The History Of RajuAbju
Episodes On:
Brain
Toys Bulletin Board Services (BT BBS),
America
Online (AOL),
Internet Relay Chat (IRC),
Arise, and abroad.
RajuAbju, the legendary, and perhaps infamous user name, known to so many throughout both cyberspace and the physical worlds. I received my first computer, an 8086, back in the mid 80’s, when I was a young child. It was an advanced computer for its day, with its 640KB of RAM and a whopping 30MB hard disk drive. 16 groovy colors to go along with its dual 5¼ floppy drives. I had DOS 2.x on it as I recall, along with a bunch of various games and Word Perfect 5. This is when I first learned the now archaic DOS, and all its commands and shortcuts, how to edit the mighty autoexec.bat and config.sys files, as well as many other functions. I played for endless hours at a time with my computer, perhaps because I was so astounded with such a complex machine and how it functioned. I opened up the case on more then 1 occasion to see what nifty parts were inside, and I screwed up the computer several times as well. Years passed, the 286 came and went, as did the 386 and various Apple computers that I wont even begin to get into. And then arrived the mighty 486, in 1990 I believe. I bought a 486 DX 33Mhz computer with an enormous 170MB hard drive, a 1x CD-ROM, a brand new 3½ along with a 5¼-inch disk drive, a speedy 2400-baud modem, and an original Sound Blaster sound card and various other components. It came with the super advanced DOS 6.22 and Windows 3.1! This was considered a dream machine for its time. In 1993 I upgraded it to a speedy DX2 66Mhz and 8MB RAM instead of the original 4MB, got a spacious 420MB HD to go along with my 170MB, and a lightning fast 14.4k modem. Now I thought, I’m set for life, never needing to buy a new computer. Unfortunately for many other computer users, and myself, Intel and Microsoft had different plans. And so today, I have what is considered a near top of the line (for the next 3 weeks) 400Mhz Dell computer, with an 11GB hard drive, a 2X DVD drive, dual video cards, 128MB of RAM, a Zip Drive and of course, a 56k modem, amongst other components. Lastly, before we begin, please take note that all my friends shall be referred to by their online names in an attempt to reduce possible confusion, as well as for security and a few personal reasons. And so begins the history of the name, the legacy with which so many are familiar with: RajuAbju.
Originating on America Online, as RaguAbgu, back in late 1991, the name was created one fine night with my good friends, Dr. Doom and Iroonie, in my residence. As I recall, we were having angel hair pasta, perhaps with the sauce Ragu, though I cannot be certain of this, and hence, the name was chosen as thus because we were only 10 years old and could not think of anything else in such short a notice. I was the first of the three to sign up and actually pay for AOL, and had this screen name for 2 years, until 1993. Back in the days, AOL 2.5 and 14.4k modems reigned supreme, and eLiTe HaX0rS were those who had programs such as AoHell, or LuciferX or HaVoK among the many available. Da Chronic was a sort of savior or perhaps a mentor for all the unruly 12 and 13 year olds who wished to graduate to the level a true hacker and scroll their middle finger macros in an attempt to destroy AOL. I admit freely, I was among these elite for a short while; before I grew out of the stage, as we all eventually do (I hope). Warez groups such as UPSS, and W.A.Y. (may it rest in peace) were the rulers of their domain, being the most powerful distributing groups of all. I created my own group, the short-lived CaMeLz, which had limited success. I was the president, and Iroonie, and another friend, CandyMan, were my council members. We lasted for about 5 months, longer then about 90% of other groups, but came to our abrupt end when there was a security breach in our ranks which was too deep to put down. In November of 1993, my account was terminated due to TOS violations, which I had received for harassing other members, and being involved in the underground Warez trade of the time. The legacy however, was not to be lost there.
Two years later, in the summer of 1995, Brain Toys Bulletin Board Services was founded. Dr. Doom introduced me to this 8-line system, with about 25 users at the time. He changed my screen name from RaguAbgu to RajuAbju, because he claimed that it sounded too much like a damned spaghetti sauce (which it was of course) and was rather childish. And so, RajuAbju was officially born to the world, on August 3rd, 1995, at the residence of Dr. Doom. Iroonie created his user name a few weeks later, as Mr. Dooms, his original screen name, taking of course an altered name from Dr. Doom. Our friend CandyMan would also soon sign up under a name that I can no longer recall, though he soon afterward would change it to his more well known name and current name of CandyMan. This of course referring to his sweet skills in Doom II, and later Duke3D as well as Quake II. And so began my stay on Brain Toys, and the rebirth of RajuAbju.
Brain Toys quickly became my home base. The place where I could always be found by all whom knew me. I traveled to many other BBS’s, from the ill-fated Omega board, on to more prominent ones, such as Ghost Town and Annex. I also received my first SysOp position on a BBS owned by an old friend, called Break Time BBS, though it shut down after only 6 months of operation. Throughout all this time however, most of my days were spent on Brain Toys, and some of my fondest memories are of this period of time in life. I made many friends with whom I still keep in touch with today, whether they still live in Los Angeles, or in New York, or even in Canada. In 1995, the name of the game was Doom II, among the best selling games of all time, this was the first true multiplayer online game to hit the markets, and hit the markets it did, in a huge way, which forever changed the PC gaming industry. BBS’s flourished as people flocked by the hundreds and thousands to blow each other way over and over for hours and hours on end. Who needed to talk with people in lame AOL chat rooms, which just had people scrolling and cursing anyway, when you could blow away your opponent with so many wonderful and deadly weapons? And then came the WADS. Perhaps the most successful and widely known WADS are, Foxer, MegaDM32, Danzig, and of course, the ever popular Dwango series. Thousands of WADS were made, including several by yours truly, though mine never really got very popular. Two of my favorite wads were created by good friends of mine, TheXMan, now known as Moncho or NeoGodX, and Flipside also sometimes referred to as Monkey. I was actually pretty damn good at Doom, and although people such as Vapor or Flipside wasted me with little effort, I could beat the majority of my opponents. Brain Toys soon expanded to 12 then 16 lines to accommodate all the new members which were coming in by the dozen to play Doom II, and the few other multiplayer games which were now being created, such as Descent, WarCaft, Heretic and others to follow. None of these games however, ever gained the popularity or respect that Doom enjoyed.
I recreated the CaMeLz on Brain Toys BBS in early 1996. It was sort of an online gang or cult you could say, with me, as their valiant leader. Again, I was the “president” with Iroonie and CandyMan as my chief advisors, and a friend of Iroonie’s, named GrandMaster, later also known as Robin Hood as another head member. We had up to 20 members at our peak membership, approximately 40% of the board was under my control at this time, though I had no real power as far as the BBS owners, Mr. Pip and Dubie, were concerned. In fact, Dubie and I had many duels for power, he controlled the BBS from the standpoint of being an owner; and he could have terminated my account at any given time with a few simple keystrokes. On several occasions, he did suspend and threaten to eliminate me, but never did, perhaps because he feared that doing so would cause many of my followers to leave, as they were loyal supporters of mine. Or perhaps because he secretly liked me, and I do admit, I did have a certain respect for Dubie, though I would never admit it to him. Counter CaMeL groups were soon formed, Asian Pride and Anti-Camelz, being the biggest ones. Asian Pride, led by my friend Flipside, and Anti-Camelz, by my arch-nemeses of the time, Flatline. Both set out to destroy me, and eventually, through many battles, did bring me down, though I took them down with me. It was at this point that online groups, though not officially, were barred from existing from Brain Toys, as the owners feared that people would get into fights, causing a decrease in membership.
Doom and its genre of entertainment began to lose their appeal after a while. You could only blow up people and be shot so many times before tiring of it, so I decided to explore other options. Various new ways of playing Doom came about, the most popular of these being Death Tag. This used teams of two to capture a flag and return it to your base without letting the other team infiltrate you and get the flag first. It was lots of fun, with teams and a tournament ladder that was soon implemented to keep score and hand out prizes. However, one game can only be modified and played for so long before it becomes repetitive and tiresome. It was time to move on, so I bean exploring my options. There was a text-based game, called Trade Wars 2002, set in a realm of science fiction and futuristic-fantasy that intrigued me. I began playing it, and Iroonie and GrandMaster soon joined me in our quest to conquer the galaxy. It was here where I made good friends with other TW2002 players whom taught me the game. I owe many thanks to BirdMan, Stray Cat, Termite, DagWood, Lord DCD, Drizzt, Dartonnian, Swizilus Arcane Fingers, and of course, Lost Soul. Twice in my 3 year TW2002 career, did I truly rule the game, and countless other times I was destroyed. In 1996, another friend of both Iroonie and I joined Brain Toys, Buster. He played both Doom and TW2002 with us, and we had great fun. Finally, a 5th friend that joined was Heyvoon, and he also had a blast in Trade Wars, though by the time he joined, Doom was no longer actively played. CandyMan left Brain Toys soon after Doom fell out of popularity, but returned later when Duke3D arrived. And Robin Hood left though returned sometime later as well. All in all, it was great fun, and something that I will surely forever cherish. I will not go into great detailed length about my TW2002 experiences for several reasons. One of which is that I participated in perhaps 15 different games, and to recount the events that transpired would be impossible, both to write, and to even remember.
And then MajorMud arrived. I don’t quite recall all the details of it…but one fine day, I saw several people in a new game, which Brain Toys had installed a demo of. MajorMud 1.1a, so I tried it out. It was a text game, like TW2002, but set in ancient times with all sorts of races and monsters and a very complex and interactive realm. In the beginning, we were all newbies to the game, exploring the endless depths of the New Haven dungeons and such. It was around this time when I made peace with Flatline, and our friendship was formed. Though we had started Mud at around the same time, he had gathered a much larger wealth of understand for the game then I had, as he was far more dedicated to learning how to survive on his own, instead of leaching off of others. We joined a gang, and worked together to explore the realm. We progressed gradually, moving to sewers, slums, and the forests. I remember one fine day, Mad Wizard took me the cult house located in the slums. He went into a room and executed a secret command and presto, a secret passageway down was revealed. We voyaged down to find a new selection of monsters, which dropped GOLD instead of copper and silver. I was amazed, and ran to tell Flatline of this exciting new discovery. I brought him there and we rolled there forever, making more money then we had ever previously imagined. Everyone was relatively new to this game, some had played for a while on other BBS’s, but most of us were learning as we went along.
In game 1, Flatline and I were involved in 3 major gangs of importance. Zhentarim, which was our first real involvement together, was created in the very beginning. In a period in which everyone was still learning all the secrets to Mud. Our main rivals were of course, the evil Illuminati, and a gang led by Psycaid called the Obsidian Order. Throughout the start and into the middle of the game, we had many encounters with each other, and often-heated words and threats were exchanged. When the Illuminati entered the scene, they tried to control the game, and for a while, succeeded. They were experienced players who traveled from BBS to BBS playing Mud, I guess going around and taking over the game. They were organized and powerful, and they dominated the game when they began playing. At this time in Mud, a certain region called the Serpentkin village was the most popular place to gain experience and money in. The Illuminati would camp out here and control the whole area, killing off anyone who dared intrude on their turf. Flatline however, did not intend to allow another gang rule the realm, and began organizing for a revolt. Eventually, at about the midpoint of the game, a 3 way gang war erupted which quickly escalated into a realm wide free for all. Not even the bank idlers were safe any longer. All three of the major gangs suffered heavy losses, and were brought down. When the smoke had cleared, several people had been rerolled, or had lost all their money or valuable possessions. But the game went on, entering a period of reconstruction. Flatline disbanded the Zhentarim and created a new gang, under the name of The Black Network. Psycaid closed down the Obsidian Order and opened up The Red Hand. The Illuminati remained, however, they were in a state of despair, as there were a few members in their ranks who had become dissatisfied and defected. A former Illuminati member, The First, created the Lords of Chaos, and that was more or less a replacement gang for the Illuminati, as it picked up many of their old members. These were the next three gangs. The Black Network was basically a training gang, an underground, for which we prepared for the upcoming battle. Once Flatline decided we were ready to wage war, he disbanded the gang and created his final gang of major importance for game 1, Retribution. Retribution was created with one goal in mind, to kick ass and chew bubble gum. And this we did indeed. I learned the basics in player vs. player combat in this period. Flatline trained our entire gang to become and elite killing squadron. For the next amount of time, we would wage successful guerilla warfare, employing hit and run tactics. The problem we faced was manpower. We were 8 or 9 against two other gangs that combined for over 15 members. They simply had enough resources to repurchase what was lost. Eventually they simply overwhelmed us in their numbers with out manned attacks, and brought Retribution to an end, though not without suffering heavy casualties of their own. Soon after, a vote was taken to reset the realm. With the demise of the powerful gangs, and a wave of fresh Mudders joining up, the game was reset, ending several legendary gangs, but opening up the path for more to come.
The next game rolled around after some new modules were added on, and some technical difficulties in setbacks and crashes delayed the game’s opening. Game 2 quite a memorable game indeed. There were several powerful gangs that dominated the realm in various periods of time. Firstly, Nosferatue, led by Psycaid, which consisted mainly of his members from the previous game, along with several new faces. The Fist came back with a new gang called Lords of Chaos (his second gang by this name), which included some of his old members and several new ones as well. Several rogue players were also around, the most noted of these being Rambo and Guy, whom joined gangs and left at their convenience, not having any loyalties but to themselves. The final gang was created by Flatline, called The High Council, or THC. This was the ultimate mud gang ever to exist on Brain Toys. Each of our gangs was large, between 8 to 15 members at any given time. BBS membership was well established at this time, with 32 local lines. The foundations of THC lay in its superb leadership in Flatline, and excellent members with guys such as Deja-Vu and Gambler. No other gang would ever enjoy such a high quality of life; not even the now doomed Illuminati could make such claims of power and prestige.
Flatline often talked of expanding his presence to other boards and realms across the nation, creating branches of THC, each with its own regional leader, and with the home base being Brain Toys. I wish I still had some of the old capture files of our long and often fantasy oriented chats on our broadcast channels or in the teleconference. I had many of these such discussions saved as text files, but lost them all when I made the mistake of formatting my computer. Unfortunately, Flatline left for Europe for a period of about four weeks, during his absence there was a major power shift in the realm.
Shortly after Flatline’s departure, The Fist left gang and created Lords of Chaos, taking with him a few members, and picking up a few new ones on his own. Soon, Lords of Chaos and Nosferatu began warring with one another, and this lasted for the duration of Flatline’s absence, often spilling beyond gang lines and engaging non-gang aligned players as well. When Flatline returned, the game had suffered a setback of approximately 3 months. At this point, he established his last important gang for game 2, Immortal Outlawz, which I quickly joined, along with Buster and several others. At this time, war was still raging between the other two gangs of power, Nosferatu and Lords of Chaos, and it was only a matter of time until the Immortal Outlawz joined in the conflict. We knew from our previous experiences in games 1 and 2, that we could not hold off an attack from two fronts, and tried to keep peace in the realm for as long as possible, as it was to our benefit. It’s funny, because I was the instigator for nearly all the wars that occurred. One of my most memorable acts of instigation was accidental. Beelzebub had hung up during a random PvP battle one day in the labyrinth. The next day, he came on and Skull was waiting for him, ready to bolt Beelzebub to death as the standard punishment called for. As it just so happened, I was rolling in the room adjacent to where Beelzebub was being bolted in, I went in to say hello, and saw him bolted to death and die right in front of me. With much surprise and glee, I quickly picked up his valuables and darted back to town, meeting him halfway back and laughing my ass off. The beginnings of our involvement in the war broke out two days later. But fortunately, my gang always backed me up. War was a daily thing, people began getting accustomed to it even. People would be killed on a daily basis. Because of all the fighting going on, there was very little progress being made by anyone in gaining exp points or leveling up. About a month into our 2 way gang war, Flatline was rerolled by Flipside, and another month after that, while all the fighting continued, though perhaps with slightly less frequency, the entire realm had become weary of all the fighting, and a recent was announced.
Game 3 started when Brain Toys was at the height of its membership and had gained quite a reputation as an active PvP board abroad. It had nearly 50 lines, dialup and TelNet combined. And the board was so active that line control had to be established to knock people off after several hours of scripting to allow other players a chance to get on. For the third, and final game I played alongside Flatline, he created a gang by the name of The Lords. We promoted peace for the realm, though we knew such would never be accomplished in actuality; and such, the many battles ensued. Famous individual rivalries shall be discussed in some detail later, for now, only gang battles will be covered. The best fights took place in or near Silvermere. This is where all the taunting, tracking, ambushes, gang rapes, and all the other good stuff took place.
Unfortunately however, as it always seems destined to be, a complete realm wide war soon erupted in game 3, engulfing everyone who played Mud, whether in a gang or not, and raged on for many weeks, draining our monetary supplies, and emptying out our stashes of items. After a poor opening to war, The Lords, proved its power and superiority, handily dishing out kill after kill, while not incurring heavy losses of its own. However, several blunders, such as dying at the feet of our enemy, began to wear us down eventually. As in the first and second games, our opponents essentially had the only advantage of manpower and resources. Like before, they had over double our size in members, and had very rich members at that, enabling them to repurchase perhaps up to 90% of items lost. Nevertheless, The Lords fought on, being forced off the offensive to a defensive position. After countless confrontations, we began to run on empty. We held off for another week or two, or perhaps a bit longer, until eventually, we had no choice but to disband as we were beginning to get rerolled. This was the first war, which ended up in multiple rerolls for all sides. There was no clear winner here...the only loser being The Lords whose magnificent tradition of excellence had come to a close. Unfortunately, I cant recall the names of our rival gangs for game 3, though I do know that they each lost some of their best members, and as a result, the realm split into multiple gangs of 3-4 people each. Many of the original Mudders left Brain Toys at this point, and Mud entered a dark period, with not much activity. The BBS itself was dying, there was no leadership from either owners, nor staff, nor any of the gang leaders within Mud. Flatline left, as did Psycaid and The Fist, who had departed some while back. Suddenly, the people and gangs who had dominated Mud for so long were gone, and the entire realm had no direction, instead merely floated along from day to day with everyone playing for themselves. Several people tried to establish base gangs, such as Skull or Rambo, but none succeeded in drawing much support or even attention. People continued to come and go, and eventually Mud began crashing. Unfortunately, from this point on, it just wasn’t the same game anymore, people by now were getting tired of Mud, and 24/7 scripting was not allowed due to the strain it put on the main console. Newer people didn’t have the dedication and drive it took to succeed in Mud, they only wanted to have other people power them up at every stage, and the elders resented this. Game 3 had started out great, but began to fade away slowly. In the later stages of the game, everyone began to leave. Even people such as Moncho and Flipside began playing less with each passing day. Soon, I took a leave of absence myself, and at some point after that, the realm was reset, and a fourth game began.
Because such a length of time has passed, I do not recall many of the events that took place in Mud, nor do I recall the order in which they materialized. Therefore, I will do my best to recount many of the Major battles that are of relevance, from the most important to least, or something of this nature. Perhaps the best battles of all were Flatline versus both Beelzebub and The Fist; and of these none more so heralded as the time which Flatline literally pimp slapped the both of them right in the middle of town, right after another, and repeatedly. Simply walking up to some and beating them down was never executed with such a calm efficiency. Another set famous duel was between Gambler and Flipside. Its difficult to determine a winner in this case as their battles ensued throughout all the games and with many different characters. On the overall, I would declare Gambler the winner, because he gained more valuable possessions than he lost. Gambler was one of the coolest people under pressure. Quiet, but deadly and accurate, he killed off many people in both games 2 and 3. It was a shame Gambler and Flatline didn’t get to play at the same time more. Gambler once said to Flatline that it was probably an act of God, which didn’t allow the two of them to play simultaneously, because they would have just dominated any realm so hard that it wouldn’t be fair or fun for anyone else. Jaque and Mike were another deadly combination, and were amongst the most seasoned Mud players, they more or less crushed their enemies, though they were defeated on a few rare occasions. Another lethal duo was that of Rambo and Guy; these two had no loyalty to anyone but each other, and would frequently even go after each other much like savages. Amongst the best PvP players I have seen, Rambo killed with such malice that I have never seen, and Guy was a great hit and run man to make them an excellent assassination team. There was also Deja-Vu, he was not quite as skilled in frontal attacks then he was in using alternate techniques in killing his foes, and he often proved to be a very valuable friend. Then there was a rank of 2nd tier players, including myself. Others of my skill level included Gfk, Moncho, Quake, Buster, Luz, Tweeker, Gecko, Hendrix, Duff, Vertigo and his idiot friend, Maniac, Heyvoon, Iroonie and whole host of others. I battled against many of these players and was evenly matched with most of them.
My own personal battle experiences are varied. I do not claim to be a champion PvP player, but I also was not such a poor one. Of the higher level players, Rambo and Troy both ripped me apart, and though I did kill Troy on a few occasions, I never really got a good kill on Rambo. Guy and myself were more evenly matched, and we had constant combat with each other, he probably was the victor in about 60% of encounters, though I fared well on my own. Luz and I also had many skirmishes, and I am happy to be able to say that I was victorious more often then I was defeated. My two most common enemies by far however, were none other than Gecko and Hendrix. Both of these two were nearly always within my battle range, and were always in rival gangs. Often, I had Gfk of my gang with me to combat these two, but many times, I was alone. My best battle with Gecko occurred in the elite orc mansions, where he was rolling to gain experience and money; I snuck in with my beloved missionary character, and backstabbed him, he was at the keyboard and saw this, and ran. I lost track of him in the slum sewers, and then he attacked me when he had rested some. I was able to get another backstab on him to lower his hp greatly, as he was a mage character, with not very many hit points. I chased him through the sewers and temporarily lost him. I was on my way back to town when I found him in the slums running towards town, I ensued and got another backstab near the slum gates where I was able to kill him finally. This is only one of perhaps over three dozen skirmishes, which I had with Gecko, and I think it evened out that he took half the wins and I took the other half. I had more combat sessions with Hendrix, perhaps twice as many as with Gecko. Hendrix was not as able a pvp’er as Gecko was, and I was able to defeat him more often then I was to be defeated. My best battle with him was in the ancient crypts and labyrinth area. Hendrix surprise attacked me here; I was only barely watching the screen, though should have known better. He had been following me around for some time, looking for me to be low on hit points, and when I was, he attacked with his variety of powerful mage spells and got me to critically wounded before I was able to lose him somewhere in the labyrinth. I was lost, as was he; while I was resting, he found me again and re-engaged, I ran once more and lost him, and began resting. Finally, I was ready to go looking for my attacker. I found him sitting on the beach, I guess waiting for me to try to run for town. I backstabbed him and ran, with him in close pursuit, I held him with my spells and came for another backstab, and did another hold but failed. We ran around the labyrinth for a few minutes, then were both transported to the wooden passages. With the Minotaurs swinging at us, we both were very low on power. I hid in a room in an attempt to rest some, he came in and I decided to backstab and landed a great one which fatally wounded him, and I finished him off with an extra round of combat before he was able to hang carrier. Alas, he was no match for my mighty Bard.
Throughout nearly my entire Mud career, I continued playing TW2002 on the side. My most famous game is one in which Lost Soul, HardCore, and I took over the Ferrengi home base and dominated the entire game. It was the only game in which I can truly say I destroyed Stray Cat, Termite, and friends. In a second game, I was teamed up with Lost Soul and Stray Cat and we also were the most powerful force in this game, though Termite Corporation was also able to hold its own. We fought many intergalactic battles, and Lost Soul and Stray Cat were both destroyed, as were Termite’s teammates. It was a 1 on 1 showdown, me versus the mighty and much more experienced Termite. He won. However, I learned much from the battles and would use my experience and knowledge to better myself and become a real contender for the crown of TW2002. It is hard for me to say which I enjoyed more, Trade Wars, or Mud. In some ways, they were very similar, both text based games, but in other ways, very different. Mud had dozens of people while Trade Wars had a small group. In the end, I would decide that the original Mud, up to Mod 2 and its modifications, was more fun than was Trade Wars. Beyond this however, the quality of Mud declined with each new addition they implemented. I was not in favor of such a large expansion of the map and other changes which were made. Trade Wars 2002 was fun, because I was the leader of my group which included myself, Iroonie, Heyvoon, GrandMaster, Buster, all of whom are my friends in real life, so we could talk about TW2002 all the time and create new strategies and the sort. Mud was fun because it was more complex and intricate, more to do and explore, and because there were so many more people actively playing.
After I returned from my leave of absence, about 2 months later, the board was in its dying stages. I remember the last few weeks on BT, it was very sad. Brain Toys had been reduced to only two local lines, and 12 TelNet lines. A once prominent board for fun and games and meeting new people was hanging on by its final threads. The owner, Mr. Pip, was going to pull the plug soon, it was evident to everyone who still logged on. The very last few days, we just chatted about stuff, life, etc, and many of us decided to keep in touch once Brain Toys went offline. And finally, BT died, quietly and slowly, without receiving much notice from anyone but myself, Flatline, and some of the staff, such as Lost Soul and Skull. It was the end of an era for us all, allowing us to move on to newer and perhaps better things, while remembering the past.
1998 arrived, and I joined Arise. And the timing of me rejoining the AOL warez scene could not have been better. Warez was in a period of decline when I returned, only four major groups remained. The battle tested U.P.S.S. was still around to my surprise, as was Legion, which was by now the 2nd eldest group and close in third was Arise, and then a new up and coming group Premium had also established itself. Although I loved UPS/UPSS for what they have done throughout their years on the scene, it has always been a group controlled by its founders and does not give people much a chance to advance through the ranks into positions of real power. I hated legion at the time, so joining them was not an option. Premium was too new a group and I didn’t know much about them, so Arise was my first choice. I joined Arise originally as an MM’er/Server. I never did huge amounts of either, but my production was steady. The day I joined was the same day Grif was promoted to the senior spot overseeing me and the rest of the distribution team. The founder of Arise was EviL, and at the time, the President was nonother than hacker extraordinaire, chemical. Council consisted of them two, and Lif3r and wop. Lif3r was away on military missions in Bosnia, and wop was more concerned with his business than with warez. Also joining at the same time as me were dubie and mekkaman, two future friends of mine, though I did not know so at the time. Arise began to flourish some as we began to pick up a steady wave of new trial members who were all dedicated. Guys like acid, sas, boardtaho, gfu, pn0y, nynex, pnt, storm, rail and many others. However, a bastard hacker whose name I no longer recall narqued our main ftp site and we were fucked. Chemical basically gave up after that, and no one was really around to lead the group for a while. I saw evil on once and asked him to promote me to senior and he did so, although I don’t think he even knew I was in the group at the time. But when I received my promotion, I was determined to make good. I worked very hard, mekk and dubie also soon were promoted as well to help me out. I began to rebuild Arise with their help. Storm had an OC3 at his work which soon became our main warez ftp after we got him lots of hard drives to store our goods on it. After a few months, I was running the entire group out of my senior position. I basically promoted myself to what I called “administrator” and also got dubie and mekk promoted with me as well. At this point, with evil’s ok, I basically took control of the group. Chemical soon became jealous and left Arise (after some troubles with owning our channel and the sort), and then I was official in my position as the leader of the group. I’m proud to say Arise expanded to new heights under my leadership, dubie and mekk took control of our botnet, I had storm as our chief siteop, we had a massive uploading team, and our distro was unparalled by any other group, or even the rest of the major groups combined. I was in total control of the group and we were breaking our own records on a weekly basis. At the peak of my leadership, Arise was 75 members strong, which is an amazing feat by even today’s standards. We were considering expanding into MP3’s and even porn, but after a few attempts into that, I decided against it. It was a good decision as our warez production skyrocketed. At one point, UPS even wished to merge into us, and I was open to the idea, as was most of my council, though evil was staunchly against it, and so such a merger never occurred. By this time, my right hand man had become Braz. He was very capable and understood what my goals for the group were, and executed them. Also another key player at the time was diablo, aka Seth, the future hacker. By now, I had been leading Arise for nearly 10 months, and the group continued to get stronger and stronger by the week. However, all good things come to an end, and I was leaving for an entire month to Israel. I left on a week of record productions, of which I was very proud. And left the leadership of the group to braz and diablo with whom I had total faith in. and they did an excellent job in my absence. But, when I returned, much of my drive and motivation to lead Arise had disappeared. I no longer had the time or dedication it took to lead such a large group. And unfortunately, the subsequent leaders Arise had after me were unable to unite the group as I had done.
Today, I keep in touch with a host of old BT members, over 20 of them. Some of us still hang out every now and then even. Its always fun to talk about the days we spent on Brain Toys, whether it was blowing out each others asses in Doom, or back stabbing each other in TradeWars or starting gang wars in Mud. I have many great memories from BT, which I hope to never forget.
It’s now December 2000, I haven’t added or changed this for nearly 8 months now, and so I figure its time to update things. Well, I still keep in contact with people from both Brain Toys and Arise these days. Actually, Brain Toys is back, TelNet only now, but with about 15 or 20 active people (one of them being Buster, and another, his girlfriend, Trashgal). Skull is the owner of the board these days, and I’m happy to see that BT lives on, though I will never be a part of it again…funny thing is, I still have a level 43 Bard which is active from when I was playing in game 4 with Gambler (by game 4, Flatline has decided he would never return). But I’ve decided not to write anything about game 4. It never had the same feeling for me. Probably cause it mainly consisted of new players, and because of Flatline’s absence. He was there on the sidelines constantly talking to Gambler and I, but without him being an active player in the realm, it just was never the same. But just briefly, ill say that game 4 was the first and only game in which I started off and played completely on my own, independent from anyone and not leeching (well, Cyan would argue with that, but shhh). It was still fun, I kicked some good ass with Gambler and Cyan and others…the game continues on now even.
Unfortunately, things haven’t turned out so rosy for Arise. The group has basically gone dead. Hasn’t produced anything for months now, and has become an idle channel. Storm’s gone into hiding from what I hear, the FBI is after him, and his site has shutdown, at least for the time being. What happened was that Outlawsys, Paul and SaS took over Arise…and fucking Paul, he screwed shit up beyond repair…I ran the group for about 6 weeks, and we actually starting doing well again, but then they kicked Evil out the group…idiots, kicking out the founder of the group. And then they decided to try and run things on their own, and so I stepped aside, and watched them flush the last remaining hope for Arise down the toilet. Ah well.
I realize this next section I’m about to add is going to be in the wrong place, but I don’t care. I’ve decided not to go back into the text I’ve previously written and make insertions or major changes, unless they are corrections. I remember Flatline telling me about the killing of the Chest for the first time in the 2nd game. It was only the second day of the game, all the players were only level 2 or 3 or 4 at the most. However, Psycaid and his crew were going to go in a large party of low level players, and take out the chest and reap a large booty of goodies. Flatline heard of their intentions, and quickly assembled his crew together at town square and they took off. Well, they decided to just run through the whole laby and not fight any monsters. On the way there, they actually passed up Psycaid and his group, who had been taking there time, fighting and resting their way through. Flatline and his guys got to the chest, killed it, took all the goodies and were on their way back before Psycaid had even realized what had just gone on. Another hilarious time was when Flatline had his witchunter character, and he went to the evil town of Rhudar and killed the dwarven witchunter there and he became the new “dwarven witchunter master” of the realm. I remember in game two, with my first missionary, Deja-Vu using the bard stats bug, boosting up my strength to 105 (this is before stats could go beyond 100), and this allowed me to bash into the Horned Demon room deep inside the crypt’s quest area, pick up a bunch of the goodies, such as the elven silversilk, a moonblade, and other items and get the fuck out before death arrived for my poor level 10 guy. No one could believe or understand how I had gotten in and out of the Horned Demon’s room alive. Another favorite affair for the realm was the unkillable gigantic black ooze which so randomly roamed the laby area. Well one day, we decided to kill the bitch once and for all. Myself, Flatline, Gambler, Psycaid, Beelzebub, Maniac, Buster, Flipside, Moncho, Vertigo, and probably about 5 other people began whacking away at the damned thing, I was using golden sickle, and ripped it, while someone else cast the spell of rott on it. Well, we did thousands of damage points, finally killed him. For all of about 200 exp, and he didn’t even drop anything at all.
Once more I’m going to switch topics abruptly. For all intents and purposes, I’m satisfied with what I have written regarding my time spent on Brain Toys, and the other BBS’s that I visited. I realize that since I post this on my web page, this is a public document, nevertheless, I feel a need to discuss my “darker” side, mainly, my side business as a carder. I don’t remember how I got involved in the whole nonsense in the first place, or how long ago it was. But I was a sophomore in high school I believe. I had carded myself a couple of hard drives, when friend began asking me to get them stuff. The first thing I got was a snowboard, boots & bindings for this guy Ricky in one of my classes, he paid me 200 dollars for the stuff, which was valued at over 700. Pretty soon, everyone wanted various items, computer components, audio equipment, clothing, jewelry. I began carding gifts for this girl I liked even, I got her a very expensive watch. I got myself a new graphics card, I carded RAM, clothing accessories, shoes, and so forth. I did it mostly for my close friends. I estimate I got about 40% of the things I ordered. Back in the day, before there were so many security checks, it was quite easy. All you needed was a credit card with the person’s info, and any drop site would do. Of course, I took all the standard precautions: never carded from home, or used real info, email contacts, accounts or anything. I even went as far as to scout out a drop site before each pickup. I remember there was a white van one time…scared me shitless, I ran away, and didn’t card for a couple of weeks. He, if I had been smart, I would have stopped altogether, but I was getting greedy at this point. And then, one fine night, I got a call from Visa’s Credit Card Fraud Investigative Division. I thought it was a prank someone was pulling on me, and I totally refused to cooperate. Later that same evening however, my dad’s lawyer called and talked to me at length about a letter he had received from Visa; I clearly understood this was no joke. Being a minor at the time in question, I wouldn’t have gone to jail, probably a fine, community service, and the, but still, my parents would kill me. So much for my millions in inheritance. Anyhow, it came to be that everything was dropped (good lawyer, plus it was difficult to trace anything directly to me since I had taken my good precautions heh. Although, if they had really been that good, how did Visa track me in the first place?) So it was that fine night I decided my career as a carder was over. That was in 1999, if I recall correctly. I still got CC’s from friends, and gave to others, but I no longer directly used any myself. In recent times, many friends (both online & offline) have asked me to restart my little occupation as a carder, but I now realize the errors of my past, and don’t wish to make them again. I’m not necessarily remorseful of what I did; if that were the case, because I had some sort of guilt for causing damage to innocent people, then I should feel the same towards warez, which of course everyone knows I don’t, and so I also don’t with respect to carding. I do however now understand that what I did was generally wrong; I attribute my actions to being a curious teenage child, not caring of the consequences of my actions, nor planning for possible outcomes or reactions, and chalk it all up to experience and a wiser person today. This is all I have to say about my time spent as a carder, and related incidents.
Next subject I shall skip to is the rebirth of Arise, picking up where I previously had left off, about two paragraphs and six months ago. It’s now early February 2001 & Arise is once again alive and active. Toxin is to be credited with this rebirth in the group. I’m not sure what motivated him so, but I’m glad to see it. He is an old school member, like myself, and he hated seeing the group just sitting idle, and decided to take action. Arise is now 20+ members strong once more, and we are actively recruiting on a daily basis. Hey, when Toxin can get this group over 80+ members, then he can brag about being the best leader Arise ever had, until then, that line is reserved for me thank you very much. But I do see such an occurrence as feasible in today’s warez world.
Good lord, another twist in the wacky world of RajuAbju. We are now in September of 2002. Been quite a while eh? Well, I have lots to report for those still reading this. The unthinkable has happened. I have begun playing Major Mud once again. I began playing about March of this year I think. As before, I am playing a Bard, the only class that suites my personality. Many new faces on Brain Toys. A few of the old times, Buster, Rambo, Skull and Cyan still exist. Brain Toys is doing quite well nowadays, with about 40-60 active mudders, with plans to expand and upgrade in the works. Mud has changed. No longer are there realm wide or even multi gang wars. Mostly, one can expect to see only individual skirmishes, over items, or scripting rights. AFK play dominates all realms, and BT is no different. I’ve joined a gang led by a player called Fandango, he is a good guy and we get along pretty well. Our gang is pretty diverse and always entertaining on bg channels. We actually play on two other BBS’s as well, and our core unit of members doesn’t change. Everyone handles their shit pretty well and it’s been a good experience. This is actually the highest level character I’ve ever played, a level 50 Elf Bard. Also, I’m once again helping run things around here. Skull still owns the BBS, but his work schedule doesn’t permit him to pay enough attention to the BBS at all times, and so I of course volunteered, and I pretty much now manage the BBS, along with Fandango who we promoted to Staff, and Skull’s girlfriend, Bast. Tweeker, Anonymous, and Lost Soul all drop by now and then to say hi, as do some of the others from the golden days of yonder. Oh, I forgot to mention, Kamel Reds also still plays, unfortunately, me and him don’t seem to get along quite as well as we used to, and probably will butt heads sometime in the future, if things continue to progress as they have been doing lately. That’s pretty much the update from the Brain Toys side of things. I don’t actually spend much time at keys, school and work keep me fairly occupied, as do the random girls I find. As for the Arise side of life, they couldn’t be doing better. Breaking personal and scene records all the time, Arise, Premium and Legion really have got things back on track and are all pumping out warez at rates never seen before. My own involvement is non-existent, as I have already stated I have a lack of time. However, I of course go around the channels whenever I can, catching up with old friends, and meeting the new faces who run the scene today. I have always said that one day, I will rejoin the scene, and I still continue to believe this. It’s only a matter of time, literally. The “new” part of RajuAbju, is my website. It’s become an extension of me, really. Everything I do with my friends, whether in real life, or on IRC or Brain Toys or wherever, the shit goes up on the net for all to see. The site has become huge, with over 700 html pages now up. Everything is covered there, from adventures with friends, to picture galleries and even info about Hulk Hogan. Its probably amongst the most random sites on the internet if you ask me, but it seems to be getting a good deal of attention. It’s become my hobby, occupying a good deal of the limited spare time I have. And the final update, my long lost friend, Flatline. Well, turned out, he had me on block on his instant messenger for a few months and just sort of forgot about it. Naturally, I was pretty upset upon hearing this, but hey, what can ya do? I’m just glad me and him are talking again, even if it is on a limited basis.
While I still play Major Mud, and infact do so on several boards, it’s taking a backseat to other things in life these days. I’m away from the keys nearly the entire time, checking in every now and then to make sure I’m still scripting, to train, to do some boss runs, and occasionally, PvP. Mainly though, I just let MegaMud do the work, and don’t fiddle around too much with Mud. I’ve been working on this site, and, in February of 2003, I FINALLY decided I had enough bullshit from HyperMart overcharging my ass every month. I switched to a new hosting company, am getting better customer service, more features for my website, and saving over 200 bucks a year. So yea, I’m pretty happy about that. My site continues to grow and expand into new area, and now contains over 1,000 pages of HTML. I get around 30,000 hits a month to my site. It’s become quite popular, I must say. Someday, I’ll start selling something on this damn site and make money. Until then, enjoy it for free
Please note that this is a continuing work in progress. If you have anything interesting to add to it, or if something written is incorrect, please contact me about it! -Danny
