Game History

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Just like any other long-running online game, HoboWars has an extensive game history.

Unless otherwise noted, all dates are according to HoboTime (GMT +10).

HoboWars

The one that started it all.

2005

Events

• August 2005
  • 8/10/05: Albert Nyugen (a.k.a. meek) created the first piece of in-game artwork for HoboWars, which was the old header image for the Battle! page. It was added to the game on the same day it was created.

2006

Updates

• March 2006
  • Major
    • 3/??/06: The option to create a new gang for 500 points at Gangs Alley was removed.
  • Minor
    • None

Events

• December 2006
  • 12/4/06: The HoboWars servers crashed and went down for three days, preventing anyone from accessing the game. When the servers were fixed and brought back online on December 7, 2006, everyone started from a restore point made 24 hours prior to the crash. Anything acquired during the 24 hour period after the backup was made (such as money, tokens, points, stats, SGHM purchases) vanished, and the Message Boards were wiped clean and the contents of the Help Wiki were erased. Additionally, any new players who signed up during that 24 hour period lost their accounts and had to create new ones in order to play. This event became known as Black Wednesday.
• ????? 2006
  • The 2006 Bummys ended.

2007

Updates

• September 2007
  • Major
    • 9/07/07: Stat graphs were added.
  • Minor
    • None

Events

• January 2007
  • 1/??/07: Ed and Oli hit the game with a phishing scam that compromised many HoboWars accounts, especially those of newer players. They spread around a rumor that there was there was a new HoboWars server, and provided links to a website that mirrored the HoboWars login page. Whenever someone attempted to login through that fake page, they would get a notice that the new server wasn't up yet, and their username and password got stored in a database that Ed and Oli used to gain access into other players' accounts.
• February 2007
  • 2/24/07: Ed and Oli used malicious Javascript seeded into HoboMail messages to snatch the address bar off of any player who viewed their jumbled mail messages, and used that information to compromise various players' accounts. Although the message boards were protected from Javascript attacks, the HoboMail message system was not, and, therefore, even the accounts of older players and staff members became compromised. Fortunately, the HoboMail message system is now protected against such Javascript attacks.
• August 2007
  • 8/06/07: Staff crackdown on abusers of the Mass Money Creation glitch (a.k.a. the "mmkk" glitch) began. Around 25+ players were jailed for exploiting Piggy Bank withdrawal abbreviations such as "k" for thousand, "m" for million. Whenever a player withdrew, for example, $10kkmm from their Piggy Bank, they would withdraw $2.1 billion, even if they did not have the money. To make matters worse, the created money was randomly sent around to players, making it a nightmare for game staff to track.
• December 2007
  • The 2007 Bummys ended.

2008

Updates

• June 2008
  • Major
    • 6/30/08: The Hospital page became protected by the anti-refresh feature, which prevented players from F5 healing.
  • Minor
    • None
• August 2008
  • Major
    • 8/??/08: Northern Fence was added to Suicide Hill.
  • Minor
    • None

Events

• April 2008
  • 4/01/08: Minister Ruiner stepped down from his role as Minister and quit HoboWars. What was initially thought of as an April Fools' joke turned out to be the exact opposite.
• June 2008
  • 6/??/08: Daniel Durante (a.k.a. Daniel D) became a Governor and programmer for HoboWars.
• ???? 2008
  • The 2008 Bummys ended.

2009

Updates

• June 2009
  • Major
    • 6/18/09: The City Planning message board was added.
    • 6/26/09: The Intro Adventures were released.
  • Minor
    • 6/23/09: The "Drinking" stat graph was added, and an issue with the "Intelligence" stat graph was fixed.
    • 6/23/09: The round length limit of War Chamber battles was increased from 5,000 to 10,000.
    • 6/24/09: The bug that allowed you to have the same exact name as another player was fixed.
    • 6/30/09: The ability to add Candy Cigarettes to an Empty Cigarette Pack one at a time was added, and the Awake gain from consuming a Pack of Candy Cigarettes was reduced to 50T.
• July 2009
  • Major
    • 7/07/09: A new battle script utilized by all in-game battles was introduced, and a few changes were made to the Uranium Enriched status effect.
  • Minor
    • 7/07/09: Drinking stat was added to gangs' member lists.
• August 2009
  • Major
    • 8/04/09: The Skill Shop and its related side-adventure were released.
    • 8/20/09: A few changes to various skills were made, and the price of all skills was greatly increased.
    • 8/26/09: A few changes to skill mechanics (such as firing rate and Can Cannon interaction) were made, and the overall power of skills was reduced.
  • Minor
    • None
• September 2009
  • Major
    • 9/08/09: The experience wall beggars previously hit at level 615 was reduced significantly.
  • Minor
    • 9/15/09: The experience gain from begging at City Hall was changed to no longer be half the normal gain (100%).
    • 9/29/09: The ability to toggle signature visibility on the Message Boards on and off was added.
    • 9/30/09: The "T Used per Day" stat graph was added.
• October 2009
  • Major
    • 10/21/09: Two new Loompa Land wishes (#23 and #24) were released.
  • Minor
    • 10/02/09: The round length limit of War Chamber battles was reduced from 10,000 to 6,000, the damage done in WC battles was redesigned to ramp up a bit more quickly, and the WC lineup screen was set up to be drag-and-droppable.
    • 10/04/09: The "Most Awake Used in a Day" leaderboard was added to the Top Hobos page.
    • 10/06/09: The War Chamber battle script was updated to account for only the Attack and Defense boosts of Levelable Gear.
    • 10/08/09: Battle logs were updated to be viewable for at least 24 hours after they've been created.
    • 10/13/09: The player attack ranges were changed to ±200 your current level.
    • 10/13/09: The restriction on attacking players in the same gang as you was removed, and a 20% experience tax on and the inability to gain gang points from such fights was added.
    • 10/21/09: Begging reports were updated to display both the base amount and multiplied amount after the money gain section whenever any kind of money multiplier is applied.
    • 10/21/09: A whole lot of new Sidebar links were added to the list of Sidebar links under the Layout Selection option.
    • 10/23/09: The "Highest Beg" record in players' Living Areas was updated to be accurate, although previous records had to be reset in the process; additionally, a new "Highest Base Beg" record was added, which does not include multipliers or other bonuses, whereas the "Highest Beg" record does. It was also made so that whenever a previous record has been beaten, a notification appears in the begging report.
• November 2009
  • Major
    • None
  • Minor
    • 11/03/09: A new War Chamber Battle Field page was created, which combined the features of the old Battle Ladder and Battle Field pages.
    • 11/14/09: A new HB-TML tag that embeds YouTube videos in message board posts and a few other places was added, along with the option to toggle Youtube video visibility under MB Settings.

2010

Updates

• June 2010
  • Major
    • 6/15/10: The new-and-improved Bernard's Mansion was released.
  • Minor
    • None