SOE to own VG - Sigil fires employees

[EmiliaEQ]

Originally Posted by Jovec

WoW killed Vanguard before either game was released. The concepts and ideas present in VG were based on EQ1-like attitudes for its target audience and EQ1-like subscription numbers.

This is where you are wrong.
Just as there are people IRL that can spend 1M$ for a Ferrari/Rolls...
There are people that look foward to a "Challenging" game.
2 words : NICHE MARKET

I'll pay 30$/M for "EQ_Reborn" and trust me there is a market of 25+ that
wants something different from the "GARDENING PvP PEWPEW BNetKID" you see in WoW.

Neverwinter Nights / Pen&Paper / PvErs they are all here.

VG failed not because there wasnt a market, but because it was shit :
- Huge world not travel
- 10Step Quests
- CTD/Bugs
- Adventurers can not Disenchant
- Crafted Robe = same number of mats as crafted Bracers (with 3x the stats)
- High End PC

Etc etc etc

[rinthea]

Originally Posted by Arukk

Fuck that!

Brad lied! He knew he was lying. He lied to us. He can kiss my ass! He doesnt have the balls to show up and answer for this. He hides behind the fear the employees that were let go today feel, in finding another job. He is a coward! Its ALL about money! This was, and is, his train wreck. No spinning will EVER change that, and he knows it. He knew it a year ago.

-Arukk

Oh please, grow up buddy. He made promises that werent delivered. It happens, deal with it.

Brad created 100 jobs for a short time. Sure he fucked up and it didnt go to plan. So what. These people got some experience and an income. Its not the end of the world losing a job.

We got a game that wasnt as good as it was supposed to be. So what? It wasnt compulsory to buy it. It was free to play beta and check it out yourself. I've spent money on worse things.

[Miele]

Originally Posted by Duppin

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.

Aside from developer chit chat, I read this boards because in all honesty talking about MMO with the average poster on a official MMO game forum is a pain in the ass and a fucking huge one.
Here most of the people have an extensive playing experience and it's nice to talk about my hobby with people that know what the hell they are talking about, using "evidence" to prove what they claim instead of reporting only word of mouth bullshits, at least about game mechaincs.
It's also an unbiased place where I can read about a game, so by coming here I knew that VG wasn't that good, that Lotro is quite good and EQ2 has improved, while WoW is stagnating (and raising sub counts, jeez).

You'll find that I mainly post about EQ2 because it's the game I play, I do not often comment on other games if not to ask for info or do a general purpose comment on the genre or a specific issue, but it's stuff that I do to mainly satisfy my graphomanic impulsive posting addiction.

To say it bluntly: if I want to have an idea of what an MMO is about and how much it rocks or sucks, this is where I check.

[Arukk]

Originally Posted by rinthea

Oh please, grow up buddy. He made promises that werent delivered. It happens, deal with it.

Brad created 100 jobs for a short time. Sure he fucked up and it didnt go to plan. So what. These people got some experience and an income. Its not the end of the world losing a job.

We got a game that wasnt as good as it was supposed to be. So what? It wasnt compulsory to buy it. It was free to play beta and check it out yourself. I've spent money on worse things.

Yeah...

Your right, thats a great standard. Promise the moon, over and over again, and fall way short and dont get held to account? Did you work for Enron? This is what passes for "smart" these days?

-Arukk

[Faith]

Apperently I was wrong;

"f13.net: Let me backtrack a little bit, simply for background - what was the hierarchy like within Sigil?

Ex-Sigil: There was input all around, but at each level, that input was simply discarded by the decision makers. Basically there were a handful of people who made decisions, regardless of input from anyone else."

(source: F13.net - Usefully Cynical Commentary » The Long and Morbid Tale of Sigil Games Online: Interview Edition )

[rinthea]

Originally Posted by Faith

Ex-Sigil: We gave demos to high-level Microsoft people frequently. These demos were often just dog and pony shows where content was created specifically for the demo. There was no intention that this content ever be used in game. When you spend 30+ million on a project, you want to see results. They became more and more suspect as time went on, and more and more people got involved. Though, they were mostly just oversight. They never sent anyone down here to actually work on the project.

Thats disgusting...

[Sinter1]

Originally Posted by Arukk

Yeah...

Your right, thats a great standard. Promise the moon, over and over again, and fall way short and dont get held to account? Did you work for Enron? This is what passes for "smart" these days?

-Arukk

Whoa where the fuck did you come from? First off you're totally off base. The current state of affairs of Vanguard has less to do with Brad than what you're reaching for. He hasn't been around it for over 8 months now. Sure Brad deserves a fair share of the blame for being completely inept at managing a large scale mmo project. However, to fully blame him clearly shows your lack of knowledge on the subject. There were other people stirring the pot that deserve part of the blame for the failure of the game.

Plus it's not like Brad held you at gunpoint and told you to buy Vanguard...

[chalon]

I first want to express my condolences to those people who no longer have jobs. It sucks when you lose your job not because of your performance, but because of poor management and budgetary concerns. I've been there, and it doesn't feel fair at all. The good news, though, is that with the growth in the industry, there's so many places looking for people with experience. The most important thing is not letting it get to you, and getting that resume out ASAP. And before you know it, your phone will start ringing.

That being said, I think when things like this happen, it really shows how immature and unprofessional the game industry as a whole still is. It's really surprising when you see how much money is invested into games and companies with poor management, concepts, vision, or any combination thereof. And all that snowballs into rushing releases to meet forced deadlines, and then, more often than not, if the game fails you and a lot of your friends are suddenly out of your jobs. About 80% of the people on the ship may know that it's sinking, but if the management and publisher doesn't acknowledge that or, worse, doesn't care, there really isn't much you can do outside of starting to look for a new job. I'm not saying all of this was necessarily true for Sigil, as I don't work there nor do I know anyone who does, but certainly the pattern is there, and I've seen this time and time again at several different companies (and I've heard many stories about many others).

Paraphrasing something from an interview with a Midway executive, execution of your game is only the third most important factor in your commercial success. The top two are having a strong concept from the start (which, even though it will go through a lot of changes throughout development, if the concept isn't strong at the start, it's not going to be strong at the end), and timing of your release. I didn't really follow the Vanguard development that closely, but it did seem, at time, that many systems were conceptually very tenuous, in the sense that it was very hard to see it being easily implemented in a functional manner. A lot of times, designers that might have great ideas for broad and vague concepts have a very difficult time actually writing a spec for it. It's easier to come up with ideas than it is to actually translate those ideas into something that truly works. For that reason, I really do think that a lot of the times, the best lead designers are creative types that come from a programming background, because not only do they have good ideas, but they actually understand how those ideas can be translated into something that is feasible to implement.

As for the second most important thing--timing of release--Vanguard went up right against the WoW expansion, which was perhaps the worst time to release the game. You don't release a game at the height of interest in your biggest competitor, but rather you wait a few months for the interest to die down, and then release (which is at least partially why initial numbers for LOTRO are looking pretty good).

I think it was pretty telling when Microsoft Game Studios dropped Vanguard, because MGS almost never drops anything if they see any sort of profit any time in the very distant future. They must have basically thought that there was no way the game was going to be financially successful unless they dramatically changed direction of the game, which may have required a much larger monetary investment than what they had originally thought.

And if the whole Brad not showing up much at all for 6+ months really is true, that's honestly just very sad. I don't think it's a great way to motivate your team if you basically give up on the title, yet mandate everyone works long hours. That's just wrong. And for the people slaving away, it's soul crushing.

[Faith]

I find it odd that MS didnt have a guy in Sigils office at least part time. I know I would have wanted someone there if I handed out 30 million for a game to a new development studio with nothing but its name to back it up.

[rinthea]

After the jump, you're going to read an interview with an ex-Sigil employee given just over 24 hours after being let go. I honestly don't have anything more to say than that.

f13.net: How long, roughly speaking, did you work for Sigil?

Ex-Sigil: A Few.

f13.net: Were you there during the Microsoft years? Or at least, before the split.

Ex-Sigil: Yes.

f13.net: In terms of hands-on involvement, how much did Microsoft make their presence known?

Ex-Sigil: Initially they stayed fairly hands-off, but as things got further along they wanted to see results of their money.

f13.net: Can you elaborate on that a bit?

Ex-Sigil: We gave demos to high-level Microsoft people frequently. These demos were often just dog and pony shows where content was created specifically for the demo. There was no intention that this content ever be used in game. When you spend 30+ million on a project, you want to see results. They became more and more suspect as time went on, and more and more people got involved. Though, they were mostly just oversight. They never sent anyone down here to actually work on the project.

f13.net: Did they set the milestones?

Ex-Sigil: They set monthly milestones. They wanted a succesful MMOG. They had so many false starts with other things that they just wanted a profitable game.

f13.net: They weren't trying to be the next WoW?

Ex-Sigil: Anyone who thinks you can make a WoW killer these days is foolish to try. You need to be your own game. WoW is a juggernaut and really needs to not be the watermark for success. WoW is a tough subject around Sigil too...

f13.net: Why?

Ex-Sigil: There are a lot of people, Brad included who were certain it would be a short-lived game. Some, in fact, including Brad, never played it. WoW should have been the example of 'look at what a good game can do!' when instead it was often spoken of like a bad thing.

f13.net: As WoW grew, did Microsoft expect more results from their new investment? Did the pressure get put on at any point?

Ex-Sigil: No.

f13.net: Then when did Microsoft grow suspicious that they weren't going to get an actual product out of Sigil?

Ex-Sigil: When they started testing it themselves.

f13.net: Or rather, talk about how and when things started going downhill.

Ex-Sigil: Tt's hard to say really, management never communicated stuff like that to us. Often times I feel like they told us more spin and nonsense then they told the public.

f13.net: So management kept everyone in the dark as much as possible?

Ex-Sigil: Completely.

f13.net: What was the rumor mill like at this time? Surely people had friends and spoke to eachother.

Ex-Sigil: Sure. People who had contacts at MS kept getting info that they were really unhappy with things, and at the same time, we had a set-in-stone release date of June/July... 2006. Or rather - that was when Microsoft was going to cut of funding.

f13.net: How long before those summer days did rumors of leaving Microsoft start flying around?

Ex-Sigil: Management told us they were shopping things around and were entertaining outside investors to complete the project. But actually leaving Microsoft as a publisher was never discussed until they told us it was happening and we were co-publishing with SOE.

f13.net: At this time, how far along was the game itself?

Ex-Sigil: Well... if you call what we shipped 100%, I'd put the game at around 65%.

f13.net: What were the terms of the alliance with SOE at this time, if you knew?

Ex-Sigil: Co-publishing, with Sigil retaining all IP rights... is what we were told.

f13.net: What was SOE's involvement from beginning the partnership up until E3 2006?

Ex-Sigil: No hands-on influence from SOE, only leveraging of SOE assets like testing.

f13.net: Let me backtrack a little bit, simply for background - what was the hierarchy like within Sigil?

Ex-Sigil: There was input all around, but at each level, that input was simply discarded by the decision makers. Basically there were a handful of people who made decisions, regardless of input from anyone else.

f13.net: When it came down to actually making game content, how much freedom did designers have?

Ex-Sigil: Quite a bit. The content itself was done almost entirely on their own. The designers on Vanguard did amazing things with the horrific tools and systems in place.

f13.net: What tools were used to make the game?

Ex-Sigil: In-house stuff for the design side... but there was no scripting language for example, even though nearly everyone wanted one except for the people who decided if we got one or not.

f13.net: Because it would cost money to make these tools?

Ex-Sigil: No... because the people in charge just didn't want one

f13.net: How much do you think the lack of reasonable tools hurt the project?

Ex-Sigil: Immeasurably. You can't expect people to create interesting content, and then not give them the means to do it.

f13.net: Do you remember when the game was first shown publically? Surely it was while Microsoft was involved.

Ex-Sigil: I'm pretty sure the first time the game was seen in public, if I recall, was E3 2005. People were shown very small pieces (I was told a dungeon was shown over and over and over). Apparently, those pieces were specifically chosen to not show the glaring flaws. Now.. honestly, everyone does that. Nobody is going to parade around their problems. But the fact is, those problems were shoved under the carpet and ignored instead of being fixed before development moved forward.

f13.net: Was this a forced appearance?

Ex-Sigil: Yes.

f13.net: By Microsoft or Brad?

Ex-Sigil: Both I'd imagine... and that trend continued though for another year. What people don't understand, is the game that went out the door was literally created in the last 15 months. Design worked 12-18 hour days for 9+ months. Coding and Art worked insane hours as well, all trying to actually get something playable out the door.

f13.net: How deep did SOE's hands get into it? What was the progression like?

Ex-Sigil: They were hands-off all the way up til today

f13.net: ... are you serious?

Ex-Sigil: SOE lent a few devs to us in the final days, but it was nothing like people think. I think design had 3 people, art 2, and programming 1 from SOE. They let us use their testing dept too somewhat. We felt somewhat reborn I guess, but with a sense of reservation. When the merger happened SOE embraced us, and spent a LOT of money on us right away. It felt really good.

f13.net: Do you know why they were willing to do that? Surely they saw the lack of... product within the project at that time.

Ex-Sigil: I don't know that they did really. They got the same show that MS did to some degree. I'll say this about Brad.. he's one hell of a salesman. He's VERY passionate about his projects, even so much as to be blinded from seeing reality.

f13.net: SOE knew Brad's game though. Smedley has been around through McQuaid Part 1 & 2 now.

Ex-Sigil: I know.. and I can't explain that part.

f13.net: Surely people around the office knew part of the history. What was the rumor mill like at this time?

Ex-Sigil: Some people were confused. Why would SOE buy a game that's a direct competitor to EQ2? There was always talk, but people who were working on the game continued to put their souls into it in hopes that we could somehow get it all together in the end.

f13.net: Without a scripting language or proper tools, it sounds like some of the people actually on the project were pretty amazing.

Ex-Sigil: The level of creativity to make things work where there were no methods to do so was incredible.

f13.net: What happened in the short time between E3 2006 and Beta?

Ex-Sigil: The dev staff knew the game wasn't ready. Brad set the beta start I think and was completely clueless as to the actual state of the game... not listening to anyone telling him it wasn't ready

f13.net: How hands off was he by this time?

Ex-Sigil: He was playing a lot right through about Beta 2 but then he vanished.

f13.net: As in, just outright disappeared?

Ex-Sigil: Yep.

f13.net: Why? He was still posting on forums during this time...

Ex-Sigil: Well, he showed up to make mandates about game systems and design decisions.

f13.net: Was he there to see that stuff get implemented?

Ex-Sigil: The management knows I'm sure, but I don't have a clue. I just know he disappeared.

f13.net: What was the mood in the office by this time?

Ex-Sigil: People were still trying to stay upbeat, but certain people continually shooting down other's ideas started to take its toll. At least 2 people quit the team due to the heavy handed inflexible people on the class design team. When something isn't fun, except for the people who designed it, and others try to help, they'd get shot down... eventually people stop trying to help.

f13.net: How was QA treated through the course of development?

Ex-Sigil: QA?

f13.net: QA.

Ex-Sigil: QA was one person up until about November... ONE.

f13.net: What.

Ex-Sigil: 100% serious.

f13.net: What? How? This is an MMOG.

Ex-Sigil: Vanguard had one internal tester for probably 95% of the design cycle.

f13.net: Doesn't the complete and utter failure, in hindsight, seem like a self-fulfilled prophecy though with only one QA member?

Ex-Sigil: The reasons for failure are too numerous to list, but can all be summed up by a lack of management. Brad, for all his faults at least made decisions. So did Jeff. Right or wrong, they took a shot. The people in charge now were so afraid to make the wrong decision that they made no decision at all.

f13.net: Surely members of the team that weren't decision makers read forums and knew Sigil was doomed. Did people just blissfully ignore this stuff? I mean, comeon, the writing was on the wall.

Ex-Sigil: Oh, people knew. The only people that didn't know seemed to be the people capable of making the decisions to change it.

f13.net: Who are these people who took over after Brad and Jeff disappeared. Who can we pin the tail on?

Ex-Sigil: Dave Gilbertson, Bill Fisher, and Darrin McPherson... Ryan Elam too, but he spread himself thin by trying to do too much.

f13.net: Can you talk about them a bit? As, for most people, those names mean nothing.

Ex-Sigil: Dave was the VP. Bill is now lead designer, and Darrin heads up the class team and is responsible for class balance.

f13.net: Going down the list, what was each persons contribution to the eventual... failure?

Ex-Sigil: Let's just say they refused to listen to anyone on how to fix what was broken.

f13.net: Did they work as one unit, or are they each responsible in their own way for driving the project into the ground?

Ex-Sigil: Well, they were so pig-headed and arrogant that they believed we were all wrong and they were right.

f13.net: Did anyone have the experience out of those people to actually live in that sort of ivory tower?

Ex-Sigil: No. Dave was a modeler on the project and somehow became VP. Bill left SOE having shipped only Velious and some stuff in Luclin. Darrin left Westwood after Earth and Beyond tanked. Bill and Darrin worked together on this project through release - they were also arrogant and refused to listen to anyone else. To be fair, I don't think Dave did any of this intentionally, he was just in WAY over his head.

f13.net: Would you say, honestly, that they are directly responsible for the unfortunate conclusion?

Ex-Sigil: A part of it. You can't leave out the insane hype machine, the process failures, and the poor design decision making at the very highest levels.

f13.net: I can't speak for the hype machine outside of f13.net. But by this time, we knew the client broke the 20GB barrier and the game was, well, in a word - terrible. So, what do you mean by hype machine? The official forums? The posi... was there any real positive press? I remember reading some, how did it even come about?

Ex-Sigil: Good salesmanship. Brad and Jeff are very passionate about things, and that passion can overwhelm people.

f13.net: But Jeff and Brad weren't even on the scene at this time, were they?

Ex-Sigil: Jeff was to some degree. Brad was gone. Jeff was at least present and tried to be involved.

f13.net: Was it futile at this point? Had these other 3 guys pretty much taken everything over?

Ex-Sigil: Yeah.

f13.net: And what was the attitude by the team towards Brad and Jeff by now? Surely Brad's disappearance absolutely wrecked morale.

Ex-Sigil: Not really. When he was at work he was more an obstacle than a help. A lot of people wanted brad to just go away.

f13.net: That conflicts with a lot of the stories I heard about people leaving companies to join Sigil because of Brad...

Ex-Sigil: People did... a lot of people.

f13.net: What do people think of Brad now? Let's be real here, is he even fit to work in the industry?

Ex-Sigil: I think Brad's situation is an odd one. He's got tons of crazy ideas but he really shouldn't be in charge of anything. He is great as a theorycrafter so long as he was tempered by people who could determine what was possible or not.

f13.net: How much did Microsoft sink into Vanguard?

Ex-Sigil: We always heard numbers like 30 million.

f13.net: And how much did SOE pay Microsoft for it?

Ex-Sigil: I doubt they paid much.

f13.net: Moving on - Beta 2 to Release. How did that go?

Ex-Sigil: Things got a lot better.

f13.net: Who set the release date?

Ex-Sigil: The release date was set as a result of SOE not wanting to fund the project any deeper without SOME revenue coming in...

f13.net: Surely no one thought this was ready for primetime. And what about the giant patches that appeared nearly daily?

Ex-Sigil: We couldn't control that. From what I was told by some on the design team, the sweeping changes were par for the course.

f13.net: At this point, why were you all getting decent press? Did Brad do most of the marketing for that (even though he wasn't in the office)?

Ex-Sigil: Yes. We got press because I think people wanted to believe Brad. They wanted it to be great and they got caught up in his passion.

f13.net: How many copies of Vanguard sell between say, release and today?

Ex-Sigil: Around 200k, I think.

f13.net: How many people stayed after the "free" month?

Ex-Sigil: Numbers I heard yesterday were 90k. But I can't be sure. Actual subscription numbers were something management was very reluctant to tell us.

f13.net: Alright, I apologize for digging up a fresh corpse - but when did you all get the feeling bad things were going to happen?

Ex-Sigil: Three weeks ago. We knew for 3 weeks that layoffs were likely, but nobody said what, when, or how many. So that cloud was over our heads for nearly a month.

f13.net: Can you go into detail about how the final month progressed? How did events unfold?

Ex-Sigil: We kept getting told that the deal was 'in the works' but there were no details to be had. This went on for 2 weeks. Then fairly quickly people started figuring out things were imminent. Then yesterday we were told to grab our things we'd need for the rest of the day and head outside for a company meeting.

f13.net: Was an email sent out, IM sent out, who told you to go outside?

Ex-Sigil: Email. The email said literally to check in any work we were working on, grab anything we'd need for the evening (keys, wallet, purse, whatever) and meet out back for a short company meeting.

f13.net: Who sent the email?

Ex-Sigil: Andy Platter. Director of Production, though nobody at the company knew if he did anything.

f13.net: Go on.

Ex-Sigil: We met in the parking lot. Worse still... though Dave was supposedly in charge all this time, Andy is the one who delivered the 'you're all fired' speech, while Dave never said a single word.

f13.net: Who was standing at the front with Andy?

Ex-Sigil: Dave Gilbertson, Ryan Elam, and Donna Parkinson (the office manager).

f13.net: What was the speech you got?

Ex-Sigil: it was very emotionless. Very callous. "The deal is done, and basically you're all fired so some of you can be re-hired by SOE." Bill was there and actually made comments about how he was likely buying a house thanks to his stock.

f13.net: Wait, what? Did non-stock holders get severance?

Ex-Sigil: There was severance, yes... and they did say they'd help out any way they could with our job search.

f13.net: What was the fallout like?

Ex-Sigil: Well, worst of all.. at the end of Sigil, Brad wasn't even there to look us in the eye and apologize.

f13.net: Why do you think SOE kept him?

Ex-Sigil: His name? I heard he's being paid a minor pittance to have his name associated with the game still... but he won't actually be doing anything. I shouldn't say pittance.. since he's likely being paid more than many of the people who were let go. He got his initial investment back, I think, in the buyout and that's about it. But that's pretty much rumor. Only those involved know for real. For all I know, he could have made plenty. Or he could have not gotten a dime, but I seriously doubt that.

f13.net: Is there anything you want to add?

Ex-Sigil: It's hard. I really wanted Vanguard to be a great game, but it seemed like we were blocked by stupid decision making at nearly every step. Good people busted their ass, only to be shown the door because they weren't a 'culture fit' moving forward. I don't believe Brad is a bad guy like some people are painting him on the various forums right now. I DO think however, that he believed people wanted to play a game that HE liked, regardless of the masses of people telling him they didn't like his ideas. He ignored the opinions of people who worked for him, and busted their ass for him, and it cost him dearly, at least in reputation. So many of us jumped at the chance to work with Brad, only to find out he was a paper leader. You can only fool me once. I never want to work for Brad or Dave ever again. There was so much good in the team, so much effort wasted. None of the people listed above should ever work in any position of leadership. Though, Jeff might have a chance. He learned lessons from this, I think. The others did not. The whole ordeal has been rough. I know I'm exhausted.

f13.net: Thank you.

[Usha Starchild]

Well I never played Vanguard, I had beta invites from the begining of time but just never bothered to download it. When Vanguard first started everyone was going on about Brad being a god etc. This is why so many people were dissaponted in the end, they were expeciting too much from one person.

It takes a dedicated TEAM a lot of work to make a game, and my only experiences have been on PC sports games / playstation EA games. Developing an mmorpg is probably about 300x as hard. Dont Blame everything on Brad, although he can be blamed a little. The day microsoft started funding the project was the day Brad was no longer in control, even though they said he was. Whoever is paying the bills is ultimatly calling the shots. Vanguard being released early, do you think that was 100% Brads decisions? or maybe Smed will take a lil blame for that... or for SOES investors for expecting.... the blame goes on forever.

I guarantee no one is happy about the failure, people lost jobs. We should stop bickering about who is to blame and wish these guys the best.

[chalon]

Originally Posted by Faith

I find it odd that MS didnt have a guy in Sigils office at least part time. I know I would have wanted someone there if I handed out 30 million for a game to a new development studio with nothing but its name to back it up.

That's actually pretty common. Usually the publisher will periodically send the publishing-side producer, or marketing people, etc., to the developer. But the only time you see them actually have people setup on-site is if it's in an end-of-project panic mode, where the publisher suddenly realizes the game is really screwed. It sounds like Microsoft decided to pull out prior to that, though.

EDIT: Grammar.

[Faith]

Regarding releasing early, Sigil managed to get money from two large game companys to finish a game and still didnt manage to deliver. Of course the people paying forced a release, you would too if you had spent so much money on a project and the only reply you get is "Soon(tm)". I doubt the money-guy even heard of WoW, TBC or whatever, he was doing his job making sure the product shipped so they could recover some money from it.

Its easy to forget that most decissions about the games we play are handled by people who dont know how to start solitare in Windows. Expecting them to keep up with releases of expansions and shit for other games is, unfortunatly, day dreaming. Sadly it comes back to bit you in the ass sooner or later.

[Ayeshala]

That interview makes the whole thing sound more and more like a scam.

Also: they did not want a scripting language for their designers? Holy what the fuck is the wrong you?

[Faith]

Originally Posted by chalon

That's actually pretty common. Usually the publisher will periodically send the publishing-side producer, or marketing people, etc., to the developer. But the only time you see them actually have people setup on-site is if it's in an end-of-project panic mode, where the publisher suddenly realizes the game is really screwed. It sounds like Microsoft decided to pull out prior to that, though.

EDIT: Grammar.

Ah, dont work in the game industry so I would not know. Thanks for the info. Sounds like a horrible way to run a railroad