Shadowbane Lives On 25
eToyChest is reporting that many of the developers are Wolfpack Studios, closed since May 15th, have banded together to keep Shadowbane running for the players. Now known as 'Stray Bullet Studios', they'll be running the game for Ubisoft while they work on a new MMO for the 'next generation'. Via his Zen of Design blog, it appears Damion Schubert will not be among the Shadowbane handlers.
Is it still free? (Score:2)
Re:Is it still free? (Score:3, Insightful)
What is the situation? (Score:2)
Re:What is the situation? (Score:4, Interesting)
1)Game is written by independent studio Wolfpack
2)Ubi agrees to publish (2nd publisher)
3)Game doesn't do as well as hoped, due to really fucking buggy code (the game should have been delayed another 6 months)
4)Ubi buys out Wolfpack
5)Time passes
6)Ubi dumps the monthly fee making it a free game
7)Ubi fires all of Wolfpack
8)Wolfpack reforms as a 3rd party and now runs SB for Ubi, but still free.
I can only see 2 things going on here.
1)A tax ploy of some kind, that requires a 3rd party
2)They have a lot of faith in WP's new MMO. FOr this to be true, it has to be pretty much beta quality and near release. Otherwise, with WP's track record, this makes no sense.
Re:What is the situation? (Score:2, Funny)
2)Ubi agrees to publish (2nd publisher)
2.1) Publisher obligates developer to unrealistic schedule.
2.2) Developer complains it will affect quality
2.3) Developer complaint goes to voice mail during prolonged phone call about golf
3)Game doesn't do as well as hoped
4)Ubi buys out Wolfpack
5)Time passes
5.1) Some new management hire exclaims "we still own this??"
5.2) Nobody answers since entire management team is at golf tournament
6)Ubi dumps the monthly fee making
Re:What is the situation? (Score:2)
Re:What is the situation? (Score:3, Funny)
Certainly; but before I can design your product, you're going to have to tell me your project requirements.
Re:What is the situation? (Score:2)
Capitalism strengths-
*decentralized decision making and allocation of resources
*possible for someone to do quite well for themselves
Capitalism weaknesses-
*short term planning only (profit driven nature makes short term profits far more important than long term goals- name 1 company with a 10 year plan)
*ease of falling from free market in oligopy or monopoly (in which case much of the efficiency strengths are lost)
*no garunteed minimum level of success (in other words, while it is possible to
Re:What is the situation? (Score:1)
Re:What is the situation? (Score:2)
*short term planning only (profit driven nature makes short term profits far more important than long term goals- name 1 company with a 10 year plan)
*ease of falling from free market in oligopy or monopoly (in which case much of the efficiency strengths are lost)
*no garunteed minimum level of success (in other words, while it is possible to live like a king in capitalism, its also possible to starve to death. Unless you have a non-pure capitalism and implement welfare systems)
*extr
Re:What is the situation? (Score:1)
Self-perpetuating cycle. Short term planning causes the market to be unstable. One generation ago, everyone knew the direction the market was moving in. It wasn't a problem. Rat fuck lying cheat middle managers MAKE it a problem so they can steal other people's paychecks then blame "market direction."
Besides, this doesn't seem to have affected most businesses that have been around for decades (Coke
Re:What is the situation? (Score:2)
National Instruments has a 100-year plan [ni.com]. But there is a breakdown at the 10-year level, too, if that makes you happier.
Perhaps this is one reason for the company's perpetual 40-ish+ PE ratio; people buy the stock for the long term.
Re:What is the situation? (Score:2)
But still, this is a very, very rare exception.
Re:What is the situation? (Score:1)
Did I say there was anything wrong with capitalism?
Capitalism is not "fuck over everyone and everything in order to cash in," despite the Slashdot anti-everyone-else philosophy.
Also, any company where the management does nothing but play golf goes under FAST.
No they don't. They do just fine. Tall dollars can make up for incompetence that would make most people drop to one knee and weep. As long as they have total control, total ownership and free perpetual
Re:What is the situation? (Score:1)
But if the next project is yet another, standard hack'n slash treadmill game, Ubisoft is better off making more of those resource strategy games, such as Settlers.
The next-gen of MMORPG needs to be something "more." Think Ultima Online in 3D. Not just another generic fantasy RPG.
Next-gen already exists.. (Score:1)
Re:What is the situation? (Score:1)
Yes of course. Because as we all know, the only indicator of future success is a long unbroken string of flawless, perfect success.
Re:WoW (Score:4, Interesting)
Asheron's Call Darktide/Beta World Black was FFA PvP and players loved it. I should say players who were mages, melee characters hated it as there was a "lack of itemization" to use a WoW euphamism. They tried to balance the skills and did a somewhat fine job, but the macroing and duping drove away a lot of the 'honest' players. It was a combination of code and publisher policy issue that drove away the players.
Shadowbane also had a FFA PvP environment, and players loved the game; hated the login bugs, sb.exe errors, rampant duping, and tedium neccesary to recover from a ZERG destroyed city. Lots of people played the game on release, lots of people left the game in 6 months because of the flawed code and building ruleset. Code and ruleset drove the players away.
I hate to bring it up, as it is still looking 'far away', but Darkfall Online is the only real FFA PvP+ game that looks to be coming out. The original developers were supposedly Darktide players, played Shadowbane and other popular MMOG's, and thier rulebase (when I was following it 2 YEARS AGO) looked well thought out and fair a PvP environment. However, it has been in development for a long time. And people aren't really sure if and when it will ever *really* come out. Which is sad.
Ahh well, my point stands that games can be successful, filling the niche market of the PvP crowd. They won't neccesarily be 6 million+ subscribers successful, but they will make thier money.
Re:WoW (Score:2, Offtopic)
Without the bugs, cheats, and duping of course. For some reason, even with its dated engine, Ultima Online was fun because of its unlimited freedom it gave the players. Of course, players kind of used this to go on mass murdering sprees of godly proportions and many people didn't like that and complained and we ended up with the UO that we have today which kind of blows.
Re:WoW (Score:1)
Re:WoW (Score:1)
Guildwars I have done a tiny bit of pvp but only at the lowest skill levels(random pvp arena as opposed to clan teams with larger numbers) the game is too teamwork based for me. Without studying the game rules(skill usuage) and working with
Re:WoW (Score:1, Interesting)
1) to build a city, you had to farm monsters. endlessly
2) to rebuild a city, you had to farm monsters. Endlessly. without a base of operations.
3) because of this, guilds who were a part of a losing faction would quit that faction and join the winning faction, so they could play relatively safely
4) Because of this constant quit the loser, join the winner mentality, the world would end up with one superguil