What Went Wrong? - Face of Mankind 

I remember being a cop in this game. I witnessed petty crimes as well as full blown faction wars. I arrested thugs and also got ambushed by criminals from time to time. Made a lot of fun memories in this game as a kid.

**Gets to the part where the game is revived by fans** Aww, how sweet! **Remembers the hook that was placed at the front of the video** Oh no. **Checks the runtime** OH NOOOOO

This game was way ahead of it’s time and it’s heartbreaking that a lot of us never got the chance to experience it in its prime.

That part where they all banded together to fight to 4chan trolls was beautiful, it was barely touched on which makes sense, but even that little bit mentioned was enough for me to get goosebumps, shit like that just gets to me. in video games people being people and essentially protecting what they love in an albeit diluted form, is still so sick

It's actually pretty crazy how close this is to modern GTA RP servers, down to the more popular players being the bank robbers and shootout focusers as opposed to the people actually RPing. The permadeath idea is especially neat, to the point some are planning on starting their own hardcore GTA RP servers. I simply feel this was really just ahead of it's time, which is a big shame.

Holy shit, this was my childhood. I played this game when i was a teenager, i was lucky enough to play it at it's peak and it was just awesome, i held so much great memores about it. Fighting aliens, dealing with Mercs, infiltrating in Yukon, launch a granade in the commercial zone and create panic, conquering Aurelia alone with a couple of friend Also everyone seems to just roleplay. It held a special place in my heart.

I was an LED player for a very, very long time in the 2010s, people probably still remember me as the squeaky voiced Vulpes/Etheodoria Vulpine. Please forgive me if some of this doesn't add up because I was a kid essentially and my memory is failing. Essentially my entire teenage life was fighting in DMCs steps (and ramps) chilling with Rampy, randomly getting into shootouts with the corps and clans, and talking to people from FoM. I remember doing my training and all the documents I had to read. I even wrote a whole primer that was used by the entirety of LED and went back to it years later when the game died and added my thoughts to it. I STILL have it along with the poll when LED was trying to find it's demographics, the documents I slapped together on Docs propelled me to study graphic design and dabble in web design, so my life on FoM wasn't exactly wasted. I learned how to speak to new people in a confident way with how much sociability was in the game and how political it was being the stellar officer of LED and treading eggshells in hopes of not starting wars. I instigated one war with some snide comments to MotB one time and toppled the first domino which fell the entire game into a war over territory. It was clear that the admins further fuelled the flames using MIB agents to invade areas, basically the Men in Black was a secret faction that was only mentioned in lore... until they actually showed up: it was an invite only faction (likely the unreleased civ faction or another dead faction they retrofitted) which had OP armour, extra privs and as Dominion you essentially had to follow what they said. The MIB armour was later only available to premium members and threw PvP for a spin. I loved it so much to the point my therapist would ask me to stop playing for my well being, which is the reason for a massive hiatus for over a year on my part. I loved sticking it out with the late night homies on LED chat with the random questions and arguments, getting together to read Sonichu and My Immortal together aloud, and jumping into other factions voice servers and chilling with them, I actually felt like a stranger in a strange land. Admittedly I was very invested and was addicted to FoM, it was my first delve into Immersive RP and unfortunately FotD never brought be back for long. I'd run around as a civilian and Bio and his boys would gank me because cause the economy was fucked, MIB armour was everywhere and I had nothing and just wanted to do Civ RP. Called it a day when vc was integrated in game and people just used it to scream loudly at each other and that was it. For a young little girl on the wild internet taking to randoms on an MMO, the community was super nice and genuinely one of the safest places, despite the amazingly passionate fights we had on TeamSpeak and Vent sometimes. "I'M BUILT BRO!" Lives in my head rent free even to this day. FoM was basically my life that the admins wanted to drag me on board to be an assistant (essentially trying to skirt around the fact I was 16 years old and they offered to make me a GM even though I had to be 18+.) I guess my biggest highlights was when I was R5 and allowed to manage DMCs airlocks, we were at war with Mercs of the Blood when Boom was leading and me and him had a long discussion about how arresting them while the Dominion was at war with them was unfair. Boom also used the common ground we were both Aussies to really set in the idea of a "fair go." I loved it, but Boom basically manipulated me and I certainly fell for it in hindsight, lol. I decided to let them out and because I had never done anything considered corrupt, the Internal Affairs Department never investigated me. Lowest was when a new officer joined the LED and used a voice modulator to sound feminine, it turns out he was a player who was kicked out for corruption and essentially OOC nastiness/griefing. He used the voice mod so could sneak back into the Department and siphon all of our money away again, we were absolutely PISSED but also congratulating him for a well done plan. But with that, I will say a 14 yo girl with a LOT of questions about yourself and your body, sometimes I'd ask for girl advice from him as he was the only other woman within the faction that talked daily with me. I do look back to it as a bit of a shit, manipulative and creepy moment. I still think over my friendships with some players, and the little doomed gaming community that me and a couple others tried so desperately to manage when we moved onto other games and those that went with us. I hope for a lot of members of DVG are going well and strong and that I hope we've all branched into something greater. It felt so long ago when I was fourteen years old shooting Euro and BoS in NYC but I feel like I haven't moved onto emergent roleplay like that. Now I play RedM and FiveM which feels like something FoMs community was trying to achieve and would highly recommend to anyone looking for that Open World PVP Heavy RP, y'all can hit me up for that. Tldr: Vulpes misses ALL you unbuilt freakazoids and like to take the time to thank Wiz for taking me down this nostalgia trip. You all are allowed on the third step at the Prison entrance as a treat.

I remember jumping into a free trial of this game way back in the day. Made a character, chose a faction, got pointed towards a terminal and... That was it. I had no idea what the game's primary focus was, I had no idea the extent of which it was locked on to RP. I just knew it was an MMO that existed during the golden age of MMOs, and it had a focus on shooting mechanics which was a novelty at the time when it wasn't really expected that any MMO would be able to handle more than tab target combat. I mucked around for a bit. Wound up in a little pub or tavern or something when suddenly some big announcement blared and the music got dire. People started saying to hide, so I jumped behind the bar and crouched as a full squad of heavily armored dudes suddenly ran through as every one stayed deathly still. Then they were gone, and the music let up. The person who had jumped over the bar and crouched down next to me said "Nice hiding spot." To this day I have no idea what the fuck was going on, but that little event was such a fascinating experience that it has stuck with me over the years. It always seemed like a game that would have been really interesting to get into, but alas, it also felt like it was going out of its way to prevent me from getting into it, and thus joined the list of so many games that ended up being "one and dones."

The part when 4chan tried a rain on the game and they were completely destroyed sounds so interesting, like what other game can fight off a horde from 4chan without casualties (genuinely curious if someone knows of something similar)

Former Eurocore President here Paul Wall. I played at the launch until the last day online. Until this day i miss this game every day and i always say it made me very successful in real life as a business man! There is no game like this nor will there ever be! If any vets on here i know you remember Paul Wall the stun ganker lol

Usually I watch videos like this eagerly waiting for shit to go wrong, but so far, 20 minutes in, I'm deeply sad that this ends the way it does.

NO one has talked about this game, I remember being one of the three lone survivors of a terrible faction war and walking away a legendary millionaire from it months later. Talk about a classic. It had no real gameplay of note, however the social interactions I had were beyond anything else I've even experienced since. Former Avatar soldier, and Special Circumstances leader here.

You can always rely on WickedWiz to deliver quality stories about games that you've never heard from

I can only wish we get another game like this, but with a full studio behind it. It sounds like it would have been so much fun to play! Role-playing games like this are always great fun.

Man those LED academy sessions really take me back. Looking back the game really was unique for its time and I truly enjoyed it. Something about it being completely player driven just appealed to me and the massive amount of roleplay within the factions. I'm glad I got to play it before the voting system and how faction leads became more of a popularity contest for who ever fought the most/best. Rest easy vets of FoM! o7

Damn had I known I would have volunteered to be interviewed since I played this game way back in the day. Guy from the guardians of mankind faction was shilling the game on 4chan and several of us gave the game a try. Lots of us where patrolling the starter area ( forget the name) in uniform and people where wondering why that faction grew so much in number. Decided to keep playing it since it was genuinely fun, then it got brought over to steam then shut down shortly after. It was a great game and I wish it was brought back.

Dev: "I don't like what is going on in the game." Everyone else: "What did you expect, in the end all of your players are still human."

I had to keep reminding myself this was a game and not like a country. It's fascinating how humans are and can buold societies anywhere with the right tools.

I started playing this game in 2010 (my character name was Wolf Blaze) and played it almost continuously for about 6-7 years. I got hooked from the very beginning as I realized that this game was really different from every other I had played. This is definitely the game in which I got the most immersed in my whole life. Being R6 of FDC and executive officer of the Central Training Division was certainly one of the most involving and fun roles I've had in any game. The extensive lore (both standard and community-made), fairly complex systems, the (not always present) roleplaying and of course the faction wars and combat together composed a game that delivered an experience no other game was able to deliver since then. The closest I've come to feeling what I felt back then was playing the closed beta of Mankind Reborn. The servers have been down for a while now, but I eagerly look forward to playing it again.

Forget if it was this game. But I remember as a new player getting picked up by a stranger that basically made me an article to a in game terrorist attack, by giving me a gun and planting a bomb, in one of the hubs of a faction. It was wild how fast it happened too. Don't think a game will ever have the same experience ever again.

Thank you for making this, it was a great trip down memory lane, especially seeing my old FoM videos, it was such a unique game and an experience you couldn't really find anywhere else, and the idea of playing it again is what's keeping the spirit and community going with Mankind Reborn.

The concept for the game is great. I hope a bigger studio does this one day

The concept of this game seems so interesting. I hope we get another one like this.

Oh fucking YEAH!!!! I remember playing this back in the day around 2011. I chose that illicit chemical dealing faction, Brotherhood of Shadow?? I think. Started selling illegal combat stims to gangs of mercs. Then them authorities ran up on me and sent me to the jail, where the guards would taunt us. Then somehow some guy smuggled a gun into the prison, which sorts set off a riot. Well it was more a riot for the authorities because all inmates are dressed the same, so when we all got into one big group it made it really hard for the authorities to tell who had the contraband weapon, which made it easer for him to kill prison guards in the confusion. Shit was hilarious.

Man, I played this game really heavily 10-14 years ago. I got pretty high up in the LED and felt like this game gave me heart palpitations from the rage induced by other players trolling the cops constantly while I was trying to be a serious police man

LED DPI Anya Clowes here, spent years Guarding DeMorgan's and running classes, made friends, made enemies, had a blast. Thanks for making the vid!

This whole game and it's story just shows how humanity and systems like democracy or individual power work. It's like an experiment, really interesting! Thank you for doing a neutral documentary of this! Awesome that you got some interviews!

Stuff like this always breaks my heart seeing MMO’s where people have whole other lives and friend groups and it just gets destroyed

Former Merc Chief Bigbong here, I only played for a couple years and not nearly as long as some other vets, but boy did I have an amazing time. Met some crazy and awesome people and have a lot of good memories. Thank you for making this video!

Thank you for standing everywhere for us Wiz. It is highly appreciated

I remember playing this with my friend. Right when we entered and walked around the lobby area, couple gangers ran past us and stopped. Turned around and just gave us guns and said "help us fight these other guys" so now we just got drafted into a gang war. After we killed the other few people we met the leader and officially joined them, gave us some items and gear. "Thanks for the help, you need anything just give us a call" so me and my buddy go off into a different zone of woods and wilderness go killing dinosaurs I think it was or something? Well a few rival gang members saw us and chased us into this like wooden shack, but thanks to the gear we got we were able to hold the entrance in, more enemies started showing up though and we were running out of health items and grenades. "Cover the door while I message our contacts" I say. I start messaging the contact and even got ahold of the leader. Gave them our location they start rolling the entire gang to help us, we manage to hold out and we hear rpg explosions, gunfire, hades. We were saved and it just became a huge battle there. Is was so fun. Sadly we didnt play much longer after that

What a nostalgia trip, I was actually one of the original community testers of the game. And I remember that everytime I started the game I thought it had so much potential, but nothing more.

Adding to my previous comment, never contribution comment before but well worth it! You would need a whole series to capture all of the complexities and hardcore style gameplay that's for sure but you did amazing in just under 40 minutes! I played for a long time. Started off in the FDC(Freedom Defense Corps) before finding my home and working my way all the up to high command(Typically rank 5 or 6 depending on the faction) in the CMG(Colonization and Mining Guild.) I started off in the Internal Affairs/ Human Resources department. It was legit had to make actual reports and disciple people who were out of line or didn't have any interest for the faction itself. Once I became rank 6, the previous rank 7's(could have up to a make of two) were stepping down so they nominated me and I won the vote. Well, the devs allowed for players to submit a vote of no competence. I was a good leader and rank 7 but one of th biggest down fall so the game was certain clicks of individuals would float around from faction to faction. Once you joined and had all you buddies join you could pretty much sweep everyone else out and take over the faction. This happened a lot and mainly happened in all the Corp factions. After about 6 months I was voted out by a communist party that wanted to run the mining guild, completely killing the RP and experience they didn't last and things fizzled back to normal but that's just an example, this happened all the time in the game. Such a shame.

wtf was literally thinking about you making a video on this game a few days ago and here it is. Was my favorite game of all time while it was still alive. I was like 12 years old so I could barely grasp the complexity of the game but I loved it

your videos are always worth the wait, I love seeing you dive so deep into games and getting as much info as possible both from players and creators.

Wow. Thank you for making this - feels like an ode to something that took up years of my time and early memories. The way things organically evolved in FOM and the completely player-run aspect of this game was what got me hooked right from the closed beta days (I remember literal goosebumps while roleplaying a cop patrolling.. of all things the mall in Brooklyn). I mean what other game could make you literally patrol and guard a prison (lol at the Stanford Prison Experiment reference) for hours on end? Don't even remember when I left (I was on the GM/CM team for a while too), and while I remember some of the disasters you referenced, it's a pity you didn't get to dive into some of the crazy story events (both player and GM-generated alike) that went on back then. Still text Marko from time to time now, and his new game Cloudpunk is amazing (you can see he really likes the cyberpunk aesthetic), but I'll never forget how much this game shaped my early years and shaped an interest for politics (I may or may not have been at least partially responsible for the lurch to democracy - I honestly don't recall how it all went down!)

Going to war without the paperwork is true mad lad energy, and is an interesting case study on a rouge faction, too bad it wasn't played out organically.

Could you please cover: "What went wrong with P.A.M.E.L.A. ?" It was an interesting survival horror game with a promising premise, but it eventually fell apart. You Tubers who played the Alpha and Beta were instructed to take those videos down. It seriously seemed like a fun game to play before its charm was lost. ♥️♥️♥️

I had an absolute blast in FoM. Nothing will ever compare to the atmosphere and community we had at its peak. I remember my days in CMG fondly. We had crafters, miners, soldiers and politicians. The politics were always so much fun. I even tried my hand at LED on an alt account at some point, but I didn't really have the patience for all the rules and regulations. It's all just memories now.

Very cool to see you make a video on this! Really nostalgic. I played this pretty heavily back in the beta, exclusively on the Mercenary faction. I never knew the details of what happened to it until seeing this just now. I do really miss the early version of this game, and have never really found the same experience. It could be boring doing patrol missions when nothing was going on, but it was also very satisfying when things were happening. The police would always be trying to protect the prison and the main areas, and we would occasionally raid them, or sneak around causing chaos here and there. The combat was actually quite fun, and rewarding when you win and loot a lot of stuff. The roleplaying was the most unique though, because depending on how well you can argue and debate with people, you'd earn respect and build a sort of persona and reputation. The police factions really got into it, doing a damn good job of acting like an authoritarian police force, and we would try to break their grip. There were some seriously tense combat moments, sneaking into an area you know damn well you're not supposed to be in, and ganking someone, which leads to a mini-war. Not really sure how the game could have been sustained, but it seems like a terrible idea to make player-created factions. The distinct goals of each faction added to a sense of identity that promoted the roleplaying dynamic. They also needed to keep a monthly membership model (with a trial or whatever), because it benefited from loyal/serious players and being pvp, it needed to be a fair playing field (that couldn't be bought).

It's always a good day when you sit down hoping there's something interesting on RU-vid, and you find a new entry in a series you follow.

This is like a forgotten memory for me. I remember playing this game all day as a kid. But I could never remember the name. Thanks Wiz!

I started playing FOM around late 2009. Since I knew nothing and wanted to get myself some action, I was directed to the FDC where I learned the basics of combat (and how to behave in this incredibly RP heavy environment). Right as I started getting my heading, going into rank 2 (Corporal) and leading my first patrols around the global dominion colonies, the great ECMG war started. I don't remember the specifics of why it started (probably just for the lulz really, although I seem to remember that alt shenanigans were involved), but the important part is that Eurocore and the CMG allied to take over the global dominion's colonies. Basically, the GD is a pure roleplay entity which acted as a sort of government for the cluster of colonies named after Earth cities (thus called earth colonies). By extension, they also held power over the rest of the galaxy, although the other colonies were left to be administered by whoever could hold control over them. This was all enabled by the Colonial Senate, the legislative arm of the GD, which held elections for representatives of each colony, who then voted on various law proposals and resolutions. Eurocore and CMG basically rebelled against the senate, doing the unspeakable act of attacking the earth colonies, which of course led the FDC and LED, representatives of the GD's executive branch (and ingame holders of these colonies) to retaliate. What ensued was a large scale conflict with the ECMG alliance and the GD trading control of the less populated areas, while the main hub became a dangerous warzone with no decisive shifts in power despite constant fighting. After what feels to me like a month or two, the ECMG offensive kinda stalled (mainly due to the sheer number advantage on the GD side), BUT THEN plot twist, the FDC started a war against the LED (can't remember the actual reasons, but they did invoke RP reasons for rebelling against the senate). The conflict lasted for a bit before the GM's were fed up, then the group of FDC high command that decided to rebel was put under investigation and trial (through ingame proceedings !!!), then promptly demoted to rank 1 and temporarily banned from promotion. These guys were obviously not having it, so they left the FDC and joined the CMG (stirring up shit in the process, understandably). (sorry if my recollection of this epic bullshit is wrong, it's been a long time, my friends) At this point, I had tried to join the FDC's teaching department and applied for promotion which was accepted. But it turns out that the FDC, stripped of its high command, was now led by a GM who appointed her boyfriend to lead the teaching dept. This guy was a huge asshole who gave me shit, demoted me for complaining about it (now that I think of it, that's good military roleplay), so I left to the LED. There, I pretty much started all over again, but with combat experience that was notoriously lacking in the LED. I climbed the ranks again, became a teacher and taught many an illiterate brazilian how to enforce law without too much backfire from the rowdy crowd of hardened criminals usually prowling the streets. Then, again facing very few opportunities for advancement from shitty leadership, I left again, this time to the BoS to become a drug dealer. I made shitloads of money selling the only two worthwile combat drugs : Anabolic Steroids and Cocaboline (respectively stam and HP regen upgrades). They were always in high demand, especially from the very few good LED combatants who knew that it was absolutely needed to not be steamrolled by criminals (cops doing drugs ? you haven't seen the half of it mate). After a few months, stock full of cash and thus able to buy whatever high quality gear I wanted, I rejoined the LED right as its leadership shifted towards more combat oriented people. An old friend of mine gave me an opening into the freshest iteration of LED's elite combat dept and we had a few lulz. Skip forward a few months, we're in late 2010, the game is already dying and nexeon is pulling shit move after shit move. I graduate from high school and with less time to invest into the spergfest that was FoM, and with it becoming less and less fun, with less and less players, I decided to quit. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-wQPh6jS7LVg.html

You never fail to provide entertaining and well-written/researched videos about the fall of video games that I have usually never heard of! Keep up the great work you are doing, Wiz!

I miss this game to this very day Edit: 4chan rushing into a game to try to bully the players,only to get completely ganked by them and bullied away is the most 4chan thing ever

The big fukkup was when the devs decided to put players in charge of the main factions and give them the power to dictate how members of the factions play. Hint: All players had to be a member of one of the factions, so you can imagine how that went. The game devolved into a stalemate where any player that tried to attack another faction would be eliminated by everyone, including members of their own faction. This game had heart but no brains. I'm glad I played it, and I'm glad I dropped it.

I played from its release in 2005 to its closure in the 2010s, one major detail missed is that in 2005 Duplex had multiple employees but within a few months after release they were pretty much all gone. Marko was doing all of the work, basically. Nexeon was a shell company made by two community players in their early 20s, one worked at a server center and he essentially leased a server at his employers company to host. A lot of players had issues with the company as they had already made a name for themselves for attempting to scam factions to get rank and power within it. It was later revealed one of the members of this company had criminal charges that were not aligned with leading a game community as well. the dev "Chris" was another person who was universally rejected by the community from 2005 on for logging into faction ventrilos and screaming at the top of his lungs when something didnt go his way. In hindsight this game seemed to be cursed by the dregs of the community somehow finding themselves in roles of power within the community sadly.

I'd like to thank you for the editing you do, its really fun to see the jokes you sneak in.

Thank you for doing this game justice! This game has a special place in the hearts of many. I still find myself thinking about it nearly 10 years later. I still have many friends to this day that I met when I first started playing this game many moons ago. Thank you again for creating this fantastic video, and for using some of my clips

I really liked this one. Not a complete trainwreck of a game. Great game historian content

Thanks for uploading this video. I used to spend hours every day on this game when I was in my teenage years and the stories and the interactions that I had within it have remained in my memories ever since. I'll just add my personal story down below to highlight how unique this game was. There'll never be anything else like it. I started off working my way up the ranks in the FDC, sitting in a classroom where we would be taught how to fight as a group, and learning the daily schedule of a regular grunt on board the Yukon. I remember being assigned my first missions, the pointless task of spending hours walking and patrolling the FDC ship that no other faction would dare board, but they were missions that were given out to help players understand what was expected of them. I must have walked around that ship countless times, on patrol with a revolving cast of fellow players sat in Ventrilo just chatting about our days. We would sit in there for hours laughing and joking, and complaining about whatever. My favourite missions were the ones sat in front of the brig, a prison that was rarely ever occupied but meant we didn't need to move around hearing the same footsteps on metal sound asset on repeat. Over time I would become (rank 2) Corporal, leading one or two others, then (rank 3) Sergeant of leading squads for these missions and after nearly a year of progression, I made my way up to (rank 4) Captain. Captains would lead large missions but mostly spent our time chatting about what had happened during the weeks amongst the ranks, and submit written reports to High Command about the state of the faction (rank 5s and above). We would chat about potential candidates for promotion, each making cases about who to promote or who we thought needed more of a guiding hand. We would keep an eye out on the forums and see what potential threats would come up and take preventative patrols on the colonies in an effort to maintain peace. I eventually became lead captain and got promoted to Rank 5, joining High Command where the politics were even more cut throat. The FDC famously had an inactive Faction Leader and there was a lot of unrest about getting him replaced. Eventually through frustration, I started chatting to one or two other members in the High Command, about my opinion that this wasn't good for the faction and we should get him replaced. A few of us had agreed to bring this up in the next High Command meeting, and we had enough votes ready for a no confidence motion. However on the day it happened I got snagged by a rank 6 and told to explain myself. One of the people who I considered a close friend within the High Command, one whom I rose the ranks with from when we both started the game, had turned and told the Faction Leader what I was planning. I was immediately demoted and I was forced out of the faction, whilst he got a promotion for his troubles. After that I was messaged by someone from the Mercenaries of the Blood who I came up against quite often after he saw that I was no longer in the FDC. He liked the way I fought and knew I was an organiser, and he wanted to reform and add some structure to the MotB and wanted to change its image from a ragtag collective of gankers to a more professional outfit, only killing when being paid. He promised to fast track me to rank 4, and told me to start creating a structure for an internal affairs for the Mercenaries. I agreed after initially hesitating, I had a reputation of a guy who did things by the book and the Mercs were totally against that, but after sitting in a Ventrilo channel with the Blood Command I realised they were serious. As soon as I got in I immediately got to work identifying the right type of people who could help me police this wild west of players. We came up against a lot of internal backlash which went from petty name calling to actively being targeted and attacked by fellow mercenaries. However the job was rewarding, I was the contact point for all the other factions to come to if they had grievances or concerns about ganking alts. We had created a system where players would have to have visual proof of a contract before killing anyone, with heavy fines being given out if they didn't. Through this role I learnt so much more about the dynamics and politics of the other factions, because I was always out and about chatting to them. It was a massive change from sitting on board the Yukon as an FDC, only talking to other soldiers. I would sometimes just TP to other colonies as a neutral party and just chat with other factions, meeting familiar and new faces every visit. The end of my experience with Face of Mankind was when I eventually made my way up to rank 6 in the MotB, the highest rank I ever got in the game. After going to university I found myself with less and less time to play the game. I unfortunately had to hand over my role to someone else in the division as I couldn't uphold my responsibilities anymore and I let my characters fade into the collective memory of the game. What I loved about this game is that I have so many fond memories, but none of it was about game play mechanics. They were terrible but it didn't matter, the interesting parts of the game were the prison raids, the brutal battles with hundreds of other players, the times when you were approached by 3 other players in the back streets and managed to escape, the boring task of patrolling the senate and finding the bargain in the market to gloat to your friends. I look at my Steam friends list and it's full of people I've met in this game. I haven't chatted to them in over a decade now, but I'm pretty sure if we ever chatted we'd spend hours bringing up stories about the good old days we spent in FoM. It was a small insignificant game in the grand scheme of things, but it's probably left the biggest mark on me out of everything I've ever played.

Well done on your coverage! This was enthralling!

I played this game for years. I rave on about it till this day. Started playing in 2009. Thank you for making this video. So many people don't know how amazing(and horrible) this game was. 10/10 man. Was High Command for CMG(Colonization and Mining Guild) for majority of my FoM career.

I remember playing this game very briefly, but in a short time I found some friends and my own story line started to unfold. It involved me unintentionally pissing of a powerful player and my friends negotiating to stop them from hunting me down over and over!

I loved FoM. I was a prison guard when I played it when I was 15. Great memories, kicking it on TeamSpeak with my fellow guards fighting back raids and putting down escape attempts. I really miss this game.

What an amazing story and incredible game. It's really sad it ended like it did but I really hope the spiritual successor works out.

"This game is old. We're talking mid-2000s here" And I'm now very, very old xD

Pretty interesting. Reminds me of the trouble with Roleplaying in general. Costs too much time and effort, and other people ruin your fun inevitably because that's part of the freedom.

seeing my clips in this masterpiece of a recap of the game we used to love... wow.. brought back some memories for sure. and thank you for crediting 'em!!

Because of what series this video is in, I knew how this story was going to end. I knew this game was going to die. But goddamn. I repeatedly felt like there was a shot for the game to be saved, so the repeated shortcomings hurt to learn about. I genuinely hope Mankind Reborn works out. This was such a great video. Tremendous work!

Eve online being an excel spreadsheet is one of the most meta things I've seen

What might have helped in giving the playermade factions a bit of a direction would have been to make them subfactions of the old factions, so that they at least would have had a rough guideline/restriction to how they should behave, while at the same time not destroying a ton of playermade lore by erasing the old factions.

2:16 love seeing the detail of the eyes opening in shock and looking around

Teenaged me beta tested this game for all of a few days before I moved on. The lack of direction bored me. I appreciate your retrospective on it! I am really happy it created a dedicated community that loved it . Another game that had this kind of death and player-driven rebirth was "Earth and Beyond" I actually played a ton of it around this time. So many memories of that game. If you're curious, also look into the game called 10six. It was a MMO from Sega. It died and was reborn with the help of a dev & dedicated community into the game called "Project Visitor" If you already covered these games, forgive me. This is the first video I've watched of yours but you have earned a sub.

God I loved that game so much back then, yet somehow I had no memory of it until I saw the name on the video. You truly unlocked a memory that was buried as deep as the game itself.

Dear God, as soon as I heard mention of the Stanford Prison Experiment, my body just recoiled in abject terror.

Yoooo Moppy here long time vet of FoM

Face of Mankind was a game like none other. It's the only game that I dumped endless hours on and never looked back. I've stumbled upon a new/remastered version of the game launching under the name, Mankind Reborn. It's not out yet and it's been in development for awhile now. Eager to see if it will satisfy my addiction.

Remember playing this as a kid for like a few days it was so weird it felt like I was just hanging out in a train station or something for a while, nothing to do so I just left.

I don’t know why they would ever shift away from the 7 ranks being GM’s move. Like it still lets people rule the game, but allows some level of developer control.

As someone just starting out on youtube, your videos are really inspiring!

"Our game is so realistic in its simulated environment, the players actually think they are freshly recruited cannonfodder who ought to live and die at the whims of their masters." Nice pitch.

hearing about the classes reminds me of my time RPing in SWTOR in the Lords of Sokan (Sith Academy RP was HILARIOUS). Honestly, I wish more games had such awesome RP communities/features...I miss those days

I was in this game's original open beta, also in its last iterations around the time when Nexeon got involved, Harbinger (rank 7) for BoS, then later lead Moderator on the forums. I saw this come up randomly on my feed and can't wait to watch the vid.

Loved the editing with the things appearing to the side of the desk 😂

Just found you a few days ago, love your work!

@wickedwiz The mild stick animations that you've started using add a bunch to this vid and I hope you keep it up. I've been a fan from the jump and hope I keep seeing you standing in my subscribed videos.

_I was too immersed in Wiz's avatar's moments thorough the video to actually pay attention and had to rewatch it at least thrice._

I did my waiting! 12 years of it! Without a WickedWiz video! Glad to see a video tho. Never heard of this game but it seems like it had a period of time where it truly shined.

I love how these videos feel like a genuine respectful look back at failed games instead of just bashing the games

I played a merc in the first iteration, died horribly when I found out how hard it was to do, then joined the brotherhood and found possibly one of the most fun rp & raid experiences I have had for a long time. Lots of good memories.. Then in the mining guilds in the second. Love this game and its a ton of fun. Sad it died AGAIN

Love when wiz uploads

I played this game as early as 2008, through the emulator, all the way until as late as Mankind Reborn. Much like all other instances of Mankind; Reborn was doing pretty well until drama blew it up completely. There was a lot of factors, but the culmination point was about 2 years ago. In essence the game had 5-50 players online at any time. Some FoMbat veterans, some internet narcissists and some no-name gankers. Not much, but enough to have play sessions. The tipping point happened when some pretty heavy backers started getting a bit too self-righteous. Deciding that combat is what killed Mankind; but lacking any tools to control player actions, they started resorting to pretty underhanded tactics to try to maintain "the correct" environment. After a continous escalation of activity from these players, they eventually ended up getting banned. They responded about as well as you'd expect. What followed was a smear campaign from the same people. The solo dev (Bioxide) was accused of everything from as simple as stealing people's money. All the way to intentionally scaring away investors by tweeting that Mankind was an alt-right safespace.

I played during Fall of thr Dominion. I was part of some mafia-like faction that wore shirts with smiley faces on them. I was new to the game so I wasn't great at combat, but boy did I enjoy fighting for control of areas of various maps (especially the cafe/bar on one of the most populated maps) and hacking mining machines. I remember there was a faction that was fairly small but all their players were INSANELY good at combat. They always fought in the best armor and with the strongest gun (was some sort of laser gun). Their movement was so good that it was very hard to hit them. They just played to fight and often 3 of them would take on the entire LED and win. I always felt accomplished when my faction would fight them and win, although it was very rare. Lots of good memories on this game.

No way he actually went to the dystopian sci fi 🤯

Really great video! MMOs in particular are hard games to preserve so at the very least it's nice to have documentaries etc.

Thanks for this video! FoM is in my steam library and every time I scroll past it, I was wonder if you, Nerdslayer or anyone would ever make a video about it.

Such a formative game for me in my younger years, and nostalgic seeing myself on the LED Podium at 4:46. VI for life though. - Conger Wynand

Heck ya, needed some Wicked Wiz in my life today.

Was reminiscing and decided to listen to the main theme for old times sake when I stumbled across this video and I just wanted to say it's a fantastic recap of the history of a game I absolutely adore. I still wait for the day Bio puts out a message over discord letting us know Mankind Reborn is ready to go so I can lose another decade or two of my life squabbling over a random colony in deep space.

The funny comment @ 30:21 had me rolling XD "This game is something like the first Rocky movie in reverse." lmfao!

EDIT: I looked up info to remember the names of the factions and planets I had fond memories of this game, especially with how social interactions worked with the roleplaying. Heck, I even had an ongoing forum character story but now all of it is pretty much gone after they did the last reboot and purged the forums. Lots of fun though, like that one time as an senate/representative official (when they introduced that mechanic) of Vortex (started with a V), I helped my fellow senator/representative official obtain a smuggled firearm courtesy of a "pizza delivery", during a hearing with the FDC leader being questioned for basically launching a global invasion, so we could assassinate him in the room during questioning. It was also really fun sneaking into the police faction-only area and doing so simply by wearing clothing that almost looked like what the LED's "plain cloth detective" style was, just waltzing past the forcefields with good timing, lots of confidence, and a whole lot of luck. We proceeded to gun down a bunch of their leadership that were having a meeting lol. Come to think of it, for a faction that was insanely rich and existed entirely on business (I think we usually competed with Eurocore in terms of faction wealth), we seemed to enjoy spending our free time on trying to undermine every other faction for no better reason than the fun of it. Well, except those guardian chaps. We left them alone usually. I also once assassinated the leader of Eurocore after we'd had a long war when I caught him AFKing on their home planet and I was forced to write an apology letter by our faction's CEO but I wrote a passive aggressive one and became persona non grata on any worlds they controlled for a while (not that it stopped me from sneaking onto their planets to mine resources. I just brought along more health kits and bigger guns to deal with the whole "kill on sight" situation). I could go on and on reminiscing about "gas leaks" (aka aliens), police brutality, the combat "dance" I never really mastered, and the notoriety of ganking crews that made every period of time spent on resource stuff for economic activity/wealth a "keep an eye over your shoulder" situation. At the same time, lots of good people too like the time when some rando who was also active on forums recognized my character name because he'd actually read my character story and we chatted for a bit and he gave me a bunch of grenades as a gift. Or the times where the faction leadership would just hang out and chill at our home planet HQ. I also just remember the mercs. Those guys were hardcore. I wasn't good enough at the combat to ever consider joining them, but Vortex did hire them occassionally (as did basically everybody else).

ah yes the golden age of games that everyone misses so much, when they weren't even really games just chatrooms.

Great video and glad to see a new upload! You should do What went wrong with callisto protocol and forspoken at some point. Maybe the story of No man sky as well.

I just looked at some of your older videos and the fact that you've gone from a crypto/NFT/scam awareness channel to making entertaining but deep analysis on failed/failing games is pretty interesting. I definitely prefer the newer stuff but the older videos are interesting, I'm subscribed to coffeezilla and enjoy hearing the crazy shit that happens in those scams and seeing the story of them collapse under their own ego is satisfying. I'm also subbed to your wizard channel because those games are wild.

Well goddamn, here I've been struggling with studying the entire evening, but turning on this video gave me the longest uninterrupted study session today. Thank you Wiz

"Inexperienced team makes mmo" is surprisingly common it feels like.

I was part of the FDC, we used to guard the meetings with the cops when they tried to have faction sit downs. It always resulted in a raid and war that would leave the crafters running as normally peaceful halls became warzones. I miss it, good times never seen again.

Great video as always! Can't wait for the next one!

As fine an obituary as FoM could have ever hoped for *raises glass* -Xabin