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[Big Publisher] is the worst thing that ever happened to [Purchased Developer]
- Thread starter Imbarkus
- Start date
Fornaximus
Member
EA is the worst thing that ever happened to...
People ride Activision for spewing out recycled CoD year after year, but as far as I know they really haven't ruined everything I loved like EA has. I think Blizzard ruined all of Blizzard's games themselves.
People ride Activision for spewing out recycled CoD year after year, but as far as I know they really haven't ruined everything I loved like EA has. I think Blizzard ruined all of Blizzard's games themselves.
Microsoft buying Rare is still going to be the #1 until the end of time. Talk about completely mishandling a purchase and a lesson on two completely different corporate cultures being incompatible. It's the single case I can think of in the game industry history where a developer was technically kidnapped.
No.
No.
Looks like neither of you know... SEGA had nothing to do with either games! Nothing!! (exclamation marks is not out of anger to both of you, but just for strong emphasis on the point highlighted).
SEGA bastardized Bayonetta, and Vanquish was not the true game that Platinum Games wanted to release. Anarchy Reign's production was completed ages prior released but it was incredibly delayed by SEGA and the marketing for the game was next to naught because SEGA's stupid internal staff thought it was a shitty button mashing game (especially looking at you, Sega Europe). Heck, Anarchy Reign was almost cancelled by SEGA. The only thing SEGA done great was SEGA Japan (note that I said Japan) marketing effort for Bayonetta in Japan, which was awesome.
Platinum Games has received nothing but incredible pain from SEGA and they have been trying very hard to make it work, but they couldn't do so due to SEGA's internal politics, frictions, illogical decisions and so much more! When Platinum Games tried to get Bayonetta back SEGA gave them the middle finger. Right now, I am hoping their relationship with Nintendo and Konami improves or, even better, the whole damn gaming world wakes up and start buying, appreciating and loving Platinum Games "games" so they can become a mega third party company. If SEGA was good for Platinum Games then you'll see MUCH MORE exciting and SEGA style games from Platinum Games because the love they had for SEGA was incredible. ... yes, "was" incredible.
wonderdung
Member
Most likely current and former employees of the studios listed in the OP will disagree in at least half the cases.
Sword Of Doom
Member
MS to Rareware. The list of all time classic games Rare has made and what they're doing now. It's just sad
PhantomOfTheKnight
Member
Disgaea is Nippon Ichi Software. ATLUS USA brought the first game over here before NIS America was formed.
EDIT: ...um, I thought this thread was about developers that were BOUGHT by publishers. Don't know why people are posting about Platinum.
TheFLYINGManga_Ka
Member
Leaving Nintendo is the worst thing that happened to Silocon Knights, Factor 5, RareWare...is that fair to say?
GoodCoffeeJoey
Banned
EA Edmonton aka Bioware is the saddest.
encephalon
Member
I would like to see Nintendo let Monolith go back to writing their stories first, even if they're in a good position right now and I should probably be glad Nintendo acquired them.
Do you have a source for that stuff? Also, how does Sega's interference compare to the normal publisher meddling that affects almost every other video game?
Fragamemnon
Member
2K is NOT the worst thing that happened to Firaxis.
THQ (was) NOT the worst thing that happend to Volition.
Firaxis has prospered and has enjoyed relative autonomy since the 2K purchase.
I'm pretty sure Volition would have gone the way of Looking Glass and Ion Storm in 2000 if THQ hadn't stepped in and bought them. They also prospered from the relationship.
THQ (was) NOT the worst thing that happend to Volition.
Firaxis has prospered and has enjoyed relative autonomy since the 2K purchase.
I'm pretty sure Volition would have gone the way of Looking Glass and Ion Storm in 2000 if THQ hadn't stepped in and bought them. They also prospered from the relationship.
Source? I know directly and not from some quotation from some magazine of some sort, and this isn't new news as lots of people known about this. Lastly, there is no such thing as a normal publisher; it's either a publisher is fully behind your product and believe in it or they are not. In this case, SEGA did a lot of crap to Platinum that will make you want to give them a major uppercut to the jaw.
ramoisdead
Member
This one. I'll never get my sequel to Geometry Wars Retro Evolved 2. =[
clutch.as.it.gets.
Member
Yeah, its just brutal how that whole MS/Rare thing played out in the end. Just brutal and sad.
Crab Milk Mickey
Member
Blizzard was the worst thing that ever happened to Swingin' Ape Studios. For those who don't remember them, they crafted this criminally underrated gem:
This was the company's very first (and disappointingly their final) project. You'd think otherwise about a game which spawned from a relative no-name company that also suffered from some development woes thanks to Vivendi's involvement (their publisher at the time), but Metal Arms was a remarkable third-person shooter that stood toe-to-toe with some of the best action games (FPS, TPS or otherwise) that came out of the PS2 / GC / Xbox generation. The shooting was extremely satisfying for a number of reasons: the enemy A.I. was surprisingly good for its time and right up there with Halo's, robots got chunked with explosive graphical splendor comparable to Binary Domain's, you could disable individual bodyparts of massive threats without wasting valuable ammunition to truly destroy them, there was a lot of variety in both your arsenal as well as the enemy types and its weapon upgrade system opened up considerable diversity in terms of viable playstyles. Its vehicular sections were underwhelming, but nonetheless there was a lot to like with the way it executed the core principles of a console shooter. The single player was unusually lengthy without grating repetitiveness too, Metal Arms didn't take itself seriously in the slightest, the game busted your balls (which is why the highest difficulty is aptly named Balls of Steel no less), the overall audio design was simply rad at times - the Zombiebots in particular were memorable - and its multiplayer was filled to the brim with potential. The latter was sadly ahead of its time, since services such as Xbox Live had not yet become popular enough to make a robust online multiplayer mode seem like a worthwhile investment for the majority of developers, much less smaller ones. So what happened?
Metal Arms didn't sell well and Vivendi owns the rights to the sequel that never officially materialized. Blizzard in their wisdom somehow noticed them; they bought Swingin' Ape to steer the troubled Starcraft: Ghost in the right direction... only to cancel it altogether while simultaneously dissolving the promising fledgling studio. In the end they made use of their talents by... absorbing them into their CG cinematics team. Brilliant.
For all the flak Blizzard got over the last few years no thanks to mismanaging all of their key franchises (World of Warcraft + Diablo III + Starcraft II), to me this is by far the worst call they've made as a company. One that I used to respect back in their prime. Now they can go fuck themselves... not that they haven't already been doing this with their internal circlejerking / self-congratulatory pats on the back by gloating about the x million copies they've sold of their latest uninspired sequel.
This was the company's very first (and disappointingly their final) project. You'd think otherwise about a game which spawned from a relative no-name company that also suffered from some development woes thanks to Vivendi's involvement (their publisher at the time), but Metal Arms was a remarkable third-person shooter that stood toe-to-toe with some of the best action games (FPS, TPS or otherwise) that came out of the PS2 / GC / Xbox generation. The shooting was extremely satisfying for a number of reasons: the enemy A.I. was surprisingly good for its time and right up there with Halo's, robots got chunked with explosive graphical splendor comparable to Binary Domain's, you could disable individual bodyparts of massive threats without wasting valuable ammunition to truly destroy them, there was a lot of variety in both your arsenal as well as the enemy types and its weapon upgrade system opened up considerable diversity in terms of viable playstyles. Its vehicular sections were underwhelming, but nonetheless there was a lot to like with the way it executed the core principles of a console shooter. The single player was unusually lengthy without grating repetitiveness too, Metal Arms didn't take itself seriously in the slightest, the game busted your balls (which is why the highest difficulty is aptly named Balls of Steel no less), the overall audio design was simply rad at times - the Zombiebots in particular were memorable - and its multiplayer was filled to the brim with potential. The latter was sadly ahead of its time, since services such as Xbox Live had not yet become popular enough to make a robust online multiplayer mode seem like a worthwhile investment for the majority of developers, much less smaller ones. So what happened?
Metal Arms didn't sell well and Vivendi owns the rights to the sequel that never officially materialized. Blizzard in their wisdom somehow noticed them; they bought Swingin' Ape to steer the troubled Starcraft: Ghost in the right direction... only to cancel it altogether while simultaneously dissolving the promising fledgling studio. In the end they made use of their talents by... absorbing them into their CG cinematics team. Brilliant.
For all the flak Blizzard got over the last few years no thanks to mismanaging all of their key franchises (World of Warcraft + Diablo III + Starcraft II), to me this is by far the worst call they've made as a company. One that I used to respect back in their prime. Now they can go fuck themselves... not that they haven't already been doing this with their internal circlejerking / self-congratulatory pats on the back by gloating about the x million copies they've sold of their latest uninspired sequel.
Messofanego
Banned
Blizzard was the worst thing that ever happened to Swingin' Ape Studios. For those who don't remember them, they crafted this criminally underrated gem:
This was the company's very first (and disappointingly their final) project. You'd think otherwise about a game which spawned from a relative no-name company that also suffered from some development woes thanks to Vivendi's involvement (their publisher at the time), but Metal Arms was a remarkable third-person shooter that stood toe-to-toe with some of the best action games (FPS, TPS or otherwise) that came out of the PS2 / GC / Xbox generation. The shooting was extremely satisfying for a number of reasons: the enemy A.I. was surprisingly good for its time and right up there with Halo's, robots got chunked with explosive graphical splendor comparable to Binary Domain's, you could disable individual bodyparts of massive threats without wasting valuable ammunition to truly destroy them, there was a lot of variety in both your arsenal as well as the enemy types and its weapon upgrade system opened up considerable diversity in terms of viable playstyles. Its vehicular sections were underwhelming, but nonetheless there was a lot to like with the way it executed the core principles of a console shooter. The single player was unusually lengthy without grating repetitiveness too, Metal Arms didn't take itself seriously in the slightest, the game busted your balls (which is why the highest difficulty is aptly named Balls of Steel no less), the overall audio design was simply rad at times - the Zombiebots in particular were memorable - and its multiplayer was filled to the brim with potential. The latter was sadly ahead of its time, since services such as Xbox Live had not yet become popular enough to make a robust online multiplayer mode seem like a worthwhile investment for the majority of developers, much less smaller ones. So what happened?
Metal Arms didn't sell well and Vivendi owns the rights to the sequel that never officially materialized. Blizzard in their wisdom somehow noticed them; they bought Swingin' Ape to steer the troubled Starcraft: Ghost in the right direction... only to cancel it altogether while simultaneously dissolving the promising fledgling studio. In the end they made use of their talents by... absorbing them into their CG cinematics team. Brilliant.
For all the flak Blizzard got over the last few years no thanks to mismanaging all of their key franchises (World of Warcraft + Diablo III + Starcraft II), to me this is by far the worst call they've made as a company. One that I used to respect back in their prime. Now they can go fuck themselves... not that they haven't already been doing this with their internal circlejerking / self-congratulatory pats on the back by gloating about the x million copies they've sold of their latest uninspired sequel.
Oh man, it's nice to see a love post to one of my favourite games!
Crab Milk Mickey
Member
I don't think I'll ever let Blizzard live this down and even if their recent releases weren't of questionable quality, I'd still go out of my way to 'boycott' them for denying us a promising new franchise.Oh man, it's nice to see a love post to one of my favourite games!
Hell, even Jim Sterling is apparently very fond of Metal Arms: A Glitch in the System and I don't typically agree with the guy.
Nintendo isn't telling Monolith to not do those grandeous stories you saw in Gears/Saga. The directors in Monolith simply acknowledged that most gamers didn't want that and so they put a bigger focus on the world and gameplay.
And thus: Xenoblade.
Souldestroyer
Banned
Is it just me or is there a trend in the results so far?
Ahem ea..
Shit company makes shit decisions and brings quality employees down into the shit with them.
A tale as old as time.
CoffeeJanitor
Member
I just remembered that EA purchased Popcap, so that
Not completely sure about this one, either. I think it's too early to tell. I mean, some of the stuff they've said (planning to make the Eidos studios focus on online games) truly sounds idiotic but so far that's been all talk, no walk. The Thief and Tomb Raider reboots had been in development since before the takeover AFAIK (in case anyone unhappy with those wants to blame them on Square) and I don't think Square Japan directly meddled in the production of any big Eidos titles (other than Visual Works doing trailers for them which doesn't really count) - so far, at least. Well...maybe adding multiplayer to Tomb Raider was their idea? But that's pure speculation...and who's to say Eidos wouldn't have told Crystal to do that, anyway? And thanks to Square the Eidos studios do now have bigger budgets and more time to polish their games.
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
Yeah I don't think they really helped Grasshopper either, but none of these fit the formula.
Tomb Raider sold 4 million units and was a disappointment to SquareEnix.
If Eidos had accomplished that on their own they'd be flush, but now they're supposed to be somehow disappointed in their results, as directed by parent company expectations?
The fact that this perception was even communicated to PR circles at all is a "jump the shark" moment for me, but I'll be happy to change it if Thief somehow satisfies Squenix. ;P
Thoughts on this given today's departure of the studio's founders?
http://venturebeat.com/2014/01/03/burnout-studio-founders-leave-electronic-arts-to-start-afresh-with-new-game-company/
encephalon
Member
I find it hard to imagine a scenario where preventing them from coming up with the story before building the game wouldn't prevent them from telling a Gears/Saga type story. Moreover, the constraints placed on monolith in that regard seem like a deliberate attempt to curtail the presence of the story element. I also find it hard to believe that there isn't a certain amount of complacency in the "we've seen the light now" comments, especially those from Soraya Saga.
In terms of what players want, obviously everyone wants a substantial gameplay experience out of their JRPGs, even if we have different ideas of what that may be. However, it's a bit strange to downplay the demand for story epics when Xenogears is held in such high regard to this day, despite the battle system not even comparing with the Xenosaga series.
Tal Shiar Agent
Member
Actually High Moon's War for Cybertron and Fall of Cybertron were pretty damn good games and faithful to original Transformers lore.
Hero of Legend
Member
Microsoft is the worst thing that ever happened to Rare.
Konami is the worse thing that ever happened to Hudson Soft.
Edit: Woah, damn necrobump, this thread is over a year old!
Konami is the worse thing that ever happened to Hudson Soft.
Edit: Woah, damn necrobump, this thread is over a year old!