Big Flex
Fitness Fascist
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Pulling all donations to Pantheon and rerouting toward TrannyQuest, abandon ship, abandon ship. AOOOH-GAH! AOOOH-GAH!
Pan'Theon: Rise' of th'e Fal'Len - #1 Thread in MMO
- Thread starter gogojira_sl
- Start date
Dont forget that many people interested will just not fund at all for various reasons.
Ichu
Molten Core Raider
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Yeah said that in another post but I think for some reason people gloss this fact over as small but it's not. From personal friends / work / classes I teach I know lots of mmo players , both old and young , some who started EQ beta , others who started well into WoW's life, and out of those I personally know 1 has ever funded a dime to a KS. The others look at you like you've lost your mind when you suggest one.
Quality KS or shitty one , they won't even consider it.
Convo
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
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It's a huge issue.. So many people refuse to donate to something so early on. I understand it and not all gamers really care if they get this type of game. It's one of those things. They will try it when it's released but that's it. They really need to get this thing in full development like I posted earlier and a lot of people said all along. They went early hoping people would just pour money into it and as of yet, it hasn't happen.
BilboFaggins
N00b
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I still got old school MMO friends that literally won't pledge because of Slius being on the team. I keep telling them that it will be better this time, but they just won't budge.
Convo
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
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I know this sounds crazy.. But I'm not so sure he realizes people are mad at him.. Just something I picked up on in the KS comment section..He also said, if people have issues with him, to email him and hopefully he can address it.
Ks is a weird thing that blew up in the last year. I was looking at some data and mid 2012 there were not even ten kickstarters that had raised a million dollars. Kickstarter has certainly gained as much if not more from high profile projects like Veronica Marrs as it happened the other way.
The percentage of people who have kickstarted anything is likely really small.
That Adam Carolla raised 1.4 million with fundanything to make a movie blows my mind. Except he has a super loyal audience who have long proven themselves willing to open their wallets for him.
Actually Jacobs was able to significantly prefund his kickstarter (and post fund the project) something which was never an option here.
Vandyn
Blackwing Lair Raider
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Keep in mind this is a pretty lofty goal that they are trying to set. It's not like they are only asking for 200k. They are asking for 800k and even then nobody smart thinks that's enough to fund this type of game. Maybe that's also the issue, the fact that even if the KS funds there is the unknown behind it. How much can they make a bare bones MMO on? Would they even launch such a game and what would that game look like?
Aside from some lower perks and the product itself.... I'm very skeptical about KS.
Hey... Gimmie 3 grand for this. I'll sign a copy for you. Don't think about my potential profits off of your dime.
That is the big drawback from KS. Right next to that is... I just gave some dude my money.... Where is my product?
Especially when there is no/limited recourse, and KS won't do anything about those who scam or fail to deliver.
Dropping more than the estimated value of a product.... That generally doesn't appeal to the masses.
If they came at it with a 50-80k goal for a prototype, then came back, presenting the prototype and asking for funding to go full steam... I think that would have worked out better.
There will still be people who wouldn't touch the idea of giving money for development or trusting KS ventures.
Hey... Gimmie 3 grand for this. I'll sign a copy for you. Don't think about my potential profits off of your dime.
That is the big drawback from KS. Right next to that is... I just gave some dude my money.... Where is my product?
Especially when there is no/limited recourse, and KS won't do anything about those who scam or fail to deliver.
Dropping more than the estimated value of a product.... That generally doesn't appeal to the masses.
If they came at it with a 50-80k goal for a prototype, then came back, presenting the prototype and asking for funding to go full steam... I think that would have worked out better.
There will still be people who wouldn't touch the idea of giving money for development or trusting KS ventures.
Korrupt
Blackwing Lair Raider
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Or here, hes a long time poster.
He could go into detail on what happened with VG when he took the helm which I would imagine is what most people have a problem with.
BilboFaggins
N00b
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The thing is, with all the crap that happened with Vanguard, I still really liked the game. Heck, I told Brad at the last SoE Live that I would still be playing Vanguard if they just made new content for it.
That crap where they take old monsters and spawn them in a new location and call it new content is bullshit. I want new monster models, new armies and weapons, new dungeons.
Actually there is one thing I REALLY hated in Vanguard... The attack animations were horrid. Especially the dual wield animation. You shouldn't just thrust both weapons at the same time. Duel wielded weapons should attack at their own rate seperately.
That crap where they take old monsters and spawn them in a new location and call it new content is bullshit. I want new monster models, new armies and weapons, new dungeons.
Actually there is one thing I REALLY hated in Vanguard... The attack animations were horrid. Especially the dual wield animation. You shouldn't just thrust both weapons at the same time. Duel wielded weapons should attack at their own rate seperately.
Quote from Brad, taken from the comments section of his interview with Boogie2988:
"In a nutshell, our publisher was Microsoft and we had a deal with them to make a new AAA MMO. For about four years everything was going well and we were almost ready to start some early alpha testing of the game. Then there was a regime change at Microsoft, with the VP of their games devision leaving the company along with just about everyone who worked for him. The new group that was assigned to our project wasn't interested in doing an MMO. They accused us of being late and over budget. They wanted to push us out the door and launch the game one year early.
This would, of course, result in total failure. So I went out and did two things: I approached SOE, asking them to take over publishing Vanguard and to fund us to completion. At the same time, I went on the road and approached a variety of investors, seeing if we could drum up some interest to invest in the game and the company, again to give us the funding we needed to complete the game.
In the limited time we had, we failed to raise any additional funds from investors. SOE, however, was able to step in and help out. They assumed the publishing rights to the game and were able to fund us for six more months. That was, of course, better than nothing and the best they could do at the time. But we really needed 12 more months. With only 6 months we ran out of time before we could polish and optimize the game. So when the game was released in January of 2007, it wasn't in very good shape. The game sold 250K units very quickly, but then the majority of players ended up quitting by level 2 or 3. Why so quickly? (you could achieve level 2 or 3 in a couple of hours). But the players couldn't enjoy the game in its unoptimized state unless they had the latest and greatest PC and graphics card. And even then the game didn't perform that well.
A few months after launch SOE decided to buy both Sigil and Vanguard. They were again a bit strapped for cash and couldn't keep the Sigil office fully staffed (at Vanguard's launch we had something like 105 employees). So about 50% of the company was laid off. The whole situation was horrible, but I need to stress that if SOE hadn't been able to come in and help as much as they could, things would have been even worse. At the very least, Vanguard did ship.
SOE then focussed on optimizing the Vanguard client and server tech. Eventually the game was playable by most average PCs, but by then critical mass and momentum had been lost. Players had left with a bad taste in their mouth and many were not willing to come back and give Vanguard another chance. So Vanguard continued on as an SOE game and, over time, became an MMO that I'm very proud of -- it was a lot of fun and most of the new game features like Diplomacy turned out to be pretty cool. The players that remained became a small but passionate and loyal bunch.
In fact, only just recently did SOE decide to shut Vanguard down. The game was up and mostly playable for 7 years. Most of the employees that were laid off were able to take their 4+ years of game development experience and land jobs elsewhere in the industry.
But there's no getting around the fact that things got ugly in early 2007. People who had poured their hearts and souls into Vanguard were laid off right after the game launched. It was a dark time and I was in a dark place. I made my share of mistakes... perhaps I could have seen what was coming, or kept more money in reserve for a rainy day. I was out of the office quite a bit talking with investors and pitching the game. I was therefore absent during a lot of these trying times. As the game sort of fell apart, so did I. There was a lot of stress and anxiety.
So anyway, that's the short version I guess. The good news is that I know myself a lot better now and have learned from my mistakes. So have the other guys on my team who were Sigil employees at the time. Our project now is smaller and the team not nearly as large. We're able to turn the negative that was the Vanguard situation into a positive, by building on our experiences and setting things up a lot smarter this time around.
-Brad"
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So he had a game that was 90% complete, needed a year of polish and optimization. Right? So he went around asking for funding and no one would fund a year this games development, which was 90% complete. Except SoE which didnt give him jack. So how is he now going to go and fund his latest project with nothing to show but a few pages of lore, art and ideas?
Convo
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
- 8,761
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I've already spoken with Salim about his involvement with Vanguard.
I brought it up on the KS page and got rolled by fools saying I was a troll.
There will be an answer from him. I'm not sure if it will be some "testimony" or via a vid.
He isn't the best with words and forum posts. Anyone from that time in VG would agree... So give it a bit of time as he goes through it with Ben.
He offered an open invite to chat with him about it all... But that isn't what is needed. Something which can be referenced to and shown is what needs to happen.
It has only been a couple of days, but I can ask again for an update.
zzeris
King Turd of Shit Hill
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And he will have his hands all over Pantheon. With that said, maybe Brad can help turn it into black gold, Texas T, liquid....uh might be going to far here even in the thread of hope.