We're releasing names of inactive clubs
Rasmus Rønn Nielsen, The Dudes
16 February 2012, 10:33
Since the beginning of Virtual Manager back in 2005, about one million managers have signed up! That's crazy!
The majority of these managers are no longer active. Still, they are blocking other people from using their club's name.
For example, a club named "The Happy Sailors" will prevent other people from using this name even though he/she hasn't been online for years.
But now, we're releasing names of inactive clubs!
Clubs of managers who have not been online for three years, will from now become "deactivated". This will release their names, so you and your friends can use them!
This means, that names such as "Manchester United", "Real Madrid", and "Liverpool FC" is available right now.
So if you've been considering a name change, now might be a good time to make it happen. You can apply for a name change by clicking Account (upper right corner) > My club profile > Change club name.
Even though 20 people applies for "Manchester United", there'll only be one club that gets the name. Who this'll be is 100% random. We think it's most fair this way.
We've temporarily paused the name change validation process. We'll resume this on Monday. This means that everybody will have a fair amount of thinking time before applying for a new name.
You should apply before Monday, if you'll increase your chances of getting one of the popular names.
To give every one a chance of getting one of these newly released names, we've temporarily removed the "only one name change every 180 days" rule.
Comments
Oh, a quick note: We've discovered a problem with the "apply for a new name page". It appears to think that "Liverpööl FC" and "Liverpool FC" is the same - which isn't letting you apply for "Liverpool FC" even though it is available.
We're working on this issue! A fix will be online very soon!
1 - How often will this "cleanup" process take place? There are clubs that have been inactive for, say, 2 and a half years, and in six months time they would have been inactive for 3 years. Will their name therefore become "cleaned" up?
2 - What happens if any of these managers who have not played for over 3 years decide to return to the game?
3 - What happens to the player history? A player who was 15 four years ago will only be about 63 now and thus will still be part of the game as a trainer. I have trainers that are over 65 and thus may possibly have history with a club that will be due for a "cleanup"?
Thanks again Rasmus. A small but positive change to the game.
2) They'll have start a new club.
3) That is why we "deactivate" the clubs rather than delete them. If a club is deleted it'll say "(Deleted)" or the employees history.
Please read my comment above - this is due to a small bug that we're currently working on fixing
Yup, that should be another brownie point for you.
Im liking somone elses idea of cleaning up quicker, say 2 years, rather than 3 years. But this has only just been introduced and as such should be allowed the time to settle down.
I dont think it will have a major impact on the game as we probably wont see most of these clubs with the desirable names, and even then, so many clubs have found ways to have an "almost" name, such as Wycombe Wanderers, Wycombe Wanderers FC, FC Wycombe Wanderers, etc etc. Im still preferring club names that are original and enable you to create a unique history.
A bit like mine
As mentioned in the bottom of the post, you should be able to apply for a new name even though you have changed your name recently.
Please check it. If it really don't work, please file a bug report.
I was inactive for 2 years, I wouldn't want to come back and start from scratch.
(TIME TO MAKE A NEW ACCOUNT!
PS: Jk ;D