Hey Ninja,

Last month was a good month for Nin Online in a lot of ways, so I just want to express my thanks for the support and know that'll we're trying our best to make Nin Online a more complete game day by day.

It's a little bit of a stretch, but based on a number of factors, including financials, March 2019 was the best month for Nin Online since the launch of Open Beta in April 2017. It's the best month for new registrations in a year. It was the best month in terms of the size of the active player base hands down with days peaking at 100+ players (120+ even) and our slowest hours still having a strong 30-50 players online. In comparison, just a few months ago before solving the server issues plaguing the game, our player base was peaking at around 30-50 players.

I can't understate how important having a stable game service is and was for Nin Online, and I just want to let everyone know that the future looks bright for the game, and the things that people are excited for have never been closer.

Greetings from the Hidden Mist Village

I also can't understate how more fresh faces, fresh ninja, add so much to the experience because each ninja in the Nin Online world is a living, breathing person with their own original character, and behavior. So if you've recently joined us, welcome to Nin Online!

As many of you know, I've been sick for awhile (mostly better now). I've still been working, but I've not been handling as much support as I've used to. So it's surprised me that people are supporting the game so much. If anything, it's been reassuring.

Thank you,
Ueda

Dear Ninja,

It is after deep consideration for the well-being of the game, that I've decided that, we will be changing our policy of name changes.

Starting today, Non-Gold/Silver ninja will no longer be eligible for name changes.
And as of February 2019 Gold and Silver ninja will be eligible to 1 name change per year. This might eventually phase out completely depending on how much trouble this feature continues to cost us.

I have observed that the ability to change names has been both a scourge to RP and Moderation.

One reason for this removal is due to the lack of weight it creates on having a name.
It has also become increasingly hard to track player reports due to name changes, and we simply do not have the resource to do that.
Another reason we've decided to remove this functionality is due to players buying/selling accounts and rebranding it for others to use them.

The reason why name changes were never regulated properly in the past was that the privileges were decided on when the game was still in closed alpha, where there was no game to play and where it was just a forum community. It has been one of the harder decisions to make because I know there will be backlash.

These changes are here to stay and hopefully, players will be forced to choose their names more wisely.

Important
For players who frequently change names for "clans", we advice for you to remove your current clan names as eventually, when the actual clan system does arrive, it will add your real clan name in front of your username in-game. Eg. If your username is Kuro and your in-game clan name is Kishin, your display name will appear as Kishin Kuro automatically, while your username will be just Kuro.

Regards,
Rory

Dear Ninja,

As of today, the village score system is working. During this trial period, scores may reset without much else going on. Eventually the village scores will allow Kage and council members to purchase provisions or benefits for their villages. It also serves as a reflection of how well each village is doing in the ninja world.

What is village score

There are 3 scores each village has - Intel, Economy and Manpower. Each affected by different kinds of missions.

Intel is a reflection of how much information your village has on it's enemy villages.
Economy is an indicator of how well the villagers and ninja are living in your village.
Manpower is how much your ninja are participating in helpful activities for the village.

Checking your village score
To check on your village score, talk to the Notice Board in your village. From there, select "Scores" to see the scores of your village and enemy villages.

Note that non-ninja villages do not have scores. However, Missing ninja missions they do against other villages can also affect the scores of Ninja villages.

Mission Score Rewards
The missions will display what scores it affects in the mission rewards. For example, surveying the Sand Village Entrance as a Leaf ninja impacts the Leaf Intel score positively as shown below.



GM Events
RP & PvP Tournaments can now start rewarding villages with scores depending on how well they perform.

Experimental Phase
The frequency that scores will reset has yet to be decided and we are running these systems as an experiment to see if scores could potentially impact RP systems. For example, allowing players to impeach a government if Economy score is dwindling low.

Expect to see use case scenarios for each score as time goes by. Including ninja tool supplies, buying uniform for promoted ninja and the such with economy score. Advantages in village vs. village events with Intel score and and increased security for villages with Manpower score.

We're also going to balance the amount of score each mission gives/takes over the course of the next few months.

Thanks for participating!

Regards,
Rory

Dear Ninja,

Manda's Lair only allows one team of up to 4 ninja to enter at once. All ninja must be level 30-40.
Find a team with a good strategy and challenge Manda in the deepest corner of the Abandoned Lair, past all the mazes.



Once you enter, you'll be greeted by Manda, who spits poison into the air and sends his spawn out at you in all directions.



Manda has a 10% chance of dropping a new, rare sword or cosmetic. Fight amongst yourselves who keeps it!

This has been something that I've been working on, on and off, for a very long time. It's the culmination of a bunch of very big features combined into one that has allowed for me to create this. I'll be talking about the features that have been added to the engine over the past year that has allowed for us to finally do our first team boss fight in a development log soon! But for now, enjoy!

Regards,
Rory

Dear Ninja,

In the spirit of June being Nin Online's 5th Anniversary month, we're releasing a time-exclusive cosmetic item! It is no other than the White Hermit Cape! You can preview them in-game.



The White Hermit Cape will be on sale from 1st June - 30th June. As with any future time-exclusive cosmetics, after it's sale period, it will not be available for purchase anymore, but will be tradeable in-game so that it may be passed on.

We hope that you continue playing Nin Online, and look forward to more updates soon!

Regards,
Rory