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Krawall Gaming Network Interviews Bill Roper about Hellgate London
- February
- 19
4:19 am Hellgate London
Recently Bill Roper was interviewed by Krawall Gaming Network (KGN) about the current state of development of Hellgate London. Original article available here.
The following is the full article translated to English by MadNerd, originally posted on the official Hellgate London Forum.
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For those people that don’t speak German and think the Google translation is somewhat funny, here we go:
In his last developer-diary bill roper sounded frustrated: The fans expectations are too high, the endless compares with Diablo 2 are unfair and some press reports about his game are sometimes just plain wrong.
A month later we called him for a phone-interview. We wanted to know what exactly bothers him, how he feels about when players criticize “his baby”, if the time at blizzard spoiled him and last how the future of HG:L looks like.
Krawall.de: Even you said that your model of a subscription and freeplay accounting stirred up some confusion. Looking now at it do you repent your decision for this hybrid-model?
Bill Roper: The business models in Asia look totally different right now. Over there it’s really rare to use a monthly subscription model. Over there people rather sell in-game items for real money. Somebody had to give our model a try. I don’t repent trying out something new at this point. But it’s really disappointing that many people just didn’t understand our payment model or just rejected it.
Krawall.de: Is this the curse of Diablo? Suddenly people saying “Back than it worked too for free”?
Bill Roper: Partly, yes. There are quite a few people around saying “Back than everything had been for free and we got all this great content”. But that isn’t right. They just remember it trough pink glasses. That’s something everybody realizes. Just go and run one of those 16-bit games you have been so amazed over back than. You gonna be sit infront of it and think: “Damn that’s boring.. and those graphics.. help!”. I always say to the people: “Check what’s written in the diablo2 patch notes, you would be surprised how little we have done.”
Or just take the other game we always get compared too: “Guild Wars”. Sure it’s for free but they don’t add any new content. Their target had been to release expansion packs every 6 months to get money this way. But that didn’t work because they couldn’t stay on schedule. Understandably - that would be a tight schedule for everyone.
In the end it took them a little bit longer than 1 year to get their first expansion done. And for that you had to pay.
If you look at the patch notes: We made more content available in the first three months than most other MMOG out there. Not only for subscribers, but for the free players too.
Krawall.de: When one reads around your forums than it looks like the players aren’t that hot for new content but rather for new features like Auction houses and stuff like that.
When can we expect something like that?
Bill Roper: We are already working on a whole lot of thing. In-game-mail is one of the things we gonna release soon. Additionally there is an extensively marksman balance-patch in the work. Beyond that i can only say: We want the same as our Fans. We don’t sit around looking in the air mumbling: “What would the players like?”. It’s pretty obvious what the players want. One can’t forget: We are an independent studio. We have to think about a good strategy what we have to work on step for step. That’s the advantage when you are backed by a big company. Blizzard has the money to just hire 200 people to produce new content.
Krawall.de: Them making tons of money appears to be helpful too in that matter.
Bill Roper: Sure, but even before they started making tons of money - with release of World of Warcraft they had 150 to 200 people working on that product. We don’t have that many people in our whole company! And by now I’m rather shy of announcing stuff if it isn’t nearly ready for release, because people tend to get mad if you don’t deliver on time. (The original part says “einen strick gedreht bekommen” instead of “people get mad” it’s something i just can’t come up with a decent english translation for. It means people hang you up on something you said).
Krawall.de: There are quite a few singleplayer-user mad right now. They are saying they feel like second grade players because the online part gets far more patches.
Bill Roper: Well they should just go and play online. It’s exactly the same experience as with singleplayer. There is no difference at all. So if they think the patches released for multiplayer are important in some way than they can just play the multiplayer for free as if it’s the singleplayer.
Krawall.de: Some players just don’t want/can’t go online. Additionally there is a psychological component of people thinking “I don’t pay, so they don’t care about me”. That’s maybe something where your player-advocate program could help where different players should help you.
Bill Roper: Well the target of the player-advocates is mainly to filter community-feedback and to pass it on in a bundled form. When we started preparing our Evoker balance-patch we had one of us go trough the forum and search for all the suggestions by the community. From hundreds of postings he had to chose those that made sense, where possible to implent and so on. That costs us much time. With those player-advoactes we can communicate much faster and more direct with our players.
Krawall.de: How much influence do you have on the development now that you are CEO of a company, especially right now? Are you browing the forums?
Bill Roper: Not that much anymore. I still write the skill-descriptions, look after things like “bedienbarkeit” (means how intuitive the UI/controls and things like those are, can’t come up with the right word for it right now) mainly i do things that don’t need my attention every day. I also read the forums but i don’t post there. I really would like to post but i realized that people threat my posts just in a totally different way than those of other coworkers. Everything i say gets picked into thousand little pieces like it gets dissected. That’s really disappointingly for me. I really would like to post freely in our forums, but i just doesn’t work.
Krawall.de: Had that been different back at blizzard? Do you think you had been spoiled as blizzard-employes with all that positive feedback and you are just not used to real critic anymore?
Bill Roper: Blizzard managed to build up such a good reputation over the years that’s a big difference. There never had been that hostile behavior i experience now in the community. We have many people in our hellgate community that like the game, they give enormous helpful constructive feedback. That’s the majority. But the critics look to me way more aggressive. Are we spoiled because of that? I don’t know. There had been real critics too back in the blizzard-times, who clearly criticized us. Every game without exception has people that don’t like it. But only with hellgate i see those people that accuse us of messing up the game with full intend.
Krawall.de: that’s pretty far stretched..
Bill Roper: Yes, indeed! No developer would ever to that. How insane would that be and i think it’s insulting when people sit there and say “They just do it for the money” - or because of something else. I always want to yell than “Sorry what? You don’t know us! You don’t have a clue at all why we are doing what we are doing!”. It’s absurd to think we don’t want to deliver the best work we can.
But that’s the nice thing in the internet: Nobody has to take responsibility for what he’s saying. Anyway: If that’s what people really think than I’m sorry. I’m really sorry we couldn’t deliver the product they wish for. I’m also sorry that at release we couldn’t deliver the product in the quality we wished it to be for - and I’m realy honest here.
But we strive to get this all done as constructive as possible. We are looking forwards, we want to apply the needed changes and make the game better and better. But some people just don’t want to see progress, they just want to be bitter.
Krawall.de: How about your other game “Mythos”? That will be for free besides the selling of ingame items. Is the community there more friendly or is it just the subscription?
Bill Roper: Sure the players over there are much more forgiving. But that’s because it’s still in beta. In beta the community often just looks over things saying “Hey it just still in beta!”. But that changes fast when the game gets released commercial. Especially when the the player has left money for the game in a shop. Suddenly they activate a big switch in their head and every detail is set in stone. He doesn’t know updates anymore at that point, it’s only “God, i can’t believe they didn’t fix that in beta”. The same is gonna happen to Mythos but more mildly.
Accordingly we worked our butts off in the last months to regain the trust of our fans. So they can see we don’t just take the money and say: “Thanks! See you on the bahamas!”. That’s what you can expect from us rightfully.
Krawall.de: In the press you get often presented as “failed”, hellgate being a flop. But your sales figures look solid. Why is that?
Bill Roper: Well i don’t have to tell you how the press works. Great success or great fail that’s worth a press release. But not “Hellgate sells pretty solid”. According to that many media sit there thinking: “Let us release something about those flagship-guys, they are in the spotlight, that’s interesting for people”. But in our range there is this unbelievably success of World of Warcraft. Hellgate can’t keep up with that right now. So you can’t present us was winners on the podest. So we just get written of as losers.
Krawall.de: Isn’t that harmful for you as a company? Do you notice people out there saying: “I better don’t touch that game, who knows how long it’s gonna last”? Do critics like those hurt you personally?
Bill Roper: It’s not good for us, that much is sure. But we released games in the past, we know the internet, we knew what we are leting ourself in to. I don’t want to lie to you, there are days on which i’m unhappy. When somebody talks like that about something you worked 4 years of your life hard on, you did everything possible to make it as good as possible at release. When somebody says to me: “Hey i tried out your game, but it’s just not something for me” - okay that’s no problem for me. But what’s really hard to process for me is when people suddenly insult me personally or other employees of my company. I just can’t understand why people have to take this way to express their displeasure. It’s such an extreme contrast! There we are trying to create something that makes people happy, something they can do with their free time. And there is such an feedback. Imagine this happening in another job. “I had been at this gas station and wanted that special sort of gasoline.. but they didn’t have it! although they said they would have it! Bill the guy that works there, he canceled that order for that special gasoline with full intention - what a big bunch of…” you know what i mean.
Krawall.de: Are you scared of the future if game-designers will be real stars?
Bill Roper: Not at all, because i don’t think that’s gonna happen at all. We don’t have actors representing the faces of your games, that are atractive, who you look up to. Quite the oppotise, YOU are the star in the game.
Krawall.de: Well but we have the equivalent to a director: the lead designer. People like you or Peter Molyneux who get associated to different games.
Bill Roper: Yes but that’s on an completely other level. Just take the even biggest names in the video game business. Nobody on the street yells”WoW! That’s Sid Meier walking right there!” And nobody is sitting in a bar right next to you asking “What do you think about Will Wright?”. And i really don’t know if something like that is ever gonna happen in our cultures - USA and Europe. There is this Phenomeon in Asia. when i’m in Korea or China or Taiwan some people actually recognize me on the street.
But over there a big part of the population is into games, games get seen as some kind of sports. Here in the US games got another perception even between fans. According to that they get another marketing. Because of that i really don’t know why that situation should change. The people here just want to play a good game. Who made it? Doesn’t matter. If at all they know the publisher or developers but no persons. Recent example: “Rock Band” extremely successfully. Or “Guitar Hero”. Or “Call of Duty 4″. Now name me one person from their developer tems! You can maybe answer that but the average gamer? Oh-oh. We only get into the public every few years while Jim Carry can make three to four movies a year easily.
Krawall.de:Bill, thank you for your time.
Bill Roper: Had been a pleasure!
It’s not perfect but i hope it’s at least better than the Google translation :P
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20 comments
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Posted by Strangelove, on February 19th, 2008, at 6:50 am. Well, the interview got here quickly, but i recommend you post the better translation that can be found on hellgateguru and hgl official site, since everyone hates google transcripts. |
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Posted by Agamemnon, on February 19th, 2008, at 7:48 am. Oh, our opinions don’t count because it’s the “Internet?” I’d gladly give my name, address, and phone number to Mr. Roper and have him explain to me why exactly he is kidding to himself that the product is “ok” and the things he does with it are “ok.” Unless, of course, he thinks the thousands of customers unsatisfied with the product and giving it criticism is just something he can’t handle. I like that bit where he said that they did less in Diablo II patches. I dunno, because I just took a look at the 1.10 patch for Diablo II and it looks like more content has been changed altogether with all the patches they’ve come out so far in Hellgate. Heck, I remember the days of 1.07 when the game played completely different. For him to say they do less on a game and then say that the free model works for it because of the “boring” gameplay and the “bad graphics” (and yet, amazingly, there are still more players playing Diablo II then there are Hellgate), then one can only wonder why those are two things they aren’t working on in Hellgate–if that’s how they prioritize things in their games, at least. Over all this review was an eye opener. It lets us know that Roper feels as if there is nothing wrong with Hellgate and nothing wrong with what he and his team has done. He doesn’t find anything wrong with breaking promises, taking his sweet time to bring out content, or exaggerating the facts. If he’s going to hide behind excuses of a small staff then he shouldn’t have taken on a project that was released as mainstream content when all it’s worth is abandonware. |
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Posted by Uriel Septim, on February 19th, 2008, at 9:08 am. It’s very obvious to me that they’ve given up on Hellgate: London and are focusing most of their efforts on Mythos. I mean, they even have Scapes (who is the Hellgate community person) at the GDC promoting… not Hellgate, but Mythos! I find it sad that Bill tries to convince the readers by saying that Hellgate received more new content in the 3 months of its release compared to any other MMORPG. That’s a pretty deceptive way of presenting the situation. The fact is that upon release, Hellgate had far less content than most, if not all MMORPGs do out of the box. This is even true to this day with the lack of any auction house, mailing system, or even the ability to inspect other players. Hellgate and even Vanguard (!!!) have had these features since day one, and Vanguard isn’t exactly a finished game. At the very least, it still has more content now than Hellgate ever will in 12 months. Who is he trying to kid? The fact that they’re only planning to release content on a ‘quarterly’ (read: 3-4 months) basis means that we won’t be seeing new content fast enough to keep us occupied. Stonehenge took over 4 months to develop and it only provided 5 hours worth of content. It’s not difficult to guess that the next “Chronicle” will only offer the same amount of content. Speaking of Chronicles, why are they even calling them that? Stonehenge didn’t even have quests or a storyline in it. It’s nothing but a few half-baked maps and some reused monster assets (Errgoth / Shulgoth) It’s funny that the man has the audacity to say that the games of yesteryear would be considered crap if we played them today. Oh really? The reason people still play Diablo 2 is because of the gameplay, not because of the graphics. And bashing Guild Wars? Gosh! I just find it awful sad that there are more people on single low population WOW servers than there are playing Hellgate: London and I don’t think Flagship has any plans to change that, now that they have the Founder’s money. |
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Posted by Uriel Septim, on February 19th, 2008, at 9:12 am. Besides all that I have said. I do not think it is fair for him to bash Guild Wars for not releasing new content… because Guild Wars is not charging a monthly subscription fee. Hellgate is charging 10 dollars a month for content that should have been available out of the box! |
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Posted by Myrkalv, on February 19th, 2008, at 10:39 am. I just asked a friend who lives near Seattle if he would be willing to drop by FSS Seattle and ‘forcebly divert’ more attention to HGL, rather than Mythos. He stated that ‘torture is a better method’. So we have decided; FSS will play Hellgate: London. |
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Posted by Strangelove, on February 19th, 2008, at 10:52 am. And of course, there will always be the fanboys that will look upon this interview and think “poor bill, he really needs a pat on the back” Being objective and not hateful to the game myself, i just see a nerd not able to cope with his failures, and crying out “please like me” with no arguments whatsoever. Oh, and from what i understood from the dev chat, we will wait more for the next content update. This only makes me think that they just reused some stuff that they allready had developped (some of wich are baltant, like moloch or the flying imps) and that they really need to put themselves to work now to deliver. Lets see what happens, but i’m still on the side that stonehendge isnt worth 30$ till the next content update. Sure you can stop paying, but you go back to the boxed content wich is ridiculous. |
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Posted by mondry, on February 19th, 2008, at 11:11 am. That to me is just too funny. He says “Just go and run one of those 16-bit games you have been so amazed over back than” Well the thing is, I hit 50 in hellgate about a month ago, did all the stone hendge crap and even killed nightmare sydonai after like 6 hours (less time then my old WoW guilds average raid btw) I kept thinking “man I was hoping this game would be more like diablo III” and then it hit me. I’ll just go back to d2. Long story short I did and have a lvl 90 sorc and not only am i enjoying myself but it brings back a lot of -good- memories. Cant say the same about hellgate sadly…. on another note, content doesn’t even really matter to me, im an item whore so im completely content to play d2’s “same boring small” amount of content because the end game items actually better my character and make a difference. Apparently so are a lot of people, as another comment said, d2 still has more players then hellgate >< When every single archlight fusion rifle is the exact same damage, the same 600 shots per minute and pretty much all of them are lvl 38 it’s just super boring. Don’t even get me started how pretty much all of the armor uniques are in the level range of 20-28 so of course they are mostly useless to a 50 char. Stats and items are so useless in this game that people run around with any where from 10-50 stat points saved up because the games so stupidly easy you dont even have to spend your points or wear gear!! I feel like i could solo stone hendge nakkid with just my gun. further more I think its even more ridiculous for him to take a shot at d2 and guild wars when hgl (aside from story) is BASED ENTIRELY OFF OF DIABLO FUCKING TWO. Yet some how, 12 years after d2’s release, hgl is still way behind it. The only excuse we hear though is “we dont have half the man power of blizzard so its ok to suck!” This is something that always worried me. It really did take a number of years for d2 to take off and really become good. I always said “i wonder how roper will do without blizzard paying the bills for all those years” and it looks like I have my answer. |
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Posted by GiantBunny, on February 19th, 2008, at 11:50 am. This is the bit that struck me “But that’s the nice thing in the internet: Nobody has to take responsibility for what he’s saying. Anyway: If that’s what people really think than I’m sorry. I’m really sorry we couldn’t deliver the product they wish for. I’m also sorry that at release we couldn’t deliver the product in the quality we wished it to be for - and I’m realy honest here. But we strive to get this all done as constructive as possible. We are looking forwards, we want to apply the needed changes and make the game better and better. But some people just don’t want to see progress, they just want to be bitter.” Ok…so THATS why you’re currently silent and not informing the community about anything except cherry-picked Dev questions? *sigh* He needs to stop talking to interviewers, and start talking to his customers. They’re the ones he should be saying sorry too, not people who write articles. |
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Posted by Uriel Septim, on February 19th, 2008, at 11:59 am. I thought it funny that he should say that he doesn’t want to post on the forum because people dissect his posts. Here’s a fact: He only posted once (or was it twice?) during the ENTIRE alpha/beta period and if you look at his user profile on the official forum, it shows that he hasn’t visited the forum since December 2007. Back in the alpha/beta days, there was no such ‘hatred’ for Flagship Studios, and nobody dissected any of his, or any other employee’s posts. So what’s he talking about? Sounds to me like he’s just making a bunch of excuses for his lack of presence on the forum. Sounds to me like he’s blaming everyone but his company about the state of the game. So yeah, he’s really one to talk. I roll my eyes in response. |
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Posted by Hairyhanna, on February 19th, 2008, at 1:40 pm. This interview just validates the negativity on the forums in my opinion. It doesn’t damn it. By being this blind to his own community, Bill is just reaffirming the fears of his community. Most people felt he was out of touch. And this interview shows that problem off in spades. Also what this interview does (or at least to good old Bill) it excuses him from being at fault for anything. And puts the blame solely into the community. Get it Bill…you’re the obvious “artard” you can’t even break the populations of that of your old “Flagship” (even 10 years old). So instead of realizing that, you take the low road and say that game is old and can’t even hold a candle to your current offering. Way to go Bill, was this something your Mommy told you to feel good about yourself. Or what you have to tell yourself, to stop yourself from taking a short walk from a 5th story window? Then you run off to bash your “closest competitor”. Also fellow developers from the old days. What happened, they have success in their offering so you feel you have to bash it to make some sorta point? Or is it, you again, that doesn’t see reality? They were able to bring out a game with success. And will most likely have further success in the sequel. While you see a constant dwindling of your own game. Face it Bill you dropped the ball (and your fellow Icons of the gaming world). And only let your community down. And then you bring in the “closer” of not insulting the intelligence of your community. But also placing blame on them for your less that stellar product. Way to go Bill. Do you not have any conscience at all. Or are you that arrogant to see that your crowning achievement away from Blizzard was a failure thus far. Not the “misunderstood success” you keep telling yourself that it is. |
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Posted by Taiko, on February 19th, 2008, at 9:30 pm. LMFAO at GW referrence! Yes Bill, GW could afford to take extra time for expansions. Thats because the original release came with FULL-CONTENT, and it took longer than 4 days to complete the game. GGNORE. |
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Posted by Lonethar, on February 20th, 2008, at 12:58 am. Im in perfect agreement with this sentimate. Some here will remember me from Hellgate Guru. The SP element to his interview is what infuriates me. What a gong show. |
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Posted by Panther, on February 20th, 2008, at 4:27 am. With regards to his Guild Wars criticsm, I spent over a year playing Prophecies, the first release. I’ve only spent 3 months playing Hellgate: London before I decided I was bored with it. The deciding factor for the duration I’ve spent playing either game? It’s *drum roll* CONTENT. Guild Wars is CHOKE full of it. Hellgate: London is NOT. Guild Wars has MORE content in its first release than Hellgate: London in it’s 3 months! Many players can speak of Guild Wars with esteem with VALID points against Hellgate: London, Mr. Roper. The massive player population in Guild Wars is already a testament as to why it is so popular. Guild Wars is a SUCCESSFUL product compared to Hellgate: London. Stop bringing down other successful games and take a better, more in-depth look at yours. Thank you. GiantBunny replied on February 20, 2008 Exactly…. GuildWars has been reasonably successful because here’s the thing….. People Enjoy It. The content, no sub fee, the quality of the game with not that many bugs, frequent patches and tweaks, events, etc etc. They even released an entire Sorrow’s Furnace area to say ’sorry’ for the late arrival of Factions Sorrow’s Furnace is easily at least 5 times better than SH, which people have PAID extra money for. But what I love is this bit: “Anyway: If that’s what people really think than I’m sorry. I’m really sorry we couldn’t deliver the product they wish for. I’m also sorry that at release we couldn’t deliver the product in the quality we wished it to be for - and I’m realy honest here. But we strive to get this all done as constructive as possible. We are looking forwards, we want to apply the needed changes and make the game better and better. But some people just don’t want to see progress, they just want to be bitter.” Yeah Bill…..would help if you tell US, your CUSTOMERS, instead of a random reviewer. Make a post. Apologize. Simple task. |
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Posted by Hairyhanna, on February 20th, 2008, at 5:54 pm. Well that does it. They locked the thread down without a reason. Sure it was a bit dicey in there but again. It was the truth and it was the concerns regarding this interview. Although I guess it was bound to happen. They really could not let that one go with all the damning BS that Bill obviously spouted out of his ass. So my hats are off to you guys over there at hellgatelondon.com. You guys take the cake. And a little parting note for all of you in management at FSS: Must hurt to be the current laughing stock of the gaming world. Its obvious since Bill is already crying in public (I would offer a hanky, but I don’t have one large enough for that tubby bastard). Nothing but a bunch of has-beens and talentless hacks. Completely out of touch with modern gaming or what gamers really want. With your only achievement owned by another company. And your current offering…soon to be hitting bargain bins and doorstops for gaming shops, everywhere, World Wide. Hmmm, I wonder if its too late to sell off my copy of HG:L CE with 2 Dye kits, and 3 level 50’s (one in Elite) on Ebay. I might get lucky enough to make 20 bucks off it in the end I think, might just be worth it. Hell, you guys over at Flagship are so proud of your work. Perhaps you can just buy me out of this mess altogether? I have 90 into it thus far. Sound like a good deal? |
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Posted by Valtonis, on February 23rd, 2008, at 5:34 am. of all of Bill’s whining, nobody bothered to tell him that FSS’ HGL has had the biggest finanical backing and most people working and the longest development time out of all the indie games released in 2007. am i mistaken or wasn’t Guild Wars made with less manpower than HGL? |
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Posted by BryanM, on February 23rd, 2008, at 8:19 am. That’s massively insulting to both Arena.net and Flagships. Arena.net’s guys had more to do with Battle.net, the MPQ format, and Starcraft than Diablo II, for the most part. What I’m saying is that Arena.net essentially built Blizzard: Core systems for Warcraft II, Warcraft III, Lost Vikings, Starcraft, Diablos, World of Warcraft… Jeff Strain was also the fellow who threw together the official Starcraft editor. Comparing the two is like comparing a dingo to a mammoth. |
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Posted by Sophia L, on February 28th, 2008, at 11:51 pm. i think FSS release a very nice addicting game. Hellgate is the best game for me that take me away from WOW and other games. i find all new game are pretentious and full of it.. call of duty 4 is boring, NWN2 boring, witcher is boring.. only gear of war and helgate london the best game in my opinion shame on you all for spouting hate for FSS/billroper.. COD4 and crysis is the worst game released. they both just a graphic demo and no story at all.. dont tell me COD4 got any story.. its a weak attempt to copycat tom clancy’s technothriller and it failed miserably. and crysis ? thats no game, that just a graphic benchmark program to test your PC.. there is no story in crysis.. unless you think stale alien plot device is a story.. at least hellgate dont pretend to be anyting more than just a good mindless shooter.. |
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Posted by Memmorium, on April 11th, 2008, at 9:45 am. Good idea! |
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Phil Hoper replied on February 19, 2008
Got here a bit too quickly. Thanks Strangelove for the notice that a human translation became available.
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