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Flagship studios is no more
shovel1818
Member Posts: 34
Nearly the entire development team at Flagship Studios has been laid off due to financial problems. Future of Hellgate: London and Mythos are uncertain.
Source: http://news.bigdownload.com/2008/07/11/rumor-massive-flagship-studios-layoff
google for more information
Comments
Kinda sad, but this is what happens when you release pointless games. They wont be the last.....
RIP Orc Choppa
Let's face it Hellgate was crap. Also having a MMO style subscription when the game itself was crap at launch and it was just a basic hack and slash game (ala Diablo2) was not a smart move. Oh well only the best survive and thrive in this industry. NEXT !
Games I've played/tried out:WAR, LOTRO, Tabula Rasa, AoC, EQ1, EQ2, WoW, Vangaurd, FFXI, D&DO, Lineage 2, Saga Of Ryzom, EvE Online, DAoC, Guild Wars,Star Wars Galaxies, Hell Gate London, Auto Assault, Grando Espada ( AKA SoTNW ), Archlord, CoV/H, Star Trek Online, APB, Champions Online, FFXIV, Rift Online, GW2.
Game(s) I Am Currently Playing:
GW2 (+LoL and BF3)
i was really looking forward to mythos though, ive heard nothing but great things about it. i need a new free mmo to hold me off until my new computer comes
Hellgate may have survived if they made their subscription simular to Dungeon Runners. $5 dollars a month. But, as usual, every MMO company thinks their game has to be worth $15 a month.
hellgate sub is $9.99 or free without sub features
IT's wrong...Flagship is still around. Looks perhaps a few layoffs but the company did not fall.
Official response on forums of hellgate: http://forums.hellgatelondon.com/showthread.php?t=101425
that is from june 6th.
this rumor was released today and has yet to be proven wrong.
that is from june 6th.
this rumor was released today and has yet to be proven wrong.
Oh, you're right. I was looking at the last edited note which said it was edited today...hmmm. Think they posted something somewhere else though.
http://forums.hellgatelondon.com/showthread.php?p=1064155#post1064155
Quote from the link above:
Hello,
I would like to respond to some of the recent coverage that Flagship Studios has received as a result of the publication of Guy Somberg's blog.
Everyone has good days and bad days. Guy was having a bad day. It was his friend's last day of internship and he found out another friend was thinking of leaving. He vented, exaggerated, and posted information that was inaccurate.
We will be the first to admit that Hellgate: London did launch with some problems. The game would certainly have benefited from a couple more months in the oven, but as an independent developer we didn't have the ability to delay our ship date. It can be difficult to stand by and see something that you put your heart and soul into, week in and week out, get the initial reception Hellgate got. It can put a strain on any developer and some days it can get to you. Thankfully, after some very hard work by all the people here, including Guy, the game is much better now and we believe in the future of Hellgate.
Both our studios are currently fully staffed, with our San Francisco studio working on ongoing content for Hellgate: London and our Seattle studio working on our free-to-play MMORPG, Mythos, which should go into open beta within the next couple months. In total, we have over 100 employees working for both studios. As is typical in the industry, after a game is released some people naturally want to work on something else and they leave the company to do so. But in total we have had less than 10% turn-over and have rehired for all needed positions.
All our Directors and Founders are still working at Flagship, and all of them are working on Hellgate: London or Mythos. The team size for Hellgate is as big now as when we shipped. We are putting all of our efforts into these projects and I think it will show in the upcoming Hellgate Abyss Chronicles.
Sincerely,
David Brevik
CVO
Flagship Studios
-- Personal comments --
All of these sites sited the exact same source and "confirmed" it through the exact same source. It was a piss-poor rumor, despite the game and Flagship having some painfully obvious issues with QA and honesty (especially at launch).
that post is from june
Hellgate is just as pointless as diablo 1 2 and 3........
Own, Mine, Defend, Attack, 24/7
I blame it on EA.
I don't agree Hellgate wasn't crap. I never understood why they thought they could get subs. And it was a bit too generic and the online part had bugs but at its core is was a pretty good game.
Most of the blame has to be given to FSS itself. They tried to please too many people at launch (SP, MP, Sub). They spread themselves too thin and thus no one was satisfied. IMO they should have concentrated on SP and LAN multiplayer first before they ever even thought about maintaining a server, let alone a subscription.
The servers were still in beta state and online billing was in alpha at launch (what a nightmare that was). Even though the game did improve it was already too late. Potential customers already wrote them off. It's a shame too, because this game was becoming more fun and polished over time. Even though it still had some more polishing to do. Ironic too because I would say the game we have today is ready for launch.
And so it goes with a fledgling company without a warchest of cash. FSS didn't have the leeway for mistakes, so the lousy launch did them in.