Kingdoms of Amalur was an OK game but nothing really special about it, nothing that really stood out and made it special.
Was it a competent game? Yes. Is that enough to sell a high fantasy action RPG? Seems not. It just needed that one extra unique fun thing to elevate it, but really there was nothing wrong with KOA.
I actually think KOA and D3 share that sense of "meh fine" game, the only difference is that Diablo 3 had hype and KOA did not.
KoA had alot of issues IMO......It just wasnt a very good game....Alot of people liked the combat, but I thought it was terrible.....I didn't like that I'd click my mouse button once and swing my sword 7 or 8 times while the mob just stood there...... I didnt like that I'd point my bow and have no sense of aim until the mob was close enough then it would autolock on it...... THen you go to cast a spell and it casts it in a wierd direction feeling like you had no control of it......THe game was fairly pretty, but there just wasnt enough of anything with it to even be somewhat tempting to buy it.
Also there is rumor (source : kotaku) that 38 studios did not play nice with not paying & not telling that workers health insurance is going to end like tommorow.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
I've been saying it for a while now, 38 studios screwed themselves by doing the SRPG before the mmo. With the mmo your guranteed to make a ton of upfront money, assuming they do the proper marketing. It just seems to me they were incredible aggrogant to assume the SRPG would be such a huge hit that people would be clamoring to play their mmo.
Its really one of the all time huge dissappointments in the video game industry.
I remember when I applied there as a Content Designer last year. I wanted it so bad, wanted to work for 38 studios more than anything. With this comming to light I am kind of glad that I didn't work there with all of my school loans and stuff due. However, even working there for a year would be an awesome resume filler.
I've been saying it for a while now, 38 studios screwed themselves by doing the SRPG before the mmo. With the mmo your guranteed to make a ton of upfront money, assuming they do the proper marketing. It just seems to me they were incredible aggrogant to assume the SRPG would be such a huge hit that people would be clamoring to play their mmo.
Its really one of the all time huge dissappointments in the video game industry.
I don't think that in itself was the problem. Having a SPG first can be a huge benefit. It can set the stage for what comes in the MMORPG. But what you need is some detail on the MMORPG, a world that players want to play, and mystery that players are excited to dig into. Then you need the SPG to give them that to a large degree, but leave the additional mystery to be solved in the MMORPG. They failed to do any of that, as far as I know.
Also there is rumor (source : kotaku) that 38 studios did not play nice with not paying & not telling that workers health insurance is going to end like tommorow.
Is that even legal? Aren't companies obligated by law to make insurance available for a year or something? Maybe it's different in a case of them folding, but I don't know.
Something else I'm wondering about is Schilling paying back his own investment knowing they might be going down. As far as I know, people who are owed money on loans come first, before investors. He may have placed his arse in a very big sling. Not sure though, these things get complicated.
You know, in a way I can almost feel sorry for Curt just because he was a gamer who wanted to make his dream game and actually had the chance to do it untill it all fell apart.
But at the same time all the signs seemed to indicate that his big dream was simply to make his own version of WoW and seeing that go down in flames, I must admit, tweaks that horrible, gleefully vindictive part of my mind and makes me want to chuckle in a sinister sort of way.
I didn't expect to see things go from bad to catastrophic that quickly. I hope some of those employees were successful in finding a new home at the job fair Turbine held there recently.
Is that even legal? Aren't companies obligated by law to make insurance available for a year or something? Maybe it's different in a case of them folding, but I don't know.
Something else I'm wondering about is Schilling paying back his own investment knowing they might be going down. As far as I know, people who are owed money on loans come first, before investors. He may have placed his arse in a very big sling. Not sure though, these things get complicated.
Unfortunately far as I know unless they had something specific in their contract they don't have to do a thing. Most unless it is an involuntary termination put least some type of package toegther. Hell, sometimes even invols get something unless they're a tov or caused some other type of serious issue or dilemma. But they don't have to.
Yep, loans come before investors. You know the bank is always going to want its pound of flesh.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
Is that even legal? Aren't companies obligated by law to make insurance available for a year or something? Maybe it's different in a case of them folding, but I don't know.
Something else I'm wondering about is Schilling paying back his own investment knowing they might be going down. As far as I know, people who are owed money on loans come first, before investors. He may have placed his arse in a very big sling. Not sure though, these things get complicated.
Unfortunately far as I know unless they had something specific in their contract they don't have to do a thing. Most unless it is an involuntary termination put least some type of package toegther. Hell, sometimes even invols get something unless they're a tov or caused some other type of serious issue or dilemma. But they don't have to.
Yep, loans come before investors. You know the bank is always going to want its pound of flesh.
As far as insurance goes, in the U.S. we have what is called COBRA (I don't remember what it stands for) but the insurance company must offer the ex-employee the same benefits they had, BUT the employee must pay 100% of the premiums.
Is that even legal? Aren't companies obligated by law to make insurance available for a year or something? Maybe it's different in a case of them folding, but I don't know.
Something else I'm wondering about is Schilling paying back his own investment knowing they might be going down. As far as I know, people who are owed money on loans come first, before investors. He may have placed his arse in a very big sling. Not sure though, these things get complicated.
Unfortunately far as I know unless they had something specific in their contract they don't have to do a thing. Most unless it is an involuntary termination put least some type of package toegther. Hell, sometimes even invols get something unless they're a tov or caused some other type of serious issue or dilemma. But they don't have to.
Yep, loans come before investors. You know the bank is always going to want its pound of flesh.
Well, companies are legally obligated to allow you to at least pick up your insurance plan at your own cost, and that cost is based on what the company paid as opposed to an individual plan. But that's in the case of normal layoffs, and I don't know if having the company go under means anything different.
It's not just about the banks, I don't think. It's anyone making a loan, and that includes bond buyers. But you could be right, there may be a "direct loans>bonds>prefered stocks>common stocks" sort of thing. Thyen again, maybe Schilling's "investment" was set up as a loan, which would allow him some sort of first rights, and maybe he's not in trouble.
Fact is they made a crap game,its as simple as that,KOA is shite.Talked up a good one but delivered a sub par game that some of these gaming sites,including this one,claimed KOA was on par with the likes of Skyrim,lmfao.
This is the buttom line and the cold hard truth.With games like The Witcher 2 and Skyrim,KOA needed to be special and it was a pile of rehashed Fabled type RPG that wasn't even as good as Fabled and that's saying something their.
They had all the tools at their disposal but used none of them,they lost.
Kurt..boohoo,living on your name will not sell a crap game.
No its not the bottom line KOA:Reckoning sold 1.2 million boxes and some unspecified numbers for 2 DLC.
They probably sold a total of $60 million worth of stuff. May have hit $100 million.
Whether you like reckoning or not it wasn't a failure. May not have been a smashing success but it wasn't a failure. Even if Reckoning had sold double the burn rate for the rest of Studio 38 could have had this happen 3 months from now in stead.
Is that even legal? Aren't companies obligated by law to make insurance available for a year or something? Maybe it's different in a case of them folding, but I don't know.
Something else I'm wondering about is Schilling paying back his own investment knowing they might be going down. As far as I know, people who are owed money on loans come first, before investors. He may have placed his arse in a very big sling. Not sure though, these things get complicated.
Unfortunately far as I know unless they had something specific in their contract they don't have to do a thing. Most unless it is an involuntary termination put least some type of package toegther. Hell, sometimes even invols get something unless they're a tov or caused some other type of serious issue or dilemma. But they don't have to.
Yep, loans come before investors. You know the bank is always going to want its pound of flesh.
As far as insurance goes, in the U.S. we have what is called COBRA (I don't remember what it stands for) but the insurance company must offer the ex-employee the same benefits they had, BUT the employee must pay 100% of the premiums.
Yes, that's it. I remembered more and just posted that much. It's been a long time since I've been involved in any of that, been through some things that caused a temporary memory wipe and sort of pushed stuff I used to know down into harder to access regions of me ol' brain.
For some reason, it just never went on sale, anywhere. Maybe it is too new ...but I would expect if they didn't make enough money...they would put it on sale.
It has been proven games that go on sale, earn TONS of money. At least on Steam.
For some reason, it just never went on sale, anywhere. Maybe it is too new ...but I would expect if they didn't make enough money...they would put it on sale.
It has been proven games that go on sale, earn TONS of money. At least on Steam.
Probably EA had something to do with that.
Wouldn't have mattered how much money KOA:Reckoning made, between the initial purchase of BHG and the huge burn rate of salaries/benefits Copernicus was set to kill the company many months before KOA:Reckoning was set to release.
Copernicus was set to release in like mid 2013 which almost certain was optimistic as it alwasy is that means at least 15 months of salaries at their burn rate Reckoning would have need to make an addition $150 million of PURE PROFIT.
That means they need KOA:Reckoning to have sold like 5 million copies. They need to qunitiple the sales of an a game that was already a moderate success.
That is an insane way to run a business.
Edit:
Keep in mind KOA:reckoning released like 4 months ago. VERY few games sell 5 million copies in that time. It takes time to get to those kinds of numbers. When you consider sales + time there was something seriously missing in their projections.
If they expected KOA:Reckoning to keep them afloat they have a terrible business plan. That's called gambling.
Letting your employees health insurance run out without telling them is only one of the gutless things he did.
One employee found out their health insurance was expiring because his pregnant wife was informed so by their Dr.
Mr Schilling deserves all the grief he's getting , and the fact he hasn' faced the employees at all in all this puts him worse than McQuaid level even.
Some of the hundreds of 38 Studios employees laid off yesterday were hit with a second round of bad news this week when they were told by banks that homes they thought the company had sold for them hadn't been and that they may be stuck with a second mortgage, Polygon has learned.
Fact is they made a crap game,its as simple as that,KOA is shite.Talked up a good one but delivered a sub par game that some of these gaming sites,including this one,claimed KOA was on par with the likes of Skyrim,lmfao.
This is the buttom line and the cold hard truth.With games like The Witcher 2 and Skyrim,KOA needed to be special and it was a pile of rehashed Fabled type RPG that wasn't even as good as Fabled and that's saying something their.
They had all the tools at their disposal but used none of them,they lost.
Kurt..boohoo,living on your name will not sell a crap game.
No its not the bottom line KOA:Reckoning sold 1.2 million boxes and some unspecified numbers for 2 DLC.
They probably sold a total of $60 million worth of stuff. May have hit $100 million.
Whether you like reckoning or not it wasn't a failure. May not have been a smashing success but it wasn't a failure. Even if Reckoning had sold double the burn rate for the rest of Studio 38 could have had this happen 3 months from now in stead.
Hmmm,pretty sure i didn't mention the word failure in my post.Anyway,crap game is crap,it's as simple as that.
Some of the hundreds of 38 Studios employees laid off yesterday were hit with a second round of bad news this week when they were told by banks that homes they thought the company had sold for them hadn't been and that they may be stuck with a second mortgage, Polygon has learned.
That sounds really whacky on so many different levels.
Fact is they made a crap game,its as simple as that,KOA is shite.Talked up a good one but delivered a sub par game that some of these gaming sites,including this one,claimed KOA was on par with the likes of Skyrim,lmfao.
This is the buttom line and the cold hard truth.With games like The Witcher 2 and Skyrim,KOA needed to be special and it was a pile of rehashed Fabled type RPG that wasn't even as good as Fabled and that's saying something their.
They had all the tools at their disposal but used none of them,they lost.
Kurt..boohoo,living on your name will not sell a crap game.
No its not the bottom line KOA:Reckoning sold 1.2 million boxes and some unspecified numbers for 2 DLC.
They probably sold a total of $60 million worth of stuff. May have hit $100 million.
Whether you like reckoning or not it wasn't a failure. May not have been a smashing success but it wasn't a failure. Even if Reckoning had sold double the burn rate for the rest of Studio 38 could have had this happen 3 months from now in stead.
Hmmm,pretty sure i didn't mention the word failure in my post.Anyway,crap game is crap,it's as simple as that.
Um no. A game you call crap made enough money to be useful in a business sense. You are talking nonsense. You have set up no causation but insist there is causation.
Fact is they made a crap game,its as simple as that,KOA is shite.Talked up a good one but delivered a sub par game that some of these gaming sites,including this one,claimed KOA was on par with the likes of Skyrim,lmfao.
This is the buttom line and the cold hard truth.With games like The Witcher 2 and Skyrim,KOA needed to be special and it was a pile of rehashed Fabled type RPG that wasn't even as good as Fabled and that's saying something their.
They had all the tools at their disposal but used none of them,they lost.
Kurt..boohoo,living on your name will not sell a crap game.
No its not the bottom line KOA:Reckoning sold 1.2 million boxes and some unspecified numbers for 2 DLC.
They probably sold a total of $60 million worth of stuff. May have hit $100 million.
Whether you like reckoning or not it wasn't a failure. May not have been a smashing success but it wasn't a failure. Even if Reckoning had sold double the burn rate for the rest of Studio 38 could have had this happen 3 months from now in stead.
Hmmm,pretty sure i didn't mention the word failure in my post.Anyway,crap game is crap,it's as simple as that.
Um no. A game you call crap made enough money to be useful in a business sense. You are talking nonsense. You have set up no causation but insist there is causation.
Um no,the game is crap just like swtor is crap but still sold units.That just means you hit em once and after that most(obviously not you) knows not to fall for the hype again.
Fact is they made a crap game,its as simple as that,KOA is shite.Talked up a good one but delivered a sub par game that some of these gaming sites,including this one,claimed KOA was on par with the likes of Skyrim,lmfao.
This is the buttom line and the cold hard truth.With games like The Witcher 2 and Skyrim,KOA needed to be special and it was a pile of rehashed Fabled type RPG that wasn't even as good as Fabled and that's saying something their.
They had all the tools at their disposal but used none of them,they lost.
Kurt..boohoo,living on your name will not sell a crap game.
No its not the bottom line KOA:Reckoning sold 1.2 million boxes and some unspecified numbers for 2 DLC.
They probably sold a total of $60 million worth of stuff. May have hit $100 million.
Whether you like reckoning or not it wasn't a failure. May not have been a smashing success but it wasn't a failure. Even if Reckoning had sold double the burn rate for the rest of Studio 38 could have had this happen 3 months from now in stead.
Hmmm,pretty sure i didn't mention the word failure in my post.Anyway,crap game is crap,it's as simple as that.
Um no. A game you call crap made enough money to be useful in a business sense. You are talking nonsense. You have set up no causation but insist there is causation.
Um no,the game is crap just like swtor is crap but still sold units.That just means you hit em once and after that most(obviously not you) knows not to fall for the hype again.
KOA is crap.
I am sorry but that statement makes no sense in this context. Not a flame it simply has no real meaning.
Comments
Kingdoms of Amalur was an OK game but nothing really special about it, nothing that really stood out and made it special.
Was it a competent game? Yes. Is that enough to sell a high fantasy action RPG? Seems not. It just needed that one extra unique fun thing to elevate it, but really there was nothing wrong with KOA.
I actually think KOA and D3 share that sense of "meh fine" game, the only difference is that Diablo 3 had hype and KOA did not.
KoA had alot of issues IMO......It just wasnt a very good game....Alot of people liked the combat, but I thought it was terrible.....I didn't like that I'd click my mouse button once and swing my sword 7 or 8 times while the mob just stood there...... I didnt like that I'd point my bow and have no sense of aim until the mob was close enough then it would autolock on it...... THen you go to cast a spell and it casts it in a wierd direction feeling like you had no control of it......THe game was fairly pretty, but there just wasnt enough of anything with it to even be somewhat tempting to buy it.
That is so fucked up
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
Should have just skipped KoA and Big Huge Games and put everything into Copernicus and 38 Studios.
KoA was such a disaster it not only killed an MMO but 2 development companies.
I've been saying it for a while now, 38 studios screwed themselves by doing the SRPG before the mmo. With the mmo your guranteed to make a ton of upfront money, assuming they do the proper marketing. It just seems to me they were incredible aggrogant to assume the SRPG would be such a huge hit that people would be clamoring to play their mmo.
Its really one of the all time huge dissappointments in the video game industry.
I remember when I applied there as a Content Designer last year. I wanted it so bad, wanted to work for 38 studios more than anything. With this comming to light I am kind of glad that I didn't work there with all of my school loans and stuff due. However, even working there for a year would be an awesome resume filler.
I don't think that in itself was the problem. Having a SPG first can be a huge benefit. It can set the stage for what comes in the MMORPG. But what you need is some detail on the MMORPG, a world that players want to play, and mystery that players are excited to dig into. Then you need the SPG to give them that to a large degree, but leave the additional mystery to be solved in the MMORPG. They failed to do any of that, as far as I know.
Once upon a time....
Is that even legal? Aren't companies obligated by law to make insurance available for a year or something? Maybe it's different in a case of them folding, but I don't know.
Something else I'm wondering about is Schilling paying back his own investment knowing they might be going down. As far as I know, people who are owed money on loans come first, before investors. He may have placed his arse in a very big sling. Not sure though, these things get complicated.
Once upon a time....
Hmm...
You know, in a way I can almost feel sorry for Curt just because he was a gamer who wanted to make his dream game and actually had the chance to do it untill it all fell apart.
But at the same time all the signs seemed to indicate that his big dream was simply to make his own version of WoW and seeing that go down in flames, I must admit, tweaks that horrible, gleefully vindictive part of my mind and makes me want to chuckle in a sinister sort of way.
I do feel bad for all the grunt workers though.
That sucks. I enjoyed KoA even with the bugs and unfinished pieces and would have loved to see what MMO they'd put out.
Not sure if it's dead though, they put out trailers at the same time they fired everyone...
I didn't expect to see things go from bad to catastrophic that quickly. I hope some of those employees were successful in finding a new home at the job fair Turbine held there recently.
Unfortunately far as I know unless they had something specific in their contract they don't have to do a thing. Most unless it is an involuntary termination put least some type of package toegther. Hell, sometimes even invols get something unless they're a tov or caused some other type of serious issue or dilemma. But they don't have to.
Yep, loans come before investors. You know the bank is always going to want its pound of flesh.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
As far as insurance goes, in the U.S. we have what is called COBRA (I don't remember what it stands for) but the insurance company must offer the ex-employee the same benefits they had, BUT the employee must pay 100% of the premiums.
Well, companies are legally obligated to allow you to at least pick up your insurance plan at your own cost, and that cost is based on what the company paid as opposed to an individual plan. But that's in the case of normal layoffs, and I don't know if having the company go under means anything different.
It's not just about the banks, I don't think. It's anyone making a loan, and that includes bond buyers. But you could be right, there may be a "direct loans>bonds>prefered stocks>common stocks" sort of thing. Thyen again, maybe Schilling's "investment" was set up as a loan, which would allow him some sort of first rights, and maybe he's not in trouble.
Once upon a time....
No its not the bottom line KOA:Reckoning sold 1.2 million boxes and some unspecified numbers for 2 DLC.
They probably sold a total of $60 million worth of stuff. May have hit $100 million.
Whether you like reckoning or not it wasn't a failure. May not have been a smashing success but it wasn't a failure. Even if Reckoning had sold double the burn rate for the rest of Studio 38 could have had this happen 3 months from now in stead.
Yes, that's it. I remembered more and just posted that much. It's been a long time since I've been involved in any of that, been through some things that caused a temporary memory wipe and sort of pushed stuff I used to know down into harder to access regions of me ol' brain.
Once upon a time....
For some reason, it just never went on sale, anywhere. Maybe it is too new ...but I would expect if they didn't make enough money...they would put it on sale.
It has been proven games that go on sale, earn TONS of money. At least on Steam.
Probably EA had something to do with that.
Wouldn't have mattered how much money KOA:Reckoning made, between the initial purchase of BHG and the huge burn rate of salaries/benefits Copernicus was set to kill the company many months before KOA:Reckoning was set to release.
Copernicus was set to release in like mid 2013 which almost certain was optimistic as it alwasy is that means at least 15 months of salaries at their burn rate Reckoning would have need to make an addition $150 million of PURE PROFIT.
That means they need KOA:Reckoning to have sold like 5 million copies. They need to qunitiple the sales of an a game that was already a moderate success.
That is an insane way to run a business.
Edit:
Keep in mind KOA:reckoning released like 4 months ago. VERY few games sell 5 million copies in that time. It takes time to get to those kinds of numbers. When you consider sales + time there was something seriously missing in their projections.
If they expected KOA:Reckoning to keep them afloat they have a terrible business plan. That's called gambling.
Schilling is a prick , and a gutless one at that.
Letting your employees health insurance run out without telling them is only one of the gutless things he did.
One employee found out their health insurance was expiring because his pregnant wife was informed so by their Dr.
Mr Schilling deserves all the grief he's getting , and the fact he hasn' faced the employees at all in all this puts him worse than McQuaid level even.
ouch
38 Studios passes second mortgages onto some former employees
http://www.theverge.com/gaming/2012/5/25/3043282/38-studios-downfall-leads-to-second-mortgages-for-some-employees
Some of the hundreds of 38 Studios employees laid off yesterday were hit with a second round of bad news this week when they were told by banks that homes they thought the company had sold for them hadn't been and that they may be stuck with a second mortgage, Polygon has learned.
EQ2 fan sites
Hmmm,pretty sure i didn't mention the word failure in my post.Anyway,crap game is crap,it's as simple as that.
That sounds really whacky on so many different levels.
Um no. A game you call crap made enough money to be useful in a business sense. You are talking nonsense. You have set up no causation but insist there is causation.
Um no,the game is crap just like swtor is crap but still sold units.That just means you hit em once and after that most(obviously not you) knows not to fall for the hype again.
KOA is crap.
I am sorry but that statement makes no sense in this context. Not a flame it simply has no real meaning.