Rumour of Mythic Layoffs

[schild]

Selling out to EA is like putting your head into the mouth of a hungry Great White Shark: you are going to get bitten, it is just a question of when.

Disagree.  Pandemic just had a problem of making games nobody gives a shit about.  EA is not to blame for their failures.

You are arguing a point he didn't make.

Yea, Pandemic could've been a better company. Yea, EA does that. These are not tied together at the hip.

[Sheepherder]

If Mercenaries is your crowning glory, the next time your budget comes up you're getting assfucked so hard you can taste it.

Okay, I'll elaborate.  Pandemic was so thoroughly mediocre to bad it came as something of a surprise when I heard they still existed.

[LK]

I had a friend that worked as a designer at Pandemic. Yes, they are mediocre. He recognized this based on his stories about some of their decisions that made you go "WTF?"

[schild]

I had a friend that worked as a designer at Pandemic. Yes, they are mediocre. He recognized this based on his stories about some of their decisions that made you go "WTF?"

I can't parse your post. Your friend that worked there recognized mediocrity based on his stories about some decisions that were $)(#&*)$&#$ NO CARRIER. What?

[LK]

I had a friend that worked as a designer at Pandemic. Yes, they are mediocre. He recognized this based on his stories about some of their decisions that made you go "WTF?"

I can't parse your post. Your friend that worked there recognized mediocrity based on his stories about some decisions that were $)(#&*)$&#$ NO CARRIER. What?

He recognized Pandemic's mediocrity based on being a witness to their executive design decisions. He left the company after Mercenaries 2.

For example, and this is the smallest one: actually requiring someone to play with a developer to get the "Play with developer!" achievement instead of the more common practice of "Play with a developer... or someone who has!" that makes about 100% more sense.

[Sheepherder]

Why would you even have that achievement in anything less than a sixteen player game?

[LK]

Why would you even have that achievement in anything less than a sixteen player game?

Because achievement designers are FUCKING CRAZY sometimes.

[waffel]

Meanwhile, over on VN: http://vnboards.ign.com/daoc_general_board/b5176/112080521/p4/?54

Hey Folks,

I wanted to let you know that I've been following this thread (and the ones on Facebook), and I apologize for not responding sooner (had to wait for the answer to a question I asked folks here). Any time there is a major event like the staff reductions last week, it is a very emotional time for everyone involved, so we have to be extra sensitive about what we say. For the moment, I am still working with the Dark Age of Camelot team, and the "other Camelot-related work" I had been assigned to do that briefly took my attention away from you all has concluded. As of Monday, I started working with Mark Davis to bring him up to speed on the current state of DAoC, as well as your expectations of him.

Every team in the studio was affected by the events from last week, and as such, each team has been forced to make adjustments to their plans. Some DAoC projects have stalled and/or have been cancelled as a result (I can't go in to what those were, but most were things we had not mentioned publically). The DAoC team is adapting to these changes and moving forward. The plan is to bring frequent updates to the players (every 4-6 weeks, plus holidays), with many of those updates containing items that have been included in feedback submitted by the players.

I also want to thank you all for the concern that has been expressed for my well-being. It means a lot. happy

 
-----signature-----
Lori Hyrup
Dark Age of Camelot

So some secret DAoC projects were cancelled, but she can't tell us what they were.

[Soln]

I fully expect MJ is calling around to raise capital to take DAoC & UO off of EA's hands.  Believe it.  He knows they make money and are low cost to maintain.

[Trippy]

I fully expect MJ is calling around to raise capital to take DAoC & UO off of EA's hands.  Believe it.  He knows they make money and are low cost to maintain.

Then there's no reason why EA won't hang on to DAoC just like they've kept UO running all these years. WAR is a different issue

[KallDrexx]

I fully expect MJ is calling around to raise capital to take DAoC & UO off of EA's hands.  Believe it.  He knows they make money and are low cost to maintain.

MJ doesn't work there anymore remember.

[01101010]

I fully expect MJ is calling around to raise capital to take DAoC & UO off of EA's hands.  Believe it.  He knows they make money and are low cost to maintain.

MJ doesn't work there anymore remember.

ummm... I think you missed a word or a meaning somewhere?

[KallDrexx]

ummm... I think you missed a word or a meaning somewhere?

Ah misread it, my bad.  Too early for posting :P

[UnSub]

I fully expect MJ is calling around to raise capital to take DAoC & UO off of EA's hands.  Believe it.  He knows they make money and are low cost to maintain.

Does EA have a history of selling off titles to potential competitors? If they were thinking about completely getting out of the MMO space, perhaps, but they're launching SWOR in the foreseeable future. More likely to shut down DAOC and UO and pour those resources into the money factory that will be SWOR than sell the titles to someone who might - might - be able to steal market share from them.

[Modern Angel]

Yeah the Mythic titles are as good as dead/zombie walk status.

[Nebu]

So some secret DAoC projects were cancelled, but she can't tell us what they were.

Interesting.  All of my friends from WAR have all gone back to DAoC and I was tempted to resub... I may have to rethink that. 

[Xanthippe]

I guess my hopes of anyone making a DAOCv2 are completely dashed now, right?

[waffel]

It was more than likely Origins. Which they hinted at, checked reaction, hinted bigtime at by having a poll and stuff on the herald about how it might work, then interest tapered off, then MJ basically said "we don't know how much support we have for it, so you guys need to beg", and interest continued to taper, then everyone gave up hope, and now this. This cocktease lasted maybe a year.

[Nebu]

Origins would have gotten $30 a month out of me for 3-6 months.  I'm guessing you're right about it getting canned. 

[Slyfeind]

I guess my hopes of anyone making a DAOCv2 are completely dashed now, right?

Oh now I'm sad.

[schild]

The MMOG industry always, always repeats itself. Your precious RvR may come out of Eastern Eastern Europe though.

[Malakili]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFmbGWeZrAM

(figured this was a good enough place to post this)

[ghost]

 

Stupid printer!

Seriously, what the fuck?

[Sky]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFmbGWeZrAM

[tgr]

Sky's avatar just makes the whole post creepy.   

[fuser]

You'd think someone would pull out the toner first but no.

[IainC]

You'd think someone would pull out the toner first but no.

That was my first thought too, you really don't want to breathe any of that shit in.

[Velorath]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFmbGWeZrAM

(figured this was a good enough place to post this)

So... even at the end they couldn't come up with something new and original?

[Rondaror]

Selling out to EA is like putting your head into the mouth of a hungry Great White Shark: you are going to get bitten, it is just a question of when.

Selling out to EA means that the owner of a business wants to make money. Pretty simple.
Maybe MJ wanted to raise more funds to let WAR fly to the multi million dollar business.....fuck it.....I am working for a big corporation and have dealt with M&A migrations.
In the end, Gaming industries is not different, then any other industries.
Someone wanted to make big cash and the employees have to pay the bill. Seen that a couple of times.
The small, helpless, independent studio is not in danger of getting assimilated by a corporation. It's the owner.

I don't like EA, but please stop to pretend that that EA is the EVIL. It's a corp that fails to deliver earnings since.....I don't know...decades?

[UnSub]

There are some companies who manage takeovers that don't subsume and diminish the smaller company.

Also, I never said EA was evil. It's just that their history has shown a tendency to buy-out a studio and then erode the quality of that studio's outputs and / or strip it for parts and shut it down. A Great White isn't evil, but it is an eating machine.

[Triforcer]

If you didn't want people to know who you were, wouldn't you have to cover more than the eyes? 

[Velorath]

There are some companies who manage takeovers that don't subsume and diminish the smaller company.

Also, I never said EA was evil. It's just that their history has shown a tendency to buy-out a studio and then erode the quality of that studio's outputs and / or strip it for parts and shut it down. A Great White isn't evil, but it is an eating machine.

Pandemic's quality such as it was, started eroding long before EA bought it in 2007.  By most accounts it sounds like Pandemic had serious internal management issues unrelated to anything EA was doing.  Mercs 2 was apparently a huge money sink that was already in development long before the EA buyout and highlighted the issues they were having adapting to the new generation of consoles, the now closed Brisbane studio couldn't get The Dark Knight game out, and Saboteur has been in development for 5 years (for three of those it had about 100 people working on it).  The only thing that EA did wrong here was to not step in earlier.

[KallDrexx]

...the now closed Brisbane studio couldn't get The Dark Knight game out...

That's not the studio's fault though.  What happened was Warner Brothers suddenly decided that they wanted to make the game in house because they would get more money than licensing it out, thus they pulled the license.  Some of the finished work was also transferred (since WB still owned the licensed work) to be used on Arkham Asylum (I don't remember what, since that was a year and half ago or so).

[Musashi]

If you didn't want people to know who you were, wouldn't you have to cover more than the eyes? 

I'm pretty sure it was purely for comedic effect.  It only kind of worked.  I think it just might be an inside joke though.  Yes.  One of the dudes has a pretty distinctive beard. 

Gotta give it up for the choice of music though.  The world needs more midget gangster rap.

[Trippy]

Pandemic's quality such as it was, started eroding long before EA bought it in 2007.  By most accounts it sounds like Pandemic had serious internal management issues unrelated to anything EA was doing.  Mercs 2 was apparently a huge money sink that was already in development long before the EA buyout and highlighted the issues they were having adapting to the new generation of consoles, the now closed Brisbane studio couldn't get The Dark Knight game out, and Saboteur has been in development for 5 years (for three of those it had about 100 people working on it).  The only thing that EA did wrong here was to not step in earlier.

It was kind of hard for them to do that when the person who arranged the BioWare and Pandemic merger and the acquisition by EA is now the EA CEO. It's basically an admission by the CEO that 1) the BioWare/Pandemic merger was a stupid idea and 2) he conned EA into buying the overvalued merged company and making him CEO. By waiting till it was part of larger layoffs he can at least partially cover his tracks in this matter.