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Blizzard are looking at alt friendliness FWIW, they might end up in a situation like Darkest Dungeon, where one puts time and effort to level up a shared resource space and there is a roster of characters to play with. They have been talking about this for a long time, and requires changes to...

that's the graphics engine. Unity does not have any decent networking stack, MMO servers, content management system, PvP, billing etc etc. Part of the huge cost of making an MMO is that you need to develop your own tools to create and manage the game. And because there are only few MMOs built...

Having been through the process of creating an MMO from scratch I cannot understand how it can be done with less than $20m (production, servers, personnel, testing etc). So the moment anyone starts promising more than 1 race (unless they all look the same), multiple classes, multiple modes of...

SOE was fighting for its survival as was bleeding cash looking for a buyer. Pleasing Sony Japan was a key issue for the management. The mandate was to design a PC game and consoles were not even mentioned (this was pre PS4 reveal, even tho it was obvious from the action buttons) and the lead...

There wasn't one. The game was a result of the games the leads played: Terraria (with destructible environments), League of Legends (with heroes, a small subset of abilities and fast paced combat). Then they decided to make it an official EQ game and later the AI was added to it. Some of the...

The design was to block voxel editing in cities, have a limited impact in PvE areas and use it mostly in PvP areas. Also editing was going to be limited in time. But mostly the game design was never finished in most of the systems so it's not that it was a "bad MMO mechanic" - it was an idea...

After three years there was no agreement on gameplay and core features. Apart from that I agree the art was amazing. Especially the art of the buildings that was done without knowing how to actually build it with voxels, or if the voxels could have been implemented at all in buildings.

There is an open position for a creative director at Daybreak and you would be correct in thinking it's EQ related. EDIT: and you will also be correct in thinking it's not going to be an MMO

Which goes back to my previous post. These were untested systems still under development. They should have prototyped them before going into full production (was very weird to have rooms full of concept artists working, writers hired, without having finalized the game design and engineering side...

It never existed except for some concept art and some models, the "EQ3" that was scrapped was just ideas they had for design. Probably it was just the internal pitch that they created to greenlight the game (and it was rejected, so they proposed EQN)

No, the new owners appointed Jens Andersen and it was a great choice as he made the only game that was actually making money in that company (DCUO). Part of it was luck because when the PS4 launched there were few AAA F2P titles and part it was because DCUO was developed in Austin away from Smed

No idea, sorry

Anyway I think EQN will live in other projects as the ex SOE guys get new jobs. Warcraft is adding more procedural content (Moorgard is on it) and Talisker is working on Mass Effect Andromeda.

- it's not that there were multiple versions being rebooted but mostly a continuum of changes to the project. it started with some core design points that with hindsight looked a lot like Terraria, only in 3D, and then it was iterated from there. The problem was that when the designers were...

We are in what if territory but here's the gist: was convinced that the EQN/Landmark split was a mistake and they should have converged back into one. the biggest issue with that project was that it went into full production before the core design was finalized, prototyped and tested. So every...

the deal would have been acquiring 100% of SOE for a small sum, fire 50% of the personnel, replace all the management team, have all IP. the issue was that SOE was bleeding cash so it would have absorbed $50-70m over two years in the worst case scenario before turning it around, $20m in the best...

well both

FWIW it was true

The Star Citizen crowdfunding data does not make any sense. I believe they are not telling the whole story and that either some of that funding is just equity from investors or they have added few zeros. I mean had they raised $5m it would have put SC in one of the most successful crowdfunding...

Neither have an understanding about the economics of game manufacturing and distribution. They are stuck in the early 2000 which is where they had their career-defining success and they keep trying to replicate that while the rest of the world moved on.

About $3m give or take. Which is an insane amount of money considering the results. Smed ran a company for 10 years that was selling a quarter for a dollar with Sony covering the losses. Until the very end they refused to scale down the project, instead hoping that once people would be able to...

It was already over in November. They had ran out of money then and now people are getting jobs elsewhere. No idea why Smed waited so long to come clean about the fact that they blew millions on something that is not playable. Unclear with those sales and the current status of the game if it can...

That was already the case, they had like 2 people writing the content for each EQ and a skeleton team overall. The problem that you can't run a company like this because you have to pay for distribution of Kronos, ecommerce, ads, server infrastructure, 24/7 maintenance etc.

They hired some experienced people and structured the company so that the process of making games there has improved. The problem is revenue deterioration so they put a finance/ops guy in charge to manage costs. It's what needed to be done.

They were always in charge. Smed had some autonomy and Shanks had zero. Revenues kept deteriorating, no clear path to a blockbuster and they are removing more and more of Smed's old management. Also Columbus Nova is already looking for buyers. Presumably they are trying to rein in costs and...

TLDR: you are correct, it's about cash and priorities At SOE there was a team of people dealing with console and it was not indie friendly. Pre-PS4 launch Sony Playstation had a few people whose job was to help indies achieve certification so they could have some quirky games. I went through...

Because they are running out of money. They raised $2.8m from private investors last year, they have over a dozen people full time plus consultants and various sycophants. Basically 2/3rds of the money is gone already and they need more if they want to survive beyond the March release.

Yes this is why I expect them to expand the level scaling to all the content, so you can play all the content and still get better loot etc. there is a ton of unused unseen and unplayed content that could be repurposed. that and the fact that they are finally adding more and more procedural...

James Waugh also left Blizzard

ok maybe "easily" was a bit of a stretch. An engineer can make $120k-180k and with profit sharing on expansion releases (one every 18 months or so) you could make 2x or 3x in bonuses. It's a powerful way to retain top talent. Edit: top salaries for engineering talent as comparison This Is How...

You have to understand Blizzard's compensation structure: they have a salary that is ok for the game industry (not even remotely comparable to the base salaries in the tech industry) and then with profit sharing bonuses they can make 3x easily, maybe more. A medium level engineer can make...

Stardew Valley and Terraria both are big successes and they also are derivative of other successful games. So wouldn't shoot down the idea of an Ultima-esque/Stardew + AI game in advance. But design needs to be highly iterative and the first Kickstarter should have been a strong signal that...

Because they got it for free if they could cover the losses. The new acquirers thought they could turn SOE around. To some extent the company has never been better. Finally has some management structure and it's not run as a one man band with his buddies. Game development is structured (for the...

Star Citizen is working on some very hard problems in AI in relation to pathfinding and spaceship combat but the NPC stuff is nothing to write home about (not because they can't do it but because the game is not really about NPCs). The company behind the AI for SC is Case Study: Star Citizen |...

Not his choice. If the game is well received they will want it on the PS4 as to some extent it's still a walled garden. But he sold 1k units on day 1 and 500 on day 2. Somehow I don't think this is going to happen. At this point any other studio would kill this game and then salvage as much as...

It's legit. I was approached about 6 months ago asking if I was interested in buying DBG as it was not performing well and was deteriorating fast. I would imagine that it's going to be picked up by a Chinese company (not Perfect World, someone based on mainland China), gutted from the inside and...

Since the scaling down of Diablo 3 a chunk of that team is now working on Warcraft. Several D3 mechanics and art styles are included in Legion. Also there was always a big barrier internally where D3 was procedural and WoW hand-crafted - with world quests they are blurring the lines. IMO...

Anyone on Mal'Ganis?

Is there anyone here from the original FoH?

Is the guild on Mal'ganis dead? Someone booted all my characters from it