KickStarter Underworld Ascendant is a disaster

[Efe]

if history repeats they will be encouraged not to use any system shock specific enemies, names, terms and systems

 

[Child of Malkav]

Nah they're gonna put a talking Shodan as the intro to this game. Obviously.

 

[Glic2000]

Did you see the trailer? They made Shodan's face animated. Probably wasted a million bucks just on that.

 

[glass blackbird]

Shodan showing up kind of made the story of SS2 worse. It felt like something they had to do, an obligation. Same here but worse since they have nothing else to go on except nostalgia, so it's just going to be bad replicas of past games and nothing else

 

[Nyast]

Ahah, looks like Otherside got lucky back then:

Earlier today, the Kickstarter for RAW – a ‘sandbox MMORP’ title built in the style of GTA Online – was suspended, as backers received an email from Kickstarter saying that pledges will be cancelled. The project had already met its funding goal, but faced plenty of criticism as fans, critics, and streamers suggested that it was far too ambitious to come to life on its modest budget – and it seems Kickstarter itself feels the same way.

https://www.pcgamesn.com/raw/kickstarter

Let's see what Kickstarter has to say:

“Our rules and guidelines ask that creators seek to raise the amount of money needed to bring a project to completion and fulfill all rewards,” a Kickstarter representative tells us. “This creator stated in an update that they would need to raise additional funds outside of Kickstarter to complete the game. We require projects to be honest and clearly presented, and this project failed to meet that standard.”

Did these rules exist when they Kickstarted UA ?

 

[LESS T_T]

Funnily Kingdom Come was similar, KS money they asked for was a fraction of the estimated budget. Of course, Warhorse was totally upfront and honest about that, unlike Otherside, not even saying the resulting games.

 

[Gord]

Funnily Kingdom Come was similar, KS money they asked for was a fraction of the estimated budget. Of course, Warhorse was totally upfront and honest about that, unlike Otherside, not even saying the resulting games.

They did state quite early that they needed (and allegedly had) additional funding, although I don't remember if that only happened after the KS. Unfortunately they forgot to mention that this funding in the end never materialized...

 

[Rahdulan]

Funnily Kingdom Come was similar, KS money they asked for was a fraction of the estimated budget. Of course, Warhorse was totally upfront and honest about that, unlike Otherside, not even saying the resulting games.

I think Warhorse simply had a more competent team put together that wasn't just coasting on "hey guys, we were involved with Looking Glass and games they produced". In a sense, Warhorse had a team that was more relevant when it came to covering the bases they would need in order to realize KCD. To compare the two:

The OtherSide Entertainment team members have worked on over 25 award-winning games. This includes such standout games as Ultima Underworld, System Shock, Thief, Deus Ex, GEX, Neverwinter Nights, Dishonored, Medal of Honor, Uncharted, Last of Us, Dungeons & Dragons Online, and BioShock Infinite to name some.

The team is headed up by Paul Neurath. Paul was the founder of Blue Sky Productions, where he came up with the concept of Ultima Underworld and oversaw its creation. Later Blue Sky became LookingGlass, one of the most renowned indie studios of the 1990’s. Paul continued to innovate, overseeing the development of such beloved games as System Shock and Thief. As founder of OtherSide Entertainment, Paul orchestrated the return of Underworld, and is once again setting the creative vision for the latest incarnation.

OtherSide takes a collaborative approach to development with small, tight-knit teams. Joining Paul is a team of superbly talented and proven game developers. Some played key roles on Ultima Underworld, System Shock, Thief and/or on more recent landmarks in the genre that have been influenced by these games. All share a passion for bringing Underworld back!

vs

If you’d like to learn a little more about our attitude as a company and as game makers, we invite you to take a look at our blog. In addition, below you’ll find a little information about some of our key team leaders:

Dan Vávra
Director and Design Lead for Mafia, Designer and Screen Writer for Mafia II. Over a decade of industry experience, starting as a 2D artist on 16-bit computers. Nominated for a Game Developers Choice Award for Excellence in Writing for Mafia. Mafia won Game of the Year and Best Screenplay awards in a number of countries and has an 89.5% score on GameRankings. Dan’s games have sold more than 5 million copies combined. He also contributed to Hidden & Dangerous, among other projects.

Martin Klíma
The author of fantasy pen-and-paper RPG Dragon's Lair. In 1997, Martin founded ALTAR Interactive as an Executive Producer. After releasing Fish Fillets in 1997, the studio created the real-time strategy game Original War three years later. Martin later moved to Codemasters in the UK to work on Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising.

Viktor Bocan
Designer and screenwriter of computer games for 17+ years. Started with self-published text games for Atari 800 and then he worked as a lead designer in Bohemia Interactive (Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis, OFP: Resistance). Later Viktor helped to produce ArmA, a spiritual successor of Operation Flashpoint, and then worked in 2K Czech on new, not yet announced title. In his spare time, Viktor creates games for 'smaller' platforms, including Nintendo DS, XBL, iOS, etc.

Tomáš Blaho
Tomas was a Senior Graphics Programmer at Illusion Softworks (later 2K Czech), where he worked on multiple games, including Mafia 1 & Mafia 2 and Hidden & Dangerous 2. After finishing Top Spin 4 for 2K Czech, he moved on to Playground Games in the UK, working as Senior Graphics Programmer on Forza Horizon. He has a great deal of experience with development on non-PC platforms, having worked on Dreamcast, PS2, Xbox, PS3, Xbox 360, and iOS.

Roman Zawada
One of the most accomplished 3D artists in our country. Roman started at Bohemia Interactive working on Operation Flashpoint and later ArmA. He then moved to 2K Czech to work on Mafia 2, and later to Crytek to work on Crysis 3. His intimate knowledge of CryEngine is especially valuable to our current project.

 

[Nano]

...How? All of those games from the Warhorse guys are mediocre af, and hardly have anything to do with KCD's medieval themes. Meanwhile, some of the Otherside guys worked on Ultima Underworld (e.g. Tim Stellmach, lead designer on both Underworld 2 and Ascendant), which is what people would want for an Underworld sequel.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

All of those games from the Warhorse guys are mediocre af

All of them? Hidden & Dangerous 2, Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis and Arma are very good games.

 

[Nano]

All of them? Hidden & Dangerous 2, Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis and Arma are very good games.

Maybe not all of them, but still, those are all FPSs. How does one look at these and think "yes, these guys would make a good medieval-era game with fun swordplay"?

 

[Grauken]

Nano kinda has a point, all those nifty references really don't tell you whether a project will work out or not, too many hidden variables in the background

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

All of them? Hidden & Dangerous 2, Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis and Arma are very good games.

Maybe not all of them, but still, those are all FPSs. How does one look at these and think "yes, these guys would make a good medieval-era game with fun swordplay"?

These three games have pretty large maps, good attention to detail and good mechanics + Mafia 1 went pretty far trying to immerse players in the game.
While it doesn't translate to 'fun swordplay' on paper, the rest pretty much suggests that the devs are competent and most other aspects won't suck.

Nano kinda has a point, all those nifty references really don't tell you whether a project will work out or not, too many hidden variables in the background

I don't necessarily disagree, but see my point above.

 

[Nano]

These three games have pretty large maps, good attention to detail and good mechanics + Mafia 1 went pretty far trying to immerse players in the game.

And Ultima Underworld, System Shock, and Thief aren't the same? Mafia 1 is almost as old as Thief 2.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

These three games have pretty large maps, good attention to detail and good mechanics + Mafia 1 went pretty far trying to immerse players in the game.

And Ultima Underworld, System Shock, and Thief aren't the same? Mafia 1 is almost as old as Thief 2.

Sure, these are good games, but what former LGS folks were doing for 10+ years after it closed?

Chances of delivering something great and similar to your older stuff are pretty low if you spend more than a decade working on console/casual/mobile stuff.

 

[Grauken]

One of the problems is that however good those games were, we don't know how much each individual really contributed to that success, even the job title didn't tell whether they did a good job, whether it worked in the past because of good team chemistry, whether they are burnt out now and so on

 

[Efe]

at the end KCD is only mediocre while ua much worse
i think this metric of past products isnt working

 

[Viata]

Daily reminder that you want the whole team of game A making the spiritual sequel of game A and not just "guy that worked in game A". As far as we know, this guy may have only worked there as a beta tester.
I'm really tired of seeing game designers showing up saying how they developed a great game and then releases a shit game, because clearly he didn't develop the original game it was he AND his team, the team that clearly were not working in the shit game.

 

[Grauken]

Daily reminder that you want the whole team of game A making the spiritual sequel of game A and not just "guy that worked in game A". As far as we know, this guy may have only worked there as a beta tester.
I'm really tired of seeing game designers showing up saying how they developed a great game and then releases a shit game, because clearly he didn't develop the original game it was he AND his team, the team that clearly were not working in the shit game.

Which let's be honest, is impossible for these old-guys-get-together again kickstarters, most of those guys aren't in the games industry anymore (for good reasons) or have much better jobs at higher management levels these days, and even if you could get most of them together again, even that wouldn't be a guarantee it would work out

 

[Gunnar]

One of the problems is that however good those games were, we don't know how much each individual really contributed to that success, even the job title didn't tell whether they did a good job, whether it worked in the past because of good team chemistry, whether they are burnt out now and so on

All good games are lightning in a bottle.

 

[Grauken]

I think that's true for every creative medium, books, movies, comics, whatever

 

[Gunnar]

I think that's true for every creative medium, books, movies, comics, whatever

It's true for all big collaborative projects, not sure I'd go so far as to cover books and such with a single author.

 

[Grauken]

I think that's true for every creative medium, books, movies, comics, whatever

It's true for all big collaborative projects, not sure I'd go so far as to cover books and such with a single author.

Well, even my favorite authors have only few really great books where every aspect is excellent, it's just easier to get to like a certain style when they manage to remain consistent in their writing

That said, if you think books are not collaborations, a change in publisher/main editor can make a massive change in quality for authors, so I definitely think there's a collaborative aspect to books that's often hidden and underestimated

 

[Nano]

Daily reminder that you want the whole team of game A making the spiritual sequel of game A and not just "guy that worked in game A". As far as we know, this guy may have only worked there as a beta tester.

You don't know Looking Glass's history if you think Tim Stellmach "may have only worked there as a beta tester".

 

[Viata]

Daily reminder that you want the whole team of game A making the spiritual sequel of game A and not just "guy that worked in game A". As far as we know, this guy may have only worked there as a beta tester.

You don't know Looking Glass's history if you think Tim Stellmach "may have only worked there as a beta tester".

You don't know how to read if you think I'm talking about Tim Stellmach.