Hi everyone,

It's been a long time since anyone in this community has heard a peep from me, and there are a few reasons for that. Long story short, it's been a tumultuous couple of years, including the development of a chronic condition in both hands that makes it difficult to spend any significant amount of time gaming. There was a big out-of-state move, a major falling out and estrangement from a family member, and a substantial period of unemployment. Some of you have heard some of this.

But I've got some additional sad news that I feel compelled to share, which is that my girlfriend and I split up in early 2016. She played with me, with all of us, on the New Liberty map from 2014-2015, as Pigeonweed. We were together 11 years.

I can let it suffice to say that we just grew apart, as long as I add that this is a gross oversimplification. I only mention it to clarify that there was no infidelity, abuse, drugs, or anything like that involved. She is a good person and she is constantly on my mind. That's all I have to say, and I don't want to talk about it any further.

This has kept me away from the AF community because I spent a lot of time here with Pigeon. Every sign I put up has her name on it. I also didn't want to come back to a lot of "Say hi to Pigeon... How's she doing? ...What's new with you?" And have to talk about it again and again.

For anyone concerned, I'm doing better than I was. I'm employed. I have a roof over my head. I spend time with friends.

I work hard not to burden people outside my immediate circle with my troubles, so it's difficult to share even this much. If Pigeon hadn't been part of the AF community, I wouldn't bring it up. But now that I've gotten through this sad news, I do feel like it will be easier for me to pop on now and then. I don't know if I'm ever going to become an active player again. Whatever the case, I want to say that I remember the good times, and everyone I got to know, fondly.

Take care, everyone. I hope that, sooner or later, our paths cross again.

hey shanghai, sorry to hear about your tumultuous times. server is still up but it has been less active lately, haven't been spending alot of time on updates or advertising, some of the more active members have had their own health issues or life has pulled them away for school or jobs or other sorts of things.

I'm sorta waiting and watching, HOPING for the next big mining and crafting sandbox type game. I love minecraft and played and enjoyed it thoroughly but i haven't really been too thrilled or amazed by it in quite a while. it is still mildly satisfying but building in minecraft, and building up the server has just become less rewarding and interesting to me, i think the game has just become to old and stale for me. I feel like i know everything there is to know about it at this point, have done basically everything and especially when im making the server/worlds its hard to be very surprised by anything in it anymore.

ive been playing alot of games on PS4, like GTA and lately Ark, ark is a crafting/building/adventure open world game with dinosaurs.. its pretty alright. the user interface is absolutely worthless, inventory, and tamed dino interface.. pure garbage.. but the sense of adventure, the look of the game, its freshness for me, are really making it alot of fun for now

ark's completely unplayable for me on PC for some reason, it worked in the past but now wont.. its a pretty horribly managed game and i don't think it will ever substantially improve, its been in alpha for years.. but its still fun for me for now because its new i guess.

another hopeful blip is conan exiles, it looks like ark but better in almost every way except for no dinosaurs

i also want to play dual universe as soon as i can, it looks amazing, very promising, it is like anarchic frontiers with better graphics and full crafting from land to space. looks amazing! can't wait to play that, but its still in development and not sure of any eta on it yet.

if it ever delivers on what they want to do, and it is playable on moderately accessible hardware, id love to start an anarchic frontiers community on it

as for minecraft, lets see what sort of updates come out from mojang and if anything peaks my interest again, id love to see some client mods or something that add more graphical realism to the game, ive been playing with a new shaders pack that looks gorgeous and doesn't destroy the framerate. its called Chocapic13's Shaders, check it out if your into that

anyway nice to hear from you again, hope things are all on the way up for you now, have fun hope to see you in game sometime soon

Hey Shanghai, I sure have missed you, not for your incredible builds... ahhaha well ya, but because you are a good person, always helpful, and apparently the only one who can make a dam map for these world..  ahahah
 
I too have a health issue, my back is messed up and its hard for me to sit for any length of time on my computer.  Sorry to hear all you have been thru, but know you always have some friends here!

jonin has a MINECRAFT facebook set up and AIO_Fox is making something so we can all chat, and stay in touch.  this has been such an amazing server that we all still wanna be friends, stay in touch and play when we can.

you can message me any time, we should see what Elrim and Gareth are up too as well.

Miss you guys!!!

Thank you both for your kind words. Just wanted to let you guys know that I appreciate it.

Heya shanghai just wanted to say I wish ya the best in life you are a very kind person hope the jobs going well and we see ya around still one of our favorite people Hehe take care bro,  on another note I've also been playing Ark the PC version me and my brother rented a small server for us and a few irl friends  to play on there are a bunch of glitches that piss ya off but it's still fun and addictive but it has pretty high system requirements so I'm sure a lot of people out there can't run it

hey shanghai, glad you're employed and spending time with friends through these trying times, life has also gotten in the way of me playing as much as I use to.  I'm in the middle of my second semester at community college doing 15 credit hours, most are computer classes.  When I'm not doing homework I usually have free time on the weekends but noone else is ever online so I don't play anymore.  the only game I play these days is star wars battlefront 2 for pc which I've been playing for 10 years now and also has a small, tight-knit community, but is nothing like minecraft.  I'm always on steam and skype if anyone wants to chat, plus if the discord plugin becomes a thing I'll be there too.  the main reason I've played this game for nearly 5 years now is because of this server and its community.  even if minecraft or the server does eventually die out, i'm confident our friendships will live on, perhaps in a new game