RUMOR: Heavy Gear Assault in Trouble, Devs Unpaid Since July -

Gyrus

Bump.  The lack of an answer here doesn't look good.

Gyrus

Well, MMORPG.com your story concludes with

We are currently waiting on further clarification of the development and employment situation at Stompy Bot and MekTek, and we ask that any and all current or past employees who are willing to speak to the situation either do so here in the comments, or email us directly at editor at mmorpg dot com (and news at mmorpg dot com).

We'll update the story as we learn more.

but there IS an update - posted to both REDDIT and the developer site:

https://www.reddit.com/r/HeavyGearAssault/comments/41epof/devs_respond_to_rumors/

http://forums.heavygear.com/index.php?p=/discussion/comment/13967/#Comment_13967 

yet you haven't updated your story?

So, this is what the Developer said:

@tekadept you certainly have been making plenty of noise in the past 24 hours on the interwebz about this. I am glad you are such a passionate fan and looking for truth and answers. Thanks for your support!

Here are some answers for you:
1. No one has been working for 6 months without pay. It is true that the Production was halted the beginning of August to be evaluated and restructured after shareholders and management expressed concerns. People were told not to work while these concerns were addressed.
2. Stompy Bot is still a pre-revenue company and has to answer to its shareholders otherwise its lights out.
3. A trimmed down team has been working on addressing all of the issues addressed in the Gamescom/Early Access post-mortem since September.
4. We pushed a patch in December with some critical fixes to stablize the existing build while we continue to regress the game.
5. We also had a middleware supplier pull the rug out from under us which is requiring us to completely scrap an existing implementation which seriously sucks.

MekTek Studios is a developer working under an advanced royalty contract with Stompy Bot Productions to develop Heavy Gear Assault. MekTek Sudios does not call the shots nor has any control over the decisions made by Stompy Bot Productions and its shareholders. If decision makers want change or the cash stops flowing. Well changes are made to keep the cash flowing.

- VAM January 15.  (See link above)

(BTW - I don't know tekadept - in case you are wondering.)

But the question that remains unanswered is are the allegations of 'mektekemployee' true?

Who exactly is this William he is referring to?  Is it William (Bill) Murphy who wrote this article and started this rumor?

tekadept

Well he is active on twitter, yet didn't respond to mine or a PM about coming here and checking out these comments. Obviously he is the kind of guy who likes to drop a rumour and run.

pinktailz

lol people worked hard because someone promised them money

Wizardry

Only part sounds fishy to me is they signed a " Royalty contract" but have no say,i doubt that very much.
Personally i wouldn't mind a royalty deal but there has to be more than just royalties.ALso i would 100% definitely want a say in design direction because i wouldn't want to waste my time, a year or 2/3 knowing what i am working on has no chance of succeeding.

I'll tell you what else i see,if a developer is losing it's shirt,struggling badly,even if they could turn it around,the developer is going to take any and all profits and secure it far away rather than invest back into the business.Point being i see it as a VERY long time before the game actually improves much at all,right now they are going to try and figure some way to get money rolling in but how,i just don't see it happening.

Pepeq

Funny, but if I had bills to pay (you know, like everyone else on the planet), I would find another job if I wasn't being paid... but that's just me... I can't afford to work for free.

That being said, I give this real world warning to them... if the company does indeed go belly up, there is a very real possibility that they won't be able to compensate you in any way for past work done or unused vacation days.  You could try and sue them for the money, but you are but a small fish compared to their other creditors standing in line.  An attorney would likely tell you that you're better off taking the loss than trying to recoup a single dime from them.

It's the world we live in today... the only one looking out for your welfare is you.  If you feel you're being wronged, move along.

Gyrus

tekadept said:

Well he is active on twitter, yet didn't respond to mine or a PM about coming here and checking out these comments. Obviously he is the kind of guy who likes to drop a rumour and run.

@tekadept

So, do you know who this "William" is?  Do you know, or can you find out who was at Gamescom as suggested by mektekemployee? 
" ...a very poor performance for Gamescom which was led by some recent hires that claimed to be AAA developers. ..."

BillMurphy

I think he's talking about me. I'm emailing Vince today to get final clarification on the story, @Gyrus. If they are indeed still developing, and are paying current employees, it would be good to hear why they never finished paying past employees.

breadm1x

Heavy Gear Assault ? first time i see that name here.

Noone is gonna hire Bill, he is more into flowers :pleased:
http://www.cuttingedgefloral.com/about.html

tekadept

BillMurphy said:
I think he's talking about me. I'm emailing Vince today to get final clarification on the story, @Gyrus. If they are indeed still developing, and are paying current employees, it would be good to hear why they never finished paying past employees.

Yes I was talking about bill, I have no answer to anything you mention @Gyrus
Vince already said that nobody was working for 6 months without pay.

Care to answer if you have any personal relationship with one of these sources as claimed by mektekemployee?

Gyrus

BillMurphy said:

I think he's talking about me. I'm emailing Vince today to get final clarification on the story, @Gyrus. If they are indeed still developing, and are paying current employees, it would be good to hear why they never finished paying past employees.

So, is this a news story?  Or is this a personal issue?

What exactly is / was your relationship here with StompyBot and MekTek?

Gyrus

Bump for update.  And for Bill to say how he was involved here?

aRtFuLThinG

Roin said:

Wait is this based off that old game back in the day when 3DFX Voodoo was the video card to have, and passthru cables were a thing?

There was Heavy Gear 2 as well, that one was already developed in the DirectX generation of gaming.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heavy_Gear_II

All Heavy Gear titles are originally based off Heavy Gear the tabletop game.

BillMurphy

I was contacted by several of the former contractors, that's what started this all. I contacted Vince McMillan before reporting anything. I'm still waiting for Vince's reply to my most recent email to put this to bed once and for all. 

tekadept

Ok so Mektekemployee is not telling the truth then regarding Bill. So it makes it hard to believe any other claims from MektekEmployee

Gyrus

BillMurphy said:

I was contacted by several of the former contractors, that's what started this all. I contacted Vince McMillan before reporting anything. I'm still waiting for Vince's reply to my most recent email to put this to bed once and for all. 

Really?

Because in the article you say:
...but the former and current employees of the company haven't been paid since leaving for Gamescom in 2015. Read on for direct quotes from two former employees, as well as a rebuttal from MekTek CEO Vince McMillan who refutes said claims. ...

And in your other post above you also say
@Gyrus. If they are indeed still developing, and are paying current employees, it would be good to hear why they never finished paying past employees.

So, are these people employees?  or contractors? and who are they employed or contracted by?

It's a pretty important point - because if these people are contractors and were working under contract to MekTek then StompyBot has nothing to do with it.
If StompyBot paid MekTek and MekTek didn't pay their people then StompyBot can do nothing.

BillMurphy

Gyrus said:

Really?

Because in the article you say:
...but the former and current employees of the company haven't been paid since leaving for Gamescom in 2015. Read on for direct quotes from two former employees, as well as a rebuttal from MekTek CEO Vince McMillan who refutes said claims. ...

And in your other post above you also say
@Gyrus. If they are indeed still developing, and are paying current employees, it would be good to hear why they never finished paying past employees.

So, are these people employees?  or contractors? and who are they employed or contracted by?

It's a pretty important point - because if these people are contractors and were working under contract to MekTek then StompyBot has nothing to do with it.
If StompyBot paid MekTek and MekTek didn't pay their people then StompyBot can do nothing.

From what I can gather, StompyBot and MekTek are branches of the same tree, like MMORPG.com is to Cyber Creations, INC.  Vince is integral in both companies. These are the sorts of questions I last posed to him and am still waiting on clarification from his side. Apparently, all people working on the game were "contractors" at the time of the reshuffling and lack of funds issues in August.