There are no two ways two ways about it - last week was a terrible week for games.com and AOL Games.
We had two separated outages and issues with log in status over the weekend. This is unacceptable and on behalf of the games team I apologize for the trouble.

In fact there were two entirely separate issues at work here. The first issue affected games on Wednesday and Thursday nights and the second started late Friday running through the Sunday morning. They were not related strangely enough!

Technology can be a tricky thing and quite often in the rush to repair one issue another can come up to compound the problems. In this case the two items were unrelated but equally frustrating to repair. As soon as we were able to lock down the problems we set about repairing them. While these issues did last several hours our team work as hard and as fast as they could to get them repaired.

We are glad to say the the biggest problems (Stars, playing as a guest and stamps) were repaired by Sunday morning (Eastern Time) The second big and annoying issue was the messages of Tripeaks Solitaire being broadcast across games - was repaired this morning.

That's about all the problems we had to sort out this weekend. I want to take this time to say how sorry we are for all the issues. We know you have a choice in your game play destination and know that you are the most passionate and caring community on the web. It´s the games teams job to give you all a fun, easy and stable gaming home and this weekend we didn´t hold up our end of the bargain. Please rest assured that all the the necessary steps are being taken to prevent these problems for happening again.

Thank you all for your patience and continued support of games.com and AOL Games.
If you have any questions comments or just want to chat, drop me a line.
Larry
laurent.courtines@corp.aol.com
AIM:lcourtines
http://twitter.com/gamesdotcom

Yesterday we experienced had a problem with our chat and profile system that affected most of our games. Chat and stamps were not viewable for several hours. The issue began at 5 PM ET and was repaired by 10 PM ET.

We apologize for all the trouble and are in the process of reviewing what happened and why it happened. In the mean time please accept our apologies and know that we take your gaming enjoyment seriously.

At games.com we know that you have choice in where to play games and limited time in which to play them. We want you to know that we care about your time and your game play. We're passionate about games and want to be the best games site on the web.

Again, our sincerest apologies.

For the past several years Games.com has sent winners of our online tournaments to the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas. It is always a highlight of our year and we extremely proud of our players.

Last year a Troy O'Brien, a fireman from New Jersey, got to live his dream and won over $50,000 with his free seat to the World Series of Poker. I thought that was a pretty big deal and we so happy to highlight Troy O'Brien's fine poker play.

This year, our team was a bit smaller. Six of our online tournament winners were going to go to the World Series of Poker. I thought it would mean the end for our big blow out coverage. I thought our coverage would consist of our free online tournaments; we'd send our team of six and that would be it. For instance last year we created video interviews of every player and this year we just ran pictures of the team. You can forgive me if I underestimated our team? Boy was I wrong.

Have you ever looked at your buddy list and wondered what the best way to reach out to your buddies would be?

Ask about the kids? Ask them about the latest television show they might not have watched? How about inviting them to a game? With the latest version of AIM you can invite anyone online to play a game with you. The best part about it is, there is no catch. You don't need to download anything extra, no tool bar, no crazy extra software nothing. The game invite system is right there and part of AIM.

For some of us at Games.com this integration has been in the works for the better part of five years. (Yes, I am completely serious.) We're all really excited about this product and hope that everyone will at least try it out. We've tried to make it as easy as possible but there are always things that we don't see.

We need your to help us make the games on AIM experience better. If you can think of ANYTHING, anything at all that you'd like to see in the games on AIM experience please do not hesitate to let us know.

Let me take you through the Games on AIM process:

One my many responsibilities here at games.com is being the point man on issues inside the chat. Let me tell you, there are a lot of people talking inside our games. It's wonderful and most people are talking and making friends. There really isn't much to do on a day to day basis and I attribute that to our outstanding community. People on games.com are on the whole very good to each other and very cordial.

But there is a BUT and it is a BIG BUT! There are people who come into chat and are just out there to start trouble and disrupt the community. It is very likely a small portion of the community but needs to be handled. The first line of defense is YOU the community.


Here are the steps that you should following when dealing with an annoying chat room buddy

1. Ignore them. Now I don't mean using the ignore button (that's step 2.) I mean simply not replying to the person. People feed off of your reaction. In the lingo of the web it's called feeding the trolls. Trolls (as the snarky annoying people in chat are called) live off our reactions. If we ignore them they won't get the rush they need and they'll go away. Remember; DON'T FEED THE TROLLS!

Folks, sorry for the late addition. We'll be doing approximately two hours of site maintenance starting at 5.30 AM Eastern Time tomorrow morning. During the downtime we'll be doing some needed repairs to the chat and stars system that the games run inside of. We apologize for the trouble and hope too many peoples' game play are not effected.

Additionally, we'll be launching three games from our beta program; Gin Rummy, Oklahoma Gin and Whist are expected to come out tomorrow. They have been out in beta for a while but will officially roll out tomorrow morning. Lastly, we going to bring out our WSOP Poker improvements that I mentions two weeks ago. You can read the full list of improvements here: Improvements Coming to WSOP Poker Games

For those concerned about the poker tournaments please be aware that these changes will not affect tournament play.

If you have any questions or comments please do not hesitate to drop me a line.

My avatar looks pretty sharp today doesn't it? I've noticed that people are asking about avatar creation.
Avatar creation is very easy and is tons of fun. There is nothing better than being able to express one's personality through a little digital representation aye?

The problem right now is no one knows where the heck they can make one of these from. It really is no fun to see those weird alien headed things in the place of an avatar.

There are several games that you can create and avatar in.
They are:
Solitaire Race
Hearts
Video Poker
Slots Lounge

For as long as I have been here I have wanted there to be a community news section as a part of games.com. I have been here for over a year and half and learned so much from all of you in our community. You are a passionate group of game players who only wants to best from Games.com and each other.

In the time of been here we've been through a ton. From the removal for Game Talk (which we should not have done) to the redesign of the games site (which many of you hated but are now used to) to the Slingo issues there has been one constant. What has been constant is your level of passion. I am happy to have been able to communicate with all of you over these months and years and hope there is more to come.

We have great changes coming to the WSOP Poker games in the next couple of days. Instead of rambling on about the who,what and when I'll just bullet things out with an image
- Show off your face! New in table Avatars.
- How you doin? Game summaries.
- Bonus Pots
Just a couple of teaser images:

Avatar just like in a couple of our other games.


Game stats broken down by the last ten hands and table leaders. Now you know where you stand.

This should be out in the next few days. Let us know what you think. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to send me an email laurent.courtines@corp.aol.com

A couple of weeks ago I let everyone know that we released The Rise Of Atlantis with Stars. Well, when we did that we also added stamps! Now, without further ado, the Stamps of 'The Rise Of Atlantis"

Click here to play 'The Rise Of Atlantis' now
Can you win them all?

Bringing back Marvin to let people know "What's Going on?" The week has not started off great but is still pretty good, The games gang is hammering away at adding new games and repairing on-going issues. I'll bullet out what's cooking for us so you folks know where we are.

1. WSOP 2008 Tournaments Start - and have problems.
Tournaments started on Sunday May 4th and they looked to be going off without a hitch, unfortunately, technology reared it ugly head. We had a huge hardware failure and all tournaments up until Monday at 3PM T were effected. The Masque crew did their best and got things sorted out as soon as they could. Tournaments should now be working as they should.

2. Club Pogo issues.
Not everyone who reads this blog is a AOL member and comes to us from Games.com but I have to cover ALL our members. There was an annoying issue with Club Pogo games on our site. We're happy to know what the issue is and have finally repaired it. The hope is that Club Pogo issues are going to be greatly reduced.

3. New Games COMING
We're continuing to crank out the games that have been in Beta out to the general public. This week we are expecting to launch, Gin Rummy, Oklahoma Gin and Whist. There is also a possibility that we'll get Spades out. In the long term I just got a sneak peak at Checkers (Amazing!)

Please let me know if you have any questions about the new games, what is coming down the pipe, or how we can improve our site.

Folks, it's come to my attention that there was an issue with the opening rounds of the WSOP 2008 qualifier tournaments. Unfortunately, I was not made aware earlier and I was unable to let the right people know so the issues could be repaired.
On behalf of the games team we apologize for the inconvenience and we are working towards a solution. We expect to have everything up and running for the 3PM Eastern qualifiers.

If you have any issues at all please do not hesitate to email me at laurent.courtines@corp.aol.com

(cite saynotocrack.com)

Today at Games.com is a happy day. We've worked long and hard to get games out and it seemed like we were running on empty for a while. But this week we've launch two hugely important game.

1. Earlier this week Hearts went out the door. It's a really, really good version of the game and I have been enjoying it THOROUGHLY. The game had been in Beta for what seemed like forever and we finally pulled it all together and released it. From what I have seen people have been enjoying the game and Shooting the Moon!
For me, I had never been that much of a Hearts player (maybe played a few times in High School) This game has made me a Hearts player. I know the rules, I'm learning how to set up runs to shoot the moon and I'm just loving the fast pace of the game.

2. Today, we launched Video Poker Beta. This one, THIS ONE IS BIG! Why you ask? It's just Poker? Well, because our executives here at AOL/Games.com are watching. When the boss man is watching, you want to deliver. Unfortunately, the game was delayed a couple of months and the boss man was on our back. Business wise, we needed this game to come out so we could meet one of our goals. Well, it's out and people are loving it.
The game is based on those old 5-card video poker machines you always find in convenience stores, except this one, you don't have to play alone! You can chat and make friends while you play away the day with fake money! How great is that! I've been really enjoying the game and hope everyone will give it a whirl. (I know it seems like I say that about everything but I REALLY DON'T!)

It is so energizing to release good products and get good feedback from the community on the game. We make these games after all with you in mind. We try and solicit feedback and bring you into the development process as much as we can. We're so happy here to get these things out the door.

Please please, let us know what you think of the games and what I can do on this blog to help you enjoy the games!

While this post is nothing near as important as the greatest Motown record every made, I thought I would honor the record my making it my what's going on icon. Pretty cool I think!

Aside from my usual lists (Top Sales, Top Played, New Games) I haven't been putting up too much stuff with regards to what has been going on here at Games.com. We've had a great month with regards to what we've been graded on here at AOL. But that does not mean it's been great for our members.

We have been tackling lots of little hurdles to make the games better. If you noticed the rooms now are created dynamically when lots of people play. That
is a huge thing because now the chat won't break. It has had some ramifications. People now want to play in the most popular rooms and now they are closed! YIPES! Minor oversight on our part. We're working on it and hope to have the rooms back open soon.

Lastly, we've still got a few games in beta that have not been released. Those games will be getting the live treatment (Promotions, Stamps and Stars) very soon. The first one out the door will be Hearts followed by Spades plus one special game that we think everyone is going to love (Rhymes with Al Roker and Treo)