[JAN 2010] Special Mention Mars2025 : An Overview

From a distance, the reddish-brown clay surface of the aptly named 'Red Planet' looks its part as a uniform landscape stretching out beyond the line of sight -

- but in actual fact, Mars is anything BUT uniform...

Divided into 5 major servers by the central government, Mars boasts a unique time-management system unrivalled by any other. Mars Board of Directors' spokesperson and Head of the Migration Operations Department (MODs), Jeweler, has revealed the use of STDs (Space-Time Distortion Splitters) to manage the mind-bending feat of seperately scheduling and controlling the time for all 5 divisions. He refused to divulge further information, choosing instead to claim that whatever decisions the board made or whatever technology they brought in, it would be for the general good of Mars as a whole.

Jeweler did, however, agree to confirm several facts regarding the different servers. The biggest and most densely populated server by far, the alliance server has a set* length of 2 Earth months and a day-span of approximately 20 Earth minutes, which is the second longest of all the servers. A bigger area of land had to be set aside for this server because of the potential demand due to clans establishing their HeadQuarters and branches.

Located right next to it, the Primary server, designed to be the focal point of residents (but generally less populated than its Alliance counterpart) has an equal set length (2 Earth months) but a longer day-span of 30 Earth minutes. The Tournament server is further divided into 3 subsectors A, B, and C. All of them have a set length of only 1 Earth month, and day-spans of 25 minutes each. Managed via a regular tournament ladder ranking system, residents are posted into the three division according to their scores from the previous set to better encourage competition and provide a place for the newer players to pick up experience.

One of the servers experiencing recent growth and interest is the Time Shift server. It possesses the longest set length at 3 Earth months, but also the longest day-span as well (30 Earth minutes). And Jeweler stressed that in this server, time would function as a continuous flow similar to that on Earth, as compared to the other servers which ran on a day-by-day framework basis.

Lastly, the controversial Express server. Specifically constructed to allow speed-seekers to engage in fast paced dogfights or for strategy development and research purposes, the Express server offers residents a relatively short day-span of 1 Earth minute, enabling much quicker progress. The original set length was set at 2 Earth days, but recently there have been progressively more sightings of a longer 9-day set, and even a then-seemingly-endless 2 MONTH long set.

Seemingly confusing at first glance, this innovative system provides sufficient options for a wide range of audiences, and is one of the reasons Mars is flourishing as it is today.

*years on Mars are referred to as 'sets'