Do people get paid to come and defend games on forums or do people really white knight these games so hard for free? I get if you're a fan and want to "correct" people about a game you like but some of these posts about certain games seem super fishy. These "fans" sound like PR people. Anyone have an extra tinfoil hat I can use?
So being passionate about something and writing something up semi-decently on the internet is fishy? Lol!!
I really love MMORPGs and sandboxes of all kinds. I've played and backed and tested my fair share of such games over the years, and as you can see from my history in the last 11 years on mmorpg.com, I've been around several different games.
There are a lot of misinformation being carried around on the internet and forums, either on purpose or just because of misunderstanding. I don't want to "white knight" anything, I just want to make sure that the truth about games I care about is out there, so that gamers (which I also care about!) can make an educated choice to get or not in the bandwagon of a game, and not have that based on false information.
Full disclosure : in my time, I've also worked as a volunteer for ABT as a community manager, and I'm currently involved in the community team for another indie title, The Black Death. And all that as a volunteer. Because of the opportunity to learn and make a difference in the process of making those games... and also because I like talking to people
So funny. They have had more problems than CiG and were working with less than 1% of the money (pretty sure they have gotten less than 2 million including Steam sales) and they have already released two playable games better than what SC is currently right now. And they too changed engines once.
So this will be the third go around for them.
I played the first version quite a bit. During testing and alphas and up to right before they had all the issues. I have played the new one maybe 20 hours. But mostly because I am playing other things but its not as bad as people have made it out to be. Its just obviously not an MMO. But neither are a lot of other so called MMOs.
But theyre right on schedule. A little over two years ago it dropped on Steam(which was 3 years after it first launched Alpha in Dec of 2011) then a year after that they had Fragmented now they have sold out on the third year. Basically every thing takes place at exact one year intervals. They even first switched to Hero in a Dec either 2013 or 12. Its all a blur I just know everything big with this game happens during the holiday times.
Only issue I see is the guys who had it did everything they could to keep it alive. And it was on life support for along time. Now we have to see if the guys who bought it paid enough to care if they actually want to try and finish it. Or just bought it for the IP (if what they have even counts as IP) and are going to try and make something updated with the same concept the original was supposed to be. But since they claim it is going to re-re-release i n the first Q of 2017 that would assume theyre going with the old version.
Only issue I have with that is if it was that close why was it sold? Especially after these guys carried it for years? Oh and its still on hero engine. And everyone knows hero engine is still garbage.
... The reasons and problems that caused the split will still be there. . ...
No, the reason for the "split" between IdeaFabrik and Above & Beyond was the indefinite closure of all IdeaFabrik operations at the end of 2015.
That meant that no new copies of Repop could be sold, no dev work could be done on Repop and no engine patches were being worked on by IdeaFabrik. IdeaFabrik said that everything would remain frozen until they could find a new financial backer to replace the one that pulled out of funding them.
Nobody could predict how long it would take IdeaFabrik to resume operations. But with IF providing everything to do with Repopulation (billing, accounts, server hosting, etc.), it effectively meant that the Repop team would also have to "indefinitely suspend" working until IdeaFabrik resumed operations.
The Repopulation had some significant engine issues at that point, and further engine patches were desperately needed. For example, the game client would crash regularly if you crossed zone boundaries 2 or 3 times.
IdeaFabrik's financial troubles at that point did not inspire confidence that they would be able to provide solid support and engine development in the future. If they couldn't find the new investor money they needed, all bets were off.
i pretty baffled by the people who are still defending this crappy situation
After the closure of the engine in year x? the so called developers of repop.. kept claiming for serveral months/years that the repop were being developed and they were importing assets into unreal engine.
Now that this comes out.. its 200% certain nothing has been done to repop after the closure.. and they just wanted to fill their wallets with the fragmented game.( which pretty much got updated regulary)
By selling their concept idea of repop in order to fill their wallets even more.. and leave the repop behind them
I still not get it why companies in the current economy still get away with this.
Selling the rights to idea fabric.. @least should offer refunds to the kickstarters
... The reasons and problems that caused the split will still be there. . ...
<snip> IdeaFabrik's financial troubles at that point did not inspire confidence that they would be able to provide solid support and engine development in the future. If they couldn't find the new investor money they needed, all bets were off.
THAT's when the decision was made to move to UE.
And those underlying issues - as in money, lack of games released using the engine so no revenue stream, on-going costs and so on remain.
I backed this game for the hope of a game that was like SWG. Instead, after playing many hours in the alpha and beta, it was a boring and buggy mess. I really wish I could get my money back. Lesson learned.
I'm not digging back a couple of years through my posts, but I swear I predicted something like this would happen when I heard that they had chosen Hero Engine as their platform. Sure, it's not the same Hero Engine that BioWare bought back in 2006, but it's an engine that is absolutely plagued with issues, and not a platform to start building an extremely ambitious open world RPG on top of.
... The reasons and problems that caused the split will still be there. . ...
<snip> IdeaFabrik's financial troubles at that point did not inspire confidence that they would be able to provide solid support and engine development in the future. If they couldn't find the new investor money they needed, all bets were off.
THAT's when the decision was made to move to UE.
And those underlying issues - as in money, lack of games released using the engine so no revenue stream, on-going costs and so on remain.
But the risks are somewhat diminished.
While Repop was being developed, IdeaFabrik only got 30% of the (limited) revenue raised by TR. Now they will get all the revenue (assuming there will be any).
IdeaFabrik can repurpose their engine devs to work on Repop, potentially reducing dev costs for the game.
IdeaFabrik did manage to find a new source of finance to replace the line of credit they lost at the end of 2015. IF have been operating in this way for many years, how they do it baffles me, but they do it somehow. It's quite possible that their negotiations with their new backer would have included the expected earnings of the Repopulation launch in 2016.
The Repopulation was originally slated for launch in 2016 (before the fiasco late in 2015). It was supposed to be a significant source of income for IdeaFabrik via royalties, as well as being a flagship title for the current Hero Engine version.
I believe IdeaFabrik will make every effort to get a "working version" of TR launched ASAP so that they can start earning money. I fear that the resulting "streamlined" game will not match the vision of the original.
This is why I no longer back any kickstarters. I backed this project waaay back so long ago it feels like ancient history at this point. This is one of those rare instances where I really can't blame the developers for what all happened with the Hero engine. The end result is that I'm not playing this game and won't ever see the game i paid for. I never even bothered to ask for a refund because I felt like this was just something they had no control over and I just wrote off my 50$ as a lesson learned. I will never invest any money in a game that early in development again. Crowdfunding is great for some things, but it is garbage for MMORPG's.
Hello, for what its worth, I played the game for a long while, It had a lot of SWG vibes to it with crafting and building so I had fun with it. Hopefully IF can tweek its own engine to make it a better better game...
Do people get paid to come and defend games on forums or do people really white knight these games so hard for free? I get if you're a fan and want to "correct" people about a game you like but some of these posts about certain games seem super fishy. These "fans" sound like PR people. Anyone have an extra tinfoil hat I can use?
The game is the closest thing to SWG we have seen since pre NGE, so a lot of ex SWG players were testing this game, As a seasoned SWG crafter I can tell you that this game came close to replication the crafting and housing system that SWG offered. If IF is smart they will continue to program the game as close to SWG as possible.
i pretty baffled by the people who are still defending this crappy situation
After the closure of the engine in year x? the so called developers of repop.. kept claiming for serveral months/years that the repop were being developed and they were importing assets into unreal engine.
Now that this comes out.. its 200% certain nothing has been done to repop after the closure.. and they just wanted to fill their wallets with the fragmented game.( which pretty much got updated regulary)
By selling their concept idea of repop in order to fill their wallets even more.. and leave the repop behind them
I still not get it why companies in the current economy still get away with this.
Selling the rights to idea fabric.. @least should offer refunds to the kickstarters
You can even check for yourself, here's what they've done with the assets over the last year : http://store.steampowered.com/app/441790 I don't know how you can be certain that this doesn't exist, but if you're backer/owner of TR, you have it for free and if you login, you'll see where the last year went. Also, reading news pieces on the game would keep you informed on that.
To you, and to whoever else want their money back, it doesn't make any remote sense and has absolutely no legal nor moral ground. Here's why:
1- First of all. When you back a game or buy an Early Access title, you have to understand the risks. It's pretty clear from Steam's TOS. That's also the nature of MMOs. Did Daybreak/SOE offer refunds after shutting down their games? It doesn't work like that.
2- Second, if they had money left to reimburse anyone, do you think they would be selling out to IF, having had to layoff most of their staff for budget reasons, as well as lose control over the 6-years old brainchild? No.
3- Third, how in your wildest imagination would you feel like you deserve a refund when the game you backed/purchased is actually coming back shortly now? That doesn't make any remote sense.
I understand the anger and frustration -- this is not the scenario that I would have liked to see unfolding either. But refunding is the last thing that will happen, and it makes complete sense.
... If IF is smart they will continue to program the game as close to SWG as possible.
I expect IF will follow the exact same path with Repop as was the case with old SWG.
They will probably anounce the NGE any day now... :glasses:
Well you never know the future, but their initial commitment now is to keep the spirit and design of the original game, while bringing some improvements based on community feedback : https://www.therepopulation.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=12572 (see Sarrene's posts in that thread).
... The reasons and problems that caused the split will still be there. . ...
<snip> IdeaFabrik's financial troubles at that point did not inspire confidence that they would be able to provide solid support and engine development in the future. If they couldn't find the new investor money they needed, all bets were off.
THAT's when the decision was made to move to UE.
And those underlying issues - as in money, lack of games released using the engine so no revenue stream, on-going costs and so on remain.
IF had new funding and revenue sources in 2016, which allowed them to hire a dev team and attempt to bring it to release. That wasn't the case of ABT.
So the situation *IS* different. They now have a shot at bringing the game back and start generating revenues from sales again. It's going to be very hard, but it's not impossible.
And if they don't make money? Well yes, eventually, the game will shut down. Like ANY other game...
... If IF is smart they will continue to program the game as close to SWG as possible.
I expect IF will follow the exact same path with Repop as was the case with old SWG.
They will probably anounce the NGE any day now... :glasses:
Well you never know the future, but their initial commitment now is to keep the spirit and design of the original game, while bringing some improvements based on community feedback : https://www.therepopulation.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=12572 (see Sarrene's posts in that thread).
Until I see IF's exact roadmap and future plans for The Repopulation, I will remain highly sceptical.
Repop is no longer a passion project or a labor of love. It is now a technical exercise which is primarily driven by the need to "prove" the Hero Engine to be a viable MMORPG platform.
The game before it shut down had a long way to go. Where did IF suddenly get all this money? Considering they are the reason this all shut down in the first place. Hopefully they get a lot done in a short amount of time with this new development.
Well now, So this was the exciting news they proclaimed on their site back early December.
I know this is great for the game but makes me suspicious of their motives since the engine is in need of some attention. I expect now they will be concentrating on the game and not the engine so we all get the scraps from the table. Hopefully it doesn't turn out like BWT in which the rest of the indie developers got fucked in the ass and had to go looking for alternatives.
... The reasons and problems that caused the split will still be there. . ...
<snip> IdeaFabrik's financial troubles at that point did not inspire confidence that they would be able to provide solid support and engine development in the future. If they couldn't find the new investor money they needed, all bets were off.
THAT's when the decision was made to move to UE.
And those underlying issues - as in money, lack of games released using the engine so no revenue stream, on-going costs and so on remain.
But the risks are somewhat diminished.
While Repop was being developed, IdeaFabrik only got 30% of the (limited) revenue raised by TR. Now they will get all the revenue (assuming there will be any).
IdeaFabrik can repurpose their engine devs to work on Repop, potentially reducing dev costs for the game.
IdeaFabrik did manage to find a new source of finance to replace the line of credit they lost at the end of 2015. IF have been operating in this way for many years, how they do it baffles me, but they do it somehow. It's quite possible that their negotiations with their new backer would have included the expected earnings of the Repopulation launch in 2016.
The Repopulation was originally slated for launch in 2016 (before the fiasco late in 2015). It was supposed to be a significant source of income for IdeaFabrik via royalties, as well as being a flagship title for the current Hero Engine version.
I believe IdeaFabrik will make every effort to get a "working version" of TR launched ASAP so that they can start earning money. I fear that the resulting "streamlined" game will not match the vision of the original.
Agree - apart from the risks being diminished. At the end of the day it comes down to money.
... If IF is smart they will continue to program the game as close to SWG as possible.
I expect IF will follow the exact same path with Repop as was the case with old SWG.
They will probably anounce the NGE any day now... :glasses:
Well you never know the future, but their initial commitment now is to keep the spirit and design of the original game, while bringing some improvements based on community feedback : https://www.therepopulation.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=12572 (see Sarrene's posts in that thread).
Until I see IF's exact roadmap and future plans for The Repopulation, I will remain highly sceptical.
Repop is no longer a passion project or a labor of love. It is now a technical exercise which is primarily driven by the need to "prove" the Hero Engine to be a viable MMORPG platform.
Right, and I don't think anyone would blame you (or me, for that matter!) for being somewhat skeptical and needing actual proof of all that good will. I sincerely hope they can pull this, this game and its community have suffered enough, heh.
That being said, at the core, it is possible that the first motivation of IF for spending that money on TR is solely based on a need to prove things technically, showcase their engine, get some good press, etc. Nevertheless, the core of the team (all the way up to IF's COO, Sarrene Grant, nothing less) seems to be comprised of MMO devs with at least some experience as game developers, and I would believe the vast majority of game devs choose to do that job because, at the core, they are also gamers.
So beyond the corporate need, there are certainly individuals who want to see their career progress without being IF shareholders, and maybe even MMO sandbox players who just want to make something they would enjoy playing and be proud of.
But yeah, let's see how that rolls and how they prove themselves!
The game before it shut down had a long way to go. Where did IF suddenly get all this money? Considering they are the reason this all shut down in the first place. Hopefully they get a lot done in a short amount of time with this new development.
They have private investors / VCs. Same as last year, before it went to hell, but now they got new funding from these type of sources.
Well now, So this was the exciting news they proclaimed on their site back early December.
I know this is great for the game but makes me suspicious of their motives since the engine is in need of some attention. I expect now they will be concentrating on the game and not the engine so we all get the scraps from the table. Hopefully it doesn't turn out like BWT in which the rest of the indie developers got fucked in the ass and had to go looking for alternatives.
Well, the original developers aren't part of the new team. It's a whole new team coming onboard. The ABT guys will be consulting / transitioning them for a little while, but they're not working for IF.
Comments
So being passionate about something and writing something up semi-decently on the internet is fishy? Lol!!
I really love MMORPGs and sandboxes of all kinds. I've played and backed and tested my fair share of such games over the years, and as you can see from my history in the last 11 years on mmorpg.com, I've been around several different games.
There are a lot of misinformation being carried around on the internet and forums, either on purpose or just because of misunderstanding. I don't want to "white knight" anything, I just want to make sure that the truth about games I care about is out there, so that gamers (which I also care about!) can make an educated choice to get or not in the bandwagon of a game, and not have that based on false information.
Full disclosure : in my time, I've also worked as a volunteer for ABT as a community manager, and I'm currently involved in the community team for another indie title, The Black Death. And all that as a volunteer. Because of the opportunity to learn and make a difference in the process of making those games... and also because I like talking to people
So this will be the third go around for them.
I played the first version quite a bit. During testing and alphas and up to right before they had all the issues. I have played the new one maybe 20 hours. But mostly because I am playing other things but its not as bad as people have made it out to be. Its just obviously not an MMO. But neither are a lot of other so called MMOs.
But theyre right on schedule. A little over two years ago it dropped on Steam(which was 3 years after it first launched Alpha in Dec of 2011) then a year after that they had Fragmented now they have sold out on the third year. Basically every thing takes place at exact one year intervals. They even first switched to Hero in a Dec either 2013 or 12. Its all a blur I just know everything big with this game happens during the holiday times.
Only issue I see is the guys who had it did everything they could to keep it alive. And it was on life support for along time. Now we have to see if the guys who bought it paid enough to care if they actually want to try and finish it. Or just bought it for the IP (if what they have even counts as IP) and are going to try and make something updated with the same concept the original was supposed to be. But since they claim it is going to re-re-release i n the first Q of 2017 that would assume theyre going with the old version.
Only issue I have with that is if it was that close why was it sold? Especially after these guys carried it for years? Oh and its still on hero engine. And everyone knows hero engine is still garbage.
Pretty clear however that without this Repop was dead.
That meant that no new copies of Repop could be sold, no dev work could be done on Repop and no engine patches were being worked on by IdeaFabrik. IdeaFabrik said that everything would remain frozen until they could find a new financial backer to replace the one that pulled out of funding them.
Nobody could predict how long it would take IdeaFabrik to resume operations. But with IF providing everything to do with Repopulation (billing, accounts, server hosting, etc.), it effectively meant that the Repop team would also have to "indefinitely suspend" working until IdeaFabrik resumed operations.
The Repopulation had some significant engine issues at that point, and further engine patches were desperately needed. For example, the game client would crash regularly if you crossed zone boundaries 2 or 3 times.
IdeaFabrik's financial troubles at that point did not inspire confidence that they would be able to provide solid support and engine development in the future. If they couldn't find the new investor money they needed, all bets were off.
THAT's when the decision was made to move to UE.
After the closure of the engine in year x? the so called developers of repop.. kept claiming for serveral months/years that the repop were being developed and they were importing assets into unreal engine.
Now that this comes out.. its 200% certain nothing has been done to repop after the closure.. and they just wanted to fill their wallets with the fragmented game.( which pretty much got updated regulary)
By selling their concept idea of repop in order to fill their wallets even more.. and leave the repop behind them
I still not get it why companies in the current economy still get away with this.
Selling the rights to idea fabric.. @least should offer refunds to the kickstarters
While Repop was being developed, IdeaFabrik only got 30% of the (limited) revenue raised by TR. Now they will get all the revenue (assuming there will be any).
IdeaFabrik can repurpose their engine devs to work on Repop, potentially reducing dev costs for the game.
IdeaFabrik did manage to find a new source of finance to replace the line of credit they lost at the end of 2015. IF have been operating in this way for many years, how they do it baffles me, but they do it somehow. It's quite possible that their negotiations with their new backer would have included the expected earnings of the Repopulation launch in 2016.
The Repopulation was originally slated for launch in 2016 (before the fiasco late in 2015). It was supposed to be a significant source of income for IdeaFabrik via royalties, as well as being a flagship title for the current Hero Engine version.
I believe IdeaFabrik will make every effort to get a "working version" of TR launched ASAP so that they can start earning money. I fear that the resulting "streamlined" game will not match the vision of the original.
They better not expect use to pay for any sort of early access crap again, or the same thing will happen.
Originally posted by Arskaaa
"when players learned tacticks in dungeon/raids, its bread".
The game is the closest thing to SWG we have seen since pre NGE, so a lot of ex SWG players were testing this game, As a seasoned SWG crafter I can tell you that this game came close to replication the crafting and housing system that SWG offered. If IF is smart they will continue to program the game as close to SWG as possible.
They will probably anounce the NGE any day now... :glasses:
To you, and to whoever else want their money back, it doesn't make any remote sense and has absolutely no legal nor moral ground. Here's why:
1- First of all. When you back a game or buy an Early Access title, you have to understand the risks. It's pretty clear from Steam's TOS. That's also the nature of MMOs. Did Daybreak/SOE offer refunds after shutting down their games? It doesn't work like that.
2- Second, if they had money left to reimburse anyone, do you think they would be selling out to IF, having had to layoff most of their staff for budget reasons, as well as lose control over the 6-years old brainchild? No.
3- Third, how in your wildest imagination would you feel like you deserve a refund when the game you backed/purchased is actually coming back shortly now? That doesn't make any remote sense.
I understand the anger and frustration -- this is not the scenario that I would have liked to see unfolding either. But refunding is the last thing that will happen, and it makes complete sense.
So the situation *IS* different. They now have a shot at bringing the game back and start generating revenues from sales again. It's going to be very hard, but it's not impossible.
And if they don't make money? Well yes, eventually, the game will shut down. Like ANY other game...
Repop is no longer a passion project or a labor of love. It is now a technical exercise which is primarily driven by the need to "prove" the Hero Engine to be a viable MMORPG platform.
I know this is great for the game but makes me suspicious of their motives since the engine is in need of some attention. I expect now they will be concentrating on the game and not the engine so we all get the scraps from the table. Hopefully it doesn't turn out like BWT in which the rest of the indie developers got fucked in the ass and had to go looking for alternatives.
If you are interested in making a MMO maybe visit my page to get a free open source engine.
That being said, at the core, it is possible that the first motivation of IF for spending that money on TR is solely based on a need to prove things technically, showcase their engine, get some good press, etc. Nevertheless, the core of the team (all the way up to IF's COO, Sarrene Grant, nothing less) seems to be comprised of MMO devs with at least some experience as game developers, and I would believe the vast majority of game devs choose to do that job because, at the core, they are also gamers.
So beyond the corporate need, there are certainly individuals who want to see their career progress without being IF shareholders, and maybe even MMO sandbox players who just want to make something they would enjoy playing and be proud of.
But yeah, let's see how that rolls and how they prove themselves!
Whose motives are you suspicious of, exactly?