Yeah. with the way DC has churned through lead designers, I think that game has some serious problems. Tom Blair is not a bad guy, really -- he just as that arrogance of youth thing going; and yeah he made a lot of SOE-type mistakes since taking over the game. He also did some good things as well. But you know, lipstick on a pig and all that.... I wish him luck either way, he's gonna need it in that job. It seems like it's the -- "you get to be vader's next admiral" job......
I'd like to see what this guy can really do when his boss isn't telling him to build a toilet in the living room.
SOE had difficulties in SWG even when they had some of the brightest developers in the world. I've been of a mind for some time now that they could benefit from a complete, third-party, professional, organizational review.
Internal review tends to be ineffective due to organizational blindspots and politics. If SOE remains invested in this genre, it would be nice to see them functioning in a healthy, productive manner, rather than alienating consumers and digging themselves into a hole.
Chris Cao is already with DC Universe, Blix is heading over, and Smed runs the show. Tbh, I'm glad I'm a Marvel fan. It still troubles me at times how Blix (Smed and others) continue to talk about how entertaining customers was/is their top priority. Blix has said in times past that he did what he did in SWG not because it was best for customers, but because his boss told him to, and if the boss says build a toilet in the living room, you do it. Those are close to his exact words actually. I'm sure Blix put some good work into parts of this game (probably more than I'll ever know), and he has my thanks for that, truly. Unfortunately much of that seemed overshadowed by his company's goal to tap into someone else's share of the MMO market, at any cost.
Originally posted by ZtyX This is such a big loss for SWG:. It truly makes me sad to hear this. .. It also means that their developer team goes down by one
Loche MIGHT do a better job, he's been around longer than Blixtev, I've never been very fond of Blixtev's decisions.
I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
Hauken Stormchaser I want pre-CU back Station.com : We got your game Yeah?, Well i want it back!!!
Originally posted by Hauken I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
No doubt about it, the gameplay from what I've seen is far too arcade-ish, and it hasn't even reached alpha yet changed dev teams a few times? Also anyone know exactly what platform DCU will be for? Console seems to be the future for MMO games (not that I like the idea).
Originally posted by Hauken I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
As an Ex SWG VET my self, i have not only boycotted SOE but also the mother company 'Sony', because if a part of the company (Sony Online Entertainment) is capable of such gigantic lies and direct deceit, i have absolutely no trust in them, none what so ever...
As far I em concerned, these people are the bottom of the gaming industry.. They are the Uwe Bowl of gaming, and the gaming world would only be better if they where all permanently banned from ever participating in game development...
A doctor can loose his license if he EG. gets drunk while operating, shouldn't a game developer loose a kinda of "gaming license", if he (from what i see what happend in SWG), directly commit fraud, scamming their customers, and royal screw them with lies... I have gotten Nigerian scam mails that contain more truth then SWGs newsletters and DEV comments.
forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m Read about it here on in the link..... It's been almost 5 years since I was taking a nap on my couch at home and got a call from my boss asking me if I would go to Austin and help the SWG team out. The next Monday I ventured out to Austin and pitched in on what would culminate as Publish 9 "Secrets of the Force". Firsthand I saw the multiple systems that SWG was missing at the time and convinced the management that they could use those systems so much they asked me to stay on permanently and implement them. How similar then that a few weeks ago while sitting on a couch and in a relative sleepy state that my boss asked me if I would consider joining the DC Universe Online team and head up the Design Systems group. No one departs a team they have been on for near 5 years and not contemplate what they have accomplished. That time period on this team has really been amazing for me on so many levels. I went from being a junior team member to cementing myself into a leadership role. The current team that I led for 2 years is the best Live team in the MMO business hands down. Not only do they continually put out quality new content and systems they are able to produce it in a reasonable amount of time. I know some folks don't agree with everything we have done nor how we did it, but the driving goal of the team has always been aligned with mine, "entertain our customers". If you make someone grin, clap their hands in glee, or feel pride over an accomplishment, the developer has done their job as an entertainer (Yes that's true, the Dev team really is a band of entertainers ). I will miss all of you fans who have devoted the majority of their after hours to SWG. Your continued support of this project is an amazing thing to be a part of and I will miss being involved with you all on a daily basis (even a middle of the night posting spree). As a team the SWG Developers truly are a squad of ARC troopers, highly trained, elite and dedicated to accomplishing any mission. I hand that squad off to a very capable Loche, who will continue to entertain and immerse you in the Star Wars Universe. May the Force be With You
Thomas "Blixtev" Blair
Perhaps it was a poor choice of words but going from "junior member" to leadership role is questionable unless a.) you're really a star in the company and then they ask you to put your money where your mouth is or b.) your management had to reach that far into the barrel to find someone who'd try and do the job...
Professionally, he at least has an excuse then for when he moves on to his next interview..."well, I was a junior member tapped to fix this sinking ship...and look, I still kept it running through all of the veteran hate. .."
I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
As an Ex SWG VET my self, i have not only boycotted SOE but also the mother company 'Sony', because if a part of the company (Sony Online Entertainment) is capable of such gigantic lies and direct deceit, i have absolutely no trust in them, none what so ever...
As far I em concerned, these people are the bottom of the gaming industry..
They are the Uwe Bowl of gaming, and the gaming world would only be better if they where all permanently banned from ever participating in game development...
A doctor can loose his license if he EG. gets drunk while operating, shouldn't a game developer loose a kinda of "gaming license", if he (from what i see what happend in SWG), directly commit fraud, scamming their customers, and royal screw them with lies... I have gotten Nigerian scam mails that contain more truth then SWGs newsletters and DEV comments.
Heh, well I'm not a big fan of a lot of what went down with SWG. It does seem to me that there were lies told, mistakes made and promises broken. At the same time though, blaming a dev (e.g. Blix, Rubenfield) or any one person for all the problems is probably not realistic.
So many things, people, departments, even companies played a role in the chain of events that we call SWG. Marketting research seemed off the mark. Management seemed reactionary and short-sighted. Coding was rushed. Communication between departments seemed questionable, and communication to consumers appeared misleading and/or inaccurate.
Should a dev lose his licence to practice for all of this? The situation seems a bit more complex than that. Organizational review is certainly called for in my opinion. People should be held accountable for things they can directly control, but this is different than blaming one dev for all the factors contributing to the current state of affairs in SWG.
Should a dev lose his licence to practice for all of this? The situation seems a bit more complex than that. Organizational review is certainly called for in my opinion.
Already happening I bet. Can you imagine Smed getting a position anywhere else in the MMO industry? Do you think Bliz will get on their hands and knees and beg him to help launch their unannounced mmo? The taint of SWG will have a lasting efffect, we may not hear about all the repercussions but they're there all the same.
...The spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought.
Originally posted by Hauken I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
As an Ex SWG VET my self, i have not only boycotted SOE but also the mother company 'Sony', because if a part of the company (Sony Online Entertainment) is capable of such gigantic lies and direct deceit, i have absolutely no trust in them, none what so ever...
As far I em concerned, these people are the bottom of the gaming industry.. They are the Uwe Bowl of gaming, and the gaming world would only be better if they where all permanently banned from ever participating in game development... A doctor can loose his license if he EG. gets drunk while operating, shouldn't a game developer loose a kinda of "gaming license", if he (from what i see what happend in SWG), directly commit fraud, scamming their customers, and royal screw them with lies... I have gotten Nigerian scam mails that contain more truth then SWGs newsletters and DEV comments.
Heh, well I'm not a big fan of a lot of what went down with SWG. It does seem to me that there were lies told, mistakes made and promises broken. At the same time though, blaming a dev (e.g. Blix, Rubenfield) or any one person for all the problems is probably not realistic.
So many things, people, departments, even companies played a role in the chain of events that we call SWG. Marketting research seemed off the mark. Management seemed reactionary and short-sighted. Coding was rushed. Communication between departments seemed questionable, and communication to consumers appeared misleading and/or inaccurate. Should a dev lose his licence to practice for all of this? The situation seems a bit more complex than that. Organizational review is certainly called for in my opinion. People should be held accountable for things they can directly control, but this is different than blaming one dev for all the factors contributing to the current state of affairs in SWG.
The problem i have is not that they turned a good (even if a little boken) game into something awful, that was expected from SOE, but that they kept lien to their customers. They keept saying dont worry about this because we are gonne fix it, and then turn around and not fixing it but either removing it or ignoring it etc. They kept fooling their customers so they could get just a little extra money out of them, that is just not very nice. And btw the old Nazi defence, "i am not to blame, i was ordered to do it", just dosent work.
I know he is on his way out and there are a few things that a person is obliged to say when they leave but some of that farewell blurb is just embarrasing.
So i edited it for him:
<snip> Firsthand I saw the multiple systems that SWG had in place from Raph Koster's brilliant design and I didn't understand any of it so I was missing at the time and convinced the management that they could use a lot of Blizzards design those systems so much they asked me to stay on permanently and implement them. <snip>
<snip> That time period on this team has really been amazing for me on so many levels, for instance, I am amazed customers still believe this team when it says something. I went from being a junior team member to cementing myself into a leadership role. The current team that I led for 2 years is the best Live a team in the MMO business hands down. Not only do they continually put out quality new content and systems they are able to produce it in a reasonable amount of time, but that really doesn't matter because SOE will release it even if it's not complete. I know everyone some folks don't doesn't agree with anything everything we have done nor how we did it, but the driving goal of the team has always been aligned with mine, "entertain our customers" too bad managements driving goal was "pick their pockets clean at any cost". If you make someone pay for beta grin, not leave due to game bugs clap their hands in glee, or string people along with lies feel pride over an accomplishment, the management developer has done their job as an business people entertainer (Yes that's true, management the Dev team really is a band of thieves entertainers >:O ).
I will miss all of you fans who have devoted too much the majority of their dollars after hours to SWG. Your continued financial support of this project is an amazing thing to be a part of and I will miss being involved with you all on a daily basis (even a middle of the night posting spree).
As a team the SWG Developers truly are a squad of ARC troopers, highly trained, elite and dedicated to accomplishing any mission. I hand that squad off to a very capable Loche, who will continue to entertain and immerse you in the Star Wars Universe.
May the Force be With You out of game because it certainly isn't in-game.
Thomas "Blixtev" Blair
"The liberties and resulting economic prosperity that YOU take for granted were granted by those "dead guys"
Originally posted by Hauken I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
As an Ex SWG VET my self, i have not only boycotted SOE but also the mother company 'Sony', because if a part of the company (Sony Online Entertainment) is capable of such gigantic lies and direct deceit, i have absolutely no trust in them, none what so ever...
As far I em concerned, these people are the bottom of the gaming industry.. They are the Uwe Bowl of gaming, and the gaming world would only be better if they where all permanently banned from ever participating in game development... A doctor can loose his license if he EG. gets drunk while operating, shouldn't a game developer loose a kinda of "gaming license", if he (from what i see what happend in SWG), directly commit fraud, scamming their customers, and royal screw them with lies... I have gotten Nigerian scam mails that contain more truth then SWGs newsletters and DEV comments.
Heh, well I'm not a big fan of a lot of what went down with SWG. It does seem to me that there were lies told, mistakes made and promises broken. At the same time though, blaming a dev (e.g. Blix, Rubenfield) or any one person for all the problems is probably not realistic.
So many things, people, departments, even companies played a role in the chain of events that we call SWG. Marketting research seemed off the mark. Management seemed reactionary and short-sighted. Coding was rushed. Communication between departments seemed questionable, and communication to consumers appeared misleading and/or inaccurate. Should a dev lose his licence to practice for all of this? The situation seems a bit more complex than that. Organizational review is certainly called for in my opinion. People should be held accountable for things they can directly control, but this is different than blaming one dev for all the factors contributing to the current state of affairs in SWG.
I think it was more of the managing the team as a whole, there were many many many "we want feedback plz!" threads in test center forums for testing patches/publishes/chapters, yet none of the feedback were actually taken accounted for unless they were bug reports of existing stuff.
When we suggested for something to be changed or added, it never happened, then devs wrote an excuse being "miscommunication, we're sorry" yet doesn't do anything. It happened on multiple occasions, isn't test center for customers to test something and to tell the devs what customers think needs changing or fixed? Devs seems to treat test center as "here you go, you get a sneak preview of what's already written in stone, we're not going to change a thing from test to live". There's been too many times when a huge bug or exploit gets reported more than enough times on test server, yet makes it to live and the players are stunned at how blind the devs were.
It's not really the individuals, it's the management of the team, it's been pretty lousy for years (ever since Kostor and Rogue_5 left).
All the more reason to believe that DCMMO (which is the "must succeed" game for SOE) is going to probably top SWG in massive failure of developent of a great IP.
Just to keep score here, these NGE and post NGE nitwits have "moved along" from the NGE to DCMMO:
"The Dork Lord Heliass"
Grant "Rogue 5" McDaniel
Chris "I had a" Cao
Deadmeat
and now... Blixtev the "toilet boy", aka the Jedi hater.
With Blixtev on the job, I wonder how people will love having their Superman and Batman characters continually nerfed?
And Chris will rant and rave at the player base when his team of halfwits commits yet another outrage.
About all this perfect storm of incompetency is missing is Nancy "Reading is bad mmmkay" McIntyre to handle PR.
He ran the best team in the industry?!?!?!?!?! Which is why they are still the laughing stock of the industry and the game hasn't been successful like other teams that actually make decent games. They couldn't even get the damn holiday event to work right.... Why not just say they have the best customer service in the industry while he is at it or maybe go back to calling SOE an industry leader in MMOs again. After making a statement like that how much bigger could the lie be?
Yeah if Team Toilet Boy was the best dev team in the industry, I'd hate to see the worst.
Probably the only one that you could even argue was worse was the Dark and Light team, or possibly Vanguard.
Having been gone from SWG for years now, and playing EVE, I know the difference between a REAL Dev team that can deal with an incredibly complex game and a bunch of half trained monkeys.
I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
"SOE" on a box is truly the stamp of certain failure.
I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
As an Ex SWG VET my self, i have not only boycotted SOE but also the mother company 'Sony', because if a part of the company (Sony Online Entertainment) is capable of such gigantic lies and direct deceit, i have absolutely no trust in them, none what so ever...
As far I em concerned, these people are the bottom of the gaming industry..
They are the Uwe Bowl of gaming, and the gaming world would only be better if they where all permanently banned from ever participating in game development...
A doctor can loose his license if he EG. gets drunk while operating, shouldn't a game developer loose a kinda of "gaming license", if he (from what i see what happend in SWG), directly commit fraud, scamming their customers, and royal screw them with lies... I have gotten Nigerian scam mails that contain more truth then SWGs newsletters and DEV comments.
Heh, well I'm not a big fan of a lot of what went down with SWG. It does seem to me that there were lies told, mistakes made and promises broken. At the same time though, blaming a dev (e.g. Blix, Rubenfield) or any one person for all the problems is probably not realistic.
So many things, people, departments, even companies played a role in the chain of events that we call SWG. Marketting research seemed off the mark. Management seemed reactionary and short-sighted. Coding was rushed. Communication between departments seemed questionable, and communication to consumers appeared misleading and/or inaccurate.
Should a dev lose his licence to practice for all of this? The situation seems a bit more complex than that. Organizational review is certainly called for in my opinion. People should be held accountable for things they can directly control, but this is different than blaming one dev for all the factors contributing to the current state of affairs in SWG.
I see where you are coming from but I still beg to differ.
We learned a great deal from Rubenfields blog. He stated that they were given a directive to "make SWG better". The total extent of how to do that lied with the development dept. Rubenfield also says that they came up with a combat design and then "sold" the idea to the higher ups. It was interesting to note that , at that time, SOE employed no writers, per se, just the dev team to do the job of writers.
It pretty easy to see, from hindsight, the plan that blix and deadmeat layed on the table after C5. It''s also pretty easy to see that the "plan" took around a year to complete and it was nothing more than another mini NGE, just done in increments. I would imagine that blix and DM came up with this plan and "sold" it to higher-ups just the same as Rubenfield and his team did. Needless to say, another massive CHANGE had the same effect of all the other massive CHANGES. Big loss in subscriptions. I believe the current thinking is about a 66% - 75% loss in players and seems to be consistant with what the thinking is that NGE cost them, also.
I have learned from a high ranking dev (from another game due out here shortly) that he was interviewed to be the "creative director" (so to speak) of the NGE. When this dev, told them in the interview process, NOT to do the NGE and to ADD content to CU, he was not considered a serious canditate for the job. He also told me that there just wasn't too many "on board" with his ideas at SOE Austin. So, SOE did the NGE and this guy went on to other projects and the rest is history.
Sorry, but I believe Blix and DM deserve the credit (or the infamy) of the last year+ and well deserved, it is.
Comments
DC online had a lot of buzz and excitement so we're sending someone over to take care of that.....
That was pretty funny!
I'd like to see what this guy can really do when his boss isn't telling him to build a toilet in the living room.
SOE had difficulties in SWG even when they had some of the brightest developers in the world. I've been of a mind for some time now that they could benefit from a complete, third-party, professional, organizational review.
Internal review tends to be ineffective due to organizational blindspots and politics. If SOE remains invested in this genre, it would be nice to see them functioning in a healthy, productive manner, rather than alienating consumers and digging themselves into a hole.
another nail in the coffin.
hail and farewell toilet boy.
Flushed.
The toilet may be gone...but the stench still remains.
--------
Ten Golden Rules Of Videogame Fanboyism
"SOE has probably united more gamers in hatred than Blizzard has subs"...daelnor
Dont forget Helios was over there also :P
This is such a big loss for SWG:. It truly makes me sad to hear this.
.. It also means that their developer team goes down by one
lets flush the toilet...good things.:)
dont let the door hit ya wear the good lord split ya !!!!
entertainers ???? more like doom bringers and nerf lovers publish 9 straight through nerfs
if I consider hitting the cancel button thrilling then yea the soe team is entertainers in there own rights
You want loot? Go kill some npcs, you wanna visit hades? come find ME, and dont forget to bring coins for the ferryman,
I wont touch any game that has the SOE mark stamped on it anyways. I got a funny feeling tho... DCO will be flushed down a toilet and go into history as a epic fail in development. Another SOE job well done
Hauken Stormchaser
I want pre-CU back
Station.com : We got your game
Yeah?, Well i want it back!!!
As far I em concerned, these people are the bottom of the gaming industry..
They are the Uwe Bowl of gaming, and the gaming world would only be better if they where all permanently banned from ever participating in game development...
A doctor can loose his license if he EG. gets drunk while operating, shouldn't a game developer loose a kinda of "gaming license", if he (from what i see what happend in SWG), directly commit fraud, scamming their customers, and royal screw them with lies... I have gotten Nigerian scam mails that contain more truth then SWGs newsletters and DEV comments.
Perhaps it was a poor choice of words but going from "junior member" to leadership role is questionable unless a.) you're really a star in the company and then they ask you to put your money where your mouth is or b.) your management had to reach that far into the barrel to find someone who'd try and do the job...
Professionally, he at least has an excuse then for when he moves on to his next interview..."well, I was a junior member tapped to fix this sinking ship...and look, I still kept it running through all of the veteran hate. .."
As far I em concerned, these people are the bottom of the gaming industry..
They are the Uwe Bowl of gaming, and the gaming world would only be better if they where all permanently banned from ever participating in game development...
A doctor can loose his license if he EG. gets drunk while operating, shouldn't a game developer loose a kinda of "gaming license", if he (from what i see what happend in SWG), directly commit fraud, scamming their customers, and royal screw them with lies... I have gotten Nigerian scam mails that contain more truth then SWGs newsletters and DEV comments.
Heh, well I'm not a big fan of a lot of what went down with SWG. It does seem to me that there were lies told, mistakes made and promises broken. At the same time though, blaming a dev (e.g. Blix, Rubenfield) or any one person for all the problems is probably not realistic.
So many things, people, departments, even companies played a role in the chain of events that we call SWG. Marketting research seemed off the mark. Management seemed reactionary and short-sighted. Coding was rushed. Communication between departments seemed questionable, and communication to consumers appeared misleading and/or inaccurate.
Should a dev lose his licence to practice for all of this? The situation seems a bit more complex than that. Organizational review is certainly called for in my opinion. People should be held accountable for things they can directly control, but this is different than blaming one dev for all the factors contributing to the current state of affairs in SWG.
Already happening I bet. Can you imagine Smed getting a position anywhere else in the MMO industry? Do you think Bliz will get on their hands and knees and beg him to help launch their unannounced mmo? The taint of SWG will have a lasting efffect, we may not hear about all the repercussions but they're there all the same.
...The spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought.
The problem i have is not that they turned a good (even if a little boken) game into something awful, that was expected from SOE, but that they kept lien to their customers.
They keept saying dont worry about this because we are gonne fix it, and then turn around and not fixing it but either removing it or ignoring it etc. They kept fooling their customers so they could get just a little extra money out of them, that is just not very nice. And btw the old Nazi defence, "i am not to blame, i was ordered to do it", just dosent work.
I know he is on his way out and there are a few things that a person is obliged to say when they leave but some of that farewell blurb is just embarrasing.
So i edited it for him:
<snip> Firsthand I saw the multiple systems that SWG had in place from Raph Koster's brilliant design and I didn't understand any of it so I was missing at the time and convinced the management that they could use a lot of Blizzards design those systems so much they asked me to stay on permanently and implement them. <snip>
<snip> That time period on this team has really been amazing for me on so many levels, for instance, I am amazed customers still believe this team when it says something. I went from being a junior team member to cementing myself into a leadership role. The current team that I led for 2 years is the best Live a team in the MMO business hands down. Not only do they continually put out quality new content and systems they are able to produce it in a reasonable amount of time, but that really doesn't matter because SOE will release it even if it's not complete. I know everyone some folks don't doesn't agree with anything everything we have done nor how we did it, but the driving goal of the team has always been aligned with mine, "entertain our customers" too bad managements driving goal was "pick their pockets clean at any cost". If you make someone pay for beta grin, not leave due to game bugs clap their hands in glee, or string people along with lies feel pride over an accomplishment, the management developer has done their job as an business people entertainer (Yes that's true, management the Dev team really is a band of thieves entertainers >:O
).
I will miss all of you fans who have devoted too much the majority of their dollars after hours to SWG. Your continued financial support of this project is an amazing thing to be a part of and I will miss being involved with you all on a daily basis (even a middle of the night posting spree).
As a team the SWG Developers truly are a squad of ARC troopers, highly trained, elite and dedicated to accomplishing any mission. I hand that squad off to a very capable Loche, who will continue to entertain and immerse you in the Star Wars Universe.
May the Force be With You out of game because it certainly isn't in-game.
Thomas "Blixtev" Blair
"The liberties and resulting economic prosperity that YOU take for granted were granted by those "dead guys"
When we suggested for something to be changed or added, it never happened, then devs wrote an excuse being "miscommunication, we're sorry" yet doesn't do anything. It happened on multiple occasions, isn't test center for customers to test something and to tell the devs what customers think needs changing or fixed? Devs seems to treat test center as "here you go, you get a sneak preview of what's already written in stone, we're not going to change a thing from test to live". There's been too many times when a huge bug or exploit gets reported more than enough times on test server, yet makes it to live and the players are stunned at how blind the devs were.
It's not really the individuals, it's the management of the team, it's been pretty lousy for years (ever since Kostor and Rogue_5 left).
All the more reason to believe that DCMMO (which is the "must succeed" game for SOE) is going to probably top SWG in massive failure of developent of a great IP.
Just to keep score here, these NGE and post NGE nitwits have "moved along" from the NGE to DCMMO:
"The Dork Lord Heliass"
Grant "Rogue 5" McDaniel
Chris "I had a" Cao
Deadmeat
and now... Blixtev the "toilet boy", aka the Jedi hater.
With Blixtev on the job, I wonder how people will love having their Superman and Batman characters continually nerfed?
And Chris will rant and rave at the player base when his team of halfwits commits yet another outrage.
About all this perfect storm of incompetency is missing is Nancy "Reading is bad mmmkay" McIntyre to handle PR.
Yeah if Team Toilet Boy was the best dev team in the industry, I'd hate to see the worst.
Probably the only one that you could even argue was worse was the Dark and Light team, or possibly Vanguard.
Having been gone from SWG for years now, and playing EVE, I know the difference between a REAL Dev team that can deal with an incredibly complex game and a bunch of half trained monkeys.
"SOE" on a box is truly the stamp of certain failure.
As far I em concerned, these people are the bottom of the gaming industry..
They are the Uwe Bowl of gaming, and the gaming world would only be better if they where all permanently banned from ever participating in game development...
A doctor can loose his license if he EG. gets drunk while operating, shouldn't a game developer loose a kinda of "gaming license", if he (from what i see what happend in SWG), directly commit fraud, scamming their customers, and royal screw them with lies... I have gotten Nigerian scam mails that contain more truth then SWGs newsletters and DEV comments.
Heh, well I'm not a big fan of a lot of what went down with SWG. It does seem to me that there were lies told, mistakes made and promises broken. At the same time though, blaming a dev (e.g. Blix, Rubenfield) or any one person for all the problems is probably not realistic.
So many things, people, departments, even companies played a role in the chain of events that we call SWG. Marketting research seemed off the mark. Management seemed reactionary and short-sighted. Coding was rushed. Communication between departments seemed questionable, and communication to consumers appeared misleading and/or inaccurate.
Should a dev lose his licence to practice for all of this? The situation seems a bit more complex than that. Organizational review is certainly called for in my opinion. People should be held accountable for things they can directly control, but this is different than blaming one dev for all the factors contributing to the current state of affairs in SWG.
I see where you are coming from but I still beg to differ.
We learned a great deal from Rubenfields blog. He stated that they were given a directive to "make SWG better". The total extent of how to do that lied with the development dept. Rubenfield also says that they came up with a combat design and then "sold" the idea to the higher ups. It was interesting to note that , at that time, SOE employed no writers, per se, just the dev team to do the job of writers.
It pretty easy to see, from hindsight, the plan that blix and deadmeat layed on the table after C5. It''s also pretty easy to see that the "plan" took around a year to complete and it was nothing more than another mini NGE, just done in increments. I would imagine that blix and DM came up with this plan and "sold" it to higher-ups just the same as Rubenfield and his team did. Needless to say, another massive CHANGE had the same effect of all the other massive CHANGES. Big loss in subscriptions. I believe the current thinking is about a 66% - 75% loss in players and seems to be consistant with what the thinking is that NGE cost them, also.
I have learned from a high ranking dev (from another game due out here shortly) that he was interviewed to be the "creative director" (so to speak) of the NGE. When this dev, told them in the interview process, NOT to do the NGE and to ADD content to CU, he was not considered a serious canditate for the job. He also told me that there just wasn't too many "on board" with his ideas at SOE Austin. So, SOE did the NGE and this guy went on to other projects and the rest is history.
Sorry, but I believe Blix and DM deserve the credit (or the infamy) of the last year+ and well deserved, it is.
good one.
the new dc mmo villian!