16 October 2020 - Creative Director Letter

jahlon

Greetings MMORPG Forums,

Back again with an Ashes of Creation Update, mostly in text style since I know that's what you prefer.

• Intrepid Studios released their 3rd Quarter Creative Director Letter.  The Entire letter is available here:  https://ashesofcreation.com/news/2020-10-16-creative-directors-letter

• It is worth noting the letter does have some new character models.  Gone are the days of Magey McButterface.  The new models have decent looking faces and better looking hair.  That might be worth clicking on the letter just to scan through the pictures.

• The pièce de résistance is the Alpha 1 Roadmap.  This is the first time that a roadmap has been given.  Yes, the NDA drop is delayed by 6 months which seems like a long time.  Not going to justify that either way.  

• The letter also links you to the stuff they pushed out this quarter and to a video that the Lazy Peon did which has generated 1.8M views on YouTube.  Congrats to the Lazy Peon on that one.
  

https://i.imgur.com/OUL2hbX.jpg

• If you haven't been keeping track of Intrepid's development they did get a little delayed when they upgraded from Unreal 4.23 to 4.25.  That generate da lot of bugs and set them back by about a month (give or take).  They have continued to push forward with development, but the working from home situation is a real fact in San Diego.

• Their staff number is now above 90, the exact number is unknown.  They no longer publicly post their entire staff, but they just finished hiring 20 of 24 positions in the latest hiring cycle.  

For the people just hearing about Ashes, join the official Discord and learn more about this game.

For the people who already know about Ashes and are passionate, Alpha 1 is coming.  Its a little late, but its coming.  I will note, they will make their Fall 2020 date (barely, but they make it)

For the people who already know about Ashes and are skeptical - Stay Skeptical.   I don't expect a single letter to change your mind.   Stay skeptical keep Intrepid Honest.  Keep me from becoming a shill.  There are still many things that need to be addressed and corrected.


Hopefully that text update satisfies the majority of you.  If you are looking for something a little more Op-Ed I invite you to check out:

cheyane

Thanks for highlighting this.

Kyleran

Much appreciated

Slapshot1188

3 years ago we got this while you mocked other games for their delays:



Now 3 years (ok just 34 months) later we get a pièce de résistance Alpha 1 Roadmap.

Before you respond.  Think about that.  Then think about it again.

YashaX

Slapshot1188 said:

3 years ago we got this while you mocked other games for their delays:



Now 3 years (ok just 34 months) later we get a pièce de résistance Alpha 1 Roadmap.

Before you respond.  Think about that.  Then think about it again.

Ouch. 

These guys seem to be doing a better job on the marketing (conning?) side of things than some of the older crowdfunded mmos. When I played the New World beta I was amazed at the number of people in chat talking about Ashes of Creation like it was the next big thing and just around the corner. I had heard similar talk in the past about Panthenon and Chronicles of Elyria, but not to the same extent.


The secret sauce to seems to be getting your hooks into youtube influencers like Lazy Peon. That poor guy gets dupped way too easily by these sharks.

Slapshot1188

YashaX said:

Slapshot1188 said:

3 years ago we got this while you mocked other games for their delays:



Now 3 years (ok just 34 months) later we get a pièce de résistance Alpha 1 Roadmap.

Before you respond.  Think about that.  Then think about it again.

Ouch. 

These guys seem to be doing a better job on the marketing (conning?) side of things than some of the older crowdfunded mmos. When I played the New World beta I was amazed at the number of people in chat talking about Ashes of Creation like it was the next big thing and just around the corner. I had heard similar talk in the past about Panthenon and Chronicles of Elyria, but not to the same extent.


The secret sauce to seems to be getting your hooks into youtube influencers like Lazy Peon. That poor guy gets dupped way too easily by these sharks.

It's not surprising at all.  Stephen made a fortune in multi-level-marketing.  He knows how to turn up the heat one degree at a time so the frogs don't even notice and jump out of the pot.  He's more than willing to pay other people real money to market for him and he also ties it into the successful launch of the game.  So if he doesn't make any money, they don't.  That goes for LazyPeon as well as Jahlon.  Just something to keep in mind when watching them rave about an "A+" Director's Letter. 

Slapshot1188

Rhoklaw said:

Slapshot1188 said:

YashaX said:

Slapshot1188 said:

3 years ago we got this while you mocked other games for their delays:



Now 3 years (ok just 34 months) later we get a pièce de résistance Alpha 1 Roadmap.

Before you respond.  Think about that.  Then think about it again.

Ouch. 

These guys seem to be doing a better job on the marketing (conning?) side of things than some of the older crowdfunded mmos. When I played the New World beta I was amazed at the number of people in chat talking about Ashes of Creation like it was the next big thing and just around the corner. I had heard similar talk in the past about Panthenon and Chronicles of Elyria, but not to the same extent.


The secret sauce to seems to be getting your hooks into youtube influencers like Lazy Peon. That poor guy gets dupped way too easily by these sharks.

It's not surprising at all.  Stephen made a fortune in multi-level-marketing.  He knows how to turn up the heat one degree at a time so the frogs don't even notice and jump out of the pot.  He's more than willing to pay other people real money to market for him and he also ties it into the successful launch of the game.  So if he doesn't make any money, they don't.  That goes for LazyPeon as well as Jahlon.  Just something to keep in mind when watching them rave about an "A+" Director's Letter. 

So what exactly are you saying? The game was delayed 3 years? While this is true, it's still leagues ahead of everything else, including my beloved Pantheon. According to Stephen, the game is funded, unlike a majority of other crowdfunded MMOs in production.

Also, while New World has been delayed roughly a year, it's not being produced from 1 fan of MMORPGs with a personal checkbook. Amazon has money to burn, so you should expect better results, which they aren't exactly showing right now.

Aside from that, Ashes of Creation is going to kill New World simply from feature and scope. Which is funny since you'd expect Amazon to go balls to the wall crazy with making really good games. So far they've scrapped 2 of their 3 games in their lineup.

You may not like Stephen or how he acquired his money, but you can't deny that if AoC launches with all the intended features, it will be the next big thing.

I'm not saying anything other than what I said.  As shown in the original screenshot I linked, the game was supposed to be in soft launch a year ago.   We still have not gotten to "Alpha 1".  Other games, rightfully so, were crucified for delays.  In this case, the Youtubers have been paid off so instead we get things like "A+" Developers Letter and Alpha 1 is "a little late".  It's literally years late.

It's par for the course with these games for sure, just be careful when the people making the rah-rah videos are literally going to be paid real cash by Stephen when the game launches. 

That's all I'm saying.

Once there is a real NDA drop, I think we will get more reliable information.  I hope.  And maybe that information turns out to be great.  We will see.

As far as it launching... I sure hope so!  Stephen owes me money!

Asm0deus

Followed the link just for the pics and have to say, "ouch...that chick has dem cazy cray, cray eyes".  The guy's not much better but the effect on the female is just so much more, probably just due to her face structure.

I mean damn! Just stare at the woman's eyes and after a bit I swear it's almost like they stare back while doing an inner top cross eyed flicker thing!

YashaX

Rhoklaw said:

Slapshot1188 said:

YashaX said:

Slapshot1188 said:

3 years ago we got this while you mocked other games for their delays:



Now 3 years (ok just 34 months) later we get a pièce de résistance Alpha 1 Roadmap.

Before you respond.  Think about that.  Then think about it again.

Ouch. 

These guys seem to be doing a better job on the marketing (conning?) side of things than some of the older crowdfunded mmos. When I played the New World beta I was amazed at the number of people in chat talking about Ashes of Creation like it was the next big thing and just around the corner. I had heard similar talk in the past about Panthenon and Chronicles of Elyria, but not to the same extent.


The secret sauce to seems to be getting your hooks into youtube influencers like Lazy Peon. That poor guy gets dupped way too easily by these sharks.

It's not surprising at all.  Stephen made a fortune in multi-level-marketing.  He knows how to turn up the heat one degree at a time so the frogs don't even notice and jump out of the pot.  He's more than willing to pay other people real money to market for him and he also ties it into the successful launch of the game.  So if he doesn't make any money, they don't.  That goes for LazyPeon as well as Jahlon.  Just something to keep in mind when watching them rave about an "A+" Director's Letter. 

So what exactly are you saying? The game was delayed 3 years? While this is true, it's still leagues ahead of everything else, including my beloved Pantheon. According to Stephen, the game is funded, unlike a majority of other crowdfunded MMOs in production.

Also, while New World has been delayed roughly a year, it's not being produced from 1 fan of MMORPGs with a personal checkbook. Amazon has money to burn, so you should expect better results, which they aren't exactly showing right now.

Aside from that, Ashes of Creation is going to kill New World simply from feature and scope. Which is funny since you'd expect Amazon to go balls to the wall crazy with making really good games. So far they've scrapped 2 of their 3 games in their lineup.

You may not like Stephen or how he acquired his money, but you can't deny that if AoC launches with all the intended features, it will be the next big thing.

1) On what criteria are you claiming that it is "leagues ahead of everything else"?

2) "According to Stephen" !!! Alarm bells should be ringing

3) New World is essentially a finished game, and is quite enjoyable in its own right. A one year delay till actual release seems much better than a three year delay to a "first alpha" with no idea of when or if the game will be released and no non-NDA streams of the game available.

4) Every crowdfunded mmo has dreamed of features and scope that would "kill New WOrld*(add other random mmo here). That is probably half the problem with them!

5) If a guy has a history of being a successful conman then I would expect nothing less than that in his future behavior. It certainly doesn't inspire confidence.

jahlon

Slapshot1188 said:

3 years ago we got this while you mocked other games for their delays:

Now 3 years (ok just 34 months) later we get a pièce de résistance Alpha 1 Roadmap.

Before you respond.  Think about that.  Then think about it again.

Yup, they ran into a development delay.  They have publicly admitted they needed to scrap their back end (Feb 2019) and they had a 7/8 month delay on that.  So a lot of work they did had to be redone.

Steven has also stated that his original timeline was aggressive, probably too aggressive.  Part of that is due to the fact they didn't bring on a Producer with serious experience, and he has owned that too. 

They also in the letter said they upgraded from UE 4.23 to UE 4.25 they ran into issues.  Today during my interview with him he actually specified that they had half their engineering team and half their design team tied up for 6 weeks fixing things that broken when they did the upgrade.   

All that said, it doesn't excuse the failures, it doesn't excuse the delays, but Ashes is doing a hell of a lot better than

Chronicles of Elyria (shut down and being sued)
Camelot Unchained (delayed indefinitely while working on secondary project) 
Pantheon (out of money and looking for investors),
New World (who even knows what's going on there)

I think the only other crowdfunded game I follow that is doing well is Fractured.  They go into testing on 4 November.  

You are correct, however, late is late.  They know it, they've changed what they've said about it, they no longer give dates unless they are reasonably sure they can hit them. 

I think after this we can just be assured no crowdfunded MMORPG is going to be released on time.

Slapshot1188

Rhoklaw said:

5) If you want my opinion on the matter, I deal with conman all the time, when I take my car in to get it repaired or when I buy or sell a home or when I put money in a savings account and make that 0.3% interest while credit cards slam me for 18% interest, so it's safe to say the world is full of conmen

See, I don’t know that he is a conman so I don’t use that term.  Maybe Xangojuice is really a magic health balm.  Apparently a lot of people believed that as he made a boatload of money through multi-level-marketing of the product.  I think, as you said, that determination is something we do all the time.   What concerns me more, is the way he has taken parts of his marketing stuff and moved it to the Crowdfunded mmorpg world.  I just find it insidious that the people proselytizing about the game are going to be paid a ton of money when the game launches. 

It’s insidious because it even works at a subconscious level.  It’s why multi-year delays for this game are described as “ a little late” when for another game it’s described as being incompetence.  

Does Xango juice work?  I dunno... I doubt it... but what I do know is that I’m going to be skeptical of believing the guy excusing away it’s ineffectiveness when he’s making 15% on sales.

I have a CU account but have been openly critical of the incompetence they displayed in developing it.

I have a CF account but have been open about the fact that the game just hasn’t hooked me yet AND that their delays are a sign of incompetence.

I have an AoC account and Stephen owes me money, yet I will be openly critical and consistent.  If I started excusing away the same things I criticized the others for... you should really question why.

Thats all I’m saying.

Slapshot1188

jahlon said:

Camelot Unchained (delayed indefinitely while working on secondary project) 

See.  This is a perfect example of what I mentioned in my last post.

Camelot Unchained is "delayed indefinitely" sure... exactly like AoC is indefinitely delayed.  Both had initial launch windows they missed and both now do not have a new ETA for launch.  Yet one is described as "delayed indefinitely".

Then lets delve even further...  "while working on a secondary project".  What they did is exactly what AoC did. CU had a spinoff project called Last Stand or something (they totally borked the naming so even the media don't know the right name).  This project was said to have no impact on the timeline for the main game and was said to be beneficial to it because it enabled the development of the Overmind and other tools which will make the CU game better.  This is exactly the same (or pretty darn close) to AoC launching their cash-grab Apocalypse battle arena game and calling it a combat test. 

You can quibble about a hair here and a hair there to point out differences. but this is a perfect example IMHO of the insidiousness that has crept in.

Is AoC delayed?  Yes.  Does it have a new release date?  No.  Is that indefinite?  Yes.  Did they divert resources to work on a secondary Battle Arena they claimed would benefit the main game? Yes.
So please... explain to me how delayed indefinitely while working on a secondary project does not also apply to AoC. 

PS: This is not in any way, shape or form a defense of CU.  Their development has been an utter disaster and  Jacobs should be ashamed of himself.  Of course the one difference is that anyone who was frustrated by the delays could request their money back from CU (and yes there was even drama around that which I think was recently resolved). 

YashaX

Rhoklaw said:

1) Gameplay videos

2) Should, but I guess we can only wait and see

3) Essentially finished? It was delayed a few months ago for 9 months, so I don't know what that means, but again, we can only wait and see

4) Speaking of features and scope, while I applaud NW for making the changes it did, they went a little overboard and removed a great deal of content probably because they want to ship it out as quick as possible, who knows

5) If you want my opinion on the matter, I deal with conman all the time, when I take my car in to get it repaired or when I buy or sell a home or when I put money in a savings account and make that 0.3% interest while credit cards slam me for 18% interest, so it's safe to say the world is full of conmen

1) What is it about the gameplay videos that makes you think AoC is "leagues ahead of everything else"? It hasn't even gone into alpha yet so I am not sure how you can even compare it. Do you like the graphics or something? The combat?

3) By essentially finished I mean that NW is a fully functional game, AoC is not even in alpha and has no release date.

4) What exactly is the "great deal of content" NW took out? As far as I am aware, the main thing they changed was the owpvp system, which is a change you liked. Also I believe they are taking this time to add more content?

5) At this point in time we have seen several crowdfunded mmos play out essentially the same way: they talk the big talk, promise all these amazing ground breaking features, and give unrealistically short timelines which are consistently broken. Then they drag on and on trying to milk the community for all its worth, before either completely failing (CoE), delivering a mediocre product (SoA), or looking likely to head in one of those two directions (the rest). 

The main difference I see with AoC is that they have better marketing and seem to have succeeding in duping or buying some popular youtube influencers. They are also bringing that horrible MLM scam into the mmo space as a form of funding and advertising.

Speaking of which, where are @Scott ; and RedThomas now? They are all guns blazing on bashing early access as form of funding/testing for small studios, but when an mmo studio uses one of the shadiest market strategies around to push their product all I hear is crickets. 

Iselin

YashaX said:

Speaking of which, where are @Scott ; and RedThomas now? They are all guns blazing on bashing early access as form of funding/testing for small studios, but when an mmo studio uses one of the shadiest market strategies around to push their product all I hear is crickets. 

Slapshot1188

Slapshot1188 said:

jahlon said:

Camelot Unchained (delayed indefinitely while working on secondary project) 

See.  This is a perfect example of what I mentioned in my last post.

Camelot Unchained is "delayed indefinitely" sure... exactly like AoC is indefinitely delayed.  Both had initial launch windows they missed and both now do not have a new ETA for launch.  Yet one is described as "delayed indefinitely".

Then lets delve even further...  "while working on a secondary project".  What they did is exactly what AoC did. CU had a spinoff project called Last Stand or something (they totally borked the naming so even the media don't know the right name).  This project was said to have no impact on the timeline for the main game and was said to be beneficial to it because it enabled the development of the Overmind and other tools which will make the CU game better.  This is exactly the same (or pretty darn close) to AoC launching their cash-grab Apocalypse battle arena game and calling it a combat test. 

You can quibble about a hair here and a hair there to point out differences. but this is a perfect example IMHO of the insidiousness that has crept in.

Is AoC delayed?  Yes.  Does it have a new release date?  No.  Is that indefinite?  Yes.  Did they divert resources to work on a secondary Battle Arena they claimed would benefit the main game? Yes.
So please... explain to me how delayed indefinitely while working on a secondary project does not also apply to AoC. 

PS: This is not in any way, shape or form a defense of CU.  Their development has been an utter disaster and  Jacobs should be ashamed of himself.  Of course the one difference is that anyone who was frustrated by the delays could request their money back from CU (and yes there was even drama around that which I think was recently resolved). 

Where'd ya go?

Nanfoodle

Slapshot1188 said:

3 years ago we got this while you mocked other games for their delays:



Now 3 years (ok just 34 months) later we get a pièce de résistance Alpha 1 Roadmap.

Before you respond.  Think about that.  Then think about it again.

I get they are way off their first road map but it just does not bug me. I see top studios that have made many games miss the mark by years as well. IS has grown allot over the years and face it, the past 8 months of our lives has chucked everything off track. Unlike Pantheon, I have a strong feeling this will get released. 

Ponzini

Everyone knows their first alpha/launch dates were going to be way off. Anyone who thought otherwise was a fool. It was an amateur mistake and they have admitted to it. However, these new alpha dates are locked in. If they somehow do not keep these dates there will be serious backlash. 

The non NDA alpha is early next year so we can all see for ourselves the game in action. Not sure why we have so many in here crying about it when we are so close to seeing the game for ourselves. 

Keep in mind, in terms of MMO development AoC is still a baby compared to how long some of these other guys have been in the works. The progress we have seen and the amount of staff we have seen hired should be proof enough of their commitment. Anyone still calling this game a scam is probably not looking at the game objectively.

Slapshot1188

Sure

Wizardry

When you been around as long as me and gamed as many hours marketing...hype..chit chat doesn't mean much of anything to me.

it does sometimes make me chuckle a bit,seeing how people think about games,expectations how easy people become puppets to game hype.

I believe what i see not what i hear or not what devs are telling me because what i see tells me a LOT,you know that phrase,a picture is worth a thousand words.

I come to a conclusion long ago there are an awful lot of gamer's that simply enjoy very mediocre sub par games,expectations seem to be very low.

When this game is announced as released,i'll take a closer look but i already know that mixing pvp in a rpg setting is just NO...no and more noes.so for myself,i don't need to see beyond the bare bones of a game to know it won't be something i want to play.

Are there a few decent ideas in the game design,sure but when it comes to a rpg i need the big package,it takes a very robust well designed game to please me.I can simply look at arguably the best mmorpg "package"right now FFXIV and it is still not a game i want to play.Even if i took the best parts of this game and added them into FFXIV or vice versa,still not good enough.

I gave up on mmorpg's for god reason,nobody wants to take the genre seriously and i am not buying your half assed rpg's.

Slapshot1188

jahlon said:

You are correct, however, late is late.  They know it, they've changed what they've said about it, they no longer give dates unless they are reasonably sure they can hit them. 

Given todays news... So much for that...

And let's always remember this:

Kyleran

Ponzini said:

Everyone knows their first alpha/launch dates were going to be way off. Anyone who thought otherwise was a fool. It was an amateur mistake and they have admitted to it. However, these new alpha dates are locked in. If they somehow do not keep these dates there will be serious backlash. 

Locked in you said...