SW City History

The entire real life history of SW City is documented on this page. You can browse the history by year.

199719981999200020012002200320042005200620072008
200920102011201320142015201620192020202220232024

1997top

SCARAB (1997)

April

  • The shooter PC game SCARAB is released worldwide.

1998top

February

  • SW Comit forms the clan Scarab Warriors on the online game matchmaking service Mplayer to play SCARAB. The clan grew to 50 concurrent members over its lifetime.

May or June

  • SW Comit discovers Activeworlds and the Scarab Warriors spend the rest of the year building several tourist towns using free Activeworlds tourist accounts. Since anyone can delete property built by tourists, they try to hide each town, but most were eventually ruined by griefers. There were 7 total built between 1998 and the founding of the current-day SW City in March 1999.

July - November

  • SW Chris joins the Scarab Warriors sometime during the latter half of the year after meeting SW Comit (a.k.a. "Meanmallow" lol) on the Nintendo forums posting about how cool it would be to have a Nintendo character fighting game. Super Smash Bros. would be released the following year.
  • SW Chris discovers Activeworlds through SW Comit and helps build one of the Scarab Warriors' tourist towns.

1999top

January - March

  • The Scarab Warriors continue building tourist towns using free Activeworlds tourist accounts. Most were eventually ruined by griefers. There were 7 total built between 1998 and the founding of the current-day SW City in March 1999.

February 26th

  • Captain MAD Mike immigrates to Activeworlds; citizen number 295187.

March 24th

  • Old SW City (the 7th and final tourist SW City) is founded by SW Comit by dragging an object from a nearby town. (NOTE: We tried to determine the town, thinking at first it was Pink Village, and then later Pippenville, but Old SW City predates Pippenville.)

March 26th

  • SW Comit immigrates to Activeworlds; citizen number 297649.

Old Town Square near SW Pub

March 28th

  • SW City is founded by SW Comit, SW Kila (Sojiurn), SW Nitro Excell and SW Magnum.

March 30th

  • Old Town Square built by SW Kila (Sojiurn). It contains bot stands for Flint, Misty, and Jack and a water fountain, as well as a list of SW members' email addresses and names on mailbox objects.

August 12th

  • SW Comit, leader of the Scarab Warriors, resigns after a year and a half to spend more time building SW City in Activeworlds. SW Nitro Excell takes over leadership of the Scarab Warriors.

August 29th

  • SW Chris immigrates to Activeworlds; citizen number 306637.

August - November

  • Sometime during this period, SW Nitro Excell and SW Magnum leave Activeworlds.

October 8th

  • Syntax immigrates to Activeworlds; citizen number 308403.

November

  • Sometime in November, SW Kila changes his name to Sojiurn. Shortly after he leaves Scarab Warriors and Activeworlds.

Syntax Manor, 1999

November 19th

  • Syntax Manor is started.

November 20th

  • Syntax Estates is founded by Syntax.
  • Teddy's Friendly Community is founded by Teddy Man Soft.

2000top
  • The Scarab Warriors clan disbands sometime during this year.

July 9th

  • Palm Grove is founded by Captain MAD Mike.
  • Oceanside Community is founded by MrJohn.

July 10th

  • The first version of the SW City Website is launched. It features orange colors with a street sign navigation bar.

July 18th

  • The first issue of City Life is released by SW Comit.

August ??th

  • Oceanside is destroyed after a fight over a cheese log. >_<

September 10th


UTN Town of the Month

October 1st

  • First SW City Subway Station is built in Palm Grove near the Baseball Field.

October 15th

  • "SWeeet City" Movie premiered in AWCC at 10s 32e on October 15th, 2000 and was played until November 15th, 2000.

December 1st

  • SW City is the Universal Town Network (UTN) Town of the Month.

2001top

January 19th

March 24th

  • SW City turns 2 years old.

April 1st

  • SW City 2nd Birthday Bash kicks off!
    • ScRaM, an event by Lanezeri, is replaced with Trivia due to Lanezeri's departure from Activeworlds. It's held in Syntax Estate's Trivia Arena. Captain MAD Mike, Legion, and others camp out on the roof of the arena. American Police wins the contest!
      • 1st: American Police with 96 points.
      • 2nd: Master Penguin with 50 points.
      • 3rd: Rossyboy with 21 points.
      • 4th: Legion with 14 points.
      • 5th: Syntax with 2 points.
      • 5th: Captain MAD Mike with 2 points.
    • During the 2nd birthday bash, SW City residents discover the O_O emoji, which becomes an integral part of SW City's meme culture. (Conjecture based upon the "SW City's 2nd Birthday Bash: The Year of the O_O" exhibit title, located in downtown James River.)

April 2nd

  • Events continue for SW City's 2nd Birthday Bash.
    • The Best Builds tour kicks off at SW City Town Square. The guided tour by SW City's staff took visitors through 7 unique builds. Attendees were American Police, Captain MAD Mike, Diane, Event Horizon, Faero, ig0r, NeoFox, Rossyboy, S p a r k, SW Comit, SW Chris, Syntax, and "Twix" (the quotes denote a free tourist account). The locations visited were:

April 3rd

  • Events continue for SW City's 2nd Birthday Bash.
    • Wacky Races, a precursor to parkour found in games like Minecraft and Roblox, are held at the Wacky Races courses at the top of James River Falls.
      • 1st: Rynhorn with 15 points.
      • 2nd: Master Penguin with 8 points.
      • 3rd: TheDevil with 4 points.
      • 4th: Captain Pilot with 3 points.
      • 5th: Raider360 with 1 point.
      • 5th: Snobordr63 with 1 point.

April 4th

  • SW City's 2nd Birthday Bash continues.
    • Sports Night doesn't take place even though it was scheduled to be part of the 2nd Birthday Bash. However, several people did show up to play Tennis, including Riggo and Rynhorn.

April 5th

  • SW City's 2nd Birthday Bash continues.
    • The paintball event, scheduled as part of the 2nd Birthday Bash, is cancelled.

April 6th

  • Events continue for SW City's 2nd Birthday Bash.
    • The 2nd Birthday Bash Building contest takes place. The attendees are Angemon, Austin 2001, Brent, Captain MAD Mike, Castilion, Chewygoldfish, Red XIII, Rossyboy, SSJ Gohan, SW Comit, Syntax, The Creator, "Dan", and "OniLink" (the quotes denote a free tourist account).
    • OniLink immigrates to Activeworlds after winning a citizenship by placing in the 2nd Birthday Bash building contest: citizen number 335093. (conjecture based on the "SW City's 2nd Birthday Bash: The Year of the O_O" exhibit located in downtown James River.)
    • The closing ceremonies are held immediately after the building contest, which featured a fireworks show set to MIDI music. The Attendees were Rynhorn, Devil Cat, Rossyboy, Silent Assassin, Vornox, Castilion, The Creator, Captain MAD Mike, Archergirl, OniLink, Chewygoldfish, n a y R, and RedXIII.

April 7th

  • SW City 2nd Birthday Bash ends.

June 25th

  • Saddle Creek founded by OniLink. It's named the first public sector (suburb) of SW City.

August 8th

August 11th

  • Silver Valley founded as a public sector by Nutinmuch.
  • Syntax wins a CY Award for www.swcity.net in the category of best AW Themed website.

August 31st

  • Old SW City Hall near SW City GZ is destroyed. New City Hall built at 2328s 3830e.

SW City's first City Hall

September 28th

  • New SW City website design released. (Blue and black colors)

October 6th

  • Silver Valley suburb upgraded to subcommunity status. Nutinmuch becomes a manager.

October 14th

October 24th

December 23rd

  • "Public Sector" name changed to "Suburb" in Forum poll.

2002top
  • Sometime this year, Ferruccio discovers SW City and begins building there.
  • Sometime between January and April, Rae goes AWOL and leaves SW City.

January 5th

  • A proposal by Syntax to make SW City an island (build a huge body of water around it) was brought up. Construction starts on the "ocean."

January 14th

  • After over a weeks' worth of work building shores and making water, the ocean is completed!

January 18th

  • The ocean completed 4 days earlier is named Irenic Ocean, meaning 'peaceful ocean'.

March 16th

  • Newspro installed on the website. Core staff members can now post news on the main page of the website easily.

March 18th

  • SW Chris releases the first SW City Newsletter. It features articles on the impending mayor resignation, third birthday bash, Embassy Row and Temps Island.

March 24th

  • SW City 3rd Birthday bash kicks off! SW City turns 3 years old!

March 25th


SW Comit resigns as SW City Mayor

March 26th

  • SW City 3rd Birthdy bash ends.
    • SW Comit, mayor of SW City for 3 years, resigns. SW Comit hands down mayor duties to Syntax.
    • Saddle Creek also upgraded to subcommunity status. OniLink promoted to Manager.

April 27th

  • Vornox's viceroy lot Cypris Creek gets promoted to "Suburb" status. It is the third citizen-built area to become a suburb (formerly called public sectors). It is also annexed by Central District due to Rae's inactivity.
  • Ridge District is absorbed into Central District due to Rae's inactivity.

May 8th

  • SW City Ground Zero revamped by Syntax. The very first SW City Ground Zero is demolished and a new Ground Zero, which contains the monorail track, wooden towers and pink/orange tiling is built.

July 9th

  • SW City Charter is approved by all four staff members and is released to the public.

July 26th

  • Cypris Creek promoted to subcommunity status! A party is thrown for Vornox on Flangton Island.

August 3rd

  • Espilae immigrates to Activeworlds: citizen number 349220.

August 5th

  • Espilae is discovered in SW City Town Square and is invited to a build raising. The theme is a biodome, which is built in James River. Sometime between now and December, he is granted a Viceroy which he names the Esperion Isles.

August 21st

  • Rossyboy founds a new SW City Newspaper: Poppage Press.

August 31st

  • SW City is graced with 4 CY Nominations!
    • SW City for Community Development in Architecture/Urban Planning/Design.
    • 3rd Birthday Bash for Community Initiative in Community Groups/Activities and Events.
    • SW City for Community Initiative for a Community or Town!
    • Mango Land for Creative Vision & Application Environment Design in a Public Building World.

September 2nd

  • SW City's UTN Subnetwork "Republic" opens to the public!

Pre-CY Awards Party at Uncle Nitros, 2002

October 26th

  • SW City Pre-Cy Party 2002 kicks off at SW City Town Square at 6pm VRT. Moves to Uncle Nitro's Bar and Grill in Central SW City.
  • CY Ceremony starts at 7pm VRT. SW City wins two more CY Awards over the course of the night!
  • Praxten Oil Rig built by SW Comit wins in the category of Community Development in Architecture/Urban Planning/Design.
  • SW City wins in the category of Community Initiative for a Community or Town

October 30th

  • Eastern Ocean Expansion completed. Skexis River, which stretches nearly 600 coords from the expansion to Cougar lake has also been completed. Besburn River, which will extend over 13000 coordinates to Horizon City, is also started.

December 12th

  • A build raising is held! The theme is a city which was demolished by a meteor. This area is built near the Pelma meteor on Sybit Island. AW 1457S 3672E 270

December 14th

  • Espilae's island named Esperion Isles is promoted to suburb status and joins the Palm District, becoming the first suburb to join that district.

2003top

January 14th

February 3rd

  • The CY statue for SW City's "Best Town/Community" Award is finally placed south of SW City Ground Zero.

March 24th

  • SW City 4th Birthday bash kicks off with two building contests.
  • SW City turns 4 years old!

March 28th

  • SW City 4th Birthday Bash continues at 6PM VRT with Wacky Races, Games Night and the Amazing SW Race (a spinoff of the CBS TV show "The Amazing Race").

March 29th

  • SW City 4th Birthday Bash ends.

July 28th

  • www.SWCity.net is transferred from Namezero (domain forwarding) to Godaddy, which is a domain host. SW City Staff dumps Tripod accounts and uses this as the main server to host pictures, midis and wavs.

August 8th

  • SW City debuts their very own radio show. SW Chris, SW Comit, Goober King and Captain MAD Mike participate in discussing such things as AW v3.4, AWRPG and thumb drives.

August 22nd

  • A new suburb is created by Ferruccio named Castle Pines. It is located on SW City's second biggest island, Sybit Island.

September 9th

October 20th

  • SW City Radio episode two is released. Syntax, Captain MAD Mike, Goober King and Archergirl discuss such matters like the addition of tourist access and Z-axis rotation in Alphaworld, the death of the community and Pineriver's latest AW video.

November 9th

2004top

January 22nd

  • Screenshots of various areas from each District are added to their respective District pages on www.swcity.net.

March 8th

  • Syntax and SW Comit double the size of Besburn River, making it over halfway on it's journey to Horizon City.

March 24th

  • SW City turns 5 years old! SW City's 5th Birthday Bash starts with a Historical Tour around old SW City by SW Comit at 10pm VRT. The Syntax Estates' Sculpture Building contest also starts at this time.

5th Bday Bash: Town Square

March 26th

  • SW City's 5th Birthday Bash officially kicks off with SW Comit's fireworks infront of the New City Hall located beside Mount SW and King Khalid Airport. The universe message advertises SW City's 5th Birthday Bash for a few minutes, which draws in a huge crowd. 40+ people show up at SW City Town Square for fireworks.
    • The Alphaworld sky is turned to night and a world message is set to Alphaworld. "Immigration Officer: Welcome to Alphaworld! :) The largest building world in Cyberspace! Join SW City as they celebrate their 5th birthday. Complete details at: http://swcity.net/birthday.htm."
    • New SW City Hall is opened to the public after a short speech by Syntax. A red ribbon is cut to symbolize the opening of the new hall. Very large attendance here.
    • Core Staff poetry reading is skipped, and the SW City Subway Challenge starts at 11:00pm VRT.
    • 130+ "birthday logs" are scattered around SW City's 32 subway stations. Contest ends at 1:00am VRT. Results are as followed:
      • 1st: Ferruccio with 96 logs.
      • 2nd: Captain MAD Mike with 61 logs.
      • 3rd: Espilae with 54 logs.
      • 4th: "Synner Jr." with 43 logs.

5th Bday Bash: SW City Subway Challenge
  • After the Subway Hunt, people gathered at Mango Land to test out it's new game "The Lava Chamber." Afterwards, the remaining crowd gathered at Velothi Island to hang out at the coffee shop and check out the Stargate Teleporter.

March 27th

  • Events continue for SW City's 5th Birthday Bash.
    • SW Comit's version of the Amazing Race and the second Amazing Race to take place in the city gets a good response as about 10+ people participate.
    • Morgul Mines Minigame in Syntax Estates debuts to the public.
    • SW City's 5th Birthday Bash comes to a close, making it the most successful Birthday Bash, or Event for that matter, in recent SW City history.

April 7th

  • SW Comit takes an official census of SW Island, but not surrounding islands, with a Xelagot using the property dump that Andras had created for the city days earlier.
    • 207 builders with 50 or more objects.
    • 244 builders with 1 or more objects.

April 30th

  • SW City Radio episode 3 is released. SW Chris, Syntax, Archergirl, Goober King, and Espilae discuss the CY Awards, AW Radio, just why Grover's name build was deleted from Alphaworld GZ, and whether or not expired citizen number accounts should be put up for resale.

October 6th

  • Alphaworlds Cell Data Limit raised to "Large"

October 16th

  • SW Chris creates "Journey's End" a video depicting various areas around SW City. This is the first video about SW City although not the first to contain images of SW City in it.

October 26th

  • SW City Radio episode 4 is released. SW Chris, Syntax, Archergirl, Goober King, Espilae, and Absolute Monarch run the gamut of topics in this free* form double sized version of SW City Radio.

November 11th

  • Castle Pines opens to public after over a year of being under construction.

November 16th

  • "NPC Cards" are created by Syntax while building the 'Rusty Axe' pub in Syntax Estates.

Wedding at Archpilae Church

November 19th

  • Espilae and Archergirl virtually wed at the Archipilae Church in Central SW City. Over 50 people in attendance in total over the course of the night which included the ceremony and the reception at the Palais de Ferruccio ballroom.

November 26th

  • Talks with AW citizen Selanit start about creating an SW City based "RPG/Adventure" game with PHP.
  • Ferruccio moves his large "Pyramid Hotel" from near the SW City International Airport to off the southern shores of Sybit Island.

November 28th

  • SW City staff meet in SW City Hall and simplify the SW City government structure.
    • SW City core becomes the "Administration" which oversees the districts.
    • Regular staff become "Management," who oversee their own areas.
    • Subcommunities, suburbs and viceroys are all now grouped into one category, "Precincts" with a Manager for each.
    • The old "promotion" system is abolished. This new system is more relevant to the way things were running despite the rules written.
    • This makes the total number of precincts seven, including Castle Pines, Esperion Isles, Saddle Creek, James River, Palm Grove, Syntax Estates, and Central SW City.

December 11th

  • Ferruccio starts work on a replica of the "Bank of China" tower on the southern part of Sybit Island.

2005top

January 4th

  • New Arklay City (AWTeen 2850s 1400e) owned by Hyper Anthony is officially admitted into the Scarabian Republic.

January 22nd

  • First NPC's developed with PHP are built in SW City at East Ending. It is a simple mission between two Nougats where one gives you a package to deliver to the other.

February 2nd

  • Work on the first large* scale PHP quest (Missing Person) is started by SW Comit and Syntax.

March 20th

  • The building contest for the 6th Birthday Bash is opened on Hyokia Island. The theme is Industrial.

March 24th

  • SW City turns 6 years old!

April 1st

  • First day of SW City's 6th Birthday Bash. Events included the East Ending Nougat Hunt, SW Amazing Race 3 and SW City Tour 2005.

6th Bday Bash: Pipe Plunge

April 2nd

  • Second day of the 6th Birthday Bash. Events included Pipe Plunge, Mango Land Game Night and AWIA Infiltration Adventure Game. Winners of the Bash were announced.
    • Gnu32 placed 1st winning $30US
    • Matt888 placed 2nd winning $15US. Matt888 also won the building contest.
    • DaBean e placed 3rd winning $10US

April 4th

  • SW Island sewer network is started by Syntax near Rage Lake Station (now named Sojiurn Station).

April 8th

  • SWCity.net goes down after our host-at-the-time screws up terribly.

April 24th

  • SWCity.net finally recovers from the terribly long downtime after the staff cuts their losses with the previous host (who was the absolute worst) and went back to hasweb.

May 8th

  • SW Comit builds a long line of foothills which separates the Faldon Desert from the rest of SW City island, creating the Faldon Valley.

June 6th

June 20th

  • The SWiki, SW City's own 'Wiki' is launched which contains information on geography, wildlife, corporations and much more around SW City. The address is http://wiki.swcity.net.

June 24th

  • Flint gets a tip jar.

June 29th

  • Activeworlds turns 10 years old. People gather at AWGZ and eventually move their way to SW City to view fireworks, play Pipe Plunge and participate in Mango Land attractions. Night mode was also setup for the fireworks and a cloud layer was applied to Alphaworld.

July 6th

July 16th

  • SW City hosts the second 'Movie Night in SW City' and Office Space is shown. No one shows up.

July 18th

July 24th

  • SW City hosts a Block Party on Cirrus Street in Syntax Estates. Over 65 people show up during the course of the night making it one of the most successful "random event" events SW City has ever hosted. Goober King from AWRadio DJ'd the event.

August 8th * 11th

  • SW City Town Square undergoes major renovations for the upcoming release of SW Chris's new video. One addition to the park is a new Light Rail station near the monorail station. Many other additions, such as "Infobusians" are added. Many little details are added and upgraded.

August 12th

  • "SW City: Revolution", the new SW City promotional video is released by SW Chris during the AW Reunion in Boston.

August 18th

  • Shannon Cove renamed to Eastern Shores by Espilae. Much of the Town Square is and surrounding areas are rebuilt and redesigned for the grand re* opening.

August 30th

  • SW Chris begins converting the old Central SW City monorail track style to the new, updated style.

September 11th

  • Syntax begins converting the old Syntax Estates monorail track style to the new, updated style.

September 26th

  • 'Activeworlds Discussion' board is opened on the Scarabian Republic Forums.

September 28th

  • Hydrogen City suspended from the Scarabian Republic due to inactivity.

October 8th


Town Square Park Clock Tower

October 9th

  • Town Square Park Clock Tower is built just north of SW Ground Zero (where new users spawn in) and sparks a large-scale overhaul on many parts of Town Square Park.

October 13th

  • Ferruccio starts heavily developing the southern areas of Sybit Island with a large-scale road project.

October 17th

  • SW City Town Square is decorated for the Halloween season. Nougat and Nimbusian-o-lanterns dot the pathways.

October 20th

  • Great Submin Brew Fest is held just south of SW Ground Zero.

October 28th

  • Talks begin with bot programmer Ima Genius about how to implement the current SW City PHP game system in with a server-side database. Syntax and Ima Genius begin re-coding the current PHP game system to work with an swcity.net database in what will come to be known as SW City Interactive.

October 30th

  • A new PHP quest, Heretika Artifact, is launched for the SW City Halloween event. The AW skybox is changed to a night sky, world fog is added and the world light is darkened by Stacee for the event.

Halloween Decor at SWGZ

November 12th

  • SW Chris completes converting the old Central SW City monorail loop to the new track style.

December 19th

  • SW Chris finishes what Syntax started: converting the old Syntax Estates monorail loop track to the new style.

2006top

March 25th

  • Eastern Shores building contest, for the 7th Birthday Bash, starts.

March 31st

  • The second SW City Block Party is held in James River.

7th Bday Bash: Pipe Plunge Classic

April 1st

  • SW City's 7th Birthday Bash kicks off with its first day of events.
    • 9:00PM: Opening Ceremonies
    • 9:30PM: Pipe Plunge Classic
    • 10:00PM: SW City Revisited Tour
    • 11:00PM: SW City Interactive Grand Opening
    • 11:45PM: The SW Amazing Race IV
    • 1:00AM: Movie Night - The Matrix Reloaded

7th Bday Bash: Sewer Pipe Plunge

April 2nd

  • The second day of SW City's 7th Birthday Bash starts with the second batch of events.
    • 9:00PM: Mango Land Game Night
    • 9:45PM: Pipe Plunge 2.0 - Sewer Edition
    • 10:30PM: Ilexus Caves Reloaded
    • 12:00AM: Closing Ceremonies & Fireworks Display

April 15th

  • SW City Interactive v1.1 is released to public. It contains features such as member profiles, memberlist and SUT navigation bar.

April 25th

May 5th

  • Goober Zone (AW Radio) invades Club Cyberdome in Syntax Estates.

June 21st


2006 Cy Awards Pre-Party

June 24th

  • Cy Awards Pre-Party at Uncle Nitros Bar and Grill. The Pre-Party had a good turnout, but the Cy's were postponed due to server bandwidth issues. Oops!

July 1st

  • Cy Awards ceremony in Cy Awards world! SW City comes home with three awards!
    • Lifetime Achievement Award - SW Comit
    • Best Software - Alphaworld Enhanced
    • Best Building - Back to the Future Recreation

July 14th

  • Ferruccio's Wing House is announced, located at AW 2180.77S 3642.83E.

September 12th

  • Baro starts building a Shig farm on the northern shore of the Irenic Ocean.

October 29th

  • SW City Interactive reaches 300 registered users!

November 3rd

  • AWI adds 324 primitive building objects, designed by Syntax and SW Comit, to the Alphaworld Object Path.
  • AW Expo 2006 begins in Sparkles World; SW City booth recieves much acclaim and encourages new visitors to the city.

November 5th

  • AW Expo 2006 ends.

December 9th

  • SW City was added to AW's official browser teleport list.

December 18th

  • Town Square Park's visitor counter reaches 10k hits, just under a year after its induction.

December 23rd

  • SW City's Builder's Academy is officially re-released! The new format contains 5x the information over the last Academy website and now sports a much more updated look.

2007top

January 1st

  • For the first time in 6 years, SW City brings in the new year by promoting Espilae to the SW City Administration, making him a city governor. Espilae has decided to name his new district Shores District.
  • Espilae accepts Hyper Anthony's request for his land grant to become a precinct, becoming the Southern Highlands precinct.

January 6th

  • V4s_R_Us Building Contest Ends; SW'ians that participated received v4 building rights in Alphaworld.

January 9th

March 28th

  • The 8th SW City Birthday Bash kicks off with the potluck building contest at Bueny Peninsula.

April 1st

  • The formal first day of events for the Birthday Bash kicks off. Events on the 1st included the release of SW City Interactive 3.0, a mover tour guided by Nimbusian Hot Air Balloons, and an SW City Block Party.

April 2nd

  • The second day of the Birthday Bash kicks off with Amazing Race V, a guided tour of SW City Interactive, the closing ceremonies and then a Nintendo DS Virtual LAN Party!

April 11th

  • Avatar objects are added to the Alphaworld Object Path; Humans, Birdes, and Grays begin appearing around SW City.

April 29th

  • SAW Awards Ceremonies held in Maya world! SW City brings two awards home:
    • Ferruccio for Better Building
    • SW Chris for Community Leader

May - August

  • Long period of general inactivity.

September 20th

September - October

  • Heavy SW City Interactive development.

October 7th

  • Southern Highlands hosts the grand opening of Rising Glen Retreat with many builders taking up residence. A new SWI quest is also available.

October 10th

  • SW City Interactive reaches 600 registered users.
  • SW City Interactive version 3.1 released. Features include phone system and voicemail messaging system.

October 14th

  • SW Chris releases a quick Activeworlds exploration demo video using SW City as an example. The video garners over 250K hits before it's reuploaded to a different channel. You can watch it here.

November 8th

  • SWiki Upgraded with new Theme

November 17th

  • Espilae accepts Joshua's request for the Sequini Isles to become a precinct, and Joshua becomes an SW City manager.

December

  • Baro opens the Zelena Islands and Zlata Ves, small outposts in the delta of the Emswell River, to trade with SW City. The islands are a major exporter of canned fish and Shig wool.
  • Most SWians become inactive throughout December as the usual winter hibernation begins.

December 1st

  • Winter arrives in SW City; Town Square Park is covered in snow and seasonal decorations are placed.

December 2nd

  • SWCity.net recieves a redesign. The navigation bar has been moved the the right of the news feed while many links were cleaned up and reorganized.

December 3rd

2008top

January 14th

  • SW City Interactive introduces player stats; Mini-game win/loss records, SWiki Card Stats, and Profiles are largely expanded. SWI is now also integrated with AWPortals.

January 18th

  • The SW City Times are temporarily under new management, passed from Syntax to Hyper Anthony.

February

  • Sevens develops the community of Hartford Fields in the Outerlands.

Februrary 20th

  • The Alphaworld Object Path receives an update, including a new wall/floor set, new pictwalls, semitrans mask set, and various others.

March 17th

  • Pamozo Island is built off the coast of Syntax Estates as a hub for users with v4 privileges to activate them when needed.

April 27th

  • SAW Awards held in Maya World! SW City and staff brings home:
    • Active Community
    • Better Building
    • Non-profit Contributor (to SW Chris)

May

  • Bach Zhaa writes 'The SW City Chronicles' while traveling through Alphaworld. His work can be found here.

June 16th

  • Activeworlds 4.2 is released.

September

  • A wave of building sweeps the city as new building commands (such as scale) are introduced and as older community members make a return. SWI also begins a resurgence in development. Areas of note include Scoperta Forest, Norlisk Island, Zlata Ves, and West Central SW City.

September 20th

September 28th

  • A SW City specific version of Twitter is released, using the Scaranet bot to leave 'sweets' for other community members to see. Switter feeds are also implemented into SWI User Profiles.

October 8th

  • Syntax begins work on Terrax Swamp, featuring the special Halloween objects added by Flagg for citizens to develop Halloween themed builds.

November 3rd

  • Special Halloween themed objects removed from the registry.

2009top

January

February 5th

  • An Eclipse Evolution bot on global mode appears in Alphaworld.
    • Global Chat Channels become available; channels for #world, #swcity, and #builders.
    • Jump points become available.
    • Verbal commands such as '^coords' allow ease-of-use for Alphaworld users.
  • Tourist building has been re-enabled.

February 16th

March - September

  • No one cares about recording history.

May 30th

  • SW City Interactive achieves 1000 registered users.

June-July

  • A general period of great activity within the SW City Community.
    • Burst of development in Rising Glen Retreat, including new residents and new SWI quests.
    • Several new communities founded on Bueny Peninsula by Dash567 and C u r t i s. Silverliner briefly returns to assist with building a railroad across the area.
    • Baro actively working on Zelena, expanding the once small island community into a strong nation.
    • Sevens and Hicks8 build the community of Greensville in the Outerlands.
    • Major renovations around Town Square Park.

July 29th

July 30th

Mid-August

  • The boom of activity that SW City enjoyed during the summer fades as the school year begins anew.

September 8th

  • Mark Randall adds a HUD Icon for easy access to Scarabian User Terminals through the global Eclipse Evolution Bot. Every user that is on the #swcity chat channel can see it.

October 6th

October 21st

  • The first SW Interactive quest to use web interface commands is created in Ilexus Village.

November 2nd

November 26th

  • The SW City Forum gets its first major visual overhaul in many years.

2010top
  • Joshua leaves SW City sometime during this year after his citizen account expires.

January 1st

  • SW City undergoes a second government reformation/lore update, formalizing the development team SW City Productions, limiting SW City's city limits to the main islands, and replacing the Scarabian Republic with the Scarabian Confederation.
    • Southern Highlands, Esperion (formerly Esperion Isles), and Sequini (formerly Sequini Isles) are now independent from Shores District
    • East Ending and Mondary are now independent from Central District.
    • Towns that formerly belonged to the Scarabian Republic, yet existed outside of the Scarabian region like Moonlight Heights, are not considered part of the Scarabian Confederation that replaced it.

November

  • The CY Awards are held and Hyper Anthony wins Best Bot/Software for his Ultimate AW User Guide.

2011top

July 6th

  • V4 objects are enabled for paid and free users in Alphaworld.

August 6th

  • Shear and Skew commands are enabled for Alphaworld builders.

September 19th

  • SW Chris debuts Airspeed at this year's completely virtual AW Reunion. Airspeed is a successor game to the Pipe Plunge that uses zones to replace the gravity falling mechanic that no longer works properly due to changes made in the Activeworlds browser. You can see a playthrough of it here.

November 14th

  • Hyper Anthony drops a large SW City Interactive content update.
    • 4 new quests: Coaxing Spirits, Unearthing Statuettes, Unearthing the Bronze Statue, and Unearthing Cannons.
    • 2 new digsites: Mason Keep Commons, Mason Keep Cannons
    • Several bug fixes

2013top
  • Activeworlds does away with license and account fees and goes free-to-play.

2014top

February 8th

  • SW Chris becomes concerned about the future viability of Activeworlds as a platform and takes a backup of SW City and its surrounding territories so that it can be resurrected if Activeworlds ever goes offline. Backups are taken several more times over the years as updates to the city are made.

September 14th - 23rd

  • SW Chris posts a recorded tour of SW City on his YouTube channel with live commentary about the making of SW City. Hyper Anthony, Ferruccio, Byte, Ima Genius, Earendil37, and Vornox participated in the recording.

2015top

March 6th - March 18th

  • SW Chris posts a second tour of SW City on his YouTube channel with live commentary about the making of SW City. Syntax, Hyper Anthony, SirGreendown, and Earendil37 participate. This tour visits entirely different locations from the first tour.

2016top

January 16th

2019top

March

  • SW City Celebrates its 20th birthday with a small gathering and tour around the city hosted by Syntax and SW Chris. The Alphaworld landing point is changed to SW City for the duration of the weekend.

April 5th - 9th

  • SW Comit, Syntax, and Hyper Anthony fix SW City Interactive, which had stopped working due to its encryption being deprecated in PHP. This fix required manually updating the URLs for every NPC in town. Multiple other updates and fixes are also made around the city.

2020top

November 17th

  • OniLink leaves SW City.

2022top

February 22nd

  • Nutinmuch (who now goes by Strasz) releases a video essay about Activeworlds.

2023top

February 27th

  • Activeworlds shuts down free public building in favor of a pay-to-build system, grinding the occasional development of the city in Activeworlds to a halt.
  • Activeworlds also removes the ability for remotely hosted images to render in the software and begins requiring all assets to be hosted by Activeworlds itself. This visually breaks most of SW City.

March 1st

  • Xandrah opens a copy of the Alphaworld server from early 2018 in DeltaWorlds, which includes SW City.
    • This copy of SW City doesn't have the fixed SW City Interactive NPCs that were updated in 2019, so SWI gameplay doesn't work in this version.
    • DeltaWorlds is a white label version of the Activeworlds software that was formerly known as Piko Island and is owned by Xandrah.

March 5th

  • Rick Noll, the owner of Activeworlds, visits SW City Town Square to survey the damage.

March 7th

  • The developer of Activeworlds approaches SW Chris about restoring the textures and audio that were hosted on swcity.net by transferring copies of them over to an Activeworlds hosted server.

March 23rd

  • SW Chris, concerned with SW City's future physical survival, sends a courtesy notice to Activeworlds of our desire to host copies of SW City in other software as well as a desire to explore a mutually beneficial path forward that would bring some benefit to Activeworlds.

March 24th

  • The original SW City's visual fidelity is fully restored in Activeworlds.

Between March 24th and 29th

  • SW Chris modifies the welcome message at SW City Town Square, becoming the last SW City staff member to build in the original SW City.

March 29th

  • Efforts at compromise are rebuffed by Activeworlds.

2024top

February 23rd

  • SW City staff discover that every one of their Activeworlds accounts have had their passwords changed by the developer without permission sometime in the last year.
  • Captain MAD Mike resets his password to log in and becomes the last SW City staff member to build in Activeworlds, helping SirQus fix a highway interchange in between SW City and Horizon City.
  • All SW City staff abandon Activeworlds because of the developer's targeted behavior towards them.

April 29th

  • SW Chris, with the help of AI and a new web host, restores functionality to SW City Interactive which had fallen into disrepair due to some of its code becoming obsoleted in new PHP versions.