly. We’re not like The Black Horde with “generals” who do nothing but brag about things they can never possibly accomplish. Our secrecy and deception are powerful tools which have allowed us to thrive.” So we found out that The Family has no leader, but an inner core group who make the decisions, and once again Pannu had strong words for The Black Horde!
We thanked Pannu for being honest with us, and then went on to ask him what the future holds for The Family and if they would always be around? “Anything is possible, as long as the game is still playable and there are no further ludicrous attempts to stop us, we will play. It’s tough for me to answer this question because unfortunately I cannot predict the future. The gymnasium feature was put in especially to prevent a repeat of what we did last round, as were the increases in shooting amounts. The reason we’re powerful has to do with our cooperation, whereas the rest of the game is simply lazy and relies upon the Moderators to balance the game through unfair and unprecedented bans. In previous rounds, a small group like ourselves might have been able to pull of some nice shootings, but in no way would they have been in a dominant position, simply because the rest would fight back and anyway you play it, 20 vs 1000 cannot be won by the 20, yet last round, we did.” A very interesting answer! So in theory, Pannu believes that The Family can be defeated, was this the case? “Of course, crews in previous rounds from Revelation and allies, Resistance, Eternal Labyrinth, The Syndicate and now us have all had some form of domination, and have all lost it at some point, most due to a combination of the dominant people that stopped caring, and 'enemies' who started to really gear up. The alliance between Death Valley, The Black Horde and Event Horizon could potentially stop us, but time will tell. The fun part is, one of the reasons TF is hated has to do with us shooting people, seemingly at random, yet the ones who want to stop us will have to do the exact same thing, shoot at random people who look suspicious. Event Horizon is doing a great service to the players of Bootleggers by killing an account or two daily. This brings absolutely no heat onto them, and allows the players to continually think of us as the sole bad guys. Chances are that 8 out of 10 they hit are innocent; making them just as guilty as doing the same thing as us doesn’t it? Furthermore, suppose they do succeed, then what? Will they become the new TF, or just let everything be and get BL back to its boring self where everyone helps everyone, and everyone is nice to everyone?” Pannu makes some interesting points, but let's see what else he has to say...
We questioned Pannu on what The Black Horde had said earlier, if they in fact were planning on ruining the game for every one to aid their own personal enjoyment and to dominate the game? We also questioned him on the “manual reset” they performed last round? “Last round is last round, what we accomplished can never be repeated. We definitely had some help from Komodo, so we’re not going to take all of the credit. Yes we did perform a manual reset despite having numerous disadvantages. These include moderators who were out to get us, a moronic kill system featuring wait times, and the existence of scripters who were trying to find our holders. Again, most of you also forget that Event Horizon was an ally of ours, and was involved in the manual reset spree. This is the crew that is supposed to be Bootlegger’s saviour and help remove this virus that is The Family. Again, we in TF aren’t killing this game or trying to ruin it. We play the game as we believe it was intended by BSF. We believe BL isn’t a game where everyone should rank-up in safety, get rich, and then do nothing with it. We got rich by playing a smarter game than the rest, and we use our resources both for a form of dominance, but mainly because it’s fun. As I said, 1000 of you vs. 20 of us, and it’s considered unfair for the 1000? A finger should also be pointed at the Elite Guard. By adding the hidden rank and hidden wealth feature, this makes us shoot random accounts because the reason for wanting to shoot rich and high ranked accounts is still there. Look at the profile of Hornetv2 for a good read on what’s wrong with this game. We play this game as its intended to be played; this is a mafia game and not a social networking website.” We did take his advice and had a look at the profile of Hornetv2 and we must say it was a very good read! As we asked The Black Horde if they thought they were the “good guys” in this situation, we had to ask Pannu if he thought The Family were the “bad guys”? “No, we merely play a game and we like the shooting feature. If you don’t like that, either you can leave BL or you can suck it up, play the game, and shoot back. If this means we’re the bad guys, that’s fine by us. We have thick skin; we can be whatever this game needs us to be. We attempt to bring action into this game; we’re not the ones who are playing solely to stop another crew. Some crews like TBH say they're out to get us, that’s fine with us. Until they defeat us, or we get bored or most likely a combination of both, we'll do what we want, play Bootleggers in the way we see fit.” Which is a fair enough statement, considering shooting is the main feature of the game! That just about wrapped up everything with The Family, but again we asked Pannu if there was anything he would like to add? “We’re not the kind of crew that makes idle threats, we rarely threaten anyone. We prefer to let our shooting do the talking (take notes TBH). We’re also a pretty intelligent bunch of people, for the crews on the statistics currently helping DV/TBH/EH, we know who you are, and we’re not ignorant. We will continue to play this game in the way we see fit. As long as the Moderators stay neutral, I expect nothing but success on our part. You can call us the bad guys if you want, we’re a necessary evil. I believe even BSF has to acknowledge the importance of TF for the continued success of this game. We play the game as he initially intended, this is a mafia game, and shooting is part of the game.”
So in conclusion, the Buzz thinks this war is far from over yet, with both parties answering our questions very differently. Does The Black Horde and their new found alliance have what it takes to wipe out the presence of The Family? Will any one take note of both The Black Horde and The Family and join the fight either against The Family or just to make the game exciting again? Is the fact that The Family feel that the current players of Bootleggers have turned their beloved mafia-shooting game into a social networking site a motive for all these killings? Even if The Family are the bad guys, who would Superman be without Lex Luthor? Every one needs a nemesis. So many questions that need an answer, although the Buzz isn't worried, because there is so much time to answer them! We are especially looking forward to see what this tale has to offer, with both sides no were near giving up just yet, we think there is a lot more to come in what may prove to be an exciting time in Bootleggers!
Thank you for taking the time to read this article, and we look forward to providing you with as much information as we can get about these two notorious crews in next weeks Buzz!
