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New Report Details Mismanagement And More Behind The Scenes At Amazon Games Studios | MMORPG.com

SystemSystem Member UncommonPosts: 12,599
edited January 2021 in News & Features Discussion

imageNew Report Details Mismanagement And More Behind The Scenes At Amazon Games Studios | MMORPG.com

In a report by Bloomberg, reports of mismanagement and more at Amazon Game Studios and the games division, have been revealed.

Read the full story here


Gdemami
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Comments

  • CuddleheartCuddleheart Member UncommonPosts: 391
    Totally had a feeling that lumber yard was a problem after trying star citizen.
    GdemamiKyleranKalafaxmandark91
  • SovrathSovrath Member LegendaryPosts: 32,627
    "The Devil you say?!?"
    Kyleran
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  • IceAgeIceAge Member EpicPosts: 3,190
    I mean, who in their right mind, hires someone who ruined a big company like SOE?!

    I knew there will be problems the first time I heard that Smedley is working at Amazon.

    I hope Amazon takes the charge and ..clean this mess until is not too late.
    GdemamiMustikosalkarionlog

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  • SandmanjwSandmanjw Member RarePosts: 531
    I swear Bloomberg is such a gossip rag.

    Why it is listed under news is beyond me. Has not been a real news from that rag in ages.
    GdemamiKyleranDrius75aldisunMustikosNoxiasFTrunks21strawhat0981[Deleted User]
  • WizardryWizardry Member LegendaryPosts: 19,332
    Well thank god for the news,we been living under a rock and thought Amazon was the greatest upcoming studio on the planet !!.

    I will say a game like New World has SOME potential but it would take a LOT more work to get me on board.
    I also don't like their approach to pve entering into some instance portal NO THANKS.

    Smedley...lol,who cares about that guy anymore,he and Lord British should get on a rocket ship and try and con a different planet.
    ashiru_1978MustikosFTrunks21Narug

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  • BizkitNLBizkitNL Member RarePosts: 2,546
    "Another one of the site's sources states that after a disagreement with a male member of senior leadership, he "created new management positions above her and filled them with men.""

    Call me skeptical, but that sounds like a woman just grasping at things now (knowing fully well she will be taken seriously).
    aldisunMustikosNoxiasmarkel13DaranarFTrunks21kjempff
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  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,006
    edited January 2021

    Sandmanjw said:

    I swear Bloomberg is such a gossip rag.



    Why it is listed under news is beyond me. Has not been a real news from that rag in ages.



    Jason Schreier is legit. He gets first hand info from people on the inside. You may not like what he reports but he's as legit as it gets in the industry. He just happens to be a complete asshat on twitter and such. It's been obvious for a while that the Amazon Game Studio has been a mess.
    KyleranDAOWAceKumaponGdemamialdisunMustikosSandmanjw[Deleted User]FTrunks21alkarionlogand 1 other.
  • KyleranKyleran Member LegendaryPosts: 43,879




    Sandmanjw said:


    I swear Bloomberg is such a gossip rag.





    Why it is listed under news is beyond me. Has not been a real news from that rag in ages.






    Jason Schreier is legit. He gets first hand info from people on the inside. You may not like what he reports but he's as legit as it gets in the industry. He just happens to be a complete asshat on twitter and such.

    It's been obvious for a while that the Amazon Game Studio has been a mess.



    Have to give Amazon Studios credit, they clearly live the old software development adage, fail early, fail often.
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  • DAOWAceDAOWAce Member UncommonPosts: 436




    Sandmanjw said:


    I swear Bloomberg is such a gossip rag.





    Why it is listed under news is beyond me. Has not been a real news from that rag in ages.






    Jason Schreier is legit. He gets first hand info from people on the inside. You may not like what he reports but he's as legit as it gets in the industry.


    +1

    You read Jason Schreier articles no matter the platform. One of the few journalists that's actually good at his job, probably the best in the gaming industry.
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  • IselinIselin Member LegendaryPosts: 18,719
    Make a guy with zero experience making games the head of the games division... what could possibly go wrong?
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  • kilunkilun Member UncommonPosts: 829

    Iselin said:

    Make a guy with zero experience making games the head of the games division... what could possibly go wrong?



    Who probably doesn't even play games.
    [Deleted User]GdemamiMustikos
  • Slapshot1188Slapshot1188 Member LegendaryPosts: 17,402
    Iselin said:
    Make a guy with zero experience making games the head of the games division... what could possibly go wrong?
    Probably less than having guys with experience making games but no experience running a company the head of it.   See Crowdfunded MMORPG record for evidence.

    But that's setting the bar low... I agree.

    With Amazon's resources I'm not sure how they didn't just nab the cream of the crop...
    BruceYeeGdemami[Deleted User]

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  • VrikaVrika Member LegendaryPosts: 7,946
    I'm happy that Amazon has been failing with games. They're too big. Their aim is clearly to create a membership where you'd get music, books, tv-series, games and delivery of physical goods to your doorstep with one purchase. I don't want any company to get big enough to succeed in that.
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  • BruceYeeBruceYee Member EpicPosts: 2,556
    I said this years ago but no one listens to lowly forum posters. From the time they aired that announce stream for their games it was obvious the disaster course they were heading down. I said years ago that Smed will eventually rise to the top by any means even if it meant him letting everyone else destroy themselves so he can be the last man standing.

    This article is being too kind by calling it "mismanagement" which usually implies random business mistakes which this clearly is not. They knowingly continued to fleece Amazon who didn't know anything about game development.

    So what they did and continue to do is keep games in perpetual development(New World) or make half effort games, cancel them and blame whatever they can to deflect the attention from themselves and keep collecting those paychecks. Think of how crowdfunded games almost a decade later are still being developed in a similar way except instead of fleecing and lying to joe public these people are fleecing and lying to Amazon. Imagine burning through hundreds of millions and having not one single product over a 4/10 or 5/10 rating. At what point would an individual(top devs at AGS) throw in the towel and admit that the task before them is beyond their ability? These individuals knowingly destroyed any chance of providing even a remotely quality product just to benefit themselves.

    I said years ago very early on that they needed to fire every last person there and start fresh cause the hires were being manipulated from the start. People were being hired to ensure that the top bureaucracy would never be at risk and that type of structure is the opposite of what an artistic environment should be. They are now over a billion(s) down with nothing to show for it. They would've been better off hiring people on this site, give them some funds and let them roll with their ideas. I'm sure whatever game delete would come up with that would be kinda/sorta like vanilla WoW would've been better than anything these fraudsters could even imagine at 1/40th of the cost.

    500mil per year x4-5 years = 2 billion+
    That is 40+ vanilla WoW or 20+ WAR or 4 SWTOR

    A problem in this situation and also generally in the video game industry is that devs are reluctant to call out other devs and when they do they get attacked from every direction making the attempt to bring truth not worth it so you can't blame them. When you look at crowdfunded MMO's that are obvious scams no dev will speak out against it for fear of industry ridicule even if the scams are stealing millions from gamers.

    Oh and btw the last part mentioning New World and "murdering inhabitants" is BS to anyone who followed the game from the start and they know it. Not once did anyone ever publically mention anything like that and if you can prove they did post it cause as far as I know it does not exist.
    I can almost place a Vegas bet now though that that's what they'll eventually use to cancel the game citing 'development of the game started with hints of racism so we cannot continue' or something like that.

    It feels strange to type it but I genuinely feel bad for Amazon. No one should be taken advantage of in the way they were I don't care how much money they have.
    KumaponGdemamiRidrithUngood
  • BruceYeeBruceYee Member EpicPosts: 2,556
    Vrika said:
    I'm happy that Amazon has been failing with games. They're too big. Their aim is clearly to create a membership where you'd get music, books, tv-series, games and delivery of physical goods to your doorstep with one purchase. I don't want any company to get big enough to succeed in that.

    I hear you 100% but in this scenario we are the ones who lost.

    The games that could've been created with 2 billion+ dollars if they'd hired people who were actually interested in doing their jobs(or step down if they couldn't) and not just fill their pockets.
    ashiru_1978Gdemami
  • VorthanionVorthanion Member RarePosts: 2,749
    I don't feel sorry for Amazon. It is the law of the market that bad behavior leads to bad business which leads to bankruptcy or liquidation. This may have been a new venture for them, but you do your due diligence, make a solid and verified business plan and put in the effort to hire qualified and preferably proven employees to oversee that business plan. They should never have hired someone like Smedley and deserve everything they get. Ignorance is unacceptable and stupidity is its own reward.
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  • BruceYeeBruceYee Member EpicPosts: 2,556
    edited January 2021
    I don't feel sorry for Amazon. It is the law of the market that bad behavior leads to bad business which leads to bankruptcy or liquidation. This may have been a new venture for them, but you do your due diligence, make a solid and verified business plan and put in the effort to hire qualified and preferably proven employees to oversee that business plan. They should never have hired someone like Smedley and deserve everything they get. Ignorance is unacceptable and stupidity is its own reward.

    Smedley(AGS SD) was added after the initial important hires were made. The people who started the disaster remained in full control destroying everything. Smed sat back letting them do it while collecting that paycheck so he could buy his fine liqueur.

    Honestly, seeing as both EQ's are still going, DCUO is thriving, Daybreak(SOE) just sold for 300 million... AGS would probably be better off with him at the very top.
    Gdemamikilun
  • enesisxlr8enesisxlr8 Member UncommonPosts: 189
    New World still in Alpha... Who senses yet another delay?
    ScotRemyVorender
  • ashiru_1978ashiru_1978 Member RarePosts: 818
    I have tried both Crucible and New World and did not like either. I could not manage to play either for more than 30 minutes before uninstalling.

    Crucible was just BAD and boring, as for New World, it felt like a massive clunkfest, the world and theme did not appeal to me, it looked super generic and worst of all - the controls felt like they were designed for a console joystick rather than mouse and keyboard. Not having jumping in the game was also stupid for me, the combat devolved to stunlocking enemies, it was bad like ESO, but somehow worse.

    I don't think New World will succeed - it will launch, like Crucible it will get a lot of negative reviews on Steam, then players will leave and they will "go back into Beta", then they will shut it down. The only exception that I see is that New World being an MMO, it will have a bigger audience that has slightly more tolerance for shit, so it will survive a little longer than Crucible.

    I'm now concerned about that new Middle Earth MMO that is coming. If they treat it the same, it will be bad, but it being Middle Earth, maybe they have someone standing over their should making sure they don't give the franchise a bad name, but who knows...

    As for Amazon, I really hate the fact that the head of Gaming is a person who probably doesn't even play games... My question is "How does that even happen?" You don't put a cucumber seller to run a nuclear power plant.

    My country is so corrupt that the literal mafia runs it, but I did not imagine the same for the US. I was there in 2013 during a Work & Travel program and it seemed a lot nicer. But this literally puts the corrupt government to so much shame, they should pull out their notepads and start taking notes.
    Gdemami
  • cheyanecheyane Member LegendaryPosts: 9,354
    Wasn't there some lawsuit about Lumberyard and Star Citizen? I recall reading about that.
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  • ScotScot Member LegendaryPosts: 24,016
    edited January 2021
    "The leader of Amazon's games division, Mike Frazzini, seems to be central to all of this, including reports that the division head frustrates game developers working under him for simply not having a basic understanding of differences between gameplay and concept footage."

    That's where gaming is today in many AAA companies, CD Project is not alone, a disconnect between those making the game and those running the company. Gaming is an entertainment business, when you look at the heads of Hollywood studios you see people who have been in that area for years.

    Gaming on the other hand gets people like Mr Frazzini, who was never previously involved in the development of a game and headed Amazon's book store. I mentioned recently that EA only has one director with any gaming experience, is anyone surprised gaming consequently stumbles now and then?
    Gdemami
  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,006
    edited January 2021
    Iselin said:
    Make a guy with zero experience making games the head of the games division... what could possibly go wrong?
    It worked for Curt Schilling.  Oh wait, no it didn't.

    It's not JUST that they don't have the necessary experience.  It's also that they tend to shoot for the moon and waste a ton of money trying to figure it all out.
    WhiteLanternGdemami
  • VrikaVrika Member LegendaryPosts: 7,946
    cheyane said:
    Wasn't there some lawsuit about Lumberyard and Star Citizen? I recall reading about that.
    The lawsuit was between Crytek and Star Citizen about whether Star Citizen had followed their license agreement with Crytek. Lumberyard was mentioned because Star Citizen is currently licensing Lumberyard, but Amazon/Lumberyard was never part of that lawsuit.

    Also the lawsuit was settled between closed doors so it's unlikely we'll ever hear anything further about it.
    Ungood
     
  • cheyanecheyane Member LegendaryPosts: 9,354
    Vrika said:
    cheyane said:
    Wasn't there some lawsuit about Lumberyard and Star Citizen? I recall reading about that.
    The lawsuit was between Crytek and Star Citizen about whether Star Citizen had followed their license agreement with Crytek. Lumberyard was mentioned because Star Citizen is currently licensing Lumberyard, but Amazon/Lumberyard was never part of that lawsuit.

    Also the lawsuit was settled between closed doors so it's unlikely we'll ever hear anything further about it.
    Thanks for the elucidation.
    Ungood
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