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Guild Software's space-combat MMORPG Vendetta Online is now allowing subscribers to directly participate in the development of new content for the game's universe. The developer has launched its new "Player Contribution Corps", a community of game subscribers with access to building and testing new missions, creating new user-interface features with direct access to source code, as well as other avenues of content creation.

The mission editor permits players to autonomously build and test new scenarios on the official Vendetta Online test-server. Once completed, the missions may be submitted to the greater "PCC" community for review and feedback, the completion of which sends them on to the development staff for final approval and placement in the production game universe.

"We're very excited about this new community of involved players," commented John Bergman, CEO of Guild Software. "For some gamers, the attraction of creating new content, telling stories of their own and watching others respond to them, can outweigh even the fun of playing the games themselves. We hope to give this group an outlet with our new PCC community." Unlike some of the few other MMOs offering degrees of player-created content, all development approved for the Vendetta Online universe must stay within the context of the established backstory. "We see it as a bit like Lucas's 'Expanded Universe'," Bergman continued.

"We have provided a backdrop of history, politics and war that has given rise to the current galaxy; our players are welcome to tell their own stories within that framework." Since development began on the "PCC" and editor in 2006, close to a thousand missions have been built by users beta-testing the system. "People have constructed trees of elaborate espionage missions, large space battles, all sorts of different scenarios, many of which have been propagated into the production game," said Bergman.

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