Today’s Shadow news is brought to you by Luc the wise (Community Lead), Malte the fabulous (German CM), and That Ryan guy aka “Text to speech guy” (US CM).
It will give you the latest update about:
- Activations (US and EU)
- Extra storage
- The US university program
- The US VR exploration program
- The shadow creator program
- followed by a Q&A session!
Don’t forget to check out the FAQ section on discord (updated every Thursday) and also Shadow’s blog article here (for Europe) and here for the US, as it is updated daily!
I) Activations & extra storage
1) Activations
a) Europe
Amsterdam data center
As of last week Shadow was on time and now they might be a little bit ahead . So anyone that should be activated in June, might actually get activated before.
Paris data center
Everyone who should have been activated until April is now activated. However, there are some specific cases, but Shadow is actively working on them to sort it out. Please contact support if you should have been activated and you’re not.
Graveline data center (Ultra and Infinite)
No news so far about the next batch planned for late summer this year. Shadow will let everybody knows as soon as there is something to say about it !
b) USA
Activations are made monday through thursday. Here is the ETA regarding activations in all 4 data centers.
California (SV2): Active Delays. (around 4-6 weeks) times vary and may be lower or higher
New York (NY1): Active Delays. (around 5-7 weeks) times vary and may be lower or higher
Chicago (CH1): Active Delays. (around 5-7 weeks) times vary and may be lower or higher
Texas (TX1): Active Delays. (around 5-7 weeks) times vary and may be lower or higher
US discord, #activation-status channel
2) Extra storage
It is sold out in the Paris data center, there is none available in Amsterdam and there is still quite a bit available in the US data centers. So far, no ETA for extra storage in Paris again, but Shadow will keep everyone up to date about it !
If you want to know more about additional storage, check out this link: Additional storage – FAQ.
II) No updates
1) Valorant
Unfortunately, Valorant is not compatible with Shadow at this time. This is due to the nature of the game’s “Vanguard” anti-cheat and how it is installed. Since Riot uses a custom anti-cheat mechanism, this makes it nearly impossible to run on virtual machines, including cloud platforms. This article might be helpful: https://www.extremetech.com/gaming/309320-riot-games-new-anti-cheat-system-runs-at-system-boot-uses-kernel-driver
2) iOS
Shadow is still trying to work around to see what they can do for the guidelines to get it back in the App Store. But they did push a small update for the test flight version that fixed a couple of crashes. Other than that, no further updates.
3) Shadow Ghost
No updates about a delivery date. Shadow is still in discussion with the factory in China and waiting for these to be shipped.
III) US programs and Race for care
1) Shadow university program
Shadow kicked it a couple of weeks ago. They received a lot of applications, around 50 to 60 teams registered. If you want more information about it, or join in, check out this link here.
If you register your team, you’ll be able to partake in the many challenges to come which will allow you to win rewards and bonuses.
2) Shadow creator program
To know more about it, please check out this link : Shadow creator program.
3) The VR exploration program
Shadow has a lot of things coming in terms of communications but all of the testings right now is under NDA as a part of a closed beta (that is why we don’t see or hear anything about it). However Shadow, as a company, would not be true to its spirit if it did not share this journey with you, and so it has been working on plans for that.
Expect a whole lot of news in the coming month regarding the VR exploration program ( what it takes to develop, who’s involved, the challenges and hurdles that might have caused problems, etc.)
4) Race for care
It is an inter-corporation tournament, which goal it to raise money for the charitable organisation : Prtège ton soignant.
Shadow has participated in this charity event right after the Shadow news. 4 members of the company joined in to raise money for the charitable organisation : Protège ton soignant.
If you’d like to know more about it check out this links :
Q & A
Q: Is there a way to get the Ultra and Infinite offers at a lower price ?
A: Yes, through the referral program.
Q: Why can’t we set up our account before purchasing Shadow?
A: Internally we have discussed this before and it was talked about with the Web team & the product team. But right now, it’s not in the plans. There is no reason why or why not, I think it’s more of a technical feasibility. But right now we’re prioritizing having the account for shadow users first whenever they are activated
Q: What is the average response time for support?
A: I don’t have an exact response time, because it fluctuates quite often based on the demand. But again, given the whole COVID-19 situation, we’ve seen a big increase in shadow usage, both in orders and in just plain usage. So that means more questions and more tickets to support. So right now, I think it’s at least a week
Q: IS there a chance to end the 30-minute window for the hibernation mechanism?
A: That was put into place during this COVID-19 situation because we want to be able to free up as many Shadows as possible for all of you. So given the recent spike in usage, because everyone is confined at home, we found it necessary to put that in place. However, the good news is that it is only temporary, so once we get out of confinement we will extend it back to its regular time!
Q: Why can’t I use a VPN in Shadow?
A: To know more about it, check out this article : https://help.shadow.tech/hc/en-gb/articles/360016430454-Can-I-use-a-VPN-with-Shadow-
Q: How does your personal setup look like at home?
A: You can find out in this article we wrote: Quarantine gaming break
Please listen to the last 10ish minutes of the live to see Luc, Malte, and Ryan talk about how they managed things during COVID-19 and how it is to work at Shadow!