About BCU...

[CassandraSaturn]

i heard here was Bridge Commander Universe forum, so i did my research, it was said that forum was shut down due to hacker, and that this hacker put porn links on it. before i did all that research, i actually thought i could create a bridge commander universe forum. that's when i did my search, the name popped up. so i researched. saw the forum.

i'm like, "derp. so this is the original forum, can't believe it was shut down. this is beautiful forum" to my hindsight, i didn't realize it at that time. i had my own Bridge Commander facebook page, and Bridge Commander forum. Bridge Commander Universe was gonna be the second forum version of Bridge Commander forum because it has "universe" in it.
to my dismay, i didn't even known this at all before i made it my "next forum to make" list

[Darkthunder]

The history of the BC community dates back further...

In the early days of 2002, there was BCN (Bridge Commander Network).

Then came BCU (Bridge Commander Universe).

Following the hacking which corrupted the entire forum, there was... BCC (Bridge Commander Central)

And after years of sites like BCFiles and Filefront being shut down, BCC still stands

[CassandraSaturn]

damn. i remember those sites.. that's so cool. well, here is Bridge Commander Universe (new forum) i just had it reformatted it was (Bridge Commander) ah well. to new life of the BCU forum.

[Mario]

If I can recall correctly BCC was around when BCU was still active. Its initial purpose was to serve something as a hub (such as BCS).

[CassandraSaturn]

well, my BCU (new BCU) would serve as an interlocking discussion environment for players between here and BCU. i mean, it would be the forum that might help add influx of community and new people coming here between both. kinda like secondary forum to this forum essentially. i'm not sure what to emulate for that basis. maybe.. emulate more than original BCU was. i'm not sure what i'm shooting for. it's fan forum for those who are trek fans.

[Morgan]

well, my BCU (new BCU) would serve as an interlocking discussion environment for players between here and BCU

It sounds good in theory; however, the community is already only a fraction of the size it was as recently as a few years ago.  Between BC's age, the engine limitations and instability, and other games, BC has just kind of aged out with all but the most loyal of players.

Those of us who have modded and played with BC from the beginning all check in here at minimum at least every couple of days, and when activity is up there's an urge to check more often.  I definitely don't wanna discourage you from creating a new forum if you want, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little afraid of it fracturing the community a little more.  When we had hundreds of users coming in every day, yeah, a second forum would have been great, but with only 20-30 on a good day, I'd think redirecting newcomers here would be better since it'd grow the community and they could ask veterans questions that we could respond to reasonably quickly.

Just my thoughts.  I remember the old BCU forums - spent many of my teenage days playing around on that forum.  I don't remember BCN - I bought the game shortly before the release of Star Trek Nemesis and didn't check out BCU until later so I may have missed that change.  Those were the days of waiting for ATP Dimensions (sadly never finished); NanoFX 2 and MVAM were still brand new, and there was no DS9FX or Bridge Plugin yet.  Most ship models were by P81 which for the time were solid quality that almost anyone could run.

[Mario]

I'm inclined to agree with Morgan. You are with your own right to open a forum should you choose to do so however.

[JimmyB76]

If I can recall correctly BCC was around when BCU was still active. Its initial purpose was to serve something as a hub (such as BCS).

that is correct...  BCC went online in BCU's last year of being online...

back at BCU, alot of the modders and site staff grew more and more bothered that the many site malfunctions and problems were not being addressed and the site owner seemed to fall very much out of touch just after a hurricane in 2004...  as well the Admin staff were all gone...  the site was only under the supervision from the Forum Moderators and we all grew very annoyed with keeping things going day to day but not having any Admin privileges to fix any problems with the site as they grew more and more bigger of a problem, as well as not having access to Ban functions to keep people that break rules away from the site... we were essentially powerless...

as a result, many of BC's elite-most modders and BCU upper staff migrated here to BCC (which was created by Mark (Ignis at the time), one of BC's elitemost bridge modders and script creators)...  and no one really bothered to go back to BCU which eventually just died...

we've all been here since...

there are a number of us from back to BCN days end especially early BCU days and active here at BCC...
i joined BCU in spring of 2003 and BCC patrons such as Darkthunder, Nebula, Trim and a few others were all already big parts of the community...  i think we all had over 15,000ish posts when BCU died, i know Trim and Neb had just over 20,000 (yay BCU Spam Forum! )

and still, 15 years later, here we all are

It sounds good in theory; however, the community is already only a fraction of the size it was as recently as a few years ago.

if another BC forum were to be created, i would strongly advise that it not have the name of Bridge Commander Universe or BCU...  BCU is a legend in the community and despite the last 2 years of it falling apart, it is something of importance to us all, sentimental...  in it's prime (like 2002-2005), it was an amazing forum, so very active (if you hadnt been there in like 24hrs, there were a few pages of threads of unseen posts)... it was tough to keep up with all of it...  the main daily community posting was a few hundred people and like 20 staff members to run it all...

those were fun times indeed!
i would just urge that the name of BCU be kept for only that place....

[JimmyB76]

Those were the days of waiting for ATP Dimensions (sadly never finished)

i still have a copy, i should release it with all its bugs and maybe that would get some interest in remaining modders to check it all out...

NanoFX 2 and MVAM were still brand new

i dont know if you were there the exact night of NanoFX2 being released (same day as MVAM by Sneaker98, MLeo and Sim Rex, and a few bridges by Viper and LC) - there were like 300 people on BCU forums at the same time, all of us posting in threads, waiting minute by minute for Nano to upload it to BCFiles...
Nano was posting along with us all that day and kept us anxiously waiting as he fixed up the last few major bugs...
good times

[Nebula]

that is correct...  BCC went online in BCU's last year of being online...

back at BCU, alot of the modders and site staff grew more and more bothered that the many site malfunctions and problems were not being addressed and the site owner seemed to fall very much out of touch just after a hurricane in 2004...  as well the Admin staff were all gone...  the site was only under the supervision from the Forum Moderators and we all grew very annoyed with keeping things going day to day but not having any Admin privileges to fix any problems with the site as they grew more and more bigger of a problem, as well as not having access to Ban functions to keep people that break rules away from the site... we were essentially powerless...

as a result, many of BC's elite-most modders and BCU upper staff migrated here to BCC (which was created by Mark (Ignis at the time), one of BC's elitemost bridge modders and script creators)...  and no one really bothered to go back to BCU which eventually just died...

we've all been here since...

there are a number of us from back to BCN days end especially early BCU days and active here at BCC...
i joined BCU in spring of 2003 and BCC patrons such as Darkthunder, Nebula, Trim and a few others were all already big parts of the community...  i think we all had over 15,000ish posts when BCU died, i know Trim and Neb had just over 20,000 (yay BCU Spam Forum! )

and still, 15 years later, here we all are


if another BC forum were to be created, i would strongly advise that it not have the name of Bridge Commander Universe or BCU...  BCu is a legend in the community and despite the last 2 years of it falling apart, it is something of importance to us all, sentimental...  in it's prime (like 2002-2005), it was an amazing forum, so very active (if you hadnt been there in like 24hrs, there were a few pages of threads of unseen posts) it was tough to keep up with all of it...  the main community was a few hundred people and like 20 staff members to run it all...

those were fun times indeed!
i would just urge that the name of BCU be kept for only that place....

I don't even have to add anything here Jimmy basically hit it right on the dot.
If you would like to create a new BC Forum It'd be best not to name it something like BCU.

i dont know if you were there the exact night of NanoFX2 being released (same day as MVAM by Sneaker98, MLeo and Sim Rex, and a few bridges by Viper and LC) - there were like 300 people on BCU forums at the same time, all of us posting in threads, waiting minute by minute for Nano to upload it to BCFiles...
Nano was posting along with us all that day and kept us anxiously waiting as he fixed up the last few major bugs...
good times

Hahah I remember that day! That was awesome. Coincidentally that was the same week I got Cable Internet. 3mbps baby so much better than 56k!

[JimmyB76]

Hahah I remember that day! That was awesome. Coincidentally that was the same week I got Cable Internet. 3mbps baby so much better than 56k!

remember that? lol
you (and me) were posting as well as a few hundred others that whole evening...
i remember Nano asking what the download times that people on 56k connections were getting and it was like an hour long to download lol
yay fun

[Darkthunder]

Ahh, 56k, the good times...

Back when you were downloading the latest patch or mod (which was then "big" at sizes like 40-50MB), halfways through (on a multi-hour download), then someone picks up a phone and breaks the Internet. BAM!!! Start over...

[Lurok91]

I was never on BCU, but I distinctly remember very fondly all the encouragement and support I received at BCC back in 2008 when I joined as a noob who was 'vaguely' interested in 3D modelling and bridges. 

[Morgan]

i dont know if you were there the exact night of NanoFX2 being released (same day as MVAM by Sneaker98, MLeo and Sim Rex, and a few bridges by Viper and LC) - there were like 300 people on BCU forums at the same time, all of us posting in threads, waiting minute by minute for Nano to upload it to BCFiles...
Nano was posting along with us all that day and kept us anxiously waiting as he fixed up the last few major bugs...
good times

Ohhh yeah I was.  I was 15 and on an old 56k Internet connection at the time too.  I had windows open at both BCU and BCFiles waiting for those babies to drop.  Luckily it was late at night so my mom was already asleep and not yelling at me to let her get online for a bit lol.

I was never on BCU, but I distinctly remember very fondly all the encouragement and support I received at BCC back in 2008 when I joined as a noob who was 'vaguely' interested in 3D modelling and bridges.

It was a privilege beta testing all those bridges you put out, man!  DS9FX and those bridges were probably the biggest things that kept my enthusiasm for BC up.

Ahh, 56k, the good times...

Back when you were downloading the latest patch or mod (which was then "big" at sizes like 40-50MB), halfways through (on a multi-hour download), then someone picks up a phone and breaks the Internet. BAM!!! Start over...

Holy shit I hated that.  The Internet I had back in the day liked to disconnect for no other reason than "LOL screw you buddy!"  I just started backing up all the important mods to CDs so I wouldn't have to download them again.

[Morgan]

i still have a copy, i should release it with all its bugs and maybe that would get some interest in remaining modders to check it all out...

Holy hell man!  Do that and I'll have the girlfriend bake some cookies and mail them to you 

[King Class Scout]

I'm the latecomer around here.  I pulled in in 09 thanks to my best freind, and am probably the last true n00b these guys ever saw.  even now, I'm still playing with starships (i'm literally reskinning one of my own old mods, and still have stuff in the pipline, if I can get my files back)  I'm also the only survivor of the SFRD mod team that never really left the team

yes, I remember dialup days as well...we were stuck with it untill after 2005 because of a lack of infrastructure and support for rural computer users.  our dialup was so bad it was down to a max of 14.4 on a GOOD day!  a single 4 meg MP3 used to take 4 HOURS!

what was that about a buggy mod?

[CassandraSaturn]

well gee whiz. that's awesome stories you guys got here. i only remember my first trek game, Star Trek New Worlds. i never played it but kept the box.. it's still in mint condition.

as for BCU, i suppose i could find a different name than BCU.. as to keep the old BCU as legendary forum.

[Morgan]

as for BCU, i suppose i could find a different name than BCU.. as to keep the old BCU as legendary forum.

Despite what I said earlier, it certainly can't hurt to have a backup for BCC just incase.  I would only suggest also including a link here as well, and keeping us in the loop as far as when it's active and ready to go so that way we'll know to check it out and chime in to any questions that come up there.

i only remember my first trek game, Star Trek New Worlds

I don't know that one.  I played BC (obviously lol), both Armada's and Elite Force's, and STO.  Oh and I have Timelines on my phone but don't bother with it much.

[CassandraSaturn]

Despite what I said earlier, it certainly can't hurt to have a backup for BCC just incase.  I would only suggest also including a link here as well, and keeping us in the loop as far as when it's active and ready to go so that way we'll know to check it out and chime in to any questions that come up there.
I don't know that one.  I played BC (obviously lol), both Armada's and Elite Force's, and STO.  Oh and I have Timelines on my phone but don't bother with it much.

i have Elite force on PS2 lol

the link to the forum is listed under my picture, "world" icon still in maintenance, was extended to six hours today. i kinda fell asleep working on it all night.

[Nebula]

ah I remember New Worlds I picked up that game after I got Armada 1. The game was broken in single player it was very hard to complete the missions and as far as I could tell there were no saves. The story was interesting I'll give it that. It was Star Treks first and only ground based RTS game.