Support NeoGAF

[Denzar]

I knew that Cortez was supposed to be a parody of the Vin Diesel Action Hero, but I didn't know EA initially wanted it to be serious. It's a shame nobody in the industry "got" FR's sense of humour.

Their humour is very British. Logical, considering they ARE British, but it's a kind of humour that does not appeal to a broad audience ATM, I think. I love it though.

It looks like development and publisher/marketing woes with TS: Future Perfect and Haze built the coffin, and Battlefornt III hammered the nail in it.


The Eurogamer article has to be taken with a grain of salt, ofc. It's only one perspective. But as a lover of video games, I still find it hard to bear that publisher treat their developers in such a heartless way. I'd love to get into the industry, but after reading stories like these...

 

[ScreenSplitter]

And the story here isn't just about Lucas Arts either:

Damn, so EA might be part the reason why Timesplitters isn't such a well known series :\ All for trying to replicate an over-rated game that certain Free Radical members had a hand in.

 

[Chuck Norris]

I don't understand how a game could be 99% done but not even revealed?

 

[Shao Kahn Brewing a Stew]

They could've sold us that 99% completed game and we would've bought it with open arms, giving them enough financial stability to patch it and make it 100%.

I mean, every game released these days is 99% complete with shit loads of bugs in it. I'm sure we'd understand!

I don't understand how a game could be 99% done but not even revealed?

Smells like BS to me. Someone is bitter and that's about it.

 

[Edag Plata]

Where's Borman? Still sleeping?

 

[Baron_Calamity]

I think percentage finish in game development goes like this: 1% = 1 man year, 2%=2 man years, 3%= 4 man years, 4% = 8 man years, etc. So 99% still means a ton of work needed to be done.

 

[Haunted]

fucking cocksuckers

 

[BlackJace]

Didn't they realize how well this game would've sold?

 

[Oemenia]

99% figure is bullshit but the way things ended, it really was the little guy getting trampled by the use of threats.

 

[IdreamofHIME]

I don't believe him, sorry. No way youre game get's that close to finished and the only footage that exists are short vids that were smuggled out years later.

Nope.

Good try on making yourself look good and Lucas seem like the eye of Sauron.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

I don't believe him, sorry. No way youre game get's that close to finished and the only footage that exists are short vids that were smuggled out years later.

Nope.

Good try on making yourself look good and Lucas seem like the eye of Sauron.

I don't think this is biggest part of the story, and the OP should mention this.

Lucas Arts' decision to cancel the game is at the end of the day their decision. We don't have to like it and neither do Free Radical, but canceling the game is perfectly within their right, no matter how close it was to being complete.

The much bigger problem here is the way Lucas Arts' new management handled the cancellation (see Deepack's original post, quoted at the bottom). You can't withhold payment to the developer for six months and then fire them without compensation. That is a breach of contract.

Lucas Arts went even further and made it clear to Free Radical that they wouldn't be able take this to the courts, because Lucas Arts would prolong the trial until it became prohibitively expensive for Free Radical to pay for the court sessions/legal representation.

So Free Radical was fired from the project without due compensation and with no option to sue, because Lucas Arts' new management didn't approve of the contract the old management signed.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-05-04-free-radical-vs-the-monsters

 

[Hilti92]

GET A KICKSTARTER! Will pledge.

 

[Bending_Unit_22]

I'm pretty sure you'd still at least lower your losses by releasing the game with few to no marketing at all instead of canning the title.

Without knowing the counterfactual case of how it would have done if released unpolished and to no marketing that is very difficult to say, and without knowing the company's internal situation/contracts/expectations, etc it is basically impossible to say. In general sometimes that is true, and sometimes it is not.

 

[Anton Sugar]

Time to collaborate with SOE to create a Star Wars universe PlanetSide game!

 

[Rygar 8 Bit]

telling me things like this just hurts me more

 

[Dibbz]

And the story here isn't just about Lucas Arts either:

Man I fucking hate reading shit like this. Makes my blood boil.

 

[Cake Boss]

Mah balls it was finished, publisher's would have been tripping over themselves to publish the title if it was finished and all they had to do was distribute and market it.

 

[BattleMonkey]

We had a similar claim made in another article, while back while a former FR employee had posted on here that it was bullshit that the game was almost finished.

 

[Takamura-San]

From the few videos that I saw... that thing didn't look almost finished at all....

At the same time, I don't know the build from which those videos were taken.

I cannot comprehend the fascination with this game.

 

[Borman]

Bullshit.

How long has Steve Ellis been talking about the great conspiracy against Free Radical and this is the first we have heard about Battlefront 3 being 99% finished? Why haven't we seen more from this content-complete game that only needed some bug fixes? We've all seen the leaked videos by now and they sure as shit didn't look like they came from a game that was basically finished, as they like to claim. I have a feeling that Steve Ellis enjoys the attention he gets for talking about Free Radical and has begun stretching the truth to generate meaty headlines. After all, everyone always wants to believe the big bad publishers screwed the always-innocent little guy.

I read it more as being 99% content complete. But still, even if it was just 1% away from being "complete," that last 1% is a doozy. The video that I released was from 8 months or so prior to the studio being closed.

And yes Edag, I was sleeping

Funny timing though, since I uploaded one more Battlefront III video yesterday.
http://ptoponline.com/?p=791

 

[Rygar 8 Bit]

I read it more as being 99% content complete. But still, even if it was just 1% away from being "complete," that last 1% is a doozy. The video that I released was from 8 months or so prior to the studio being closed.

And yes Edag, I was sleeping

Funny timing though, since I uploaded one more Battlefront III video yesterday.
http://ptoponline.com/?p=791

flying from the ground into space is still cool as fuck god damn it ugh maybe on the next console cycle theyll resurface battlefront

 

[billy beane]

It doesn't make a lot of sense to cancel it due to financial reasons. Isn't Battlefront the best selling Star Wars game series?

 

[Lord Phol]

Meh never enjoyed battlefront, didn't feel or play like star wars IMO. No star wars game will ever come close to Movie Battles II though.

 

[Snaku]

I had totally forgotten about Haze. What a piece of shit.

I don't understand how a game could be 99% done but not even revealed?

It was 99% complete, on a dinner napkin.

 

[vazel]

We've been through this before. Someone with inside knowledge weighed in.

 

[zephervack]

Leak it by "accident".

Im sure the modder community would have a field day with this.

 

[Plasmid]

KICKSTART THAT SHIT

 

[BattleMonkey]

We've been through this before. Someone with inside knowledge weighed in.

Yep that was what I was thinking of. As he says and makes a good point, the game was not nearly done especially with it not having been even announced yet.

 

[Cat Party]

Free Radical also thought Haze was 100% finished.

Ice cold.

 

[Marty Chinn]

So you cancel a basically finished game because of financial reasons without, in the worst case, making at least some money back on your investment by selling the goddamn thing?

I don't think many of you understand business. In business, this is considered a sunk cost. That money is already spent and gone. As unintuitive it might be, typically a business will weigh in how much money has to be further spent to continue to determine if it's worth going forward or not. You don't weigh in moving forward to recover money you've already spent.

 

[derder]

I'm pretty sure you'd still at least lower your losses by releasing the game with few to no marketing at all instead of canning the title.

That's what I'm thinking.

Stupid move from a company that makes stupid moves.

 

[Marty Chinn]

That's what I'm thinking.

Stupid move from a company that makes stupid moves.

Look up sunk cost fallacy.