I was debating on making a new thread on this, but if anyone of you guys feel it warrants more discussion feel free to go ahead and make it and I'll delete this post.
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Kotaku - The Collapse Of Visceral's Ambitious Star Wars Game
It seemed like a surefire hit: a Star Wars take on Uncharted, published by Electronic Arts and developed by the longrunning studio Visceral Games. But nothing is sure in the video game industry, and on October 17, 2017, when employees of Visceral were told that the company would be closing, some who had worked for the studio found themselves unsurprised. In many people’s eyes, doom was inevitable.
Visceral Games had been an odd fit at EA for several years now. First founded in 1998 as EA Redwood Shores, the studio developed a mishmash of assorted games in the 2000s before finally finding an identity with a horror-action-adventure series called Dead Space. After three Dead Space games (and a couple of spin-offs), the company went on to make the first-person shooter Battlefield Hardline, which came out in 2015.
Around the same time, under the iconic director Amy Hennig, who was best known for writing and directing the first three Uncharted games, Visceral launched a project called Ragtag. This was meant to be EA’s entry into the action-adventure market—a linear Star Wars story set between the episode IV and V movies that would compete with the likes of Uncharted and Tomb Raider.
In the weeks leading up to the studio’s closure, the staff of Visceral Games had crunched hard, working long hours to make a demo for Ragtag that they hoped might impress EA. Alongside the Canada-based studio EA Vancouver, Visceral’s employees made a set of high-octane demos in which Ragtag’s main characters would get chased by an AT-ST walker, get into a shootout on the desert planet Tatooine, and embark on a rescue mission within the dungeons of Jabba’s palace. One person who worked on the game described these demos as a “sampler platter,” something that would show EA’s executives what Visceral’s vision of Uncharted Star Wars could become.
The demos weren’t enough. Former Visceral employees don’t know when EA made the decision to shut down their studio, but on October 17, 2017, it became official. Visceral, which employed around 80 people, was no more. Staff say they were given three weeks to put together portfolios and look for other employment, both in and outside of EA.
This news immediately led to a glut of opinions and editorials about the death of single-player video games. Visceral, best known for making a linear action-adventure game series called Dead Space, did not fit into EA’s focus on “games as a service,” a common phrase referring to games designed to be playable, and to generate money, long after they’ve launched. EA’s statement made the same implications, stating about Ragtag:
In its current form, it was shaping up to be a story-based, linear adventure game. Throughout the development process, we have been testing the game concept with players, listening to the feedback about what and how they want to play, and closely tracking fundamental shifts in the marketplace. It has become clear that to deliver an experience that players will want to come back to and enjoy for a long time to come, we needed to pivot the design.
But the story behind Ragtag 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.
..... much more at the link, it's long as hell.
https://kotaku.com/the-collapse-of-viscerals-ambitious-star-wars-game-1819916152
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Kotaku - The Collapse Of Visceral's Ambitious Star Wars Game
It seemed like a surefire hit: a Star Wars take on Uncharted, published by Electronic Arts and developed by the longrunning studio Visceral Games. But nothing is sure in the video game industry, and on October 17, 2017, when employees of Visceral were told that the company would be closing, some who had worked for the studio found themselves unsurprised. In many people’s eyes, doom was inevitable.
Visceral Games had been an odd fit at EA for several years now. First founded in 1998 as EA Redwood Shores, the studio developed a mishmash of assorted games in the 2000s before finally finding an identity with a horror-action-adventure series called Dead Space. After three Dead Space games (and a couple of spin-offs), the company went on to make the first-person shooter Battlefield Hardline, which came out in 2015.
Around the same time, under the iconic director Amy Hennig, who was best known for writing and directing the first three Uncharted games, Visceral launched a project called Ragtag. This was meant to be EA’s entry into the action-adventure market—a linear Star Wars story set between the episode IV and V movies that would compete with the likes of Uncharted and Tomb Raider.
In the weeks leading up to the studio’s closure, the staff of Visceral Games had crunched hard, working long hours to make a demo for Ragtag that they hoped might impress EA. Alongside the Canada-based studio EA Vancouver, Visceral’s employees made a set of high-octane demos in which Ragtag’s main characters would get chased by an AT-ST walker, get into a shootout on the desert planet Tatooine, and embark on a rescue mission within the dungeons of Jabba’s palace. One person who worked on the game described these demos as a “sampler platter,” something that would show EA’s executives what Visceral’s vision of Uncharted Star Wars could become.
The demos weren’t enough. Former Visceral employees don’t know when EA made the decision to shut down their studio, but on October 17, 2017, it became official. Visceral, which employed around 80 people, was no more. Staff say they were given three weeks to put together portfolios and look for other employment, both in and outside of EA.
This news immediately led to a glut of opinions and editorials about the death of single-player video games. Visceral, best known for making a linear action-adventure game series called Dead Space, did not fit into EA’s focus on “games as a service,” a common phrase referring to games designed to be playable, and to generate money, long after they’ve launched. EA’s statement made the same implications, stating about Ragtag:
In its current form, it was shaping up to be a story-based, linear adventure game. Throughout the development process, we have been testing the game concept with players, listening to the feedback about what and how they want to play, and closely tracking fundamental shifts in the marketplace. It has become clear that to deliver an experience that players will want to come back to and enjoy for a long time to come, we needed to pivot the design.
But the story behind Ragtag 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.
..... much more at the link, it's long as hell.
https://kotaku.com/the-collapse-of-viscerals-ambitious-star-wars-game-1819916152
