SOE to own VG - Sigil fires employees

[tad10]

Originally Posted by Zarcath

Somebody has a case of the mondays.

Hopefully all the employees that got fired went out and rented Office Space. Cheered me up when I was in their position

[Faille]

Originally Posted by tad10

Hopefully all the employees that got fired went out and rented Office Space. Cheered me up when I was in their position

Hopefully they stole the printers and beat them to death.

[Istros]

Originally Posted by Nino

For the record...of course Brad did not intend for this to happen; nor should people's ire be directed solely at him. Outside of work I spend time with Brad and we get along fine. I consider him a friend, and I want nothing more than to put all of this behind and move forward. This does not remove him from culpability; but there is nothing to be gained by rubbing it in. I said what I felt needed to be said, and hopefully that is that.

You said more than enough and I'm sure everyone here appreciates it--but expect people's ire to be nonetheless directed primarily at Brad since, for all I care, he was the one who failed to manage expectations, and failed even harder to deliver in the end.

[Faith]

I think its rediculous to blame everything on Brad. Sure, he fucked up in a biiiiig way, but on the other hand he was not the sole leader around. Things like this do have a board to which he is responsible if Im not wrong. He probly had a few guys just under him that should have seen the whole project going south a long time ago (as some people on this board did) and acted. 100+ people, thats not a garage company, thats a decent sized firm who should have most of the usual checks and balances to assure that the company is on the right way.

So what are the consequenses?

Imho, Vanguard could possibly continue with a small subscriber base "as is" but I dont think we will see a lot of expansions comming out. I feel this is a pitty really since I really liked the diffrent classes in the game. The 50+ people who SOE took in should add some talent to their projects so that is a good thing. Nino, local board hero, gets to work from the start with a new secret MMO that we can talk about for the years to come ("omg, it sucks!" "omg SOE-hater!") and Brad will probly vanish into the mists of history with a decent consulting job.

The real losers here are all the players that want something else then the current WoW-clone generation of games. Oddly enough I find myself feeling that Funcoms upcomming horror/whatever MMO is the next candidate for breaking the mold of game design, but we have years to debate that.

All in all, its been an intresting ride to see something go from being the gaminingworlds second comming of christ, to become the most hated kid on the block.

PS. If I had to fire half the workforce under me I would have to use the parkinglot too. No its not classy, but what can you do? Few "normal" offices have a room that will house 50% of the workforce at once comfortable if at all and you cant really let people back to their desks without supervision (yeah, people WILL avenge themselves if possible, and attempt at sabotage is pretty common) and you cant effectivly monitor large groups of people unless you have one guard per employee.

[Duppin]

Originally Posted by Javvo

irony.

OMGROFLLOL U SURE PWNED ME ON TEH INTERNETS

The highly amusing irony is that the same crew of retards that is e-towel snapping each other in joy over their defeat of the evil Vanguard monster are the same people directly responsible for the fact that this board will never be used to have any sort of interesting back and forth communication with any MMORPG developer ever again.

The very "spin" and "marketing" that they decry from the cross they climbed up on (I can't take credit for that, props to Samflam), they have ensured is all we'll be getting from here on out.

But it's okay, because they've won the internet!

It's just the rest of us who've lost.

[Kaylena]

Originally Posted by Faille

Hopefully they stole the printers and beat them to death.

So that's why Brad wasn't there?

I'm kidding... I'm kidding.. sorta.

[ruination]

Originally Posted by Faith

The real losers here are all the players that want something else then the current WoW-clone generation of games.

Lol what? Explain.

[serrathen]

In hindsight from my previous post like SoE just wasted a bunch of money.

Mark my words : Nothing will change the game will still suck and will eventually end up in the zapper. Smedley is the kiss of death. When will SoE get rid of him... cause hes a fool.

[Believe]

Originally Posted by Faith

I think its rediculous to blame everything on Brad. Sure, he fucked up in a biiiiig way, but on the other hand he was not the sole leader around.

There's multiple reason why Bras is to blame, in my opinion. No it probably isn't all his fault but:
-The game was designed on his Vision™. A lot of the Vision™ seemed to be wasted time on things that were later redone.
-He hyped the game insanely. Especially things that never ended up in the launch.
-He dissed other games that were doing very well - and claimed it was basically just a fad.
-And if it's true, he was basically absent in probably that most important months for Vanguard (the months leading up to the launch). I think because of that alone he deserves most of the blame.

It sounds like you expected everyone below him to form some sort of mutiny

[Faith]

Originally Posted by ruination

Lol what? Explain.

The original idea behind Vanguard was to make a game that was not a rip-off of WoW, but something continuing the EQ-style. Whatever you think about WoW, its never good when something is alone in dominating the market. I would like to avoid playing WoW-2, WoW-in-space, WoW-under-water, WoW-blah-blah just because investors see "omfg 9 million subs! Make a clone, QUICK!" Some other styles would be welcomed.

Diversity is a good thing.

[Drtyrm]

Originally Posted by Duppin

OMGROFLLOL U SURE PWNED ME ON TEH INTERNETS

The highly amusing irony is that the same crew of retards that is e-towel snapping each other in joy over their defeat of the evil Vanguard monster are the same people directly responsible for the fact that this board will never be used to have any sort of interesting back and forth communication with any MMORPG developer ever again.

The very "spin" and "marketing" that they decry from the cross they climbed up on (I can't take credit for that, props to Samflam), they have ensured is all we'll be getting from here on out.

But it's okay, because they've won the internet!

It's just the rest of us who've lost.

Furor & Tigole quit posting here long before VG died.

Interesting back and forth? Check out the 38 Studios thread.

People aren't pissed at developers in general, they are pissed at Sigil for delivering a sub-par product.

[kcxiv]

Originally Posted by Drtyrm

Furor & Tigole quit posting here long before VG died.

Interesting back and forth? Check out the 38 Studios thread.

People aren't pissed at developers in general, they are pissed at Sigil for delivering a sub-par product.

Yep, Curt has no idea what he's in for if the game isnt top notch. I will be watching though, thats for sure.

[Duppin]

Originally Posted by Drtyrm

Furor & Tigole quit posting here long before VG died.

Interesting back and forth? Check out the 38 Studios thread.

People aren't pissed at developers in general, they are pissed at Sigil for delivering a sub-par product.

As awesome as it is to be able to chat with Curt Schilling on a message board, I wouldn't qualify any of what has happened in that thread, at least as far as discussion of his project goes, as being interesting back and forth. It's basically the same marketing fluff that people screamed at Brad about. I mean, we know what at this point? That he's churning out yet another fantasy game, and some of the people he's got working on the game. That's it.

And Furor and Tigole were largely muzzled here because of what this place had already turned into, a haven for people to try to "count coup" on developers who had to be accountable for what they said, while they themselves did not.

From a public relations/marketing standpoint, this place turned from a nice little backchannel to access hardcore gamers in the market, to an enormous fucking landmine.

Is Brad somewhat culpable for that, and very culpable for Vanguard's failures? Absolutely. He never should've given people like Utnayan, Neric, Hiram Key, etc, the benefit of the doubt and attempted to have discussions with them based on the assumption that productive discussion was what they were interested in.

But when the next dev uses this place to just spit out press releases ad nauseam, you can just check this thread for an easy reference of who you can thank.

[Faith]

Originally Posted by Believe

There's multiple reason why Bras is to blame, in my opinion. No it probably isn't all his fault but:
-The game was designed on the Vision™. A lot of the Vision™ seemed to be wasted time on things that were later redone.
-He hyped the game insanely. Especially things that never ended up in the launch.
-He dissed other games that were doing very well - and claimed it was basically just a fad.
-And if it's true, he was basically absent in probably that most important months for Vanguard (the months leading up to the launch). I think because of that alone he deserves most of the blame.

It sounds like you expected everyone below him to form some sort of mutiny

Yes, he failed, and failed hard. It will be a legend in the business. But he had good help in that imho. No I dont expect a mutiny but I do expect people to do their fucking job. If one of the guys who work under me (I have an admin job) discovers that we are about to fuck up, or that shit dont run smoothly according to plan, he comes to me and points it out. I expect him to, its his job to do so, its the reason he has a job to start with. If I dont do shit about that, the board of directors will want a "private chat" at the end of the month and Im the one the guards will escort out next. No man is alone responsible for such a huge fuckup. Its impossible unless the corporate structure is very very odd.

He was not in the office for months? Yeah that seems very odd unless he was on sickleave or something. Unless he had no real reason to be there ofc. Like... if SOE was calling the shots those months and kept him around for decoration and brand recognicion. This game was mostly hyped by Brad and his fans, do you think it would have sold 200.000 boxes if Brad was kicked out 5 months ago? If, and its a BIG "if", he really didnt come to the office for such a long time without any valid excuse, its just another pointer to a corporate structure that was flawed beyond repair and anyone involved in that should have seen it a mile away.

[Istros]

Originally Posted by Faith

The original idea behind Vanguard was to make a game that was not a rip-off of WoW, but something continuing the EQ-style. Whatever you think about WoW, its never good when something is alone in dominating the market. I would like to avoid playing WoW-2, WoW-in-space, WoW-under-water, WoW-blah-blah just because investors see "omfg 9 million subs! Make a clone, QUICK!" Some other styles would be welcomed.

Diversity is a good thing.

WoW was in its earliest stages of development when "the original idea behind Vanguard" was conceived, so dont even try to suggest that VG was an answer to that. It wasnt. Brad simply wanted to recreate EQ on a grander scale, and failed, even if there is a market for such a game (and Im pretty sure there is).