38 studios Auction Nov 14th and 15th.

ThunderCougarFalconBird_sl said:

From recent Rhode Island quotes, they expect to get "Tens of millions" of dollars from the IP.

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LOOOOOOOOL

They've probably paid some Marketing guy $10 Million to tell them that Bad Publicity is actually great for the game, and that the sensationalism of the company's collapse totally means it's still a relevant IP in the minds of consumers!

How much to buy the state instead?

I don't think the game looked that bad. It was horribly managed though.

salumeth_sl said:

I don't think the game looked that bad. It was horribly managed though.

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I found the single player game they put out quite enjoyable actually. It wore on me after about 30 hours of play time but I really liked it.

I really don't see the MMO assets being used for anything. This IP will be picked up for the BHG stuff. Knowing where the MMO was at, the only real useful stuff would be getting the art from the 1-25 zones since they were locked and the 25-50 zones were closing in on that. The tools, server stuff, classes, combat all needed a bunch of work. Once a company started gutting that stuff to make it actually work, you're pretty much left with the art because you're most likely re-doing content if you re-do the tools and server stuff to work better. Who knows though, Art is usually the biggest bottle neck when it comes down to it. The world building on the MMO was still some of the best I've seen.

I'm still guessing EA picks this up for Reckoning 2.

Tenks_sl said:

I found the single player game they put out quite enjoyable actually. It wore on me after about 30 hours of play time but I really liked it.

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Yeah, KoA felt kinda like WoW + Skyrim, it was pretty fun. Could have used about 75% less bullshit quests though.

bixxby_sl said:

Yeah, KoA felt kinda like WoW + Skyrim, it was pretty fun. Could have used about 75% less bullshit quests though.

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I also felt the same. The single player game was really fun for the first ~30 hours and then it started feeling like a chore. The involved quests were quite well done, but the stupid collect 5 bear asses ones started to overshadow the well done ones. I really liked the class system and fighting style.

Whether we see the MMO finished or the Single player RPG depends on who ends up buying it. EA will make Reckoning2, Nexon will finish the MMO but I don't see a single potential company doing both. There were some rumors at one point of SoE, Bethesda, and Take-Two talking with R.I. SoE is out. Beth doesn't make any sense and Take-two would be an interesting wild-card.

I'll just leave this here.

The 11 Best Things For Sale At Curt Schillings Bankruptcy Auction

Haha "Tools - Curt Schilling not included"

OneofOne_sl said:

Haha "Tools - Curt Schilling not included"

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Is it conceivable that throwing 75 mil away was the best decision?

Say they put another 25 mil into the game to finish it, even if the game was an abortion I'm guessing it would net atleast 50-60 mil in box sales. So even at a huge loss, Rhode Island could have recouped more than just getting nothing at all. The over time whatever nominal sub fees per month would also trickle in, continuing to chip away at the debt. Even if its a pittance, isn't that better than zero?

Unless Rhode Island seriously thought they'd recoup the largest amount by selling the assets and Ips, which is pretty laughably delusional if so

I highly doubt 25mil would have finished that game without an entire change to the company.

Pasteton_sl said:

Is it conceivable that throwing 75 mil away was the best decision?

Say they put another 25 mil into the game to finish it, even if the game was an abortion I'm guessing it would net atleast 50-60 mil in box sales. So even at a huge loss, Rhode Island could have recouped more than just getting nothing at all. The over time whatever nominal sub fees per month would also trickle in, continuing to chip away at the debt. Even if its a pittance, isn't that better than zero?

Unless Rhode Island seriously thought they'd recoup the largest amount by selling the assets and Ips, which is pretty laughably delusional if so

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The whole enterprise from 38S' side to RI's side was dripping in delusion. Also, going from reports, the game was no where near being finished, so 25MM wouldn't begin to cover finishing it.

The ONLY good decision to come out of this whole mess was killing the company.

Silence_sl said:

The whole enterprise from 38S' side to RI's side was dripping in delusion. Also, going from reports, the game was no where near being finished, so 25MM wouldn't begin to cover finishing it.

The ONLY good decision to come out of this whole mess was killing the company.

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To bad. What the MMO community really needed right now was another WOW clone. His game will be forever remembered.........../scoff

Pasteton_sl said:

Is it conceivable that throwing 75 mil away was the best decision?

Say they put another 25 mil into the game to finish it, even if the game was an abortion I'm guessing it would net atleast 50-60 mil in box sales. So even at a huge loss, Rhode Island could have recouped more than just getting nothing at all. The over time whatever nominal sub fees per month would also trickle in, continuing to chip away at the debt. Even if its a pittance, isn't that better than zero?

Unless Rhode Island seriously thought they'd recoup the largest amount by selling the assets and Ips, which is pretty laughably delusional if so

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Yes, its pretty clear that Governor Chaffe shared culpability in the failure of 38 Studios, or at least their attempts to rectify the trainwreck:
Former official says R.I. governor forced bankruptcy of Schillings 38 Studios - Business - The Boston Globe

What he and R.I. still doesn't understand is that allowing 38 studios to restructure their debt, and help them secure additional funding to finish this abortion would have been the best way to recoup the investment. They (R.I.) are still totally delusional as to how much money they are going to make off the IP sale. Almost as delusional as the 38 management were in running their studio.

The restructuring could and should have come with new terms to oversee production by an experienced 3rd party developer and a renegotiation of profits until the debts are secured.

The most interesting charge against 38 in the state's lawsuit imo is the claim that 38 insisted the $75m would be enough to finish the mmo. Whereas 38 claims they told R.I. that more $$ was always going to be needed. That 38 couldn't or wouldn't retool the MMO to finish it with the $75m is mindblowingly incompetent. Whether its criminally incompetent remains to be seen.

But still, R.I. is going to be in for a heck of a shock come November..

Pasteton_sl said:

Is it conceivable that throwing 75 mil away was the best decision?

Say they put another 25 mil into the game to finish it, even if the game was an abortion I'm guessing it would net atleast 50-60 mil in box sales. So even at a huge loss, Rhode Island could have recouped more than just getting nothing at all. The over time whatever nominal sub fees per month would also trickle in, continuing to chip away at the debt. Even if its a pittance, isn't that better than zero?

Unless Rhode Island seriously thought they'd recoup the largest amount by selling the assets and Ips, which is pretty laughably delusional if so

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From what I was getting, there's no chance that game was going to be finished for 25 mil. It was going to be closer to the 150m-200m range due to just absolutely terrible management.

Ambiturner_sl said:

From what I was getting, there's no chance that game was going to be finished for 25 mil. It was going to be closer to the 150m-200m range due to just absolutely terrible management.

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There was a year to launch when it all went down but it was supposed to launch September 2012 which should have been enough to cover if we would have made that date. Obviously we were not hitting the date and it was pushed back. So figure in the 4ish million a month burn rate in salaries that puts you around 48 million or so needed just for salaries for a 2013 launch. Rhode Island held back 27 Million of the 75 that was involved with the deal so there was at least another 25 million needed to make that launch. Then add in Marketing and additional costs.

Management was talking to a few companies from Korea for further funding a few months prior and up to the shit hit the fan. From my viewpoint it sounded like we were close to signing a deal that would have funded us through the May/June 2013 launch date. There was already a deal in place needing the final signature to fund Reckoning 2. As soon as Chaffe came out to the public, those investors immediately took deals off the table for both the MMO and Reckoning 2.

Not sure if that is 100% the honest truth but it's what I was led to believe from the lower ranks.

The game had issues but so much work is done in the last year of development (which is sad but not uncommon) on MMO's that it could have been decent/good at launch. I felt the art was gorgeous. Running around spawning the world I was constantly in awe at many of the POI's. I'm a jaded bastard and I really had no bad things to say about the world art. The classes/combat needed a lot of work and the server stability was behind and I think that is what led to Curt saying it wasn't fun. Of course it wasn't, it was still a work in progress and like I said, until your combat is fun and servers are stable it won't be fun... There seemed to be quite a few problems getting UE3/Bigworld to play nice together causing the server issues. Art/Content would have hit the deadline for sure though.