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Topic: Guys. I needed money - got a job writing about games. (NCSoft/Midway news too) (Read 115353 times)
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Murgos
Terracotta Army
Posts: 7474
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John Galt Games?!?  Edit: Never mind |
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« Last Edit: August 13, 2008, 03:24:50 PM by Murgos »
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"You have all recieved youre last warning. I am in the process of currently tracking all of youre ips and pinging your home adressess. you should not have commencemed a war with me" - Aaron Rayburn
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schild
Administrator
Posts: 60350
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Midway numbers are now between 90 and 130.
Jesus.
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Engels
Terracotta Army
Posts: 9029
inflicts shingles.
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Cheers Lum. Sorry NCSoft yoghurting didn't work out :/ mebbe something a wee bit less corporate and small will rekindle teh fahr.
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I should get back to nature, too. You know, like going to a shop for groceries instead of the computer. Maybe a condo in the woods that doesn't even have a health club or restaurant attached. Buy a car with only two cup holders or something. -Signe
I LIKE being bounced around by Tonkors. - Lantyssa
Babies shooting themselves in the head is the state bird of West Virginia. - schild
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Margalis
Terracotta Army
Posts: 12335
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In other news, Forbes coincidentally just called Austin the Hardest-Drinking City in America. You can't make that shit up. Depressing and morbidly funny at the same time.
So the question becomes, do they drink a lot because they are fired or vice-versa? Edit: WebWars sounds really wacky. "Set course for espn.com, warp 8!" |
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« Last Edit: August 13, 2008, 05:00:14 PM by Margalis »
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vampirehipi23: I would enjoy a book written by a monkey and turned into a movie rather than this.
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Lum
Developers
Posts: 1608
Hellfire Games
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Margalis, it's not intended to be a hardcore MMO by any stretch of the imagination. I don't think anyone roleplays in Kingdom of Loathing, either...
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Slyfeind
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2037
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Well that's good. Gives me more time to get around to it. lol Yaaaaaay! /confetti |
"Role playing in an MMO is more like an open orchestra with no conductor, anyone of any skill level can walk in at any time, and everyone brings their own instrument and plays whatever song they want. Then toss PvP into the mix and things REALLY get ugly!" -Count Nerfedalot
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LK
Terracotta Army
Posts: 4268
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I've actually found myself increasingly drawn to web-browser based games. Imagine if Firefox was the equivalent of a Playstation.
I signed up my work e-mail for Beta. Fingers crossed I can try it out. I want to ownz f13!!!11!!ONE!
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"Then there's the double-barreled shotgun from Doom 2 - no-one within your entire household could be of any doubt that it's been fired because it sounds like God slamming a door on his fingers." - Yahtzee Croshaw
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Lum
Developers
Posts: 1608
Hellfire Games
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Slyfeind
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2037
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Yea, it's just too bad your producer is a real son of a bitch.
Jerk. :) Hehe that was cute. ^_^ More topicy, Webwars: Eve looks a lot of fun. I find it harder and harder to roll up my sleeves and get down for a marathon session of awesome rawkin HARDCORE GAAAAAAAAAAAAMING!!!!! I don't think this is the future of all gaming, but I'm interested to think what the gaming public will make of this. It's like a casual game for the hardcore, or something somesuch. |
"Role playing in an MMO is more like an open orchestra with no conductor, anyone of any skill level can walk in at any time, and everyone brings their own instrument and plays whatever song they want. Then toss PvP into the mix and things REALLY get ugly!" -Count Nerfedalot
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Calandryll
Developers
Posts: 335
Would you kindly produce a web game.
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Yea, it's just too bad your producer is a real son of a bitch.
Jerk. :) Hehe that was cute. ^_^ More topicy, Webwars: Eve looks a lot of fun. I find it harder and harder to roll up my sleeves and get down for a marathon session of awesome rawkin HARDCORE GAAAAAAAAAAAAMING!!!!! I don't think this is the future of all gaming, but I'm interested to think what the gaming public will make of this. It's like a casual game for the hardcore, or something somesuch. It's definitely an interesting concept which is a large part of the reason I decided to join the team. I don't want to hijack this thread, but once we're ready, we'll be making some more announcements about EVE Wars I am sure. First I gotta move my family back to Austin, get to know the team and the project better, and then we'll take it from there. Hopefully those that got laid off will find something quickly. There are some really experienced and talented people in that group of 21. |
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Margalis
Terracotta Army
Posts: 12335
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Margalis, it's not intended to be a hardcore MMO by any stretch of the imagination. I don't think anyone roleplays in Kingdom of Loathing, either...
I'm not mocking it. I was just making a dopey Star Trek joke. |
vampirehipi23: I would enjoy a book written by a monkey and turned into a movie rather than this.
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Hutch
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1893
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I will share one crack-monkey idea I had that probably never would have made release: I wanted a floating economy. As in, NPCs that valued loot/items/material based on the amount of money in the economy. If money devalued, then by god MONEY WOULD DEVALUE - NPCs would have a similar judge of monetary value as players. It would be interesting to see if hyperinflation would kick in, the effects thereof, how players would cope, would an alternative economy form... good stuff.
The official currency in AC1 (the pyreal) was worthless for a long long time. The money sinks weren't sufficient, and the money was easy to come by. So, the players eventually settled on alternative currencies. There were even web sites that tried to track the relative value of the alternatives. We used pyreal motes, solid iron keys, virindi chest keys, etc etc. As the monthly patches went in, the relative values of the currencies would shift, depending on what was added to the game, did the devs nerf anything, etc etc. Alt currencies would come into play, and others would lose their market value. On the other hand, the vendors rarely changed their prices, so the basic consumables were always easily affordable. The alt currencies were used to purchase things you couldn't get from the vendors. |
Plant yourself like a tree
Haven't you noticed? We've been sharing our culture with you all morning.
The sun will shine on us again, brother
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UnSub
Contributor
Posts: 8064
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Schild was more on target than a number of other sites that posted this rumour - they claimed that TR was going to dump a lot of people, where as Schild said TR was protected (for now). So, gg on the info. April "CuppaJo" Burba and Crickette (don't know her real name off the top of my head) were both let go from DR (afaik). A group of CoH/V fanbois are making calls for CuppaJo to come back (and there is some  for Crickette, but there's a core group that CuppaJo) to being the CMs - I don't think Cuppa would want to come back to being a CM after being a producer, but Cryptic is looking for a producer... EDIT: *golf clap* on Lum's grief title, btw |
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Trippy
Administrator
Posts: 23657
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NCSoft folks were just let go.
Anybody know how Lum is doing? I'm good, thanks. Schild may want to change my title to "Objectivist Cockmonkey" or something, though. It's great you landed on your feet so quickly. I'm sad, though, that we'll never see what it was you were working on.  |
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UnSub
Contributor
Posts: 8064
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It's amazing the trail of destruction that AA and TR have left in their wake. Could NCsoft handle a 3rd major flop?
... of course, the NA section of the business is only about a fifth of the overall business, but it has still got to hurt.
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Trippy
Administrator
Posts: 23657
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It's amazing the trail of destruction that AA and TR have left in their wake. Could NCsoft handle a 3rd major flop?
... of course, the NA section of the business is only about a fifth of the overall business, but it has still got to hurt.
The problem is that the budgets weren't scaled to the size of the business. Though they deny it it's very likely that TR cost at least as much if not more than WoW to make. For AA NCsoft took a $13.1 million writeoff on the game, on top of all the money they sunk into the development/marketing/promotion. |
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UnSub
Contributor
Posts: 8064
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I also have to wonder how much money was sunk into Lum's project and into publisher deals for MMOs like Blackstar. All that has to add up for the complete lack of return NCsoft are getting on those abandoned investments.
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Cylus
Terracotta Army
Posts: 51
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So can you talk about the unannounced project, now that it's been canceled? Or does that fall under a blanket NDA?
My exit interview with SoE was conducted by one of their lawyers, not by one of their producers or HR folks. In the end, it's still just a business. Best of luck, Lum. Have enjoyed your blogs :) |
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« Last Edit: August 14, 2008, 01:23:15 AM by Cylus »
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Margalis
Terracotta Army
Posts: 12335
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Wasn't Lum also on Imperator or some unannounced Mythic game?
He's the kiss of death!
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vampirehipi23: I would enjoy a book written by a monkey and turned into a movie rather than this.
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Jayce
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2647
Diluted Fool
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Wow, that (WW:E) is truly a bizarre idea for a game. It's just bizarre enough to possibly work.
I guess I've been too long away from this thread. It's not the thread that's adverstised anymore.
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Witty banter not included.
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Mrbloodworth
Terracotta Army
Posts: 15148
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Ouch, thats quite a blow to the team size. |
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schild
Administrator
Posts: 60350
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I am also crossposting at Gameriot now. By proxy, I suppose. Do not clump me in with that one freakjob who posts about AOC, backpedals, and does it again, ad infinitum. This is a totally seperate automatic feed.
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cevik
I'm Special
Posts: 1690
I've always wondered about the All Black People Eat Watermelons
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I am also crossposting at Gameriot now. While I am accused of picking low hanging fruit for my trolls, some fruit is too deliciously low to the ground for even me to pick. Congratulations on the new job schild, sucks that it had to begin with a foretelling of doom on the part of Lum. |
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schild
Administrator
Posts: 60350
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I'm not actually posting there. Joe is doing it. I'm only posting to Giant Realm. It's all sorta connected though. So, yea. I don't think I could even force myself to post with some of the crazies over there. That's simply not my scene.
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Ingmar
Terracotta Army
Posts: 19280
Auto Assault Affectionado
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The Transcendent One: AH... THE ROGUE CONSTRUCT.
Nordom: Sense of closure: imminent.
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Slyfeind
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2037
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I lost my cyber cherry in Kingdom of Loathing. She never called back. :(
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"Role playing in an MMO is more like an open orchestra with no conductor, anyone of any skill level can walk in at any time, and everyone brings their own instrument and plays whatever song they want. Then toss PvP into the mix and things REALLY get ugly!" -Count Nerfedalot
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stu
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1891
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Don't be sad. She used you! That's awesome.
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Dear Diary,
Jackpot!
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Aez
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1369
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This thread feels like I'm peeking at a private conversation... and I've been lurking since the Waterthread era.
random comments :
I hope Schild will have some influence on Giantrealm's site layout. It's horrible. f13's one is amazing.
It's funny that Schild moves to writing. My humble opinion is that f13 is doing great on community management but very average on writing. Why not take a community manager position?
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schild
Administrator
Posts: 60350
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Honestly, while I think I'd like a community management position, the number of games I'd want to work on are very few. The people I'd be willing to work with, even less. Being the manager of f13 has allowed me to .... hear and see things that you can't unsee or unhear.
Edit: I should point out I'm not trying to be an elitist prick with that statement so much as a lot of the gaming industry, particularly the online sector, is a lot of laughable amateur hour karaoke bullshit. We're talking the vast majority, including Community Management. And also, it's a very tight knit group of people that splits into about 3 factions and they all float through jobs effortlessly having little effect on the communities. Frankly, it's embarrassing. Development houses don't take the job seriously and the people in the job just try to wedge themselves into design. Or at least, that bad ones do (again, vast majority). It's also a position with a very low ceiling, frankly, you have to pick design or production afterwards. And honestly, I don't know which I'd want or if I'd want either. I'd like the position to gain some traction in the industry as well, I mean fuck, it's the first line of defense against the customers and half of them forget they work for the company when they respond to people and the other half just want to play Community Mommy, Daddy, or Teenage Babysitter.
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« Last Edit: August 14, 2008, 07:43:51 PM by schild »
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Bunk
Contributor
Posts: 5828
Operating Thetan One
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Schild - we appreciate your elitist pickishness, its entertaining.
Lum - glad to see you picked up something so fast. Also, thank you to NCSoft for at least canning your game before we new anything about it. I don't think I could have taken another UO2.
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"Welcome to the internet, pussy." - VDL
"I have retard strength." - Schild
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5150
Terracotta Army
Posts: 951
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Am I the only one getting 404's for the Dungeonrunners links?
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Margalis
Terracotta Army
Posts: 12335
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There is a message on the front page about downtime. Which I just visited for the first time. And saw "BLING GNOMES FTW." And some thug gnomes with tats and grills.
I will now close my browser, pretend this never happened and hopefully never be reminded that someone created a game that prominently features "bling gnomes."
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vampirehipi23: I would enjoy a book written by a monkey and turned into a movie rather than this.
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HaemishM
Staff Emeritus
Posts: 42666
the Confederate flag underneath the stone in my class ring
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a lot of the gaming industry, particularly the online sector, is a lot of laughable amateur hour karaoke bullshit. We're talking the vast majority, including Community Management. QFT. I think I'd rather take a job washing the taints of senior citizens than doing Community Management for an online game. |
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Musashi
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1692
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Ew.
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AKA Gyoza
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Slayerik
Terracotta Army
Posts: 4868
Victim: Sirius Maximus
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Ew.
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"I have more qualifications than Jesus and earn more than this whole board put together. My ego is huge and my modesty non-existant." -Ironwood
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. - schild