ibia fansites have existed for almost as long as Tibia itself. Over the years, various dedicated Tibia players invested much time and effort to offer other Tibia players a platform about their favourite online role playing game Tibia. As fansites play a great role in the community, we decided to introduce a fansite programme more than 2 years ago. On the one hand, we were looking for a way to support fansites more effectively. On the other hand, the programme allows us to offer our players a selection of fansites which have been checked by us and which are safe to enter.

In March 2005, we started with the 4 most popular Tibia fansites of the time - the English news site: TibiaNews.net, the Brazilian fansite: TibiaBr.com and the Polish fansite: Tibia.pl. The 4th one, a German fansite, left the programme after a while. 6 months later we invited TibiaHumor.net to become a supported fansite. Shortly after, the trade site MyTibia.com, the statistics site Erig.net and the Mexican fansite: TibiaMx.com.mx also became part of the programme. Finally, in September 2006, the Spanish news site TibiaHispano.com and the English fansite Tibiacity.org were added. As a result, we currently have 9 supported fansites and we are planning to accept 2 new supported fansites to the programme in the next few days.

Our supported fansites contribute to the Tibia community in numerous ways. You can find all kinds of useful stuff about your favourite MMORPG there, such as informative articles, exciting role playing stories, interesting interviews, funny quotes or beautiful poetry. You can learn more about the game by looking at training guides or quest hints. Item and price lists as well as damage calculators help you to find your way around the game more easily. Additionally, you can find cool movies to watch there, astonishing screenshots to admire or even wallpapers to adorn your desktop. Needless to say, it is impossible to name all individual features that are provided by fansites. Why don't you check them out yourself on your next visit to one of our supported fansites?

Fansites are also great places on which Tibia players can become active themselves. Some fansites even depend on the material and ideas they get from players, e.g. many shortnews on TibiaNews are provided by players, while TibiaHumor uses quotes, poems and stories written by Tibians and the wikipedia on Erig.net consists largely of articles written by players. Almost all fansites show photos, screenshots and drawings by Tibia players, such as the one shown above which was published on our Spanish news site TibiaHispano. Finally, many fansites have a forum of their own in which the visitor can discuss all kind of things with fellow Tibia players. To sum up, fansites are great platforms to share ideas, stories and pieces of art with the community.

However, this is not all: Fansites often organise exciting events and competitions. Many players took part in fun contests such as the teddybear quest organised by TibiaNews, the video competition held by Tibiacity, the crafting contest of TibiaMx or the poetry contest of TibiaHumor. Not only did the winners of these cool events earn glory and honour, but they also received valuable prizes sponsored by the fansites or by CipSoft, including the rare "medal of honour."

As the official language of Tibia is English, one should not underestimate the importance of fansites that offer their content in other languages. It is surely no coincidence that many of our players come from countries in which a fansite is offered. In countries in which English is not widely spoken, a fansite in the country's native language is almost essential. People who do not speak English well can learn how to play the game here. There are instructions which explain how to communicate with NPCs, tutorials in which you can learn how to trade with other players, and useful guides on how to play a certain vocation. New players can learn how to create accounts and to master Rookgaard. Of course, the Tibia Rules have also been translated into various languages on our fansites to make sure that players understand what they are allowed to do and which things are prohibited. Moreover, several texts and especially the news can be found in the various languages and thus become available to a larger crowd. Supported fansites in other languages simply offer all important things for players with limited English skills.

Those language-based fansites are also very active in organising conventions and real life events for players in their country. Tibia players have the chance to meet their fellow players, take part in fun contests or simply enjoy the atmosphere of such a special event. TibiaMx will have a great convention at the end of July in Monterrey, Mexico. TibiaBr's biggest event this year will be held in Florian?polis, Brazil in September.

What is more, TibiaBr does not only organise a good deal of Tibia meetings in Brazil, they have even opened up a Tibia lan house in Maring? in which people can play Tibia together. Players can visit the fascinating world of Tibia on one of the 30 workstations there.

Without doubt, fansites have a large influence on the development of the Tibian community. To maintain a supported fansite demands an immense amount of time, effort and also money. For this reason, fansites are normally run by a whole group of people. The fansite administrators and their staff devote much of their spare time to provide an up-to-date, interesting and well-designed fansite for their fellow players. We really appreciate the enthusiasm of all those dedicated Tibians who contribute to the various supported fansite teams in some way or other, and we would like to express our gratitude for their excellent work for the Tibian community.

Enjoy our supported fansites!
Your CipSoft Team