Decipher.com

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Home page, 1 March 2000.
Lobby, January 1998.

Decipher.com was the official website of Decipher, the publisher of the Star Wars Customizable Card Game. It went online in 1996 and carried news, rules, card lists, contests, tournament information, message boards and mailing lists for Decipher's games. The Star Wars CCG section stopped changing after Decipher's license ended on 31 December 2001 and stayed online as an archive until about 2008. From 2005 the address forwarded to other Decipher sites, and since 2014 it has shown a single page about How to Host a Murder.

History

1996–1999: the lobby

The earliest archived copy of the site is from 2 November 1996, on the host games.decipher.com; www.decipher.com was first archived on 21 November 1996.[1] The first page was a splash screen with the slogan "The Art of Great Games", recommending Netscape Navigator and plug-ins for animation and video.

Behind the splash page was a "lobby" with image-map navigation. It led to six areas: The Galleries, Star Wars Customizable Cards, Star Trek:TNG Customizable Cards, Decipher Shop, Inside Decipher and Decipher's West Wing.[2] The West Wing covered Decipher's party games and was renamed the East Wing by June 1997.[3] In 1998 the lobby added a Welcome Center, search, help, a "new" page and a Question of the Day.[4]

  • Splash screen, November 1996.
    Splash screen, November 1996.
  • Lobby, December 1996.
    Lobby, December 1996.
  • Lobby, January 1998.
    Lobby, January 1998.
  • Inside Decipher, December 1996.
    Inside Decipher, December 1996.

1999–2002: DECIPHER.com

In 1999 the site was redesigned as "DECIPHER.com", with a top bar linking each game, Help, About Decipher, Art Show, Tournaments, Message Boards, The Eccentric Order and the Party Zone.[5] Each game area had the same sub-sections: what is it?, rules, deck designs, card lists, strategy, fun and where to buy. In 2000 the home page listed Star Trek CCG, Star Wars CCG, Young Jedi CCG and Austin Powers CCG.[6] Jedi Knights TCG was added in 2001, along with Terms and Usage and Privacy Notice links.[7] By March 2002 The Lord of the Rings led the navigation.[8]

  • Site navigation, March 2000.
    Site navigation, March 2000.
  • Home-page feature, 29 February 2000.
    Home-page feature, 29 February 2000.
  • Home page, June 2001.
    Home page, June 2001.

2002–2005: Lord of the Rings and new games

Home page, January 2003.

From 2003 news moved to a /content/ folder. The home page covered The Lord of the Rings TCG and RPG, Star Trek CCG Second Edition and RPG and the Party Zone. It linked to the online store, Decipher Online and the DGMA tournament site.[9] In 2004 it added .hack//ENEMY, MegaMan NT Warrior and Beyblade.[10] By January 2005 WARS TCG led the page and many links pointed to the fanhq.com domain.[11]

2005 onward

How to Host a Murder page, 2014.

In April 2005 the home page began forwarding visitors to decipher.fanHQ.com, which lasted until early 2008.[12] In April 2008 the address pointed to a Fight Klub blog, and in 2009 the home page announced Fight Klub with the line "Decipher reinvents the Trading Card Game".[13] From 2010 the home page was the Fight Klub site itself.[14] Since 2014 the site has shown one page for How to Host a Murder.[15] As of 2026 it links to that line at Cryptozoic.[16]

Star Wars CCG section

Main article: Decipher.com Star Wars CCG

From 1996 to 2001 the Star Wars CCG section was the largest part of the site. The Internet Archive holds about 227,000 unique URLs under decipher.com and its subdomains, about 19,000 of them under /starwars/, most of them one-page-per-card card lists. After the license ended the section stayed online as an archive until about 2008.

Other areas

  • Inside Decipher (1996), later About Decipher, had company philosophy, staff contacts and legal information.[17]
  • West Wing / East Wing (1996–1999), later Party Zone (1999), covered How to Host a Murder, Stir Crazy, Pente and Decipher's other party and family games.[18]
  • Decipher Shop (1996) sent electronic postcards and sold promotional cards by mail; a full online store opened later at shop.decipher.com.
  • Question of the Day, Event Calendar, Product Calendar, Archives and a Volunteer Area appear in the 1999 site map.[5]

News

From 1996 to early 1999 news appeared under News and Highlights (/newsandhighlights/), as the Decipher NewsFlash, with older stories moved to Inside Decipher archives and, from 1999, to /archives/.[19] From April 1999 to 2004 news ran under /newsflash/, and from 2003 to 2005 under /content/.

On 9 February 1998 Decipher announced an exclusive worldwide license for collectible card game rights to the Star Wars prequels. The deal also extended the Star Wars CCG license "into the next millennium". Holland said Decipher would use rights to Shadows of the Empire, novels and computer games for CGI cards.[20] In February 1998 a Cloud City Month NewsFlash Special offered articles, deck designs, contests, live online games and Cloud City scenario tournaments run by Squadron members. First prize was a Cloud City poster signed by Jeremy Bulloch.[21] See also Cloud City Celebration.

Galleries and Art Show

Main article: Decipher.com Galleries

The Galleries (/thegalleries/, 1996–1999) and its successor Art Show (/artshow/, 1999–2004) showed how Decipher's studio artists made card art. Exhibits included Future History prototype packaging, Easter eggs in card art, Creating Reality ship models, and a QuickTime VR tour of Decipher's New York Toy Fair showroom.

Contests

Main article: Decipher.com contests

The site ran card-title puzzles, website Easter egg hunts and fan design contests from 1996. They included the 1996 Hoth Contest, the 1997 Dagobah Contest and Design a Card contest, and a 1999 Endor hidden-cards contest.

World Championship coverage

Main article: DecipherCon website

DecipherCon 2000 site, 2000.

The DECIPHER Calendar (/calendars/, 1999–2002) carried the qualification rules for the 1999 World Championships.[22][23] It also hosted the DecipherCon 1999 site, with finalist pages and RealAudio play-by-play. In the final Gary Carman beat Steven Lewis.[24]

The DecipherCon 2000 site (/deciphercon/2000/) had a live camera, message boards, photos, reports and more than 20 RealAudio "Sound Bytes" interviews.[25][26] Decipher streamed the championship finals as RealVideo in 20 kb and 80 kb versions. The Star Wars CCG final was the two-game match between Matt Sokol and Yannick Lapointe, posted with both players' decks.[27]

Radio Free Decipher (/rfd/, 1998–2003) was a RealAudio show, hosted in 1999 by Carol Wisely. It billed itself as "the authentic voice of Decipher's Young Jedi and Star Trek and Star Wars Customizable Card Games and the people who make them".[28]

Message boards

Message Boards logo, 1999.

Decipher's first bulletin boards (/bbs-master/, 1996–1997) were threaded boards, including Star Wars CCG discussion (swccg-bbs), trading (swccg-mkt-bbs), tournament, "buzz", special and world boards.[29] About 1,500 pages of the SWCCG board survive in the Internet Archive. From 1999 the boards were CGI forums on calder.decipher.com, with discussion, trading, auction, off-topic and deck-design boards for each game.[30] In 2004 they moved to phpBB forums at forums.decipher.com.[31]

Volunteers

The /volunteers/ area (1999–2009) listed Squadron tournament volunteers and Ambassadors by region. The Star Wars CCG regions were named after planets, such as Coruscant, Dagobah, Endor, Hoth: Ice Plains and Tatooine.

Mailing lists

Main article: Decipher mailing lists

From 1996 Decipher ran e-mail lists through majordomo@decipher.com, including decipher-announce, swccg-discussion and swccg-marketplace, each with a digest version.[32] swccg-discussion, the main e-mail forum for the game, carried about 67,000 messages between January 1997 and December 1998.[33] Around 2002 the lists moved to a GNU Mailman server at lists.decipher.com, whose archives were open only to members.[34] The surviving messages are indexed on Decipher swccg-discussion list archive.

Downloads

Main article: Decipher.com downloads

Decipher.com offered chat software, desktop wallpapers, QuickTime movies, Shockwave contest puzzles and RealAudio and RealMedia webcasts, plus printable card lists, rules and tournament forms. Many of these files survive in the Internet Archive; the Palace chat installers do not.

Subdomains and servers

See also

References

  1. ↑ Welcome to Decipher Inc., Decipher (November 1996). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  2. ↑ Welcome To Decipher!, Decipher (December 1996). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  3. ↑ Welcome To Decipher's East Wing!, Decipher (June 1997). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  4. ↑ Welcome To Decipher!, Decipher (January 1998). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 DECIPHER.com: Site Map, Decipher (September 1999). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  6. ↑ Welcome to DECIPHER.com!, Decipher (March 2000). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  7. ↑ Welcome To DECIPHER.com, Decipher (June 2001). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  8. ↑ Welcome To DECIPHER.com, Decipher (March 2002). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  9. ↑ Welcome To DECIPHER.com, Decipher (January 2003). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  10. ↑ Welcome To DECIPHER.com, Decipher (January 2004). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  11. ↑ Welcome To DECIPHER.com, Decipher (January 2005). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  12. ↑ Welcome To DECIPHER.com, Decipher (April 2005). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  13. ↑ FightKlūb: Home, Decipher (January 2009). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  14. ↑ Fight Klūb, Decipher (December 2010). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  15. ↑ Decipher, Decipher (March 2014). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  16. ↑ Decipher, Decipher (March 2026). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  17. ↑ Inside Decipher, Decipher (December 1996). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  18. ↑ Welcome To The Decipher Party Zone!, Decipher (March 2000). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  19. ↑ Decipher NewsFlash For November - December 1996, Decipher (December 1996). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  20. ↑ The Future of Star Wars CCG, Decipher (9 February 1998). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  21. ↑ NewsFlash Special: Cloud City Month, Decipher (February 1998). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  22. ↑ Welcome to the 1999 World Championships!, Decipher (1999). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  23. ↑ 1999 Star Wars CCG World Championship Details, Decipher (1999). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  24. ↑ Meet the 1999 Star Wars CCG World Championship Finalists, Decipher (1999). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  25. ↑ DecipherCon 2000, Decipher (2000). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  26. ↑ DecipherCon 2000: Sound Bytes, Decipher (2000). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  27. ↑ Championship Finals Videos, Decipher (2000). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  28. ↑ Radio Free Decipher, Decipher (27 September 1999). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  29. ↑ Bulletin Boards: Star Wars CCG, Decipher (December 1996). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  30. ↑ DECIPHER.com: Message Boards, Decipher (September 1999). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  31. ↑ Message Boards :: Index, Decipher (June 2004). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  32. ↑ Dialog: Listserv, Decipher (December 1998). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  33. ↑ swccg-discussion messages, eGroups (1999). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  34. ↑ Swccg-discussion Info Page, Decipher (2002). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  35. ↑ Enterprise Home Page, Decipher (December 1998). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  36. ↑ Welcome To DECIPHER.com, Decipher (April 2001). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  37. ↑ Welcome To The Eccentric Order!, Decipher (December 1997). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  38. ↑ Decipher's Star Trek CCG Online, Decipher (February 2001). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  39. ↑ Decipher TCG Tournaments, Decipher (November 2001). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  40. ↑ Welcome to The Decipher Store, Decipher (March 2002). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  41. ↑ Decipher Online Gaming, Decipher (November 2002). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  42. ↑ Decipher for Prize Support, Decipher (October 2003). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
  43. ↑ Happy Holidays!, Decipher (December 2007). Preserved copy: Internet Archive
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