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NCSoft Downsizes TR Staff in Austin
Drolkin
Member UncommonPosts: 246
in Tabula Rasa
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2008/02/123_19134.html
GG, bad news for future TR development it seems.
And yeah gotta love the fact the man with his name on the box has not been helping develop the game since release or will be helping for a long time since he is in Russia training to go to space.
Just cancelled my subscription, maybe I will be back, but I doubt it.
Comments
So why did you cancel your subscription to TR? Seems a bit reactionary to me.
""But Coyote, you could learn! You only prefer keyboard and mouse because that's all you've ever known!" You might say right before you hug a rainforest and walk in sandals to your drum circle where you're trying to raise group consciousness of ladybugs or whatever it is you dirty goddamn hippies do when you're not busy smoking pot and smelling bad."
Coyote's Howling: Death of the Computer
That's too bad. I think this might not be that uncommon with mmo's, but it is worrisome because from what I've read and the miniscule 3 day trial that I had the game does need some lovin'.
I think LOTRO has the right idea by keeping their staff on even after launch. It has allowed them to grow their game, add new features, and put quality into their publishes.
If they hack the dev. team working this to a skeleton crew and the updates and add-on like the PAU's don't make it in game they are gonna loose even more money on this game because there are a lot of Capped players just waiting for new content and vehicles to get put in. If that doesn't happen even though I'm taking my time and working on all the classes, as of now all my toons are from lvl 17 to 24, I'll probably leave too if developement stalls on this game.
I just can't beleive that NCSoft let Garriot redo the game twice before it was released. This mess is partially their own fault.
Acctually TR would have been better off w/o Garriot. He should have stayed and made UO2
This is really bad, the game is suffering as it is.
Its got so much potential and they throw it away by doing this? I can say, I will consider whether its worth my while to swap mmos for a bit. Come back if it gets any better...
Edit: I see, If it is indeed fake then....
But they didn't say that it was not true....
As long as I am having fun (and the game stays open) I will keep playing.
Its simple economics really - if the staff costs are > income then the only choice is reduce staff cost or close the game down altogether.
Take this news with a grain of salt.
The Lineage II Community Manager responded to this news article with this
Please take any Korea Times articles about NCsoft with a grain of salt. Their writer is responsible for several inflammatory articles containing sloppy reporting and erroneous content in the past year. They are by no means an official source of information.
``We need enough of a workforce to provide maintenance for `Tabula Rasa,''' a spokeswoman said Monday.
Thats funny seeing as, General B. has been in game alot recently for player events. Just look at any fight night video.
Also this article is debunked on the fact that NCsoft was going to send RG to space but decided not to in the end due to finances. He even was quoted in game of saying he didnt have the money to do it himself, but its still a dream of his.
God people love this stuff dont they!
-Jive
Earlier this morning we posted an article from The Korea Times that -- on the surface -- seemed to herald very bad times for NCsoft and Tabula Rasa. After talking with our contacts at NCsoft, things may not be nearly as dire as the writer of that article made it seem. The cliche "take things with a grain of salt" was coined for a reason, and as you'll see... this appears to be one of them.
According to what we were able to uncover this very same Korea Times staff writer has earned a reputation for writing sensationalized articles about NCsoft. In the last year he apparently has "reported" particulars from conferences that he never actually attended.
Here are a few nuggets of knowledge that Cho Jin-seo "forgot" to mention:
NCsoft CFO Lee Jae-ho did state that some downsizing in Austin is inevitable. But he also indicated in the conference call that he has hope that TR will improve its revenue stream over time.
NCsoft has committed to putting several million dollars more into further developing TR.
TR is launching in Japan later this year. Considering that Richard Garriott's games have done well in Japan, this will only help to bolster the game's population.
There will be some reduction at the Austin Studio, but only on the TR team. This isn't shocking by the way. MMOs normally ramp up their staff during development and leading up to launch, then reduce it after. Fact is, some of the TR team has already transitioned over to other internal dev teams.
It sure doesn't sound like they're shutting down the servers any time soon. With all this additional information, Jin-seo's "report" now sounds a lot like the selective reporting we've come to expect from tabloid journalists here in the States. To further solidify that this Korea Times "report" is in fact erroneous, Amy "Critters" Crider (TR's Community Coordinator), posted about it on the PlanetTR forums.
Here's another cliche to chew on: "If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck... it must be a duck." Sure, you might think this is just NCsoft PR spin. And in this day and age of jaded, conspiracy theorists who walk around with a glass that's half empty (instead of half full) wanting immediate gratification... that's to be expected. But remember: every cliche started from truth. And truth might be the very thing lacking in this report from The Korea Times.
http://www.massively.com/2008/02/18/tabula-rasa-news-not-what-it-seems/
Thanks
-Jive
Wake up and smell the coffee. If you ignore all other indicators just look at the share price that is solid fact. What you going to slam now? The global economy? <sighs>
Well crap and here I was hoping for this game to recover. Why does NCSoft do this crap ? I no longer feel like paying $50 for 2 weeks of entertainment
FUNCOM - putting the FUN in disFUNctional !
Just an FYI this article was proved to be complete bullshit and the writer of said article has written several slanderous and outright false articles about NCSoft.
According to the mmogchart.com site TR pulls in around 125k of active subs which isn't impressive nor is it terrible. On top of that companies naturally downsize dev teams after game launch. Even WoW did it. You don't need to keep hundreds of people on a game after launch.
The article that addresses the Korean article.
Critters wrote:
Link to above.
Further more:
Read the sentence in bold. Original link.
Hard to say what's true, NCSofts spin on the situation or the original report. I suspect the truth lies somewhere in the middle.
If the company was slandered, they should have legal recourse, even in S. Korea, and we'll hear more about it.
Who the hell are you, and why should I care?
Congrats! You are a victim of Trollstar!
To be honest...
Even if the article is wrong...the fact remains that TR is not that much fun...has many issues, lower population, and a genre that does not scream success (Sci-Fi and MMO's just seem to not work)
I have a feeling that this game may go the way of Auto Assault...unless some radical changes take place
Good luck TR
So our choices are trust a journalist working at an actual newspaper or trust a web reporter from a gaming site. Hmmmmm.
But as other have said, the truth is probably somewhere between the two. With this discussion of how well NCSoft is really doing, it helps to look at the bottom line with numbers that can't be given any journalistic bias or company PR spin.
http://stocks.us.reuters.com/stocks/overview.asp?symbol=036570.KS
Daily gains or losses don't matter, I see a pretty steady drop and fair drop in the last month (shortly after the release of the quarterly financial report). TR was supposed to be one of the big games releases for NC Soft, it doesn't seem to be having the impact they wanted.
I wonder if NCSoft is thinking they got their money's worth when they hired the Garriott bros.
Well I'll say I did cancel my TR sub.. but figured I would try it again when they got some more development into it.
Personal point of view... its a very solid foundation.. it just didn't have as much game built on it as they need to have.
However, I'd suggest bringing up a financial conversion tool... cuz I kind of question the article just based on...
He claims that many people say that TR cost 100 BILLION Won to create...
If I read this right .. at the current conversion rate... 100 BILLION Won.. would equate to around..
$105,741,770 (that's US dollars).
I just don't honestly believe that TR could have cost anywhere near 105 million dollars...
Even Brad McVanguard.. didn't waste that much money..
If that number was represented at about half that amount I'd be more.. along the lines of thinking it was legit. But it sounds well beyond high even... unless the person who wrote the article was high.
So your saying pre-nge SWG, EvE and AO arent successful!?!? You play EQ2, which i would say has around the same numbers as a game like EvE, so I dont see the comparison. The Fact is they make more fantasy games then Sci-Fi games, so there is going to be more hits and more misses.
-Jive
So TR pulled around 125k subbers? If you count $40 a pop, that is US$5M (not counting monthly fees) and that is quite consistent with the original article.
May be downsizing the staff is normal but certainly it is quite bad to make only $5M off a game that costed $100M. Even if you added in the subscription, it will take them a LONG LONG time, if ever, to get their investment back.
So your saying pre-nge SWG, EvE and AO arent successful!?!? You play EQ2, which i would say has around the same numbers as a game like EvE, so I dont see the comparison. The Fact is they make more fantasy games then Sci-Fi games, so there is going to be more hits and more misses.
-Jive
SWG is not successful NOW...and we will not know how it would have done if NGE had not taken place...but, it did, and failedEvE is totally niche, and also was low cost to make, and low maintenance, etc...so, it's success totally hinges on it's indy quality...just like Clerks was a hit as a movie, as an independant film, but will never match the power of the Lord of the Rings movies..And it is ONE game compared to how many successful Fantasy MMO's?
AO is free. Nuff' said
TR at this point, is also not a hit...and until we give it time (took Auto Assault a year to find out it would fail), then we will not know how this goes...unless they roll it into an all in one deal (say Lineage 2, TR and CoH for one monthly like Station Pass).
Did that to MxO and Planetside, and it is the only reason they still survive...
I am not sure what EQ2 has to do with this discussion, except it is a fantasy MMO, that has had success, fallen, success, fallen...yet, there exists a multitude of fantasy MMO's that all make money, compared to Sci-Fi hits...of which there is one right now (I never consider CoH in this discussion as Super Heroes seems like a 3rd genre...or of course, like some people call Fantasy Sci-fi...then yes, it could be Sci-Fi...but, then lets clump everything into one...which I think does NOT work)
But, just for a moment, look at a list like this, and see if there is a "multitude" of hits...
MxO, Ryzom, Planetside, Tabula Rasa, Anarchy Online, Eve Online, Auto Assault
You get the point?
So your saying pre-nge SWG, EvE and AO arent successful!?!? You play EQ2, which i would say has around the same numbers as a game like EvE, so I dont see the comparison. The Fact is they make more fantasy games then Sci-Fi games, so there is going to be more hits and more misses.
-Jive
SWG is not successful NOW...and we will not know how it would have done if NGE had not taken place...but, it did, and failedEvE is totally niche, and also was low cost to make, and low maintenance, etc...so, it's success totally hinges on it's indy quality...just like Clerks was a hit as a movie, as an independant film, but will never match the power of the Lord of the Rings movies..And it is ONE game compared to how many successful Fantasy MMO's?
AO is free. Nuff' said
TR at this point, is also not a hit...and until we give it time (took Auto Assault a year to find out it would fail), then we will not know how this goes...unless they roll it into an all in one deal (say Lineage 2, TR and CoH for one monthly like Station Pass).
Did that to MxO and Planetside, and it is the only reason they still survive...
I am not sure what EQ2 has to do with this discussion, except it is a fantasy MMO, that has had success, fallen, success, fallen...yet, there exists a multitude of fantasy MMO's that all make money, compared to Sci-Fi hits...of which there is one right now (I never consider CoH in this discussion as Super Heroes seems like a 3rd genre...or of course, like some people call Fantasy Sci-fi...then yes, it could be Sci-Fi...but, then lets clump everything into one...which I think does NOT work)
But, just for a moment, look at a list like this, and see if there is a "multitude" of hits...
MxO, Ryzom, Planetside, Tabula Rasa, Anarchy Online, Eve Online, Auto Assault
You get the point?
First off, SWG was highly successful when it first launched and had over 200k subs. How is that not a success? You cant say it was never successful just cause the NGE happened. IO yes and about your EvE argument, so your saying to me, that because "gone with the wind" cost less to make, then LOTR, that it was not as much of a success!?!?
You do know that movie ticket prices have inflated HIGHLY over the past 60 years right? The Fact is Gone with the wind was greatly successful and if buy todays ticket price would have outsold LOTR by millions. Thats a fact, I had a college course last semester in Film, and that was our first major section we went over.
-Jive
So your saying pre-nge SWG, EvE and AO arent successful!?!? You play EQ2, which i would say has around the same numbers as a game like EvE, so I dont see the comparison. The Fact is they make more fantasy games then Sci-Fi games, so there is going to be more hits and more misses.
-Jive
SWG is not successful NOW...and we will not know how it would have done if NGE had not taken place...but, it did, and failedEvE is totally niche, and also was low cost to make, and low maintenance, etc...so, it's success totally hinges on it's indy quality...just like Clerks was a hit as a movie, as an independant film, but will never match the power of the Lord of the Rings movies..And it is ONE game compared to how many successful Fantasy MMO's?
AO is free. Nuff' said
TR at this point, is also not a hit...and until we give it time (took Auto Assault a year to find out it would fail), then we will not know how this goes...unless they roll it into an all in one deal (say Lineage 2, TR and CoH for one monthly like Station Pass).
Did that to MxO and Planetside, and it is the only reason they still survive...
I am not sure what EQ2 has to do with this discussion, except it is a fantasy MMO, that has had success, fallen, success, fallen...yet, there exists a multitude of fantasy MMO's that all make money, compared to Sci-Fi hits...of which there is one right now (I never consider CoH in this discussion as Super Heroes seems like a 3rd genre...or of course, like some people call Fantasy Sci-fi...then yes, it could be Sci-Fi...but, then lets clump everything into one...which I think does NOT work)
But, just for a moment, look at a list like this, and see if there is a "multitude" of hits...
MxO, Ryzom, Planetside, Tabula Rasa, Anarchy Online, Eve Online, Auto Assault
You get the point?
First off, SWG was highly successful when it first launched and had over 200k subs. How is that not a success? You cant say it was never successful just cause the NGE happened. IO yes and about your EvE argument, so your saying to me, that because "gone with the wind" cost less to make, then LOTR, that it was not as much of a success!?!?
You do know that movie ticket prices have inflated HIGHLY over the past 60 years right? The Fact is Gone with the wind was greatly successful and if buy todays ticket price would have outsold LOTR by millions. Thats a fact, I had a college course last semester in Film, and that was our first major section we went over.
-Jive
But, we are not discussing "SALES" but overall audience. For example...my mother would go see Lord of the rings...and would NOT go see Clerks..note how the "popularity" of those movies decides it's audience...?Why? Niche is the key there...just as Eve is a niche game..
SWG was a success at first...just as TR's sales at first were a success...but for how long?
UO still has an audience after how many years? EQ after how many years?
Again...we will not know how TR does until the end of the year...we garner from the info that TR cost a lot to make, and they need to recoup somehow...and that is by box sales and scrips..hopefully they can..but, my money is on another Sci-Fi MMO going down in flames..
Later
Talk about someone being paid for a non-existant role. If they had official forums, then yes, this title would be correct, as it is?
Amy 'Critters' Crider (TR's Propaganda Maven) or
Amy 'Critters' Crider (TR's Mouthpiece) or
Amy 'Critters' Crider (TR's PR Manager) might be more correct
all-in-all, the total lack of any formal venue for us to vent spleen at the crap decisions made by the Devs is discouraging. Not to mention the wide swings in game balance and basic game mechanics.
I can't be the only one who is starting to think that they really haven't a clue which direction they should be takign the game, and certainly aren't listening to the litany of complaint coming from the dues-paying customers
and Devs, remember this - THE CUSTOMER IS AALWAYS RIGHT - SCREW US AROUND LONG ENOUGH AND YOU NO LONGER HAVE ANY CUSTOMERS - AND SUBSEQUENTLY NO LONGER HAVE A JOB.
I wonder what it is like to be a game developer who has nothing but failed projects on his/her CV? I certainly wouldn't be wanting to hire them.
Maybe the problem is listening to all the customers who all have different opinions of what they want.
You couldnt be further from the truth if you tried. The customer is always right - wrong. If someone buys a game designed for casual pve players (TR) then complains there are no raids, no serious PvP - well they are right that its not there, but wrong if they demand it should be added.
As a consumer its your right not to resubscribe if you dont like the game as it is.