Convo
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
- 8,761
- 613
38 Studios
- Thread starter Tmac
- Start date
Tmac
Adventurer
- 9,398
- 15,971
BHG is one thing, but what about the whole Rhode Island deal? I mean that was a HUGE spike in the growth of the studio and as an outsider, it just seemed like too much too soon and totally deviated from the natural progression most businesses take. Unless 300 new employees working 24/7 is what the game needed to get pushed out on time, in which case kind of boggles my mind. The Rhode Island deal seemed like more of a burden than anything else...
Yeah, the Rhode Island deal was unsustainable to begin with. Turns out more capitol was always going to be needed. And the terms of the loan never made any financial sense whatsoever. This is one of the primary allegations in the lawsuit against Curt & Co. The fact that 38 wasn't able to produce an MMO for the amount of the $75m loan is one thing, but the fact they never even intended to begin with is truly boggling. Shit's gonna get ugly in court. Oh, and the defendants were able to tap into an addition $2m in funds to pay for lawyers, just the other day; money that would have been used to pay back R.I.'s debt. So, this debacle is a gift that still keeps giving.
Pancreas
Vyemm Raider
- 1,124
- 3,818
The Rhode Island deal was definitely the wrong move. However, it is what happens when you decide to build a railroad in front of a racing locomotive. Curt was desperately trying to lay down enough resources in front of his teams so they could make it to the finish line. Rather than take a step back and realize the company was out of control and needed to be cut WAY the fuck back to meet budget, he kept looking for more money. Eventually most of the traditional capital sources were already tapped or no longer had faith in the projects.
Then this magical money machine from on high appears in the form of a really bad contract from RI. So they sign on the dotted line, pleased as shit they are going to make payroll that month... not realizing they started the countdown sequence to the self destruct module. By the time it sinks in that they have no hope of surviving long enough to see a return while meeting the contractual job creation requirements... It is too late.
It's like at the end of Alien when Ripley realizes she needs more time and tries to stop the countdown... not gunna happen.
Then this magical money machine from on high appears in the form of a really bad contract from RI. So they sign on the dotted line, pleased as shit they are going to make payroll that month... not realizing they started the countdown sequence to the self destruct module. By the time it sinks in that they have no hope of surviving long enough to see a return while meeting the contractual job creation requirements... It is too late.
It's like at the end of Alien when Ripley realizes she needs more time and tries to stop the countdown... not gunna happen.
Pasteton
Blackwing Lair Raider
- 2,608
- 1,718
Say Koa:reckoning had like skyrim levels of box sales. Would that have been enough to prevent destruction, or would they still have failed?
Reason I ask is I'm sure curt had a few wise people telling him shit was gonna hit the fan but I can see him being blindly enthusiastic that Koa was gonna sell 6 mil boxes so they would be all set
Reason I ask is I'm sure curt had a few wise people telling him shit was gonna hit the fan but I can see him being blindly enthusiastic that Koa was gonna sell 6 mil boxes so they would be all set
Skyrim = money hats, it has prolly sold 20+ million copies worldwide.. so ya had KOA sold like that people would have been begging Curt to take their money no matter how over budget they went.
There is no way KoA could of sold enough copies to fix their problem. KoA could of doubled Skyrim's sales and we would still be having this discussion now. Their problem wasn't just a lack of funding. It was how they used the funding they did have when they got it. Rhode Island could of written them another huge check and it would of been pissed away just like the first one.
The bottom line is that they were given enough money to make a MMO.With that kind of cash they should of been able to at the very least push a piece of shit out the door. When that place was going down in flames they released some stuff in a panic and I think it did more harm then good. We got some generic screenshots, and a flyover of a empty world. That is pretty damning stuff when you consider the millions of dollars, and years of development time it took to get to that point. That being the best they could produce in a pinch pretty much showed the gaming world that they didn't have shit. The claims about the game being almost done are a joke at best. Maybe it was almost "done" in the way that Horizons was "done" when it launched.
So it goes back to the question that has been asked a thousand times already. What the hell were they doing over there? I don't expect Moorgard to answer that since I'm sure the only way to give a real answer means outing friends. Going to be one of those mysteries where we just have to draw our own conclusions on how that got to be such a cluster fuck. I'd be humiliated if that was my project.
Don't forget about those gameplay videos that were leaked also. Truly uninspiring stuff. While I thought the art of the game was great, the actual gameplay looked bad. The very first thing you see is a static NPC with a huge <del>yellow</del> purple exclamation over its head. Then later, typical hotbar combat.
Found it. Who knows how early of a build this was. Pretty big letdown, IMO.
spronk
FPS noob
- 22,680
- 25,783
300 white collar employees suck up around $30m/year (or more), especially when you are top heavy with VPs and senior whatever's who each make $150-300k+ so its not that hard to figure out where most of the money went - paychecks. Don't forget, the original CEO resigned 3 years ago and he was a vet of Midway, Dreamworks, EA, etc. While no one has ever said why he quit, I'd guess he wanted to get costs under control and scale back stuff, and Curt wouldn't have any of that so he brought in the fucking marketing VP at a cable company to be the new CEO. The hilarious thing is she is now back to head of marketing at some womens ovulation treatment company or shit, hahaha. CEO for a year!
There's an old saying that if you want a successful startup, only hire people better and smarter than you - big tech companies like google, facebook, etc have something like a 500:1 hire ratio (500 interviews for 1 hire), when I did startups getting people was the hardest and most time consuming part of the job. It looks like 38S was filled with a lot of expensive mediocrity, especially at the top.
There's an old saying that if you want a successful startup, only hire people better and smarter than you - big tech companies like google, facebook, etc have something like a 500:1 hire ratio (500 interviews for 1 hire), when I did startups getting people was the hardest and most time consuming part of the job. It looks like 38S was filled with a lot of expensive mediocrity, especially at the top.
bixxby
Molten Core Raider
- 2,750
- 47
Hahaha he threw away his fortune & legacy for a literal WoW clone.
Utnayan
I Love Utnayan he’s awesome
- 16,304
- 12,070
This thing looks more bland every time I see it. Complete with trying to explain this fabulous lore and IP created... With Chat bubbles on a PC>NPC AE trigger. This thing would have been eaten alive by some up and coming competition which will tell the entire story as you play the game without cut scenes, nor having to read, while at the same time, the entire world changes around you dynamically, complete with community building from yesterday.
If this would have even seen the slightest of innovation, or was as complete as McFarlane insinuates, this thing would have been purchased and wrapped up on the cheap for a quick turn and burn profit.
- 25,424
- 37,545
Cash in on the wow phenomenon, as has been tried by countless other games since 2005?
Well, at least we know we didnt miss anything, just another wow clone that didnt suck away our next $60.