Originally posted by DeVoDeVo On their website, the donation total has been stuck at around $150,000 for a couple weeks now. PROTF needs to find an investor or it will be vapor.
Originally posted by DeVoDeVo On their website, the donation total has been stuck at around $150,000 for a couple weeks now. PROTF needs to find an investor or it will be vapor.
Seems like it was never anything more than vapor
With Brad Mcquaid running the show, it's definitely going to be vapor. This guy should not be running a team and he's running a company? Aint going to happen. He should leave these jobs to the big boys and just sit in his corner and code shit.
It sounds like they have no product, they put a kickstarter up to get paid 800k for some concept art and whatever work they have already done.
There is no game or product or anything that results from this kickstarter. People keep talking about "this game" - what game? there isn't any game.
There is no product or game period.
The product they are currently selling since the Kickstarter appears to be kaput is a subscription to a forum to talk about the game they are allegedly making..fair enough.
But even that also seems like a rip-off of how SOE has been marketing landmark and EQN.
It's kind of sad at best, and I honestly wonder if it is not an outright attempt to rip people off.
If you believe the latest news from the site and rerolled Brad took 45K for himself for *Personal use Sounds like a personal piggy bank to me.
McQuaid received $45k out of the $147k raised with the remainder, plus stock/equity in the company, going to the team (and a small amount to attorneys fees and other incidentals) All had bills to pay, most had been out of work since Sept. 2013, and it was a tough time financially for both McQuaid and the entire team (many took on other part time jobs as well, so while a lot of work was indeed done on Pantheon, it wasn't as much as would have been achieved had the company sufficient funds for an office and full time employees).
McQuaid regrets taking any money out and 'counting his chickens before they hatch'; in other words, until the funding was actually in the bank, McQuaid shouldn't have counted on it and, despite being cash poor, with medical and other bills piling up, should not have taken any money out of the company until funding was in the bank.
*****
Embezzlement is the act of dishonestly withholding assets for the purpose of conversion (theft) of such assets by one or more individuals to whom such assets have been entrusted, to be held and/or used for other purposes.
An example of conversion is when a person logs checks in a check register or transaction log as being used for one specific purpose and then explicitly uses the funds from the checking account for another and completely different purpose.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embezzlement
*****
People paid to support the development of Pantheon. People did NOT pay to support personal bills. Brad is asset rich. liquidate personal assets first to pay personal bills. In criminal law, misappropriation is the intentional, illegal use of the property or funds of another person for one's own use or other unauthorized purpose. It is a felony, a crime punishable by a prison sentence.
McQuaid received $45k out of the $147k raised with the remainder, plus stock/equity in the company, going to the team (and a small amount to attorneys fees and other incidentals) All had bills to pay, most had been out of work since Sept. 2013, and it was a tough time financially for both McQuaid and the entire team (many took on other part time jobs as well, so while a lot of work was indeed done on Pantheon, it wasn't as much as would have been achieved had the company sufficient funds for an office and full time employees).
McQuaid regrets taking any money out and 'counting his chickens before they hatch'; in other words, until the funding was actually in the bank, McQuaid shouldn't have counted on it and, despite being cash poor, with medical and other bills piling up, should not have taken any money out of the company until funding was in the bank.
*****
Embezzlement is the act of dishonestly withholding assets for the purpose of conversion (theft) of such assets by one or more individuals to whom such assets have been entrusted, to be held and/or used for other purposes.
An example of conversion is when a person logs checks in a check register or transaction log as being used for one specific purpose and then explicitly uses the funds from the checking account for another and completely different purpose.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embezzlement
*****
People paid to support the development of Pantheon. People did NOT pay to support personal bills. Brad is asset rich. liquidate personal assets first to pay personal bills. In criminal law, misappropriation is the intentional, illegal use of the property or funds of another person for one's own use or other unauthorized purpose. It is a felony, a crime punishable by a prison sentence.
This is News and these are facts.
Well, you see, none of that means a damn, when the money is "donated" as opposed to invested.
And all of that BS that the boosters of this game kept repeating when talking of "investing in the game" is nothing but hot air.
Of the things you cite, most only apply to money that is actually, legally, invested, where the investors get something for something: shares in a company, rights to a percentage of some kind of revenue, bonds or other negotiable instruments, some quantifiable interest, for the capital they invest. Until something like that happens, no fiduciary responsibility attaches, at all.
When you "donate" money to some effort, i.e. what the people did for this game after the failed KS, you have absolutely no say in what it is used for or how it is spent or who takes it. Nor is McQuaid legally required to do anything, nor is there anything stopping him from taking a big chunk of the donated money as "salary". Or giving out bags of money in the lobby.
In short, nothing he did is illegal, as the money was donated.
So to answer the title is, yes, the whole thing is a scam.
Every dollar donated went to the Brad McQuaid sheep sheering fund, and the people he fleeced were the sheep.
It suffers from slow development and it's going to be a good idea but implemented into an actual game which works is looking doubtful. Love to be proved wrong.
Well, you see, none of that means a damn, when the money is "donated" as opposed to invested.
And all of that BS that the boosters of this game kept repeating when talking of "investing in the game" is nothing but hot air.
Of the things you cite, most only apply to money that is actually, legally, invested, where the investors get something for something: shares in a company, rights to a percentage of some kind of revenue, bonds or other negotiable instruments, some quantifiable interest, for the capital they invest. Until something like that happens, no fiduciary responsibility attaches, at all.
When you "donate" money to some effort, i.e. what the people did for this game after the failed KS, you have absolutely no say in what it is used for or how it is spent or who takes it. Nor is McQuaid legally required to do anything, nor is there anything stopping him from taking a big chunk of the donated money as "salary". Or giving out bags of money in the lobby.
In short, nothing he did is illegal, as the money was donated.
So to answer the title is, yes, the whole thing is a scam.
Every dollar donated went to the Brad McQuaid sheep sheering fund, and the people he fleeced were the sheep.
If you had bothered to read the terms on Kickstarter, people who invest money into a project are entitled to get promised rewards, or their money back.
Well, you see, none of that means a damn, when the money is "donated" as opposed to invested.
And all of that BS that the boosters of this game kept repeating when talking of "investing in the game" is nothing but hot air.
Of the things you cite, most only apply to money that is actually, legally, invested, where the investors get something for something: shares in a company, rights to a percentage of some kind of revenue, bonds or other negotiable instruments, some quantifiable interest, for the capital they invest. Until something like that happens, no fiduciary responsibility attaches, at all.
When you "donate" money to some effort, i.e. what the people did for this game after the failed KS, you have absolutely no say in what it is used for or how it is spent or who takes it. Nor is McQuaid legally required to do anything, nor is there anything stopping him from taking a big chunk of the donated money as "salary". Or giving out bags of money in the lobby.
In short, nothing he did is illegal, as the money was donated.
So to answer the title is, yes, the whole thing is a scam.
Every dollar donated went to the Brad McQuaid sheep sheering fund, and the people he fleeced were the sheep.
If you had bothered to read the terms on Kickstarter, people who invest money into a project are entitled to get promised rewards, or their money back.
That's not a donation. It's a contract.
If you had bothered to have any knowledge of the situation, you'd realize the donations were made on the Pantheon website, directly through Paypal after the Kickstarter failed. The going figure is around $147,000 was donated post-Kickstarter, and it is from that pool of money that Brad took a free "cash advance". None of the protections of Kickstarter apply to that money.
Point is that people trusted Brad, who claimed to have learned his lessons from the Vanguard fiaso, and he burned them hard. I knew better and jumped ship when I saw the lack of effort put forth on the Kickstarter, but I still feel sorry for those who trusted him, and I really don't want to see anyone else get taken when this inevitably goes back to Kickstarter or Indiegogo for another attempt to gather funds.
Well, you see, none of that means a damn, when the money is "donated" as opposed to invested.
And all of that BS that the boosters of this game kept repeating when talking of "investing in the game" is nothing but hot air.
Of the things you cite, most only apply to money that is actually, legally, invested, where the investors get something for something: shares in a company, rights to a percentage of some kind of revenue, bonds or other negotiable instruments, some quantifiable interest, for the capital they invest. Until something like that happens, no fiduciary responsibility attaches, at all.
When you "donate" money to some effort, i.e. what the people did for this game after the failed KS, you have absolutely no say in what it is used for or how it is spent or who takes it. Nor is McQuaid legally required to do anything, nor is there anything stopping him from taking a big chunk of the donated money as "salary". Or giving out bags of money in the lobby.
In short, nothing he did is illegal, as the money was donated.
So to answer the title is, yes, the whole thing is a scam.
Every dollar donated went to the Brad McQuaid sheep sheering fund, and the people he fleeced were the sheep.
If you had bothered to read the terms on Kickstarter, people who invest money into a project are entitled to get promised rewards, or their money back.
That's not a donation. It's a contract.
If you had bothered to have any knowledge of the situation, you'd realize the donations were made on the Pantheon website, directly through Paypal after the Kickstarter failed. The going figure is around $147,000 was donated post-Kickstarter, and it is from that pool of money that Brad took a free "cash advance". None of the protections of Kickstarter apply to that money.
Point is that people trusted Brad, who claimed to have learned his lessons from the Vanguard fiaso, and he burned them hard. I knew better and jumped ship when I saw the lack of effort put forth on the Kickstarter, but I still feel sorry for those who trusted him, and I really don't want to see anyone else get taken when this inevitably goes back to Kickstarter or Indiegogo for another attempt to gather funds.
Sorry, I missed that he was talking about their post Kickstarter activities. The original OP was about whether their Kickstarter is a scam, so I thought the talk was still about Kickstarter. My mistake.
Still, I doubt that the terms on Pantheon's website would be upheld in court, but my knowledge of US legal system isn't good enough that I could be sure. I know for sure that those kind of terms wouldn't be upheld in any EU court.
I don't know what else to tell you, do more research? Look at Brad's eyes when he is doing an Q&A, the man is so tired from working he can barely answer questions...
Or maybe he is.. you know, high again?
Stages of a new mmo: 1) It's just beta. It still has plenty of time before release. 2) It just launched. Give it time. WoW wasn't built in a day. 3) We don't need you anyway. 4) F2P announced. 5)Huge influx of players. 6) Look how much has changed. 7) Cash shop is the only thing developed lately. 8) It has been a long journey and we thank everyone who was part of it. Shutting down in 3 months. (Courtesy of Robokapp.)
I'm glad I didn't donate, but I feel very sorry for anyone who did donate. Brad taking money for personal bills and screwing over other employees is just soo wrong. I had some hope for Brad, but this is another low blow. I will not support this freak, even if he ever makes the game. He is not a leader, he is a cancer.
Why hasn't Brad McQuaid made an official statement yet? All these posts about him taking the money from one of his New Dev's to the FB page which is again an official source, but Brad has yet to come out and say anything. He is still posting about how he would like an office.
I think he still has plausible deny ability and he is getting way more press right now than Pantheon ever did and he is getting it all for free.
I have been supporting this venture since the KS started, here and on other websites. Honestly I saw the writing on the wall half way through the KS, I continued to follow, even when the KS failed as it seemed it would.
Even then I continued to make an account on their forums, but not donate that way cause I was still not very hope full. Hell, I joined a guild with a name based on the game, cause it is filled with other supporters of the game.
Last week, with the announcement that the funding had dried up, then finding out about how money was spent, then a "demo" released here and on the FB page ONLY and now this, I am officially done. I want and old school MMO created, I love them, that's my play style for sure, but this has been so pourly managed from beginning to end that I just can't say anything positive.
I am happy they have a "demo", however I dunno how you can really call it a demo. It seems more of a video of what you can do with unity in 3 hours. Put out just to say, "Yea, we have a demo.." Personally I hope it does come out and I would buy/try it but at this point I really cant sit on any forums and defend/have anything good to say about it. It just seems at every point that they could have either made some real headway or completely F****d themselves, they did the latter. They're has been no actually positive progress since the beginning of the KS campaign, IMO.
Hell, one of the people on the main forums, that was bringing up some of the important questions, Asking which devs left and why, asking if brad will admit that he is a bad manager and if/when he will get a real manager got banned from the website for asking in public these questions. Now I will say, I wasn't in any of the chats/Voice conversations/junior dev (full website access) so I cant say what exactly was talked about word for word but you would think anyone who is trying to community fund and get "volunteers" from the community would not shy away from the hard questions, but treat the community with respect and give some honest answers. He was good at it at the beginning, but seems it has all fallen off now.
Really not sure what to say at this point, I hope for a game like this, but I doubt this will be the game that does it. Until then, P99 for me, unless some of the upcoming games are gonna be more OW, Non-questing MMO's. I miss camps...
McQuaid received $45k out of the $147k raised with the remainder, plus stock/equity in the company, going to the team (and a small amount to attorneys fees and other incidentals) All had bills to pay, most had been out of work since Sept. 2013, and it was a tough time financially for both McQuaid and the entire team (many took on other part time jobs as well, so while a lot of work was indeed done on Pantheon, it wasn't as much as would have been achieved had the company sufficient funds for an office and full time employees).
McQuaid regrets taking any money out and 'counting his chickens before they hatch'; in other words, until the funding was actually in the bank, McQuaid shouldn't have counted on it and, despite being cash poor, with medical and other bills piling up, should not have taken any money out of the company until funding was in the bank.
Brad had been working at SOE until Aug 2013 but got laid off
Is it really a surprise ? Look at how behaved during the development of Vanguard. The old saying, " a leopard doesn't change it's spots " comes to mind. I wouldn't touch anything he's put in charge of since those cocaine fueled Vanguard days, Where he wasted and spend copious amounts of corporate money that it forced Micro$oft to abandon the 1/2 finished project. Back in the days when money wasn't much of an issue for Micro$oft.
I bought shroud of the avatar and its already in testing.
pantheon is connected to shroud if people want to fund it and get rewards so I don't think the portelarium team will screw their own crowd funders.
SOA, pfft.
Now SOA is how a con artist crooked scammer would run a Kickstarter.
Create just enough craptastic game to be able to show development and enough development to fuel the hype.
Wrap it all in a clunky out-dated game that could have been made as part of a high school game design project.
I don't know much about SoA, but even fi one were to assume that everything you wrote is 100 percent accurate, friend, they *STILL* exceeded by far what Brad McQuaid has been able to accomplish in terms of creating a game.
(apparently he did at least accomplish 45000 for 3 months of salary - who makes that! seriously!)
Originally posted by asrlohz I doubt 800.000 would be enough to create a working MMO.
The KS was never about creating a working MMO. The 800k was going to be used to rent office space, pay wages, buy hardware etc., to set up the company. Game development was secondary.
nice! can i launch a kickstarter to rent an apartment too? i wont develop any games but ill certainly pick a nice building with decent wages, enough space and upgrade my gaming hardware....
i dont think a kickstarter to set up a company is worth investing on... just my opinion.
Comments
Seems like it was never anything more than vapor
RELAX!@!! BREATHE!!!
With Brad Mcquaid running the show, it's definitely going to be vapor. This guy should not be running a team and he's running a company? Aint going to happen. He should leave these jobs to the big boys and just sit in his corner and code shit.
If you believe the latest news from the site and rerolled Brad took 45K for himself for *Personal use Sounds like a personal piggy bank to me.
Keep moving.
Snip
Somehow "I/We told you so...." does not quite cut it.
And lol at McQuaid pocketing 45k for himself. When you give someone money with no strings attached, that is what happens.
Just posted on the OFFICIAL Pantheon FB Page:
McQuaid received $45k out of the $147k raised with the remainder, plus stock/equity in the company, going to the team (and a small amount to attorneys fees and other incidentals) All had bills to pay, most had been out of work since Sept. 2013, and it was a tough time financially for both McQuaid and the entire team (many took on other part time jobs as well, so while a lot of work was indeed done on Pantheon, it wasn't as much as would have been achieved had the company sufficient funds for an office and full time employees).
McQuaid regrets taking any money out and 'counting his chickens before they hatch'; in other words, until the funding was actually in the bank, McQuaid shouldn't have counted on it and, despite being cash poor, with medical and other bills piling up, should not have taken any money out of the company until funding was in the bank.
*****
Embezzlement is the act of dishonestly withholding assets for the purpose of conversion (theft) of such assets by one or more individuals to whom such assets have been entrusted, to be held and/or used for other purposes.
An example of conversion is when a person logs checks in a check register or transaction log as being used for one specific purpose and then explicitly uses the funds from the checking account for another and completely different purpose.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embezzlement
*****
People paid to support the development of Pantheon. People did NOT pay to support personal bills. Brad is asset rich. liquidate personal assets first to pay personal bills. In criminal law, misappropriation is the intentional, illegal use of the property or funds of another person for one's own use or other unauthorized purpose. It is a felony, a crime punishable by a prison sentence.
This is News and these are facts.
Keep moving.
Well, you see, none of that means a damn, when the money is "donated" as opposed to invested.
And all of that BS that the boosters of this game kept repeating when talking of "investing in the game" is nothing but hot air.
Of the things you cite, most only apply to money that is actually, legally, invested, where the investors get something for something: shares in a company, rights to a percentage of some kind of revenue, bonds or other negotiable instruments, some quantifiable interest, for the capital they invest. Until something like that happens, no fiduciary responsibility attaches, at all.
When you "donate" money to some effort, i.e. what the people did for this game after the failed KS, you have absolutely no say in what it is used for or how it is spent or who takes it. Nor is McQuaid legally required to do anything, nor is there anything stopping him from taking a big chunk of the donated money as "salary". Or giving out bags of money in the lobby.
In short, nothing he did is illegal, as the money was donated.
So to answer the title is, yes, the whole thing is a scam.
Every dollar donated went to the Brad McQuaid sheep sheering fund, and the people he fleeced were the sheep.
This isn't a signature, you just think it is.
If you had bothered to read the terms on Kickstarter, people who invest money into a project are entitled to get promised rewards, or their money back.
That's not a donation. It's a contract.
If you had bothered to have any knowledge of the situation, you'd realize the donations were made on the Pantheon website, directly through Paypal after the Kickstarter failed. The going figure is around $147,000 was donated post-Kickstarter, and it is from that pool of money that Brad took a free "cash advance". None of the protections of Kickstarter apply to that money.
Point is that people trusted Brad, who claimed to have learned his lessons from the Vanguard fiaso, and he burned them hard. I knew better and jumped ship when I saw the lack of effort put forth on the Kickstarter, but I still feel sorry for those who trusted him, and I really don't want to see anyone else get taken when this inevitably goes back to Kickstarter or Indiegogo for another attempt to gather funds.
Sorry, I missed that he was talking about their post Kickstarter activities. The original OP was about whether their Kickstarter is a scam, so I thought the talk was still about Kickstarter. My mistake.
Still, I doubt that the terms on Pantheon's website would be upheld in court, but my knowledge of US legal system isn't good enough that I could be sure. I know for sure that those kind of terms wouldn't be upheld in any EU court.
Or maybe he is.. you know, high again?
Stages of a new mmo: 1) It's just beta. It still has plenty of time before release. 2) It just launched. Give it time. WoW wasn't built in a day. 3) We don't need you anyway. 4) F2P announced. 5)Huge influx of players. 6) Look how much has changed. 7) Cash shop is the only thing developed lately. 8) It has been a long journey and we thank everyone who was part of it. Shutting down in 3 months. (Courtesy of Robokapp.)
Why hasn't Brad McQuaid made an official statement yet? All these posts about him taking the money from one of his New Dev's to the FB page which is again an official source, but Brad has yet to come out and say anything. He is still posting about how he would like an office.
I think he still has plausible deny ability and he is getting way more press right now than Pantheon ever did and he is getting it all for free.
Keep moving.
I have been supporting this venture since the KS started, here and on other websites. Honestly I saw the writing on the wall half way through the KS, I continued to follow, even when the KS failed as it seemed it would.
Even then I continued to make an account on their forums, but not donate that way cause I was still not very hope full. Hell, I joined a guild with a name based on the game, cause it is filled with other supporters of the game.
Last week, with the announcement that the funding had dried up, then finding out about how money was spent, then a "demo" released here and on the FB page ONLY and now this, I am officially done. I want and old school MMO created, I love them, that's my play style for sure, but this has been so pourly managed from beginning to end that I just can't say anything positive.
I am happy they have a "demo", however I dunno how you can really call it a demo. It seems more of a video of what you can do with unity in 3 hours. Put out just to say, "Yea, we have a demo.." Personally I hope it does come out and I would buy/try it but at this point I really cant sit on any forums and defend/have anything good to say about it. It just seems at every point that they could have either made some real headway or completely F****d themselves, they did the latter. They're has been no actually positive progress since the beginning of the KS campaign, IMO.
Hell, one of the people on the main forums, that was bringing up some of the important questions, Asking which devs left and why, asking if brad will admit that he is a bad manager and if/when he will get a real manager got banned from the website for asking in public these questions. Now I will say, I wasn't in any of the chats/Voice conversations/junior dev (full website access) so I cant say what exactly was talked about word for word but you would think anyone who is trying to community fund and get "volunteers" from the community would not shy away from the hard questions, but treat the community with respect and give some honest answers. He was good at it at the beginning, but seems it has all fallen off now.
Really not sure what to say at this point, I hope for a game like this, but I doubt this will be the game that does it. Until then, P99 for me, unless some of the upcoming games are gonna be more OW, Non-questing MMO's. I miss camps...
SOA, pfft.
Now SOA is how a con artist crooked scammer would run a Kickstarter.
Create just enough craptastic game to be able to show development and enough development to fuel the hype.
Wrap it all in a clunky out-dated game that could have been made as part of a high school game design project.
Brad had been working at SOE until Aug 2013 but got laid off
http://www.bradmcquaid.com/Brad_McQuaid/Welcome.html
EQ2 fan sites
So you go into a gas station and the attendant has a gaming shit on. You ask him " oh are you a gamer " ? he says kind of. I'm a dev for pantheon.
I don't know much about SoA, but even fi one were to assume that everything you wrote is 100 percent accurate, friend, they *STILL* exceeded by far what Brad McQuaid has been able to accomplish in terms of creating a game.
(apparently he did at least accomplish 45000 for 3 months of salary - who makes that! seriously!)
RELAX!@!! BREATHE!!!
This isn't the first time he "mismanaged" money and couldn't keep a company running.
Sigil games
AKA - Bruxail
You dont seem to realize that no donation was done ?
The kickstarter failed, thus the money went back.
I'm much more interested in this 45k thing. THAT would be a scandal indeed.
The KS failed but they still took money by donation through the site.
nice! can i launch a kickstarter to rent an apartment too? i wont develop any games but ill certainly pick a nice building with decent wages, enough space and upgrade my gaming hardware....
i dont think a kickstarter to set up a company is worth investing on... just my opinion.