f13.net

Stolen from /. but I had to repost it here. I think we have officially entered crazy world.

What's it called, Two Hacks and a Bloody Red Sock?

So does every new company.  Good luck to them, hope they do.

By the way, which of them has any experience in managing software development?

At least we know that R.A. Salvatore can write compelling, multi-dimensional characters for those games  :evil:

So Drizzt, Spawn, and Curt Schilling walk into a bar...

The fuck? Since when do venture capitalists need to understand the minute details of something to put some money behind it. I'm going to go out on a limb that it won't be just the 3 of them developing a game and they'll fucking hire a few people to help them out.

I find highly amusing the idea of a hack fantasy writer, a comic book guy, and a retired baseball player running madly around the office trying to complete a major software project on their own.  I see a confused-looking Schilling clicking through Visual Basic randomly while Salvatore keeps screaming "Push the button to add more elves!" and McFarlane plays with his action figures in the corner.

Try again.  This isn't VC - these guys are forming the company.  The company, Green Monster Games, is apparently named after the left field at Fenway.  McFarlane is to be the lead artist, and Salvatore is to be the creative designer.  Nothing stops anyone from tossing money into a startup company they own, but money alone isn't going to generate success.

Also note that I said manage software development, not develop the games themselves.  They will certainly hire help, but it's still their company and they have final say on any issue they care to have.  They are the executives.  The management.  So... who amongst them has experience in managing software development?

My general experience is that executive management doesn't need to have any particular expertise in the product, just in beguiling shareholders

Or being good in evaluating talent. You could be a complete blithering idiot when it comes to software development but if you manage to surround yourself with highly intelligent and successful people and somehow retain and motivate them then you're going to do ok.

You seem to be confusing executive management with HR.

Anyone else have a vision of a game where the main character is a mis-understood outcast dual baseball-bat wielding fiend from hell?  50/50 chance there is a cape involved.

I bet it will have a mind of its own, AND EAT YOUR SOUL.... and baby.

Or maybe....

(http://www.kbtoys.com/g/toys/big/122127I.jpg)

Three Rich Jerks Who Played EQ, Inc.

Bingo.

Executive management at the startup stage is about raising money. At the later stages it is about huge sweeping decisions.

I don't think that makes sense, but that is the norm. It's rare to have a guy like Steve Jobs who knows something about his product. Look at who ran Apple before Jobs came back - a guy from Pepsi among others. From soda to computers...whatever.

Someone who truly knows the space and product well can be a huge asset, but that isn't most execs.

---

I should apply for a job. Then show up to my interview with my Yankees jersey.

Bad example. That'd be the guy who let the OS with no memory management persist through the end of the 90s. Jobs, knowing his shit, came back and turned the company around. OSX, iPod, Mactels, etc.

The role of an "executive" varies.  Enough so that it is at least somewhat conceivable that a baseball player, an author and an artist could find roles.

Executives are going to be in raising money, spending money, charge of managing brands, managing managers, aquiring higher-up talent (who do you think hires HR or gives HR direction and money to hire others?), networking with other companies, securing publishing deals, handling marketing, securing rights for IP, etc.  And of course, stomping on the hopes and dreams of all those poor programmers and artists below that just want to make a good game. :)nce

As far as "managing software development" that is more the role of people like the producer, lead programmer, lead artist, etc.

StGabe.

Newton.... Oh how I miss you.  Oh wait I still have my 2100....

Funny, but at the same time... they could hardly do any worse them some mmorpg's we've seen to date.

And it's possible that these 3 already successful people may be able to be patient enough to develop a title at a more reasonable pace compared to a clueless angel investor who sets arbitrary milestones for both development and release come hell or high water.  They aren't strapped for cash so they could at least afford to be more patient.  And hell at least schilling has played some of these games.

Stranger things have happened.  Like Lum getting hired to work inside the industry ;)

Xilren

Like I said, I don't think it's a good strategy, but it is fairly typical. Executives who know alot about the space they are in and the product they sell are not as common as you would think. You see that sort of thing all the time, one day a guy is in charge of Ford and the next he is in charge of Sony Pictures.

I gotta agree with Roac. Without someone on their initial team of founders with experience in games (heck, even software management/development), it's just a bunch of rich guys who played EQ, thinking they can do it too.

They aren't going to be able to weed out a star programmer or designer from the mediocre ones when they go hiring for their team, because none of them know anything about it. They'll be totally blind. Of the 3, I would bet only McFarlane could make a decent impact on things turning out well. Because he has a lot of experience running his own company, dealing with publishing, distribution, angsty artists, etc. He can transfer his skills into schmoozing the guys at Nintendo to go lax on the quality control for that one teeny bug, he can work the guys at PC Gamer to get a cover if he promises to draw it himself or something.

This will be a great thread to drop back in on in a few years:)

You have become better at Necromancy!(35)

Are we allowed to suck up now that an actual non-gaming celebrity has found f13 or are we required to maintain our well refined attributes of jaded cynicism?

If he can help me get Red Sox tickets I'll be his fanbois.  Heck, I'll even read those Drizz't novels, as long as I don't have to like them.

Curt's abviously not aware that these sites have a tendancy to implode every couple of years and wipe away all the history of posts.  If f13 is still here in a 'few years' I'll be impressed.

Murgos, your lack of faith makes my "remove edit button" switch glow with searing heat.

Of course we'll be here in a few years.  Where else are we going to go?  Who else would have us?

I heard mmogchart might be adding a forum section....

I think I just lol'd my pants.

No offense schild, you're doing a fine job.

The reason for my original question is because there have been a number of startups that thought software management was a non-issue.  They failed, and that you didn't have anyone with apparent experience in it from the start was a yellow flag.  You've hired a lot of guys with industry experience, so that seems to cover both software management and (more specifically) MMOG management.  The one exception may have been Todd and UO2, but I've no idea how involved he was with the process and I'd doubt to the point of managing any devs.  I like that you've gone heavy with the creative types, because I think story/plot/imagination stuffs are terribly weak in most (all?) MMOs out there.  The trouble is whether the vision becomes too large for reality, and it's happened.  If you're the fan of MMOs you've said you are, you should be all too aware that there are more stillbirth games than ones that ever made it to live, let alone successful ones.  That isn't cynical, just interested skepticism.  So as I said, good luck. 

And here I thought that "managing software development" was synonymous with 'holder of the mighty Ouija board".

Learn something new every day I suppose.

If Bruce added a forum to his site I would so register.  Seriously.  It would be a LOL and a half.