EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Daehawk
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EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

Post by Daehawk »

So EA has killed VG ....they made the Dead Space series that I loved SO much. Fuck you EA you damn devil.

https://www.polygon.com/2017/10/17/1649 ... me-delayed

Electronic Arts is shutting down its Visceral Games studio and making major changes to the team’s in-development Star Wars project, EA executive vice president Patrick Söderlund announced today.

Visceral has been working on an action-adventure game set in the Star Wars universe in some form since 2013, when EA and Disney announced a multi-year game deal. It’s been described as a “story-based, linear adventure” in the style of Naughty Dog’s Uncharted series, but based on comments from Söderlund, EA is making a “significant change” to that title.

https://kotaku.com/ea-shuts-down-viscer ... 1819623990

EA is shutting down Visceral Games, the studio behind games like Battlefield Hardline and Dead Space, the publisher said today. The Star Wars game in development at Visceral will be revamped and move to a different studio, EA says, although it will now be something completely different.

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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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...

:coffee: ... The Collapse Of Visceral's Ambitious Star Wars Game

< a snippet>
But the story behind Ragtag (codename) is more complicated than critics and pundits have assumed, and the project was more troubled than EA has admitted publicly. Among game developers, it’s been an open secret for months that Visceral’s game was in danger. The studio had been bleeding staff for years, and recruiters across the video game industry exchanged whispers about Visceral employees who were looking for new work, according to several people who have shared these rumors with me over the past couple of years.

Over the past week I’ve talked to nearly a dozen former Visceral employees who worked on Ragtag, all of whom spoke anonymously because they did not want to risk damaging their careers. I’ve also spoken to several other developers who are tangentially connected to Visceral. They all share similar stories. Ragtag was a project sunk by many factors, including a lack of resources, a vision that was too ambitious for its budget, a difficult game engine, a director who clashed with staff, a studio located in one of the most expensive cities in the world, a reputation for toxicity, multiple conflicts between Visceral and EA, and what can only be described as the curse of Star Wars.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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I had the impression that 1313 had morphed into this game due to earlier comments, but it doesn't really seem to be the case according to this article. The initial premises of both sound similar.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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...

:coffee: .. EA Says Visceral's Cancelled Star Wars Game Was Too Linear

EA also says they may resurrect the game with a new studio
Spoiler:
After Electronic Arts announced the closure of Visceral Games and the cancellation of its Star Wars project, EA CEO Andrew Wilson cautioned people not to see it as a referendum on single-player games. That said, it may have been a referendum on linear games.

Speaking at the Credit Suisse 21st Annual Technology, Media & Telecom Conference yesterday, EA CFO Blake Jorgensen explained the company's reasons for closing Visceral and axing the game.

"Over the last five or six years, [Visceral Games] had shrunk in size," Jorgensen said. "It was down to about 80 people, which is sub-scale in our business. And the game they were making was actually being supported by a team in Vancouver and a team in Montreal because of that sub-scale nature. And we were trying to build a game that really pushed gameplay to the next level, and as we kept reviewing the game, it continued to look like a style of gaming, a much more linear game, that people don't like as much today as they did five years ago or 10 years ago."

It was about three and a half years ago when EA hired Amy Hennig to be the creative director on Visceral's Star Wars game. Hennig is best known for her work at her previous employer, Naughty Dog, where she was creative director for the studio's acclaimed series of linear action games, Uncharted.

EA may not have much interest in publishing linear games, but Jorgensen said he's still looking to salvage what he can from the Visceral project.

"[W]e made the tough decision to shut down that game team and take the parts of that game, and today we're looking at what we're going to do with those," Jorgensen said. "Will me make the game in a different style at a different studio? Will we use parts of the game in other games? We're trying to go through that today."

Jorgensen said the company has been redeploying Visceral developers throughout the company, and is attempting to retain as many of them as possible.

"We haven't had to do this very often," he said. "We try to do it as early as possible in game design, and we probably let this go a little further. But I'm a believer in sunk costs. You've got to cut the bridge when you realize you can't really make a lot of money on something, so that's the decision we made."
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

Post by hitbyambulance »

And we were trying to build a game that really pushed gameplay to the next level, and as we kept reviewing the game, it continued to look like a style of gaming, a much more linear game, that people don't like as much today as they did five years ago or 10 years ago."

..such a weird thing to hear.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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....
It was about three and a half years ago when EA hired Amy Hennig to be the creative director on Visceral's Star Wars game. Hennig is best known for her work at her previous employer, Naughty Dog, where she was creative director for the studio's acclaimed series of linear action games, Uncharted.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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I find it hard to believe that a Dark Forces III (or anything remotely similar) would not sell spectacularly.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Carpet_pissr wrote: Fri Dec 01, 2017 8:51 am I find it hard to believe that a Dark Forces III (or anything remotely similar) would not sell spectacularly.
Agree 100%. Hell, give me Republic Commandos 2 and I'll drop $60 tomorrow. They mismanaged the project and are blaming consumers. hahaha :obscene-birdiered:
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Just as likely they realized that it couldn't be monetized beyond the initial release.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

Post by Carpet_pissr »

I'm also a little surprised we haven't seen any of the new Star Wars movie content in any significant games. What about a game around Kylo Ren's earlier days (similar to the story from DF re: Kyle Katarn), or hell even a game around Finn's mundane life as a stormtrooper? I would buy the shit out of either of those. Preferably FPS, but I would be ok with 3rd person as well.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Carpet_pissr wrote: Fri Dec 01, 2017 11:45 am I'm also a little surprised we haven't seen any of the new Star Wars movie content in any significant games. What about a game around Kylo Ren's earlier days (similar to the story from DF re: Kyle Katarn), or hell even a game around Finn's mundane life as a stormtrooper? I would buy the shit out of either of those. Preferably FPS, but I would be ok with 3rd person as well.
Kylo Ren, the story of a pampered rich son of a Princess, whose Father probably wasn't home much and likely didn't get all three ponies he demanded. Now, emotionally scarred for life, he somehow manages to hide this from his all-knowing Jedi Master until it's too late, and then dons a mask to simply mimic a really evil dude who actually needed the mask for life support. Or perhaps to cover his amazingly uncharismatic nose. Or just because putting him in a mask and cape was just another way for the whole film to copy the original Star Wars format because it couldn't stand on its own.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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That sounds awesome. Would play.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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morlac wrote: Fri Dec 01, 2017 9:32 am
Carpet_pissr wrote: Fri Dec 01, 2017 8:51 am I find it hard to believe that a Dark Forces III (or anything remotely similar) would not sell spectacularly.
Agree 100%. Hell, give me Republic Commandos 2 and I'll drop $60 tomorrow. They mismanaged the project and are blaming consumers. hahaha :obscene-birdiered:
Id love either of those. More i want Star Wars 1313 still!
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Carpet_pissr wrote: Fri Dec 01, 2017 11:45 am I'm also a little surprised we haven't seen any of the new Star Wars movie content in any significant games. What about a game around Kylo Ren's earlier days (similar to the story from DF re: Kyle Katarn), or hell even a game around Finn's mundane life as a stormtrooper? I would buy the shit out of either of those. Preferably FPS, but I would be ok with 3rd person as well.
Yeah, in general, Disney has been surprisingly lax with their IPs in the gaming front. It's not just Star Wars. It's Indy too. Some of these IPs have gone an entire console generation without a game. Wake up, Disney! We have wallets!
Carpet_pissr wrote: Fri Dec 01, 2017 8:51 am I find it hard to believe that a Dark Forces III (or anything remotely similar) would not sell spectacularly.
And with new technology that's out now? Hell yeah. There's opportunity waiting for Disney. Hell, you could even have an aging Katarn be a mentor. To be groundbreaking, I'd feature a story where you play from two points of view, ie someone from the Rebellion, and someone from the Order, with a story that converges.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Carpet_pissr wrote: Fri Dec 01, 2017 11:45 am I'm also a little surprised we haven't seen any of the new Star Wars movie content in any significant games. What about a game around Kylo Ren's earlier days (similar to the story from DF re: Kyle Katarn), or hell even a game around Finn's mundane life as a stormtrooper? I would buy the shit out of either of those. Preferably FPS, but I would be ok with 3rd person as well.
Alas, I think the earlier Kotaku piece KDH posted spells out much of the trouble involved:
Kotaku.com wrote:Another red flag was Star Wars—or, more specifically, the fact that Star Wars was owned by a different company. Visceral staff say that the creative cabal at Star Wars owner Lucasfilm treated them well, giving them flexibility and freedom, but one of the drawbacks to working with another company’s franchise was that they had to get approval for everything.

On an Uncharted game, for example, one of Nathan Drake’s costumes might go through a few rounds of iteration at Naughty Dog, then be finalized in a week. “With Star Wars you could be talking months—potentially years,” said one Visceral staffer. “Oh, would Dodger really look like this? What would his weapon look like? Potentially years of that. Would he carry this? Would that really work in the Star Wars universe? With Uncharted, they can build any world they come up with, because it’s their world. With Star Wars you have to have that back and forth… People think, ‘Oh it must be so cool to work on Star Wars.’ It actually kind of sucks.”
Sadly, I suspect for a third-party developer working on a project even more closely related to the movies (e.g. revolving around the backstory of major movie characters such as Finn or Kylo Ren) it'd be exponentially more convoluted and tortuous in terms of seeking necessary approval for each and every aspect of the game.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Anonymous Bosch wrote: Sun Dec 03, 2017 7:45 pm Sadly, I suspect for a third-party developer working on a project even more closely related to the movies (e.g. revolving around the backstory of major movie characters such as Finn or Kylo Ren) it'd be exponentially more convoluted and tortuous in terms of seeking necessary approval for each and every aspect of the game.
And that's why I feel it was a bad decision for Disney to can LuscasArts. They don't even have it as a brand anymore. What I would have done is make LucasArts Disney's gaming division for all of their IPs, given the street cred its had. Even if all it was, was as a brand label which their games are filtered through via third-party titles, it would still make more sense than what we have now. What Disney lost when it canned LucasArts was not just a brand, but the consultants making sure things fit creatively within the confines of the IPs, as both LucasArts and LucasFilm worked closely together at certain points making sure there was no visual disconnect, LA even using ILM at times. Now it just seems like they're directionless, and Disney can't even figure out what it wants anymore. Seeing them struggle now, when their IP is perhaps at its most important since the original trilogy and not pumping anything out is kind of sad. They'll want to figure this one out soon. They'll look back on this and wonder why they hadn't done anything with new movies pushing the IP forward. And mind you, rumours about a sequel trilogy were talked about when the original trilogy ended, already creating an absurd amount of hype for its eventuality, so it's not as if these have come out of nowhere. So, it's absurd to think that Disney would just let this happen, with such a valuable franchise.

And not to mention, I think it's a terrible idea to have EA be the IP's sole developer. Innovation doesn't breed out of singular ideas. It's at its best when things come from multiple directions.
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Indeed, it's certainly more reason to mourn the loss of LucasArts. All the moreso with EA's role as exclusive developer of Star Wars video games. Given EA's fixation on grindy, microtransactional "games as a service", it doesn't bode well for the notion of new Star Wars games providing a worthwhile single-player experience (e.g. EA's most recent release of "A bleak, 'Candy Crush' version of a 'Star Wars' game").
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Re: EA kills Visceral Games..Stars Wars game F'd

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Wish people would boycott EA across the board and put them out of business.
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