I don't think you will see a single press release or announcement that has come from Stray Bullet Games, LLC that says we are the creators of Shadowbane. I should know, I write them myself. We do take credit for the development and support of Shadowbane. We've been doing it for many years now.
Now, perhaps I am misreading things. We all know that sometimes it is hard to construe our thoughts or emotions over a forum. So much easier to do in person. And, personally, I do not believe this is the place to talk about things. You are more than welcome to call me if you wish to discuss this further.
First off, it was not my intent to "trash-talk" anyone who actually worked on the game (and I don't think I did), but merely to clarfify the fact that SBG did not develop SB. Ashen was one of the few people still there who did a great deal of work after the launch, but he also knows that Ubi did not give the game the kind of support, post launch, that it needed to grow (i.e. life-support). The folks he mentioned ( Ubiq, Lietgardis, Tangent) did work on the game, but none of them are still at the company. It's also true that only a tiny handful of the people at SBG even helped maintain SB after launch. For example, I believe that Ubi only funded a few people at Ubi Austin to continue work on SB while the rest of them worked on another ill-fated MMO. I'd finally like to point out that most of us were still employed at Wolfpack up through the launch of both expansion packs, but that company ceased to exist (legally and otherwise) after Ubi aquired Wolfpack. I also didn't come here to promote anything we're doing, or not doing, but I am a little tired of SBG taking credit for creating Shadowbane on their web site, press releases, and news articles.
Wolfpack post-Ubi, and SBG after that, have continued to update and support Shadowbane. I consider that development.
As for the bit about press releases, could you please link to a press release where SBG said they created Shadowbane? I am interested if they have, because all I've seen is that SBG's website states that Woflpack created Shadowbane, and SBG was founded by "key developers" from Wolfpack. They do have it on their site as their product, but that's because they are continuing to work on it. You're not, because you don't, because you left.
I have to agree with Ashen, a web forum isn't really the place for this kind of stuff. I personally don't believe Scorn's intention was to "trash talk" anyone, but regardless, I don't believe this is the right time or place.
From my vantage point, Shadowbane was an incredibly arduous and challenging product. We were a relatively inexperienced development team, in a brand new market, with a vision far beyond our resources.
I do still believe that our vision was a great one, and I am glad that we tried. In some ways we succeeded, in others we didn't. As for credit, I take my share of both the good and the bad. I take my credit for the vision, and I take my lumps for the implementation. Like it or not, the two things were completely intertwined. Anyone trying to take credit for the one and point fingers for the other is being less than honest.
If this ends up being the mantle that SBG takes up, I wish you guys nothing but success. I still dream of an MMO where consequences matter; if you guys have the experience, resources and dedication to make it happen, you can definately count me as a customer when you ship.
J. Todd Coleman
Austin, Texas
ps. i am posting this on behalf of myself, not my current employer. we haven't even done a press release to announce the company yet, so any assumption of "marketing" is premature and incorrect. If and when our corporate office decides to make an announcement, i think you'll agree that the companies aren't even competitors. this has nothing to do with marketing.
wow, a battle between the old SB hacks and the new guys who inherited that POS. I hope the old hacks learned something from SB and are not making the same mistakes over at King's Isle.
As for SBG. I have nothing but respect for you folks. You are trying to keep the spirit of true PvP alive. Something that has been lost with all of the new games and was taken away in games like UO. Which in my mind was one of the worst decisions in the history of MMOs.
The concept art on the Stray Bullet Games website looks like a very intriguing combination of sci-fi and fantasy...which sounds very interesting indeed! A great sci-fi / sci-fi fusion PvP-Centred MMO would be a dream come true
I'll definitely keep an eye out for updates on this project, best of luck Stray Bullet!
I'm excited to hear of a new product from SBG. They are an approachable bunch who care about providing a unique fun environment. I just read through a ton of their press releases and I'm still looking for the one that says they "created SB", someone be sure to let me know if they find it. The blood, sweat, and tears that SBG have poured into Shadowbane AFTER Ubi cut WP free have been a true showing of how much that group of people care about the fun and enjoyment of their fans. Looking forward to the new one SBG.
On behalf of everyone who's ever posted here before, I want to welcome you and all of the Stray Bullet Games supporters who've joined the forum in the past 24 hours!
Thanks to you guys, we now know EVEN MORE about what a great bunch of staff and what a rich history SBG has. And, just as importantly, we're even more enthusiastic about how "bold" and "forward-thinking" they all are. Thanks to you, we get to hear lots and lots and lots more about what a "unique fun environment" they create; what a "winning team" they are; and lots more endlessly fascinating and useful information like that.
Because the press release didn't let us know nearly enough about that sort of stuff.
And most of all, thanks for straightening us all out about whether SBG's lawyer told SBG's marketing director to say that they "created" Shadowbane, or just "developed" it. Because before you explained all of that to us, we all thought the press release just an empty-headed, meaningless hype-fest. Heaven forbid anyone might leap to the wrong conclusions about SBG's only claim to fame after reading it. But please try to forgive us, I mean, it was kind of jumbled in with all the other useful facts crammed into into that one article.
'Course, we still know absolutely nothing whatsoever about this wonderful MMORPG SBG is supposedly working on. But hey, why should we care about pesky little details like that? Thanks for trying to keep the discussion focused on the really important stuff.
Sorry but I have to jump on the whole SBG love bandwagon here. I seriously have no idea how you could even think that SBG didn't "Develop" SB. It is true that some of them weren't there when SB started. However the work they did with Shadowbane after they inherrited it was nothing short of amazing.
I played SB right from the initial beta, for about 2 years solid, and since then I played on and off right up until now where I play every so often just for sieges. I've watched the game grow and change over the years and its had its bad points but its only got better.
Before I go on the rant, let me say I take NOTHING away from the orginal SB devs, they made a game with an amazing concept a brilliant background lore story, and it was definitely (and still is in my opinion) the best PVP game around. However, the implementation of this concept, and the game itself was nothing short of...well, complete trash. The actual engine, the entire programming, the coding, everything was just bad. The game couldn't handle the main feature of the game, sieges. SB.exe's were running wild, lag was unbelieveable bugs and glitches were all over.
That was the game that the people who are now SBG inherrited. Yet with that they managed to turn the game around, SB always had a strong core playerbase, because every PVP lover hoped and prayed for SB to be fixed, unfortunately it was beyond complete repair due to how it was made. UBI also are partly to blame but thats another story. However, the people who are now part of SBG, managed to turn the game around.
Sb.exe's were fixed. Lag was cleared up (for the most part) performance and general gameplay was improved by about 80% patches, game balances everything. They could never truly fix that game, no one can, its to far gone, but they did a damn good job with it and created something that was actually playable and no longer just frustrating to play. It was enjoyable.
Maybe only a handfull of them were actually there at the original development stage, but the rest that joined, and the handfull that are still there from the beginning have indeed turned SB around. A game that most thought was going to be dead about a year or so ago is still alive and kicking., they've worked wonders with the mess they inherrited and they deserve all the praise they get.
I expect nothign but good things from SBG in the future. Maybe it wasn't your intent to trash talk them but you were taking credit away from them, highly unfair considering all they have done.
As I stated earlier, I take nothing away from the original SB devs, the game was fun as hell and I loved it, I still do. I just also don;t think you should take anything away from SBG.
Sorry for the long post, I got a little carried away.
Thanks for trying to keep the discussion focused on the really important stuff.
No problem chief.
I believe the exact phrase you're searching for is "no clue," but hey don't feel bad about that. Reading comprehension skills are entirely optional around here.
All we care about are the origins, hopes, dreams and aspirations of SBG, Inc., its employees' resumes, and most important of all its latest marketing hype.
But I can see you're way ahead of me there. Your input is highly valued. And I mean that. I really, really do. I'm not being sarcastic at all. Honest.
Normally, I don't have a great sense of direction in real life or in any game that I play.
You have proven yourself wrong. You have an apparent direction here, the only question is why? As a forum troll I give you a C-, as you seem to be able to sustain an argument that really has no legs but your lack of creativity and lack of desire to really go for it are holding you back from a higher mark.
On behalf of everyone who's ever posted here before, I want to welcome you and all of the Stray Bullet Games supporters who've joined the forum in the past 24 hours!
Thanks to you guys, we now know EVEN MORE about what a great bunch of staff and what a rich history SBG has. And, just as importantly, we're even more enthusiastic about how "bold" and "forward-thinking" they all are. Thanks to you, we get to hear lots and lots and lots more about what a "unique fun environment" they create; what a "winning team" they are; and lots more endlessly fascinating and useful information like that.
Because the press release didn't let us know nearly enough about that sort of stuff.
And most of all, thanks for straightening us all out about whether SBG's lawyer told SBG's marketing director to say that they "created" Shadowbane, or just "developed" it. Because before you explained all of that to us, we all thought the press release just an empty-headed, meaningless hype-fest. Heaven forbid anyone might leap to the wrong conclusions about SBG's only claim to fame after reading it. But please try to forgive us, I mean, it was kind of jumbled in with all the other useful facts crammed into into that one article.
'Course, we still know absolutely nothing whatsoever about this wonderful MMORPG SBG is supposedly working on. But hey, why should we care about pesky little details like that? Thanks for trying to keep the discussion focused on the really important stuff.
Sweet my guild members are now SBG developers! Heaven forbid the guild that won Shadowbane might actually communicate on message boards and follow a design team that worked on a game they thought was pretty awesome.
All I know is that after playing WoW for way too long the MMO market needs a game that focuses on PVP and not on PVE. I for one am sick and tired of all the kiddies who think WoW is the only way an MMO can be designed. SBG is the most likely candidate to design a game that is oriented towards PVP, so why don't we just be happy that they are working on something for us.
P.S. I registered today too. I must be a SBG programmer and there is no way that we might just know about this thread because we talk to each other on our guild forums.
Originally posted by Naswipp_EB P.S. I registered today too. I must be a SBG programmer and there is no way that we might just know about this thread because we talk to each other on our guild forums.
Of course no one on this forum (and probably no one anywhere) has ever accused you of having any idea whatsoever how to program a VCR, let alone a computer game - or even of having a job at all for that matter, let alone with any particular company.
All I said was that a bunch of SBG boosters were spamming the forum about a vacuous piece of marketing hype. (And, incidentally, that you appear to have little if any capacity to comprehend a significant percentage of what you read.)
Settle down; you and I are in perfect agreement here.
The press release was a bit misleading. I read it myself expecting to see some of the developers on the staff. I dont really consider support development unless there are expansion packs released and well the people who did the actual expansion packs excluding of course yourself dont seem to be on the staff.
Either way if you can make a game like Shadowbane that has an engine worth a damn and a better combat system but still matches the concept it will be a great game.
It really sucks that WoW was so successful with the idiodic concept of instances and a static world. It would be nice to see games with Shadowbanes concept in an engine that does it justic. The sb.exe errors were Shadowbanes downfall along with the horrid game engine.
Originally posted by AshenTemper
I don't think you will see a single press release or announcement that has come from Stray Bullet Games, LLC that says we are the creators of Shadowbane. I should know, I write them myself. We do take credit for the development and support of Shadowbane. We've been doing it for many years now.
Now, perhaps I am misreading things. We all know that sometimes it is hard to construe our thoughts or emotions over a forum. So much easier to do in person. And, personally, I do not believe this is the place to talk about things. You are more than welcome to call me if you wish to discuss this further.
Also, that Junior Server Programmer has worked on SB for almost five years- and ceased being Junior 3 years ago, I have worked on SB for 5 years, the "writer"- Meridian, is now Content Lead. He has over Five years, and is known industry wide for writing the lore for Shadowbane. That first post was a tad misleading. Why be harshing? Baby keeping you up still?
Comments
Now, perhaps I am misreading things. We all know that sometimes it is hard to construe our thoughts or emotions over a forum. So much easier to do in person. And, personally, I do not believe this is the place to talk about things. You are more than welcome to call me if you wish to discuss this further.
Sean "Ashen Temper" Dahlberg
http://www.seandahlberg.com/
Wolfpack post-Ubi, and SBG after that, have continued to update and support Shadowbane. I consider that development.
As for the bit about press releases, could you please link to a press release where SBG said they created Shadowbane? I am interested if they have, because all I've seen is that SBG's website states that Woflpack created Shadowbane, and SBG was founded by "key developers" from Wolfpack. They do have it on their site as their product, but that's because they are continuing to work on it. You're not, because you don't, because you left.
-Roac
King of Ravens
I have to agree with Ashen, a web forum isn't really the place for this kind of stuff. I personally don't believe Scorn's intention was to "trash talk" anyone, but regardless, I don't believe this is the right time or place.
From my vantage point, Shadowbane was an incredibly arduous and challenging product. We were a relatively inexperienced development team, in a brand new market, with a vision far beyond our resources.
I do still believe that our vision was a great one, and I am glad that we tried. In some ways we succeeded, in others we didn't. As for credit, I take my share of both the good and the bad. I take my credit for the vision, and I take my lumps for the implementation. Like it or not, the two things were completely intertwined. Anyone trying to take credit for the one and point fingers for the other is being less than honest.
If this ends up being the mantle that SBG takes up, I wish you guys nothing but success. I still dream of an MMO where consequences matter; if you guys have the experience, resources and dedication to make it happen, you can definately count me as a customer when you ship.
J. Todd Coleman
Austin, Texas
ps. i am posting this on behalf of myself, not my current employer. we haven't even done a press release to announce the company yet, so any assumption of "marketing" is premature and incorrect. If and when our corporate office decides to make an announcement, i think you'll agree that the companies aren't even competitors. this has nothing to do with marketing.
As for SBG. I have nothing but respect for you folks. You are trying to keep the spirit of true PvP alive. Something that has been lost with all of the new games and was taken away in games like UO. Which in my mind was one of the worst decisions in the history of MMOs.
Dont ever sell out, SBG. Stay true to your fans!
The concept art on the Stray Bullet Games website looks like a very intriguing combination of sci-fi and fantasy...which sounds very interesting indeed! A great sci-fi / sci-fi fusion PvP-Centred MMO would be a dream come true
I'll definitely keep an eye out for updates on this project, best of luck Stray Bullet!
All things Solar...
Oh gosh, I'm sorry. Where are our manners?
On behalf of everyone who's ever posted here before, I want to welcome you and all of the Stray Bullet Games supporters who've joined the forum in the past 24 hours!
Rethlen gorefluff Roac Warden_WP rRuckus
Thanks to you guys, we now know EVEN MORE about what a great bunch of staff and what a rich history SBG has. And, just as importantly, we're even more enthusiastic about how "bold" and "forward-thinking" they all are. Thanks to you, we get to hear lots and lots and lots more about what a "unique fun environment" they create; what a "winning team" they are; and lots more endlessly fascinating and useful information like that.
Because the press release didn't let us know nearly enough about that sort of stuff.
And most of all, thanks for straightening us all out about whether SBG's lawyer told SBG's marketing director to say that they "created" Shadowbane, or just "developed" it. Because before you explained all of that to us, we all thought the press release just an empty-headed, meaningless hype-fest. Heaven forbid anyone might leap to the wrong conclusions about SBG's only claim to fame after reading it. But please try to forgive us, I mean, it was kind of jumbled in with all the other useful facts crammed into into that one article.
'Course, we still know absolutely nothing whatsoever about this wonderful MMORPG SBG is supposedly working on. But hey, why should we care about pesky little details like that? Thanks for trying to keep the discussion focused on the really important stuff.
I played SB right from the initial beta, for about 2 years solid, and since then I played on and off right up until now where I play every so often just for sieges. I've watched the game grow and change over the years and its had its bad points but its only got better.
Before I go on the rant, let me say I take NOTHING away from the orginal SB devs, they made a game with an amazing concept a brilliant background lore story, and it was definitely (and still is in my opinion) the best PVP game around. However, the implementation of this concept, and the game itself was nothing short of...well, complete trash. The actual engine, the entire programming, the coding, everything was just bad. The game couldn't handle the main feature of the game, sieges. SB.exe's were running wild, lag was unbelieveable bugs and glitches were all over.
That was the game that the people who are now SBG inherrited. Yet with that they managed to turn the game around, SB always had a strong core playerbase, because every PVP lover hoped and prayed for SB to be fixed, unfortunately it was beyond complete repair due to how it was made. UBI also are partly to blame but thats another story. However, the people who are now part of SBG, managed to turn the game around.
Sb.exe's were fixed. Lag was cleared up (for the most part) performance and general gameplay was improved by about 80% patches, game balances everything. They could never truly fix that game, no one can, its to far gone, but they did a damn good job with it and created something that was actually playable and no longer just frustrating to play. It was enjoyable.
Maybe only a handfull of them were actually there at the original development stage, but the rest that joined, and the handfull that are still there from the beginning have indeed turned SB around. A game that most thought was going to be dead about a year or so ago is still alive and kicking., they've worked wonders with the mess they inherrited and they deserve all the praise they get.
I expect nothign but good things from SBG in the future. Maybe it wasn't your intent to trash talk them but you were taking credit away from them, highly unfair considering all they have done.
As I stated earlier, I take nothing away from the original SB devs, the game was fun as hell and I loved it, I still do. I just also don;t think you should take anything away from SBG.
Sorry for the long post, I got a little carried away.
All things Solar...
I believe the exact phrase you're searching for is "no clue," but hey don't feel bad about that. Reading comprehension skills are entirely optional around here.
All we care about are the origins, hopes, dreams and aspirations of SBG, Inc., its employees' resumes, and most important of all its latest marketing hype.
But I can see you're way ahead of me there. Your input is highly valued. And I mean that. I really, really do. I'm not being sarcastic at all. Honest.
All things Solar...
Oh gosh, I'm sorry. Where are our manners?
On behalf of everyone who's ever posted here before, I want to welcome you and all of the Stray Bullet Games supporters who've joined the forum in the past 24 hours!
Rethlen gorefluff Roac Warden_WP rRuckus
Thanks to you guys, we now know EVEN MORE about what a great bunch of staff and what a rich history SBG has. And, just as importantly, we're even more enthusiastic about how "bold" and "forward-thinking" they all are. Thanks to you, we get to hear lots and lots and lots more about what a "unique fun environment" they create; what a "winning team" they are; and lots more endlessly fascinating and useful information like that.
Because the press release didn't let us know nearly enough about that sort of stuff.
And most of all, thanks for straightening us all out about whether SBG's lawyer told SBG's marketing director to say that they "created" Shadowbane, or just "developed" it. Because before you explained all of that to us, we all thought the press release just an empty-headed, meaningless hype-fest. Heaven forbid anyone might leap to the wrong conclusions about SBG's only claim to fame after reading it. But please try to forgive us, I mean, it was kind of jumbled in with all the other useful facts crammed into into that one article.
'Course, we still know absolutely nothing whatsoever about this wonderful MMORPG SBG is supposedly working on. But hey, why should we care about pesky little details like that? Thanks for trying to keep the discussion focused on the really important stuff.
Sweet my guild members are now SBG developers! Heaven forbid the guild that won Shadowbane might actually communicate on message boards and follow a design team that worked on a game they thought was pretty awesome.
All I know is that after playing WoW for way too long the MMO market needs a game that focuses on PVP and not on PVE. I for one am sick and tired of all the kiddies who think WoW is the only way an MMO can be designed. SBG is the most likely candidate to design a game that is oriented towards PVP, so why don't we just be happy that they are working on something for us.
P.S. I registered today too. I must be a SBG programmer and there is no way that we might just know about this thread because we talk to each other on our guild forums.
All I said was that a bunch of SBG boosters were spamming the forum about a vacuous piece of marketing hype. (And, incidentally, that you appear to have little if any capacity to comprehend a significant percentage of what you read.)
Settle down; you and I are in perfect agreement here.
The press release was a bit misleading. I read it myself expecting to see some of the developers on the staff. I dont really consider support development unless there are expansion packs released and well the people who did the actual expansion packs excluding of course yourself dont seem to be on the staff.
Either way if you can make a game like Shadowbane that has an engine worth a damn and a better combat system but still matches the concept it will be a great game.
Also, that Junior Server Programmer has worked on SB for almost five years- and ceased being Junior 3 years ago, I have worked on SB for 5 years, the "writer"- Meridian, is now Content Lead. He has over Five years, and is known industry wide for writing the lore for Shadowbane. That first post was a tad misleading. Why be harshing? Baby keeping you up still?
Come on, man. Go nice, bro.
Clay