Before I got into this journalism thing, I was a drama major. I’ve done a couple of musicals (even though I have the dancing skill of a couple of broken brooms duct-taped together) and directed plays. Theatre teaches you the true meaning of deadlines.

As I’ve told nervous actors time and time again: there is this fixed moment (let’s say Friday, September 10, at 8 ‘o clock) when the curtain rises. This is an immutable fact. Some stage hand will pull a cord and the audience will see whatever it is that you’ve worked on for all those months.

Whatever the audience sees then (and what will wind up in the reviews), is the proverbial ‘it’. There are no excuses, no disclaimers. If you don’t know your lines by then, God help you and the rest of your career. This makes theatre a rather stressful occupation.

Only once during my years in theatre did the curtain not go up. This was doubly painful as this was supposed to be my big break. Still a student, I managed to get a part in a big budget production of a show called ‘Jack the Ripper’. It would tour the Netherlands, and there were huge stars in the cast. I met one of Holland’s most famous singers (Ramses Shaffy) and managed to embarrass myself in front of him, as is tradition when a young actor meets someone he idolizes.

One day the producers called us all together. I remember us sitting in the theatre where we rehearsed for weeks, our heads and hearts filled with the certain knowledge that we where living the dream, only to hear that the curtain, in fact, would not go up. There were all kinds of problems: unsigned contracts, unsubstantiated verbal agreements, money problems, all the things that put the biz in showbiz. The cast, crew and writers were heartbroken. Some cried. We hugged each other. We felt something was broken forever. And I knew I had to disappoint all my friends and family. I had told them all about how wonderful this show was going to be. Told them where to reserve tickets. And obviously I bragged to my classmates that I was basically a star already. Yeah, I was really not looking forward to facing all those people.

Codemasters could not, for whatever reason, raise the curtain on Free to Play Lotro on September 10th. I imagine the community team must have uttered a few words bad enough to ban players if they would dare utter them in the forums. And I am sure each and every one of them must have felt this pit in their stomach, realizing they would have to make an announcement.

Telling the world two days before launch that things got postponed is in fact equal to raising the curtain showing an empty stage and then stepping onto it so the audience can take aim and throw their rotten tomatoes.

Now I am just as disappointed as most of the European LOTRO community (and isn’t it a little ironic that postponing F2P incites as much rage as the announcement of it?) and I haven’t a clue when (or heavens forbid, if) we will get F2P in Europe. My contacts at Codemasters stonewalled me with a firm ‘no comment’ on every question I fired at them.

But whatever the reason, and however long it takes for stuff to get settled, I hope players will realize that the people at Codemasters would not do this if they had any other option. They must have gone through a lot of frustration and pain before they stepped onto that empty stage.

Is it too much to ask to at the very least put down the tomatoes?