Well, since The anniversary has come and gone with barely a comment, I will lay WKC to rest now.
I've never worked so hard to try to save/improve a game, or save it's community. Several people went above and beyond the call of duty trying to get D3/Sony/L5 to support this game outside Japan. Although those efforts were unsuccessful, they should not go unrecognized.
I can't remember the names of everyone who was involved from the old Neoseeker community, but I will remember now that Rhapsody was instrumental in getting the player petition for DLC created and signed. Also, a mysterious player called UBERHAXED (who now plays FFXIV - not on Behemoth though) who revealed the true extent of the missing game content and just how much was on the discs already, should be remembered as someone who risked themself by helping the community at a time when Sony was being very proactive in taking legal action against hackers on PS3. I'll also remember now the mysterious, and unnamed (no really, I don't know who it was) player who sent me the images of some of the missing content, as well as images from the official guide that mentioned items that only existed in the locked files.
Another player who helped out in one way or another was Alkor, thank you. Also, unbeknownst to many here, Hina helped me greatly when I was trying to put together the information packs and petition documents to send to D3, Sony and L5.
Ultimately, we gained more or less 1000 valid signatures to the petition for the WKC DLC. That petition was completely ignored by Sony, L5 and D3Publisher. Copies of the petition and supporting documentation (which included the evidence of the locked content) was sent to D3P in the US, L5 International in the US, SCEA, SCEE and the the head of Sony Worldwide Studios (games). People such as Kaz Hirai and Yoshida Shuhei at Sony were on the list of 10 senior executives who were sent the petition. I know that all 10 of the packages were correctly delivered and received by the intended recipients because I paid for delivery confirmation on each of them, but not one of them had the class or guts to acknowledge the receipt of the petition.
About 3 months after the petition was received, D3 announced the end of WKC outside Japan (BTW lifetime sales of WKC2 split almost exactly 50/50 between Japan and the rest of the world - Americas and Europe, with slightly more copies being sold outside Japan). In a way you could take that act as the answer to the petition, in other words a very loud 'NO'.
Personally I campaigned to save WKC on Facebook at the D3 and WkC pages, with our own page there, the petition, Neoseeker, in-game on the message boards. I spent days of my time cleaning the petition of malicious signatures and duplications. Hina and i put a lot of time into writing the accompanying letter and preparing the information packets for the people we were contacting. I spent money and time making sure that they were delivered to the right people and confirming their delivery. I also managed to get 3 gaming news outlets to cover the community effort to get the DLC.
The NekomimisFTW! guild that started so small and grew constantly until ultimately reaching rank 10 with the lead guilds, and then taking a top 10 guild place for more than 6 months in WKC, managed to hold together and transition to FFXIV. The community we built in WKC has successfully transitioned to FFXIV, and although some former Nekos are no longer a part of the NekomimisFTW! we have added old friends from WKC from other guilds as well as new friends from FFXIV itself.
Regardless of the failure of our efforts to convince the publisher/developers of WKC to bring the full game to players outside of Japan, regardless of the ridiculous and cowardly behavior of D3, L5 and Sony in closing WKC just over a year ago, our greatest victory is that we saved our community and continued to grow it in it's new home, Eorzea.
So many times in anime, the central theme behind a story or main character is one of always moving forward rather than stopping and stagnating. You cannot rewind time, you can only live in then present and look forward to the future. Keep moving forwards, making things better as you go, not trying to return to the past. The NekomimisFTW! will continue to look to the future and live in the present. We acknowledge our past, it is a fine history, worthy of remembering, and being proud of. But it is the past now, and other than occasionally cosplaying our favorites, or remembering the more fun moments from WKC, we have so many more memories to make with friends we already have or may meet in future.
Thank you to all the members of the NekomimisFTW!, members of all the WKC guilds who remained active right to the end, players who showed their commitment to that community by spending their time with us, even when we knew the game was dying. Thank you to everyone who was involved with trying to get the WKC DLC, and trying to prove that the western audience loved the game and deserved just as much care and attention as the Japanese audience got. Thank you to the community of players who started at Neoseeker and joined the NekomimisFTW! and who stayed with us through thick and thin to join everyone in Eorzea.
Thank you to Hina for putting up with me, despite my frustrations and anger over the whole D3/Sony/WKC debacle. Thank you too Hina, for standing by me, and our NekomimisFTW through the years, you've held me together and together we have kept the NekomimisFTW! true to itself throughout it's life.
Finally, thank you to everyone who has stayed with us. Ever since we created the NekomimisFTW! in WKC, one of the things I have always stated as an aim of the Nekos is to help everyone enjoy the game as much as we do. That is still my personal aim, I hope it is an aim that all of you can share and work together to achieve.
I'll never forget the last night in WKC, I'll never forget playing those last few quests, saying farewell to our avatars, saying goodbye to the guild town, georamas and the world of Leonard, Yulie, Kara, Caesar, Eldore, Will, John, Fvilya/Linelie, Paznos, Trogdor, Aljotron, Calliope, Maegwin Rhapsody/Fawn, Alkor, Kayla, Kagami, Ruby, Mellarose, Chee, Haggar, Kosmos, Perla, Hinagiku, Sky, Gwindar, Carpenter, Revjak, Sapphire, Torchic, Hope, Berformet, Nami, Rachel, Clara, Lucia, Tyrael, Karyn, Griff, Ladius, Ronny, Jade, Axie, Lukia, Milka, Misae, Algli, Nikkea, Mariano, Mataeus, Zeru, Cara, Mystria, Musashi, NoctLucisCaelum, Subaru, Midori, Nik, Trema, Onyx, Kyrie, Lillith, and so many others who I cannot even begin to name.
I'll never forget WKC, thanks for everything.
Escape reality, live the fantasy! - Louisoix Leveilleur