SOE Becomes Daybreak / Russian shutdown

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delirium_sl

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Georgeson is out, no word on Butler or Danuser... or Smed for that matter.

Edit: Danuser is out, man this thread moves fast.
 
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a_skeleton_02

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Utnayan_sl said:
So - catching up.

What's the tally? Are Georgeson, Danuser, and Butler fucking out on their ass where they belong?

Shame for some of the lower key staff. Some good developers in that mix so, honestly, probably a good thing for them to get with a company that has decent management.
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Only Georgeson so far out of those three.

Edit and Danuser

Steve Danuser @Moorgard ? 1m 1 minute ago
Hey folks, thanks for the kind words. I am no longer at Daybreak, but the lore will live on. Peace.
 
xzi

xzi

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H1Z1 is fun but ultimately Day Z is still very popular and offers good competition. EQN is in an entire different realm of game as far as we know. Who knows though about that.

I doubt they'd scrap it, that would be stupid as fuck.
 
Utnayan

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Vinyard_sl said:
Moorgard is out :/

Steve Danuser on Twitter:

Sorry to hear that bro
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Good riddance. One more to go to clean house out of that shithole and hopefully they don't land anywhere else where they can ruin management principles. Butler, Danuser, and Georgeson are plagues to the industry. Although I have a feeling they will end up landing at Battlecry or Zynga. Hopefully Zynga. Let's keep all these rejects in one place.

Nice work Ruskies. Again, feeling horrible for the good people but trust me, it will be a blessing in disguise for those folks once they land with a real company where their creative talent won't be stifled.
 
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Vinyard_sl

shitlord
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I liked Moorgard for his small stint with Vanguard. I think he helped the game out a lot in his small tenure. I have no ill will towards him, especially because he also posts on these boards from time to time.
 
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Flc_sl

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spronk_sl said:
given the layoff patterns (senior people, support staff, 50% cuts) this looks like the classic hedge fun raid and resell play: they will refocus all devs on mobile games, hire new junior devs to port their games to mobile, and sell the company in 18-36 months for 300-400% profit. I'd give it 50/50 odds on whether PC and console ports even are considered for their games anymore.

the name of the game is not actually making money, its about showing what your potential profit could be. PC/console MMOs have a very tight, very known profit model - you will generally sell 100k-1m copies at launch and settle at 50-300k subs or $15m/yr f2p fees. It doesn't really vary much outside that. Whereas f2p games are $0-100m/mo and its still the wild west, so its a much better space to try and gamble in. Investors don't give a shit about voxels or EQ heritage or anything like that, just what a company like Facebook or Microsoft or Google may buy and MMOs are not it.
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I'm not sure how I logically see how you got from your evidence (who is being cut) to your conclusion (they're going mobile F2P, Zynga 2.0 confirmed.)

It looks like the folks who have been cut are:

1. Management layers in the community team, resulting in only a couple of community managers remaining. Not a big deal since the developers do most of the "community management" anyway (see Adam Clegg and Jimmy Whizenhunt as opposed to Greg Henniger on H1Z1.) And these are always the first cuts for layoffs in the MMO genre. See: Star Wars, Elder Scrolls, WildStar, Warhammer. All let their community teams - particularly the senior level folks on those teams - go first.

2. Senior management with role redundancies and no appreciable applicable skills for the actual development of the game, whose management responsibilities were being done by others.

3. Redundant designers/producers, whose work could be incorporated by other more skilled/successful designers or producers. If you have a Terry Michaels, you don't need a Felgon.

It looks like they've done what any smart management team would do if they were unprofitable: cut major costs by cutting redundancies and management layers while keeping the core workers and teams in place, since they're the ones making the actual product.

I don't actually think we'll be seeing major directional changes in terms of the genre of game being produced or the monetization strategies.
 
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a_skeleton_02

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Maybe the people left with a job will know that the boys club is closed and Papa Smed can't protect them anymore will start to hustle and make a good product.
 
Utnayan

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/\/\ One can only hope. Problem is Battlecry studios and Rich Vogel exist. Which very well may continue the good ol boys club within that development company. There is another good ol boys club within Zynga - so lets hope they land there because no one gives two shits about Zynga.

Vinyard_sl said:
I liked Moorgard for his small stint with Vanguard. I think he helped the game out a lot in his small tenure. I have no ill will towards him, especially because he also posts on these boards from time to time.
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He is a phony pile of shit and a mouth piece trophy management kiss ass artist with no applicable skills or vision in designing games. He should go back to running a web site or defending Curt Schilling with blinders.

This all could have been avoided years ago had Smed seen this from miles away and started kicking shit into gear. They would still be with Sony and developing decent games without the nitwits that just got sacked.
 
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Flc_sl

shitlord
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Vinyard_sl said:
I liked Moorgard for his small stint with Vanguard. I think he helped the game out a lot in his small tenure. I have no ill will towards him, especially because he also posts on these boards from time to time.
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Moorgard was handling all of the actual content - the actual game - for EQN. This news is the most shocking.

If they kept Butler and relieved Steve Danuser in his place, that's sheer fucking idiocy. The fact the kept Emily and released Steve is absurd. Totally absurd.
 
Dyvim

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Dunno whats taking Daybreak that long. A quick gathering in the parking lot and telling them not to return for tomorrow would take 10 mins top.
Stay classy managers.
 
Soygen

Soygen

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Kuro_sl said:
Also, where's Jestor Rodo to revel in this!
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He doesn't get internet at his place.


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