dont go blaming THQ now. they put the most risk into this when nobody is willing to. it flopped because gamers and their needs absolutely perfect big budget games.
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RIP Vigil Games (2005-2013)
- Thread starter Nirolak
- Start date
NullPointer
Member
No, not really, many big budget and small budget games are profitable.
I'm not blaming them, it was their last hope, Darksiders 1 was an excellent game and a sequel theoretically would had been killer. It wasn't sadly. Too much pressure perhaps?
GraveRobberX
Platinum Trophy: Learned to Shit While Upright Again.
I fucking CALLED IT!
OMFG
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!
; ;
GOD FUCKING DAMMIT!
GraveRobberX
Member
(11-04-2012, 02:00 PM)
Quote | Edit
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=43960198&postcount=8374
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!
outunderthestars
Banned
THIS.
let's put fantasies aside for a bit and get back to reality.
I feel bad for Vigil. They had so much talent, but terrible art direction. I am still mystified wondering who thought the whole "iron maiden meets Spawn" art style was a good idea....
The One and Done
Member
Sucks but I didn't like DS2 nearly as much as DS1. I couldn't even finish it it felt so....off.
I don't know that anyone's thinking PG can buy Vigil, but the Darksiders IP and hiring a few key ex-Vigil employees could be within the realm of possibility.
I didn't really have a problem with the art. I found the gameplay boring after awhile. Regardless, it sucks to see them go.
outunderthestars
Banned
I would have really liked to see them work on a different IP. The games always seemed interesting, but the style was really off putting.
But why would they want to buy a rather underperforming IP? Where is the value in it for them?
NullPointer
Member
No.
Did some people dislike it? Sure. But that's the case with all stylish games.
I think you're wrong. These quotes are from the video.
"Ninja theory came to us with what they'd like to do, and we gave them advice on how to do that"
"We gave advice to Ninja on what we wanted them to be able to do, down to the individual frames"
"in this instance Isuno-san and Hiraki-san's experience was just invaluable because they have worked on these games and they understand how to put them together"
Then there's this.
I watched the entire video and didn't see anything that suggested that they did the entirety of the combat work. I found 3 references that bluntly state that they didn't. Waste of 9 minutes.
From Haydn Dalton on Twitter:
The ending of Darksiders 1 pretty much was a promise that this (4 player co-op) would be the focus of the next game. The first one only just held my interest all the way to the end and the very second they announced Darksiders 2 would be a prequel/sidequel I lost all interest.
Don't like to hear anyone lose their jobs or anything but if you don't have the conviction to follow through on ideas and instead take the easy way out -- who's to blame?
The ending of Darksiders 1 pretty much was a promise that this (4 player co-op) would be the focus of the next game. The first one only just held my interest all the way to the end and the very second they announced Darksiders 2 would be a prequel/sidequel I lost all interest.
Don't like to hear anyone lose their jobs or anything but if you don't have the conviction to follow through on ideas and instead take the easy way out -- who's to blame?
So has it been decided what happens to the IP itself?
Despite its flaws, I really enjoyed the darksiders games, the lore and story concepts were great, the story interesting, some great voice talent got involved, good gaming mechanics, it just could never come together as a whole. All it really needed was a good director or someone to oversee everything, I reckon they'd have been a developer that would have flourished under Nintendo.
Sad news.
Despite its flaws, I really enjoyed the darksiders games, the lore and story concepts were great, the story interesting, some great voice talent got involved, good gaming mechanics, it just could never come together as a whole. All it really needed was a good director or someone to oversee everything, I reckon they'd have been a developer that would have flourished under Nintendo.
Sad news.
No. The art was one of the best parts of those games, along with the gameplay.
This is an outrage. I hope Darksiders finds a way to live on. Maybe it can continue when the lead designer finds work elsewhere. I'm legitimately angry and sad over this news.
The fate of the Darksiders IP will be decided during the remainder of the Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings.
Surely the lead designer should get rights to the IP. They can't just kill it off. =/ That would be the worst news of the year for me.
Relaxed Muscle
Member
Personally I don't hate it, but I can't say I like it. But what I can say that it has personality and not like 90% games out there.
Winterfang
Banned
I'm not. Is unpleasant to the eyes and bring the graphics down.
No, why should the lead designer get the rights to the IP? That's not how these things work.
And of course they can just "kill it off" and that is what's more than likely going to happen.
https://twitter.com/haydndalton/status/294233068477243395
Almost sounds like a job offer by Platinum Games to the Darksiders guy in the responses. How does Darksiders 3 by platinum sound?
Because he's the one that came up with it? It only makes sense. It would be bullshit if the judge just said nobody gets it and nobody is allowed to make a Darksiders game.
Almost sounds like a job offer by Platinum Games to the Darksiders guy in the responses. How does Darksiders 3 by platinum sound?
Because he's the one that came up with it? It only makes sense. It would be bullshit if the judge just said nobody gets it and nobody is allowed to make a Darksiders game.
It's an job offer to contact them, nothing more than that.
And Platinum would actually have to buy the IP from THQ. Do you think they're in a position to do that?
Hope you land on your feet, good sir
To Arms!
Thanks for DS1 and DS2
Can you speak if there would have been a DS3? =3
What is this from?
Yes they did.
The quotes you're picking out are ones where Capcom said they offered their supervision, I:E; feedback, tweaks, design tips. Like I said, they supervised the development of the game, did not do any hard development of the game. That's exactly what they said earlier in the video when they described the aspects of the combat. Capcom saw their proposal, offered advice, and Ninja Theory went on to work on it.
The entirety of this game (coding, design, framework, art, etc) was developed by Ninja Theory. Again, Supervision does not mean they did any heavy lifting. The Capcom JPN team did no heavy lifting on this game whatsoever. It's entirely Ninja Theory's work.
THQ owns the IP, not the lead designer.
THQ invested the money in the IP, not the lead designer.
THQ bore the financial risk, not the lead designer.
If nobody buys the IP it should go to the guy that actually came up with it. Would be bullshit if it just dies off. Anyone that wants this IP to die off can go to hell.
Seeing how THQ is in a pretty desperate position and no one wanted Darksiders at the auction... It's not likely, but not completely outside the realm of possibility either.
I don't know, Inaba's the one that brought it up, so it's not fans pulling something out of their asses irrationally. Though he was likely joking.
Relaxed Muscle
Member
When not a single company like Sega or Ubisoft offered a single dollar for it?.
Yeah, I think they could...
Isn't that pretty much what happened to the Kingdoms of Amalur IP after 38 went under?
DeuceGamer
Member
This! I thought the art direction was amazing...Ehh to each their own and all that...
I've not been able to keep up with everything. Was their absolutely NO bids for Vigil at all or was their a Minimum bid that had to be met? If there was no minimum, I can't imagine someone not making a lowball offer for them. Strange and saddened as someone who really enjoyed the Darksiders series and who hoped to have an epic DSIII
Who owns the IP and is it remotely possible that someone could still purchase it after the case?
That's an extremely misleading way to frame it.
That's like saying Mistwalker didn't make Lost Odyssey, feelplus did. It's just not true. We're talking about who takes credit for the combat system, not who takes credit for programming. Creative is a gigantic part of that, probably the most important part.
When you're advising on what to do down to individual frames, does it matter if you don't personally go and program it? Clearly it wasn't all Ninja Theory.
You know what I meant. I'm not saying it isn't co-developed with Capcom, but you're implying that Capcom JPN's DMC team was doing heavy lifting on the game with them . Which isn't the case.
But if you insist, based on the fact they were a supervising/guiding force on the game; then yes, it was co-developed with Capcom JPN.
Maybe not, but they might know someone who is or could be persuaded to jump on it....
The people who created that IP were employed by Vigil/THQ. They were compensated for that work through their salaries. THQ has ~$100MM in debt, hence the bankruptcy auction. The IP will be sold for whatever it can fetch in order to make those creditors (partially) whole.
http://kotaku.com/5978522/the-maker...ove-to-buy-the-suddenly+endangered-darksiders
Please happen, please happen...
Fuck the creditors, IP's shouldn't die like this.
Please happen, please happen...
Fuck the creditors, IP's shouldn't die like this.
Jive Turkey
Unconfirmed Member
But they do and unfortunately quite often. Your anger over the fact won't change that.
This! I thought the art direction was amazing...Ehh to each their own and all that...
I've not been able to keep up with everything. Was their absolutely NO bids for Vigil at all or was their a Minimum bid that had to be met? If there was no minimum, I can't imagine someone not making a lowball offer for them. Strange and saddened as someone who really enjoyed the Darksiders series and who hoped to have an epic DSIII
Who owns the IP and is it remotely possible that someone could still purchase it after the case?
Assuming they were working on DS3 already, they were probably two years out from release. Let's assume the payroll was $1MM/month. That's $10,000 a head, with salary and benefits for 100 people (just an estimate, I see 111 on LinkedIn). So that's $24MM right there. Then you've got rent, power, utilities, software licenses, dev hardware, contractors (voice acting, outsourced concept and/or production art, localization, etc.). Maybe that's $5MM. Then there's publishing costs, so throw in $10MM to market the game, and another $2MM for distribution and other expenses.
So, if you bought Vigil Games for one dollar, it'd still cost you $41MM to actually develop and publish DarkSiders 3. But if it only sells 800,000 units, at a net of $40 per unit, that's going to end up being a $10MM loss.
DeuceGamer
Member
Or you could have them work on something that isn't quite as expensive. I just have trouble believing that some of the larger publishers didn't make any offer for them...
Well, look at the bulk of the expense...it's the salaries. So, if you're going to make something cheaper, it implies you're going to lay a bunch of people off. As for the big publishers, they already have lots of internal studios in Austin (EA/BioWare, ZeniMax, Nintendo...), so they can just recruit directly (and pick the creme of the crop) -- no need to pick up an entire studio, especially if those people aren't going to continue on a product already in development.
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