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Jackster21
14-01-2013, 08:20 PM
The History Of Sounds Like A Plan Gaming



The Beginning
Back in late 2008, myself and a few friends were highly into popular online racing game, TrackMania, So much so that I purchased a server for it, and formed Madness Gaming. This server soon became very popular, and I then invested in 2 more servers, hosting a total of 3 TrackMania servers. During mid 2009, we wanted to re-brand the community as we wasn't too keen on the name, an old member of the TrackMania community suggested "SLAP - Sounds Like A Plan" and from that point on, we were known as SLAP - Sound Like A Plan Gaming. When Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was released, a lot of the community purchased the game and we decided to launch a Slap Gaming Clan. We focused a lot of time and effort on this clan, and the TrackMania side of things was abandoned due to costs and lack of active users.


SLAP Gaming Mincraft
Since the launch of Minecraft, a friend of mine kept nagging me and nagging me to get it, saying it was an amazing game and I would love it. However, my opinion of it was "It's lego for a computer - it will be rubbish!" and refused to buy it! Then in December 2010, just before Christmas, I finally gave in and agreed to buy it. Within a week of playing, I was hooked on it. Me and my friend, Hungryhomer aka Duee wanted our other friends to be able to join us for games, and on January 20th 2011 we purchased a 6 slot Minecraft Server from Multiplay UK, SLAP Gaming Minecraft was born.

Within weeks of purchasing our server and inviting our friends, they were inviting their friends, and the community was growing. We upgraded the server to more and more slots, within a few months were paying for 30 slots, however this was very costly. In mid-2011 we looked into other alternatives, and Duee decided it was more cost efficient to just rent a server and manage the server ourselves, installing all the software, plugins, etc.
This enabled us to have full control over our server, managing plugins, Minecraft versions, max slot limits, and much more.
Throughout 2011 SLAP Gaming Minecraft continued to grow and grow, beginning to average between 15-20 people throughout the day.
The community just kept growing and growing, and the costs for SLAP were getting higher and higher, and was all being funded purely from mine and Duee's pockets.
In mid-2011 we introduced VIP onto the server as a solution to try and cover some of the costs, and the response we received from this overwhelmed us. We expected to make around £20-£25 a month, but instead we were getting up to x10 as much! This allowed us to invest in better hardware and provide a better experience for all of the community.

In early 2012, we had got to the stage that we were very efficient at updating our server and plugins everytime their was a Minecraft update. We realised that we could run the Bukkit Development Versions on our server, and if we kept them up to date and used the correct versions of plugins, we could have our server updated within hours of a Minecraft update, compared to most servers which took days to update.
January 2012 bought Minecraft 1.1 with it, and their was a lot of issues with Bukkit versions and Minecraft Servers, but not for SLAP. We managed to make ours work within 40 minutes of a Bukkit Dev release. Realising the opportunity we had, we posted our server on all the big community forums; Yogscast, Minecraft Forums, Planet Minecraft, Bukkit Community. The SLAP server has an insane increase in community members. For the next few days, we averaged around 50+ people online for most of the day. The staff we had at the time putting in insane hours to try and manage it all and help the community, and it paid off. From that point we kept our Forum posts as active as possible and made sure we were one of the first servers to update on every future release of Minecraft.
January - February 2012 saw SLAP receive a 300% increase on Membership applications, and a 150% Increase on Donations. It was the most successful period SLAP has had to date.

Since then, SLAP Gaming has continued to grow and grow and has aimed to serve its community as best as possible.
We listen to community feedback, and improve our services as best we can, to ensure that you, the people who make this all possible, get the best gaming experience possible.

But all of this is only possible by the dedication of our amazing group of Voluntary Staff.


The People Who Make This Possible
Over the years, we have had many volunteers come and go, but some people have dedicated years of their lives to this community and got it to where it is now, and I am eternally grateful to these people. Without them, none of this would be possible. We now have around 20 people from all over the world, dedicating their spare time to this community, and I would like to hope they are going to be with us for the future of SLAP Gaming, because without them, we wouldn't be be where we are today.

One think that most people seem to overlook is that all of the Staff members within SLAP do not get paid for what they do, they do it because they chose to. They chose to be a part of SLAP Gaming, and help us succeed in our ultimate goal, which is to provide the best Gaming Community we possibly can. Their levels of dedication astound me. They will put in ridiculous hours, give up personal commitments, go out of their way to help others, So that the community can have an enjoyable time. This is something I think everyone needs to realise, appreciate, and be thankful for.


The Future Of SLAP Gaming
2013 brings a new Year for SLAP Gaming. We have a large, stable international community, and we want to take advantage of that. Big changes to the community are coming. We are going to head back to our roots, and also explore new territories, and we want you all to be a part of it. So stick around, and see what SLAP Gaming brings in 2013.




I Would like to personally thank each and every one of you for making this possible.
SLAP was something I created over 4 years ago, and has been a huge part of my life ever since. It has dominated my life, and has had drastic effects on it, causing a lot of highs, but also some lows. But I don't regret any of it.
Everytime I log on to our servers, and see people playing together, and being happy, enjoying themselves, it reminds me that it was all worth while, and what I have created is changing the life of hundreds, thousands of people accross to world, and that is something I am very proud to have achieved.


Once again, I thank you all, and I hope you will be a part of SLAP for many years to come, because SLAP is here to stay!



- Jackster21

dany25
19-01-2013, 10:42 PM
WE LOVE YOU TOO JACK

TheKrafter1923
19-01-2013, 10:43 PM
I really enjoyed reading this Jack it is a very lovely post. :) and I know i'll be here for a long time!

Jackster21
19-01-2013, 10:45 PM
WE LOVE YOU TOO JACK

http://static.tumblr.com/mk5qfb1/Rydm70m68/oh-stop-it-you-meme.jpg

Charlotina
19-01-2013, 10:45 PM
~True words~

SparkleUnidog
19-01-2013, 11:01 PM
YOU'D BE NOTHING WITHOUT US! D:<

Jack, that was such a lovely post to read - interesting too! Good thing I'm not going anywhere anytime soon. I love this thing we have going here to much. >:D

lordgandalf
20-01-2013, 12:58 AM
Love to read that the community all started with a game im all familiar with.
Hope the community and the clan will grow bigger,better and stronger then ever.
May it be a great year for S!ap Gaming.
Oh and indeed Thanx for all the mods and admins and other people helping to get this server running like a BOSS

Laegluin
20-01-2013, 08:32 AM
I thought a few screenshots would be neat, this is all I have got left of the really old server.

Thanks for this awesome server <3


http://www.fileden.com/files/2010/8/24/2950675/2011-03-07_16.29.41.png



http://www.fileden.com/files/2010/8/24/2950675/2011-07-05_18.49.17.png

http://www.fileden.com/files/2010/8/24/2950675/2011-07-15_13.15.46.png

DesignTrice
20-01-2013, 11:37 AM
Really interesting post, Jack! I wanted to know the history so bad! :P
I hope SLAP Gaming will stay strong in the future and I hope I could be part of that future!

Telluur
20-01-2013, 11:59 AM
I thought a few screenshots would be neat, this is all I have got left of the really old server.

Thanks for this awesome server <3




Oh dear,

That's from when I started playing :D

Ryuuga
20-01-2013, 12:05 PM
Love the post jack. it's nice to see some of the old server for once Laegluin (http://forums.slapgaming.com/member.php?8824-Laegluin) thank you for the screenshots :D

flrnprdmn
20-01-2013, 12:40 PM
I thought a few screenshots would be neat, this is all I have got left of the really old server.

Thanks for this awesome server <3

Oh Laegluin :D
Good old Beta times!

I still got the old map on my computer... :P

Jackster21
20-01-2013, 03:32 PM
I thought a few screenshots would be neat, this is all I have got left of the really old server.

Thanks for this awesome server <3


http://www.fileden.com/files/2010/8/24/2950675/2011-03-07_16.29.41.png




Oh wow the old spawn!

The good old days!

I Remember hand building this with Duee!
Me mining all the stone, and him building it :D

Good Times, Good Times!

Laegluin
20-01-2013, 05:57 PM
Oh wow the old spawn!

The good old days!

I Remember hand building this with Duee!
Me mining all the stone, and him building it :D

Good Times, Good Times!

I actually remember one you two asking me to help, I was too lazy though :D


Edit:
Oh Laegluin :D
Good old Beta times!

I still got the old map on my computer... :P

Could you upload it somewhere? I'd really love to see it again. Maybe we could even add the map on the server for two weeks, so everybody could take a look at it. :)

hbmann
20-01-2013, 06:29 PM
I thought a few screenshots would be neat, this is all I have got left of the really old server.

Thanks for this awesome server <3

Oh good ol' times :D

lordgandalf
20-01-2013, 08:14 PM
Would love to have a tp pad to a watch only old spawn map just to see how it started

ridgefox1234
26-01-2013, 01:44 PM
<3 ez

flrnprdmn
26-01-2013, 02:40 PM
Could you upload it somewhere? I'd really love to see it again. Maybe we could even add the map on the server for two weeks, so everybody could take a look at it. :)
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B1-np334xxSWdEdCWVBrcW0yelU/edit

There it is, downloadable for you!

EDIT: that is a [name].tar.gz.zip file, you will have to unzip this file three times. Recommended program for that: 7Zip

Laegluin
26-01-2013, 06:09 PM
Thanks <3

SparkleUnidog
26-01-2013, 10:59 PM
This makes me wish I had Minecraft from the start <3

lordgandalf
27-01-2013, 12:52 AM
I wandered around in the old map i like it xD

DerpTwigs
05-02-2013, 02:09 AM
Jack, you forgot something important.

The AVO incident. :D