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In-depth interview with Runic Games reveals some interesting info
- August
- 15
4:28 am Hellgate London
A recent GameCyte article on an interview with Travis Baldree and Max Schaefer has hit the Internet. Definitely worth a read; tons of information to be found in this gem. I’ll bring out the highlights.
GameCyte: So when did this process begin?
Travis Baldree: We started getting ourselves reformed pretty shortly after the closure of Flagship…
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GameCyte: And you say Flagship Studios did close?
Travis Baldree: Max, are they still kind of open?
Max Schaefer: It’s barely open. It’s just open enough to take care of the final affairs, but for all intents and purposes it’s closed down.
GameCyte: We’d figured as much, but all we’d had was a press release saying “We’re still open!” “We still have our IP!” It’s hard to tell what’s actually going on.
TB: It’s a little bit of a new experience for all of us. (chuckles) We don’t exactly know the ‘proper’ way to close down a company. First and foremost, we’re just trying to take care of the debts and the employees in an orderly fashion, so Bill [Roper, CEO of Flagship Studios] and one or two other people have stuck around and are doing their best to get that done before we move on in different directions.
GameCyte: (to Max) What happened to your brother, Erich Schaefer? We noticed he’s no longer with Flagship.
MS: Well, for one thing he’s here in Michigan with me… and for another, he is one of the initial investors in Runic Games. He will be onboard with the company in one way or another from here on out. He is also a big fan of Travis and the Seattle guys and was more than happy to be able to contribute.
GameCyte: (to Travis) Based in Seattle at the time, what was your perspective on Flagship Studios’ collapse? You were conducting interviews for Mythos in late June, right before everything unfolded…
TB: I think down to the last moment, the founders of Flagship were working pretty hard to make sure that it didn’t have to come to pass; and I think we basically just ran out of time. To the last minute and actually beyond the last minute, I know that negotiations were going on to try and make sure that we could get the studio back on track. Primarily, we just all proceeded here like we were going to be releasing our open beta in October, and kept working until the last minute.
GameCyte: So you knew it was coming, and you thought you could prevent it?
TB: Well, we didn’t exactly know it was going to be coming — I don’t think anyone really did…
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MS: We knew there was a possibility, but we were in very advanced negotiations with a couple of people for deals that would have kept Flagship open and would have kept everything running. And in fact, for a good while it was looking like a near-certainty that one of those would have come to fruition.
When they didn’t, we were far enough along that we were kind of even going past the point where we should have closed down the company, because it looked like such a surety that something was going to be closed, but there were a lot of behind-the-scenes negotiations occurring with multiple partners around the globe, some of whom were less than… ethical or honest, and it was just a very complicated mess. In the end, it was just too entangled to get a good deal in place, and so we had to close down. It was really kind of a wrenching, horrible period actually, and we learned a lot from it. We’d do things differently next time for sure.
We all were up all night, every night, not getting any sleep, working every day trying to get it to work out for everyone, and in the end it just didn’t.
GameCyte: That’s such a shame. I know you’ve been intentionally coy about this subject so far, but as far as the Mythos intellectual property is concerned, it sounds like that’s not going to happen for you…
TB: We’re proceeding under the assumption that we’re not going to be able to get that or proceed on it. I think that door is just about closed. Because of the nature of how the IP is being held, and the technology being held separately, it seems safer and better for us to proceed as if we’re really not going to have any avenue to work with it, and it’ll be the best thing for our team to get moving on something we know we can do, and that doesn’t have those sorts of entanglements and history.
GameCyte: We wanted to ask about the scale of this operation: Are you considering another worldwide rollout like you planned for Hellgate and Mythos? Does that still make sense for you?
MS: I think we’re going to work at a smaller scale this time, and we’re not going to try to be developers and operators. With Hellgate, one of the challenges we faced halfway through development was that our U.S. and Europe publisher decided that they didn’t want to get into the PC business like they’d originally said, and therefore weren’t going to do the operations and back-end networking for our game.
So we had to create Ping-0 halfway through development of Hellgate: London, and it had to perform billing, provide the back-end technologies and customer support and all kinds of things that we didn’t intend in the beginning to have to do. We’re a development company, not an online operator or publisher.
…
GameCyte: Regarding Namco, do you know what’s going on currently with the Hellgate: London forums and servers? It seems that Namco Bandai has taken over the forums, and may be moving towards the servers as well.
MS: They are continuing to operate it, and they are still participating in the boxed sales portion of Hellgate and obviously have an interest in keeping it going. So they are taking it for now, but I really don’t have much visibility into what their plans are.
TL;DR
The Facts
*Flagship Studios is closing
*Runic Games will not be getting back Mythos
*Namco Bandai is operating the forums
The Commentary
*T3/HanbitSoft are the “less-than-ethical and honest” global partners that are most likely in possession of the IP rights for both Hellgate and Mythos as suggested by new job openings
*Flagship Studios had too much on their plate
*Runic Games; The Lifeboat or the Ferryman Charon down the River Styx?
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77 comments
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Posted by Sylvanus, on August 15th, 2008, at 7:37 am. Nice write-up. You are making an assumption of Flagship’s possible closing. We’ll see. Additionally, Flagship had too much on their plate because companies reneged on what they said they’d do. So, is Roper still evil in your eyes? Is this the big news you hinted at yesterday? Crazychop replied on August 15, 2008 Perhaps one should say Max is making the assumption that the company is closing. Perhaps you know more than Max does. Who knows? Perhaps you are a VC who is going to bail out Flagship Studios. Who knows? Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008 Fair call. :) Project_Xii replied on August 15, 2008 Slyvanus: Go to the forums. Comments threads aren’t great for long battles. If you think you have a point, argue it there. Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008 Thanks. This started as a compliment, correction and simple question or two. ianlim replied on August 15, 2008 Just ignore the fanboy/troll after you have pointed him out Agamemnon. In fact, just go ahead and ban him. We don’t need 1-2 line inflammatory posts and the resultant 20 posts rebuttals ala Hintaga over here. Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008 Right. … Because I started it. /sarcasm Project_Xii replied on August 15, 2008 You saying you didn’t? Who started this particular comment strand then? *looks* Oh! Lookee there! It’s you! And who continued to argue and cry like a wounded Fanboy? Oh look! You again! Sylvanus replied on August 16, 2008 Not at all. He insulted and acted like an ass first - even after I COMPLIMENTED him. Unfortunately, most of the posting readership here are apparently so filled with blind rage that their reading comprehension suffers. I don’t see how you see me complimenting Roper anywhere in these postings. I asked if he was still considered “evil”, but that’s not the same as anything you’ve insinuated. |
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Posted by MoP, on August 15th, 2008, at 9:01 am. Prepare yourselves to get runicced. |
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Posted by Mosin, on August 15th, 2008, at 9:25 am. The interview pretty much confirmed what must people were thinking. We don’t know why those companies pulled out, maybe it was someting FSS did and I’d bet my bottom dollar on that. In regards to their CS, it didn’t help they hired a bunch of nazi’s and made their forum private for eight or so months. Not exactly a good PR thing when curious people can’t view your forum and others tell stories of nazi mods who ban you for saying anything bad about FSS. BTW, tiggs can DIAF. Sylvanus - I’m still waiting for you to justify any support you have for FSS. And again, who knows why those companies pulled out. Maybe it was because the rep for Hellgate and FSS was horrible? Maybe it was because the game was a major flop in every area it came out in? Maybe it was because every patch would break something or that core issues were still not resolved? Hmmm, the list goes on and on and I can see why companies would want to stay away. Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008 Quite frankly, in regards to my support of FSS I don’t have to justify anything. I’m on one side, you and most here are on the other. There’s no need to go over stuff that’s been hashed over and over again. We have a difference of opinion. For some, that difference is stronger than others. ::shrug:: No need to go into it. As far as why companies pulled out, it’s not going to be because it was a flop. The companies pulled out before the game was released. Why? Who knows. More likely than not, they felt their interests were better served elsewhere. Not to be rude, but that nullifies the rest of that line of thinking. I am very interested in what Runic Games will bring to the table. I have no hate for Roper. I hope that whatever happens with the Hellgate IP and it’s current operations is beneficial for all that have spent money on it. That’s really about it. I’m eager to see what the new “News” is although I didn’t bring any popcorn to work. Cheers! Crazychop replied on August 15, 2008 Usually VCs and companies don’t invest in risky companies or those with a bad track record. ChocoTaco replied on August 16, 2008 Actually, VCs are more likely to invest in someone who has a previous failed venture than someone with no experience… the idea being that they ‘learned from their mistakes’. Crazychop replied on August 17, 2008 I’m glad about that then. Perhaps the world is not as gloomy and dark as I’ve thought… Gaylight Run replied on August 15, 2008 having a different opinion is great…. if you have any reasons at all behind it you do of course realize that we all wanted hellgate to be game of the year however, hellgate now falls into the category of “what should have been” there seems to have been a lot of name calling between flagship and the companies that tried to bail them out. “selfish” or “unethical” and all that. so it’s plain to see that roper wasn’t a good businessman. he came out of the gate with a blizzard reputation and huge expectations, and he lost his shit. now, when you lie to your beta testers about bugs being fixed, you get people to pay $150 for a lifetime subscription but then only offer them 1/10 of the content you promised… that’s cutting corners in order to profit i read the bad reviews and all the forum hate when hellgate came out, but i went out and bought it anyway. the game was a little shallower than i had expected, but i had a lot of fun and so did my friends that tried it out on my machine…. …. until a game breaking buggy quest forced me to reroll my first character because i was stuck in act 2. that shook my faith considerably, but i tried again, until a game breaking buggy quest got me stuck in act 3!! i don’t buy videogames to add frustration to my life. i can get plenty of that for free so i uninstalled, cried myself to sleep, wondereded wtf flagship was thinking, and waited and waited for a good single player patch to come out. it’s very sad to see this happening to all the people that made the game and tried to keep it going, but geez, roper must ultimately take the blame, since he was the ceo and spokesperson for the company, and (should have been) the biggest hellgate fan on the planet. i enjoy all the metaphors of flagship as a cruise liner, sinking in a sea of icebergs. it really is the videogame equivilant of the titanic. and it doesn’t help that they named the company flagship. but, just like in the movie, the captain must go down with it. Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008 No arguments at all. Literally everything up to the buggy quest was exactly where I was with it. (I didn’t have *that* buggy quest error). Roper should shoulder the responsibility. I have no argument with that. Thanks for your post. Mosin replied on August 15, 2008 How do you know the time line when these companies left? Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008 From the article: “With Hellgate, one of the challenges we faced halfway through development was that our U.S. and Europe publisher decided that they didn’t want to get into the PC business like they’d originally said, and therefore weren’t going to do the operations and back-end networking for our game. So we had to create Ping-0 halfway through development of Hellgate: London, and it had to perform billing, provide the back-end technologies and customer support and all kinds of things that we didn’t intend in the beginning to have to do” sudej512 replied on August 17, 2008 What color is the sky in your world? Are there unicorns? Did you use to Work for FSS? |
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Posted by Shulgoth, on August 15th, 2008, at 11:19 am. I can’t believe the shit Roper and the Schaefers have pulled. Flagship employees STILL have not received their final paychecks or moneys owed to them. But… Flagship Seattle employees DID get paid the money they were owed… so they would keep their mouth shut and sign on for Runic’s impending failure. So crooked ChocoTaco replied on August 16, 2008 Uh… no. Flagship Seattle didn’t get paid either. |
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Posted by David Lemke, on August 15th, 2008, at 2:57 pm. For those who happen to agree with me, or at least find my thoughts remotely interesting or entertaining, here they are, When you leave a gaming equivalent of Enron or Arthur Anderson, you should NOT pick up where you left off..” The Interview: TB: All of our team knew they wanted to stay on. Me: Fanboys tell us that the Mythos team was separate from the HGL team. I’m not seeing it here in the interview. On the contrary, the interview makes it sound like FSS is one big happy family. You can argue till the cows come home about who was actually responsible within FSS for what decisions and what projects, but MS and TB are giving the appearance throughout the interview that there is no “them” and “us” in FSS, just a “we” the people from FSS. And, no matter what fanboys say, you are bullshitting yourself and anyone else if you think Max Schaefer wasn’t intimately involved with and responsible for HGL as top management in FSS. TB:, “…so Bill [Roper, CEO of Flagship Studios] and one or two other people have stuck around and are doing their best to get that done [at FSS HQ, shutting down FSS, taking care of debts and employees] before we move on in different directions.” Me: Erich Schaefer is following them too? I’m happy that Max makes a place for his brother but omg, wtf. FSS management lies and cheats and their company burns to the ground, and the team, person by person reforms together? Is that supposed to reassure the public? Me: MS calls ES an “investor” in Runic Games. Lol. Don’t readers get it? Doesn’t everyone see wtf is going on? Isn’t it friggin obvious? The Schaefer brothers, and other FSS management, not only have enough money so they can use it as toilet paper, but… they got enough money from the Hellgate: London scam, they can afford to throw away more money on another venture. Poor people don’t invest. They can barely scrape enough money to buy a few lottery tickets. Rich people “invest” in founding new companies. Those fat cats made out like bandits in the Hellgate: London fiasco, and the the customers paid for it. TB: blah blah blah, “..founders of Flagship were working pretty hard…” blah blah blah. Lol. Cracks me up when those scam artists who screwed up so badly are portrayed as virtuous, hard working people. MS: “…there were a lot of behind-the-scenes negotiations occurring with multiple partners around the globe, some of whom were less than… ethical or honest,…” Me: Lol. that quote will live on forever in the hearts and minds of FSS haters everywhere. Well, Max, let’s see. YOU published a game promising everything to everyone, but the game was so screwed up, so incredibly far off from providing basic features, that using two handed weapons was, for your game, distant technology that would someday, sometime, maybe, if a customer paid a subscription for a year, perhaps, if the customer was lucky, be implemented. Charge a subscription to invent the wheel much? That’s harping on your lack of basic technology. We’ll leave off pointing out you advertised there would be a whole host of other features, some as advanced as raiding, which you never delivered and you were light years away from ever being able to provide. YOU gave your Founder subscribers crap. YOU guys lied in beta about there being an advanced release build much different from the beta build. YOU guys advertise a single player version, but then completely abandon single player customers. YOU guys release in the SEA region, but then abandon players there and try to pretend that they don’t exist. You treat SEA players like some Pulp Fiction leather clad gimp you keep in a box hidden downstairs so you can sodomize someone on a daily basis. YOU guys didn’t feel like fixing the game before moving on. All you cared about was throwing the game at anyone who would buy it in Korea and Japan and wherever, to get a quick profit, when you know dam well from U.S. and European experience that the game and your service were horrible, and that you really were selling broken, unfinished crap. YOU knew darn well that your game was a complete failure and that you were peddling crap to the world, and yet you lied to customers and lied to partner companies about success, so that you could bleed fools for more money. You took out loans, plunged FSS into more debt, raped the company for a fist full of dollars, then doused it with gasoline and torched it when the scam has run its course. YOU will never get the stink off you from what happened to your buddy at HanbitSoft. I won’t shed a tear, cuz I know that guy is rich as heck, but man, still, the guy supported you and ended up losing controlling interest in his company. YOU guys closed FSS with your site having a mysterious ‘bug’ affecting the unsubscribe button? Lol. Hahahahahaha at you calling anyone unethical. MS: “We all were up all night, every night, not getting any sleep, working every day trying to get it to work out for everyone, and in the end it just didn’t.” Me: Again, cracks me up when they try to portray themselves as virtuous, hard working Joes. MS: “We’re all action-RPG experts” Me: Hahahahahahahahahaha, just hahahahahahahahahaha. I’m glad you’re not nuclear power plant ‘experts,’ or we’d see a lot more six toed, glowing mutant animals running around irl. MS: “We really thought that Mythos was hitting on the head what the proper way to approach gaming in the future is. It was developed with an efficiency — it didn’t use all the latest graphical bells and whistles, which take time and expense to create, and which people don’t really care about. People want the games to run on the computers they actually have.” MS: “But the point is, people don’t really go to Best Buy to buy a PC game anymore and want to pay fifteen bucks a month once they’ve done that. The barrier to entry is just too high for that. Whereas if you download a game for free, try it out, and pay as you choose you want to pay, through item transactions, that’s something that almost anyone can do — and there’s no risk or commitment. What we find in Asia, and even with some games in the United States now, is that you’re actually getting people paying more that way, even on an average player basis, than you do with a subscription game. The barrier to entry is lower, the risk is lower, the commitment is lower, and it’s just much easier for people to do. That’s definitely something we believe in.” Me. Bingo. That’s what MS and his crew are after, bleeding people for money while providing them with a cheap, simple game. Read what he said again, MS “YOU’RE ACTUALLY GETTING PEOPLE PAYING MORE THAT WAY, EVEN ON AN AVERAGE PLAYER BASIS, THAN YOU WOULD WITH A SUBSCRIPTION GAME.” Me: Will the new Runic game be an mmorpg? Or will it be a casual game like Diablo? Through most of the interview, TB and MS want to distance themselves from usual fantasy mmorpgs, saying that the Runic Games project will be more casual friendly. BUT later in the interview Max, when asked about Diablo III, wants to contrast Diablo III as being more casual, like Diablo I and Diablo II, whereas the Runic Games project he says is going to be more mmo-ish. MS: “I think we’re going to work at a smaller scale this time, and we’re not going to try to be developers and operators. With Hellgate, one of the challenges we faced halfway through development was that our U.S. and Europe publisher decided that they didn’t want to get into the PC business like they’d originally said, and therefore weren’t going to do the operations and back-end networking for our game.So we had to create Ping-0 halfway through development of Hellgate: London, and it had to perform billing, provide the back-end technologies and customer support and all kinds of things that we didn’t intend in the beginning to have to do. We’re a development company, not an online operator or publisher. Going forward, we’re going to make sure that we work with solid partners so that we can do what we do best, which is making games. MS: “Having said that, we realize that our games are very popular in Asia, and we have very good relationships with a lot of Asian companies and definitely with Asian game players, and that’s not something we want to lose.” MS: About Diablo III. “We can’t wait for it to come out, just so we can play it, and we have nothing but respect for the Blizzard guys. They’re incredibly talented, and I know that Diablo III’s going to be a top-notch game.” Anyway, those are just a few thoughts about the interview. Gaylight Run replied on August 15, 2008 drinkin a lot of haterade yes, we should be a little suspicious of the schaefer bros and co. after the flagship fiasco, but they’re gonna continue on and develop a new game despite the damage that has been done to their reputations, and regardless of what we think. it’s scary to hear them talking like they’re still buddy-buddy with roper, but they were friends before they left blizzard and will probably continue to be. they’re just people. hopefully this is the end of their business partnership, however. i’m willing to give them another chance, u know, stay informed about the new game they develop, read the beta blogs, read the forums, the reviews, etc. and i’ll make a judgment as to whether or not they are repeating the flagship formula. at least if their game is free-to-play, it won’t hurt to give them a shot. will Runic Games be Flagship 2.0, or will it just be Flagship 1.3e ? hopefully, neither of the above Clayton Bigsby replied on August 15, 2008 Amen brother. Could not have analyzed the interview better myself. Thank you for helping me strengthen my resolve for anything fss and now ruined games. Lets see what baldtree has to say on the forums about this. Jawsome! Tensa replied on August 16, 2008 Sick post. Very well said. A++ Valtonis replied on August 16, 2008 I agree! Well Said! PetroRabbit replied on August 16, 2008 Good read, although it would have been easier on the eyes with a some spaces between your responses and the interview. can’t escape…..the day job…. David Lemke replied on August 16, 2008 Ya, i’m sorry about the wall of text format. I’m not sure how to present it in this forum. On my computer, in my Word document, there are plenty of spaces in key places to break it up, but when I put it in here, it gets all scrunched up. Thomas replied on August 17, 2008 Well said. They fucked everyone over. I can understand why other companies bailed, I wouldn’t want to dent my reputation by hosting some game that’s gonna fail. |
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Posted by RoboMonkey, on August 16th, 2008, at 6:48 am. Nice post. In my mind RG at this point will be nothing more than FSS all over again. I don’t know why but maybe its just the arrogance. I’ve seen too many companies close their doors only to reopen them under a different name just to screw their old customers. You see boys and girls with the old company being closed all contracts are null and void (can you say founder fk). Any way the only BR can ever justify his lame ass existence is to release a public apology to say “I screwed up. I should have made the game free and given the founders their money back or compensated them in some way”. And no I was never a Founder I was in the beta and heard all the same crap as everyone els “its just beta” and after about two days of playing I said “the game wont make it a year”. Any company that hires BR to come in and run anything will lose me as a customer and yes that includes Blizzard. Fk Roper and the horse he road in on. He’s is the most arrogant prick on the planet and yes I’ll bet when FSS closed (or should I say let its developers go) BR and the boys all got paid and the devs got screwed big time. I’d love for some of them to come on the site and post what it was like to work at FSS. By the way guys I was hoping for some news on the big Blizzard “FAIL” this past week. The way they handled the BlizzCon tickets was so fking lame. Agamemnon replied on August 16, 2008 Well it has been interesting to hear what Travis Baldree has had to say on our own forums (who is the first former employee of Flagship Studios to actually post on our forums). He has claimed that they had “little” to “nothing” to do with Hellgate and that Flagship Seattle was, in its own respect, a different “company” within the company, but that doesn’t mean we won’t be cautious about its future endeavors either. Roper might have been running the show at Flagship Studios, but he brought a basket of fruits along with him who all went ripe and sour with him. We know these guys have experience, which makes it all the more of a wonder why they were so cocky and confident that they could handle the things that were being thrown at them. I don’t know why they kept the process “on schedule” for release when they knew they were going to be facing so many problems. For me that just says it’s all the more deserving. But Baldree and Schaefer have been expressing that they have “learned from their mistakes” and what not and to that I just say; let’s wait and see. I’ve heard from quite a few people that despite Mythos being a Diablo clone it was shaping up to be a decent game for the pay model it was going to have. But yes, I do agree that right now I’m not holding them in such a positive light either. I would like to say, however, that I hope they prove me wrong. |
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Posted by tbaldree, on August 16th, 2008, at 1:09 pm. I’d be happy to respond to some of the above posts and get into a discussion if you’d like - would it be possible to take it to the forums? It’s just easier on the eyes there - this giant wall of text is hard to parse. Thanks! |
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Posted by Sylvanus, on August 16th, 2008, at 6:52 pm. Just a PM you might have forgotten: Originally Posted by Sylvanus As I said earlier, Flagshipped has handled itself well. Just wanted to let you know. Have a good night. Originally Posted by Agamemnon (Banned) |
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Posted by David Lemke, on August 19th, 2008, at 5:08 pm. GFW: What would have happened if somebody who got a boxed copy at that time, or even now, and saw the stuff in the shrink-wrapped box about getting a subscription… BR: People can still go online and play for free, like it says on the box. The only thing they can’t do right now is actually make a subscription account Um, wtf? He’s pretending the box actually still delivers a legitimate product? Just another example of what a complete jerk Bill Roper and his friends are. I swear, if Bill Roper’s grandmother was still alive, he’d sell her a box right now for the extra dime. The game is in limbo as a result of countless mistakes on their part, but Bill Roper has no problem thinking the box has value, thinking he isn’t making a shady deal when someone buys that box. I know he isn’t going to benefit from sales n’more, but just the idea in his head that the box isn’t a shady deal right now is incredibly lame. |
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Agamemnon replied on August 15, 2008
I’m making an assumption? Max Schaefer was COO of Flagship Studios. From his very own words he says the studio is closing. Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt any more.
Flagship had too much on their plate because they a) released to too many regions, b) tried to do DX10, c) released too early, d) and were understaffed from the very beginning. Everything else went downhill from there. But hey, what ever helps you sleep at night.
As for Roper. He’s a running joke around here. I’m sorry if he means something to you; nothing is worse than seeing your loved ones being badgered.
Also, I did not “hint” of big news yesterday. Like your lack of reading comprehension, you might want to check who writes the articles before posting a comment.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
“Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt any more.”
Lame. :) You didn’t answer the real question though. Was this the big news? BTW, “you” is the site.
And none of this really helps me sleep at night. While I don’t completely share your views, I do respect you. I’ve given you props more than once. You’re being an ass now though.
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Agamemnon replied on August 15, 2008
I only treat people how they treat me. Now are you done dodging your shame?
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
My shame? Sheesh, you’re rich. And in regards to dodging, look in the mirror. Apparently someone has a scoop you don’t. Now, you *could* find out about it or mention that this is or isn’t the “news”. Instead you chide me. That shows more of your *character* than anything else.
My days visiting your hate-filled misguided and yellow journalistic site are nearing an end.
Be happy with yourself. I know you will be.
Agamemnon replied on August 15, 2008
I haven’t “dodged” anything. I didn’t claim I had information. You automatically assume that I am “the site.” I am not. I am not in the know with the other writers unless I talk to them. We unfortunately cannot communicate with each other through telepathy. In fact I made that quite clear in my very first post, but now you’ve made a Straw Man out of it. Bravo, I suppose?
Anyways, don’t let the door hit you on your way out.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
“My days visiting your hate-filled misguided and yellow journalistic site are nearing an end.
Be happy with yourself. I know you will be.”
Nah… ;) Had ya goin’ though.
Shenannigans aside, you claimed that my reading comprehension wasn’t up to snuff. Correction, it is. I explained myself further. I never said you had the info. Instead of throwing out insults to YOUR readers, you could have checked into it. Instead you decided to chide me, so I decided to mess with you.
If you ever figure out how to communicate via telepathy, let us know. Could be useful if you can teach it to others. Might be profitable too.
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Woohoo replied on August 15, 2008
Another fan boy.
I’m glad flagship is finally getting what they deserved, to be flagshipped!
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
Not a fanboy. Not the opposite of that either.
Wolfetone replied on August 15, 2008
Since all of the crap you and Agamemnon have written thus far means shit, lets get back to the original comment of you telling Agamemnon that he was assuming that Flagship was closing.
Are you fucking retarded in some way? I don’t think I have ever asked that question of any person on the internet before, and I know it’s a damn popular question to throw around on here, and in this case I feel it justified considering that a FOUNDER of FLAGSIP STUDIOS just said and it’s a mother fucking quote. “Max Schaefer: It’s barely open. It’s just open enough to take care of the final affairs, but for ->all intents and purposes it’s closed down.<-”
Just open enough means squat when it is followed up by Travis.
“TB: It’s a little bit of a new experience for all of us. (chuckles) We don’t exactly know the ‘proper’ way to close down a company. First and foremost, we’re just trying to take care of the debts and the employees in an orderly fashion, so Bill [Roper, CEO of Flagship Studios] and one or two other people have stuck around and are doing their best to get that done before we move on in different directions.”
Now shut the fuck up and sit down, your precious studio is gone, dissolved, impotent, dead, incapable, paralyzed, comatose, liquidated, out of fucking comission. It is bollocksed.
I bet you’ll even try to take my fucking reply so far out of context and so far out of left field of the sanity meter you’ll end up in the god damn nuthouse for brainwashed consumers. Fuck, all of you who still linger and defend Flagship on those tainted Hellgate forums are beyond all possible hope.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
Hahahaa Fuck off. lol
“For all intents…” Meaning it’s not. Shut the fuck up yourself. Will it be? Sure seems like it. We live in a demanding world that wants answers now. This whiney little site found it’s roots based on that. Go fuck yourself. Enjoy it! :)
It’s not my precious little studio. Not at all.
The funny part is your delusional rage completely blinds you.
Fuck yourself off and have a great time with it.
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Vortex replied on August 16, 2008
Fanboy is angry.
Why so serious?
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Woohoo replied on August 16, 2008
yeap. fanboy is so angry. let’s put a smile on his face…
Agamemnon replied on August 15, 2008
It’s like watching a two-year-old trying to comprehend an Introduction to Logic.
Protip: You are not a customer. If you feel insulted you are more than welcome to cry in privacy. You got called out for your poor reading comprehension and now you’re trying to save face by insulting others (where even you started out with snide remarks yourself). You’re a Class A hypocrite whose feeling insecure because I’m not falling for your cheap parlor tricks. Correction, your reading comprehension isn’t up to snuff, as Wolfetone pointed out and then you avoided by crying with insults.
Seriously, please keep posting to further dig your grave. You’ve proved you’re an idiot, congratulations.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
So this is how you guys act?
I never said I was a customer. I am a READER. You talk about poor reading comprehension, if anything you’ve proven by your own posts how piss poor yours is.
Unfortunately, you’ve also proven to be a blind arrogant ass. I complimented you earlier and apparently you didn’t see that.
Flagshipped: Where blind rage comes to play.
ADDED: I didn’t start off with a snide remark. It was genuine. I asked two questions and you took me to task. That may explain the “I treat people how they treat me” line. I didn’t understand at the time why you were saying it. I do now.
Here’s the problem, just because I don’t hate Roper and Flagship Studios doesn’t mean I’m rolling in the hay with them either. It doesn’t mean that compliments posted are not genuine. After YOU started chiding me, yes I toyed with you. Big deal. You’ve turned this into something it wasn’t and now have egg on your face. I’m sure you’ll look for a way to save face. I really don’t care.
Maybe you should take a good look at how you handle things for the future. As I said, I have complimented you both here and in forums in the past. Instead of taking the post at face value, you go on a crusade of hate. Nice work. /sarcasm <—SEE!? I’m letting you know that “Nice work” was meant sarcastically. “Protip” for you.
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Honurot replied on August 15, 2008
Sylvanus, you still failed to point out where it is exactly that Agamemnon assumed that Flagship is pretty much closing down.
If you truly are a reader then please point out where it is that Agamemnon made an assumption like the two other posters asked repeatedly. Unless of course hurling insults at every other little thing that everyone else is saying is more of your style instead of proving your point.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
“TL;DR
The Facts
*Flagship Studios is closing”
Right there.
Agamemnon replied on August 15, 2008
While you’re rummaging through that Introduction to Logic, go ahead and look up inductive inference.
“Instead of throwing out insults to YOUR readers, you could have checked into it.”
You were acting like as if I owed you something, i.e., “I am a customer and you should meet to my demands.”
Why are you even flapping your arms? For attention? Alright, let’s do this then.
Your first post was asinine and incorrect. You said that I “assumed” that the studio was closing down, despite the FACT that former COO of Flagship Studios CONFIRMED that they were shutting down. And what was your stretch on that?
” ‘For all intents…’ Meaning it’s not.”
Finish his sentence. “For all intents and purposes, it’s closed down.”
Now explain to me how the word “intents”, which means INTENDED some how farcically translates to, “Meaning it’s not.” You pulled a rabbit out of your ass on that one, hence why I am more than justified to make a claim against your poor reading comprehension. Man up and accept that you didn’t know what you were talking about and you were reaching.
“I explained myself further.”
No, you did not, you insulted me further. You were jumping around the issue and changing your mind. First you say:
“BTW, ‘you’ is the site.”
With applied inductive reasoning, you are inferring that I am in the collective know of everything that is going on with other writers, so when I tell you otherwise, you then change your mind to this:
“I never said you had the info.”
Now you’re contradicting yourself. When called out on it you throw a hissy fit. Man up and accept the fact that you were reaching and scrambling for a leg up there as well.
“Instead you decided to chide me, so I decided to mess with you.”
What’s wrong, don’t like a taste of your own medicine? The majority of your responses have been childish insults and you have the audacity to call me a blind, arrogant ass? Looked in the mirror lately?
As far as I’m concerned, you’re done. There are things crawling in the grass out on my front lawn with more intelligence than you. Have fun living in your fantasy world while scrounging around to save face after being called out for how terrible you are at arguing. You can unsubscribe to this thread now so you won’t have to wait around making responses as quick as you can.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
Seriously? Fuck off.
See after reading your rant. It is a rant, btw. The short of it is this. YOUR PREMISE IS THAT I INTENDED TO INSULT YOU. I DIDN’T. Now it’s a different story. I’m not going to spend the time on you any further. It’s not worth it. You’re a fucking fool and “I’m honestly sorry I ever complimented a piss poor idiot like you.”
EDIT: “I’m honestly sorry I ever complimented a piss poor idiot like you.” Now that is childish. So strike it.
Fuck off, Asshole.
(And yes, I can still edit this post the reply below. Let what’s been said stay.)
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Agamemnon replied on August 15, 2008
Cry more.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
lol. No. But that was funny.
Project_Xii replied on August 15, 2008
Swearing doesn’t make you a big boy, Sylvanus. Or make your points correct, either.
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Sylvanus replied on August 16, 2008
If you read further, you’ll see that I regretted letting myself drop into that.
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Vortex replied on August 16, 2008
Why so serious?
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Honurot replied on August 15, 2008
Wait, why does this feel like the “Quarterly Updates” argument all over again???
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
Something in my nature doesn’t let me have pissing matches for long.
You can continue to rip new ones into me if you like or talk about this. What’s your choice?
Apologies for the swears and personal insults at the end. I don’t usually allow myself to do that. Here, I figured “screw it”. It really didn’t help.
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Wolfetone replied on August 15, 2008
You’re not a customer? I swear I just saw a post the other day of yours claiming you were a LIFETIME SUBSCRIBER.
http://forums.hellgatelondon.com/showpost.php?p=1172289&postcount=50
And you’re one of the TC testers if my memory serves correct, I believe I got in to a fight with you once on the TC about character storage and said that one day they may eventually have to wipe the TC so playing long term would not be a wise decision.
Oh, and fuck off pond scum.
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Honurot replied on August 15, 2008
Seriously, I don’t believe the guy is keeping up with his posts, much less what he puts in them because he’s too busy opening up other pointless fronts of conflict to prove his original point, if he even had one to begin with.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
Obviously not true.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
I”m a Lifetime Subscriber for Hellgate: London. I am NOT a customer for Flagshipped.com, just a READER. Flagshipped doesn’t owe me anything. Now, could they look into something to be more informed? Sure, but apparently Aga’d rather search for ways to make personal insults and redirect his flaws as if they’re mine.
I’m not a TC tester. I looked at using a BETA patch or something to work around a tech issue.
I’ve never had a problem being a Lifetime Subscriber. I made the choice. I took the chance.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
I am making an assumption here: TC is test center?
If it’s not, then I don’t know what it is. I was a Beta Tester.
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Agamemnon replied on August 15, 2008
LMAO, he’s that Sylvanus? I remember him from beta; he was one of the guys telling everyone else, “It’s just beta, guys! They have builds ahead of the ones we’re testing!”
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Vortex replied on August 16, 2008
I remember that too LOL!
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Sylvanus replied on August 16, 2008
I don’t believe that was me. If you want to point to a forums post, then I’ll take a look at it. I wasn’t happy with Beta and have always said that it wasn’t ready for release.
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Artemis replied on August 15, 2008
I’m glad you don’t spell it “Sylvanas” because that would be an insult to the Banshee Queen, who despite the ugly fate that befell her, chose to accept the reality. By accepting reality, she was able to unite those who also were the victims of that fate and they moved on (not necessarily in a positive direction, but hey, they do fight the Scourge!)
You are the epitome of the exact opposite - deny reality, shoot the messenger and pretend that you are the one in the right.
Crawl back into the hole you climbed out of, and don’t come back out until next month…then you we can serve you a big dose of “I told you so”.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
Silvanus (Latin: “of the woods”) was a Roman tutelary spirit of woods
Just typed a little differently.
On to your insult, no. I don’t see things as done unless they’re done. Too many times in my life I’ve seen people make assumptions and pay the price for it. I’m not shooting the messenger. I’m waiting for the message. Is the writing on the walls? Yep. It’s not over ’till it’s over. That’s all.
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Honurot replied on August 15, 2008
Still waiting for where Agamemnon’s assumption was made…….
Oh wait, you can’t prove it can you?
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
It’s in the initial article. See above.
Artemis replied on August 15, 2008
“It’s not over ’till it’s over”
Feel free to remain optimistic, but when one of the founders of the company says “It’s done, they are just closing up shop”, and they put google ads on the official forum, that seems pretty clear to me.
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Sylvanus replied on August 15, 2008
I don’t know that I’d call it optimism. I’m waiting for an official confirmation or statement. That’s all. I’m not waiting sleeplessly either. When it happens, it happens. The Schaefers decided to go another direction and moved quickly to do so. That’s about it. They can say and do whatever they want. For them, it seems like Flagship & Hellgate: London are history and no longer any of their concern. So be it.
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