Alganon: Derek Smart vs. ex-Alganon Employees

EvilGeek

Looking through the interaction Mr Smart has with his customers it's a surprise he can retain any at all, he continually states his ability to rise above the flames and trolls but is continually guilty of doing exactly the same thing, do any search for info on him and you can see what an ego this man has, an ego big enough that he will happily risk alienating potential players because of his need to shoot his mouth off.
 
Anyone with any sense of how  community is  important in an MMO  should realise that this mans ego is going to be the kiss of death. Algenon is going to be negatively impacted if he keeps posting on their forums, he is unapologetic in his choice of words and then threatens to delete posts and then ban anyone else who takes the same route.
 
Why  anyone would  let this man loose in public to try and save a failing game is beyond me...
 
If he reads these forums he would probably tell me to f*** off like he has so many others.

Beyond all that gotta love the drama! *grin*

Amathe

Derek Smart seems to be more about sniping at people on message boards and tooting his own horn than doing anything to help this game.

Torak

The enormous (and probably very time consuming) walls of text posted by this guy leaves me ask the the question...

 

Doesn't he have anything else to do?

 

This guy is a PR wrecking ball

Teiman

Derek Smart is a character, he is a weird indie guy  and totally like to enter messageboards to discuss people things.  Most people would label him troll, well.. he trully earn that title, but he is also a intelligente individual, and a cool guy.   Cool guy, but troll. 

Dragim

looking at his photo it seems that it just screams Douchebag.  I wonder if he used "real talk" too.

MMO.Maverick

Looking at the photos of many wellknown people in the gaming and IT business - Bill Gates, Miyamoto, you name it - makes you think 'what a douchebags'.

Doesn't mean a thing, doesn't say anything about the skills they have.

 

About the whole controversy and airing the dirty laundry thing, well, it could become good PR for Alganon if they manage it smartly, as in making potential players feel that Quest can make Alganon work as a fun little MMO and make people interested in giving it a try.

TomTrixx

Zomg O.o !!! THE Derek Smart is involved in Alganon. I forsee the same great outcome as vererything else he's been involved. Any one remember the Derek Smart Battlecruiser 3000AD debacle : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Smart.

 

Hilarity will soon ensue as this develops.

Plageron

Actualy after seeingthe threads.....i am actually more interested in his game then before.

I am not a fan of Derek Smart but after reading about his games and the time periods in which all the things happened.....

I kind  of want to see what Derek will do.....

I recall years ago when i felt bad about Drek and his game.....and i bought a copy becasue it took him so long to finaly get the rights to release it....yah it was old when it came out...but i could tell right off the technology got leaked badly...but it still had some pretty cool features.

 

I guess after seeing all the tsuff Derek has been a part of....i want to see what happens next....what ever it is...i am sure it will be somethign that blow the industry away.

 

Oh and another hting.....i am glad he talks to people......i mean he could have been like the worlds of warcraft group and ignored pretty much everyone....but he didnt.....

Algnon looks pretty rough right now...i would say it looks not like worlds of warcraft but it looks like pretty much every other fantasy game thats been releaed...even before world of warcraft....it does have alot of potential....needs more then 4 classes though....maybe some shapeshifters or something...and a better pet system

Axeion

I'm kinda intrested in where all this will go. What will become of the game an what they can pull off.Will keep a eye on this game an its forums.

ET3D

Derek Smart has always had a mouth on him, but I can certainly appreciate what he's saying. I've worked at several startups, including on an MMO (Ballerium, if anyone remembers that), and I completely agree that feature creep and not realising your limitations are real killers. A product manager that can set realistic goals is a big asset, and it looks like Derek may be that. That doesn't mean he'll be a good president of the company, but it could work out.

VaultFairy

No idea about David and Derek past project but after reading the whole thing.... Wow!! E-drama.

 

Seems like Derek is a bit too outspoken, there is telling the truth and there is hanging dirty laundry out in public.

Aerows

The only David Allen game I played was Mordor II, which billed itself as commercial while being Nethack with a VB (LOLOL) frontend.  You can't make quality built on crappy underpinnings. 

I'm not going to offer an opinion on Alganon, because all I've done so far is head to their site (which looks nice, btw and the game looks good).  I am going to download it though, and try it, because it appears that an aggressive, experienced developer finally holds the reins.

Derek Smart has balls the size of Volkswagen Beetles.  Two of them, in fact, for being so bluntly honest.

Aerows

Originally posted by VaultFairy


No idea about David and Derek past project but after reading the whole thing.... Wow!! E-drama.
 
Seems like Derek is a bit too outspoken, there is telling the truth and there is hanging dirty laundry out in public.

 

To be perfectly honest, if more people aired dirty laundry, we would have a better society.  Covering up BS with more BS turns it all into a shitepile.

kahulbane

I only read 2 pages of post, but I have worked on projects with Derek...

I am at a loss here as why the founder of the Battle Cruser series would get on with such an MMO type game.

 

As for other peeps on the confrentational type way he handles things, just google him...

He is a good guy, but very head strong and to the point. no deviation at all.

He was like this with the battlecruser community, fans, and beta testers. It is just him.

But to me seems very out of place for him to be with them at all.

Here is his work for the last like 20 yrs http://www.3000ad.com/

As for that picture, that is almost 20 yrs old too. LOL

Aerows

If you look at the original link, he's got people like a Zionist Camp Director trying to bury him.  (Michael Malandra).  People that you know have no interest in the game whatsoever, but are trying to bury him because he publicly admitted DA got fired, and they are either related to DA or the lawyer.  It's ridiculous.

He spoke his piece.  I know his history of being a bigmouth for BC 3000AD.  If nothing else, at least he's engaged with the community whether he agrees with them or not.  At least he's not locked away in an ivory tower.  That, I can respect.

jagd1

Originally posted by parrotpholk

Originally posted by Aerows

 

To be perfectly honest, if more people aired dirty laundry, we would have a better society.  Covering up BS with more BS turns it all into a shitepile.

Its not about covering it up, its the manner in which this is being done.  If there is to be a court battle or lawsuit the media would pick up on it and we would have had the story anyways. 

 

 

" There are police and FBI complaints filed by the investors , there is a lawsuit in the works etc.

 

Then in the midst of all this, David tried to sell and/or license the game assets (I'm not even going to bother naming names at this point) behind the backs of investors, myself and the co-founder. It was that very last act that caused him to be fired and all three of you to be gone by the time the dust settled.  "

 

important parts i copy/pasted from gamasutra  ,I think we will hear more .

kikinchaz

If there was any glimmer of hope left for Alganon thit has sadly now been destroyed. Anything this guy touches turns to absolute crap. He spends all his time flaming anyone who disagrees with his egotistical opinions. All of his games are well known to be downright terrible (you only need to play his latest title All Aspect Warfare which is horribly laughable), yet any criticisms aimed towards his titles by the community will simply cause retaliation from him, as though he sees all criticisms as 'wrong'. The man is hugely unprofessional when it comes to communicating with others online.

I feel genuinely bad for the team left working on Alganon who really want their game to work, but I sadly won't even support anything related to this guy.

terrant

I swear to god if you look up "unprofessional" in the online Miriam-Webster dictionary, it just links to the Gamasutra thread.

 

OK not really, but it's darn close. NONE of teh players in this drama are behaving in a professional business matter, and way too much stuff is becoming public that should NEVER be aired.

IAmMMO

Just looking at Derek Smart picture speaks volumes as to why things have gone the way they have and why his got a chip on each shoulder. One look at his pictures and you understand why the stupid choices to make a wow clone and waste money was even attempted. One look at his picture you understand why the unprofessional approach to deal with ex employees speaking the truth.

Valkyrie

Well, I've been knee deep in the Horizons debacle back then (the company debacle, I played the released game for 1.5 years), read the chapter 11 documents back then, was pretty close to a team member and had quite some insight I just couldn't believe. My understanding since this time and a lot of similar (though more covered stories): MMO companies specifically are often founded and run by people who have no or little programmer skills themself, are egomaniac and usually designers who got (peters principle?) promoted in ranks for what they did well in the old position but without management skills and education for their new position.

Those who manage to put out the biggest PR spin get the most money but often have the least clue about what it will cost in time and experience and lack the people to make it come true.

Allen back then screwed it, under Bowman it shipped. But Bowman was a diva himself and alienated followers and supporters with his IRC chat behavior as well. I'm an observer and pretty neutral on all of this, just watching it unfold and asking some people in the background questions about their impression and details. Fascinating psychological dynamiks all of this.

Now we have Alganon and - no clue what Allen's part in this was but at least he managed to assemble a team that DID ship a game even though it is a pretty conservative design (to not say "WoW copy for the most part"). Kudos to the team for what they accomplished, I wrote the very same thing back in beta last autumn. back then I wrote something else too: I wish you all the best with this game and I hope you have enough financial support to turn it into YOUR game and less WoW clone as there is a WoW game already and you need to find reasons why people should plays "yours" and not that one which is much more polished, has a bigger community and way more content. I got a few supporting replies and then the thread was locked without comment. *shrugs*

Now Allen was fired and I plain don't care why, that is a business decision and will be. I care about what the new CEO does. From my long standing followership of Hz and thus the Allen story I chuckled when reading what Derek put up as reasons why he was removed and what happened. Unbelievable and it just strengthens my impression that unprofessional work attitudes are common in the area. Buuuut ... sorry Derek, at the same time your "vocal and eccentric" behavior on the board at gamasutra isn't making you look any better. I checked on all that PhD fraud thing refered back to you, I see how maniac you act - that isn't building trust in YOUR management abilities. I like the interviews you give, they are reasonable and seem calm.

But the way you act on Gamasutra hurts your public standing and the company. So I'd like to see that handled differently too. Be measured by your actions with Alganon and not by the vocal behavior on the boards hm?

 

ObliviousX

This is so entertaining.

 

I would tend to side with Smart, simply because Alganon is an horrible unfinished game.

Mrbloodworth

This is about all you will see from this man, talk, and attacks and drama.

Do not expect anything to happen with the game.