15 years ago today, the PlayStation Network went offline and didn’t come back for over 3 weeks

Today is April 20, a holiday that many celebrate the world over by sparking up and having a smoke-up. But for me, it’s a bit more somber.

It marks the 15th anniversary of one of the darkest days in PlayStation history. On this date in 2011, Sony was forced to take the PS3’s PlayStation Network offline due to an “external intrusion” and data breach affecting over 77 million accounts. The infamous 2011 PSN hack.

I remember where I was. It was my senior year in college, and I was working diligently on my thesis while still attending classes. My thesis was a Call of Duty feature where I interviewed people and wrote about the game’s future, so gaming was actually pretty important when it came to my academic career at the time.

But most importantly, April 20, 2011, was the day after Mortal Kombat 9 released, and I couldn’t play the damn game online anymore. I was livid. My PS3 felt neutered. I was so excited to enjoy the new fighting game that brought the series back to its roots, and I couldn’t bring my Raiden or Reptile into the online arena anymore. I couldn’t even play Black Ops 1, which was crucial to my writing work at the time.

This feeling went on for weeks. WEEKS. 24 days, to be exact, is how long PSN was offline. That seems unimaginable now, and trust me, it was back then, too. The hack that forced Sony to bring everything down exposed information like usernames, physical addresses, email addresses, dates of birth, passwords, and financial details, so it was a big deal.

It was made an even bigger deal by the fact that Sony did not announce right away that there was an external breach to warn users that their info may have been compromised. PSN went down on April 20 after the hack apparently took place from April 17 to 19, but the company didn’t make mention of any breach until April 22.

“There’s a difference in timing between when we identified there was an intrusion and when we learned of consumers’ data being compromised,” Sony said on April 26. “We learned there was an intrusion April 19th and subsequently shut the services down. We then brought in outside experts to help us learn how the intrusion occurred and to conduct an investigation to determine the nature and scope of the incident. It was necessary to conduct several days of forensic analysis, and it took our experts until yesterday to understand the scope of the breach. We then shared that information with our consumers and announced it publicly this afternoon.”

For those of us old or aware enough to remember, this was a pretty wild time in the gaming community. Many were freaking out that their info had been stolen, while Xbox players were gloating about the fact that they could still play online during the once-rampant fanboy wars.

Sony soon announced “compensation” for users who were affected, which included the choice of two PS3 games and two PSP games from a predetermined list, along with 30 days of free PS Plus. I chose Wipeout HD/Fury and LittleBigPlanet, because I owned the other options (InFamous, Dead Nation, and Super Stardust HD). Hey, a couple free games were quite alright by me.

Later that year, Sony announced that there was “no confirmed evidence any credit card or personal information” was being “misused.” So, when the dust cleared, the outage for me just meant a long time without online gaming, which gave me a good chance to finish Mortal Kombat’s story mode and practice a lot against the CPU.

Are you old enough to remember the great PSN hack of 2011, or do you live without back pain?

The post 15 years ago today, the PlayStation Network went offline and didn’t come back for over 3 weeks appeared first on Destructoid.

Fate of the Prophets is one of the more advanced side quests you can complete in Windrose. The recommended player level is 14, so you’ll have to do a fair bit of in-game grind to gain access to the quest.

Let’s look at how to solve all the tasks of this quest in Windrose.

Windrose Fate of the Prophets quest walkthrough

The crux of the quest is about exploring the ancient observatories.

Stargazer Tower (First Stargazer)
Ancient Observatory
Warlord’s death site

Travel to the Stargazer Tower (position will have a marker) and reach its inner sanctum. You’ll have to solve the puzzle to open the secret room. Head inside and interact with the Observatory Stele to find out what happened with the first Stargazer.

The second one is in an ancient observatory that’s located southeast of the Stargazer Tower. Follow the marker, and clear all enemies you can find in the area. Solve the puzzle, and reach the inner sanctum. Interact with the second Observatory Stele to find out what happened to the second Stargazer.

Follow the marker and head north to find another observatory. The basic ritual is the same: kill the enemies, head to the inner sanctum, and interact with the Observatory Stele to find out what happened with the third Stargazer.

Finally, travel to the warlord’s death site, but there won’t be anything to note. Instead, you’ll need to defeat Chick Chan. It’s not the hardest of bosses, but it has a massive health pool. Hence, you’ll inevitably take damage from its attacks. Just stock some healing items, and you should be good to go. Once Chick Chan is defeated, it will end Fate of the Prophets, and you’ll get the following rewards.