Flagshipped has the text of a blog post by Flagship audio and gameplay programmer Guy Somberg revealing some of what's going on behind the scenes at the Hellgate: London developer (thanks IncGamers). The post was quickly removed, but a Google Cache is keeping this horse from getting back into the barn, something we felt some qualms about linking to based on that writer's regret, but stories about all this on GamesIndustry.biz and Next Generation have no such reservations (nor credits to the original sources of this news), so here's the post:

Work is depressing right now. Never mind the fact that Hellgate isn’t as popular as anybody had hoped. Never mind the fact that there exists a term “Flagshipped,” meaning where a company basically overpromises and then screws you. Never mind the fact that the forums are totally populated by people who do nothing but complain and talk about how much the game sucks. Never mind the fact that people do the same thing in the game itself.

Yes, Hellgate is not a big success. That sucks, and it’s depressing. I’m keeping a positive attitude about it because of Korea and China. The Koreans really love the game, and the Chinese have yet to see it. I don’t know how any of these deals are structured, but I’m hinging my hopes for Hellgate’s future on the Asian market.

So why is work depressing? (Other than all of those other depressing things, that is.) The reason is that people are leaving. In droves, they’re leaving. We’ve had programmers, accountants, HR people, and artists leave. The founders are all still around, but they’ve been floating away from Hellgate to work on various other projects. The only one still actively on Hellgate is Tyler, but Tyler’s not programming anymore; he spends all of his time on management activities.

Today was our programming intern’s last day; he’s leaving the company for the world of academia to get his PhD in computer science. I also learned today that another of our programmers is leaving in a couple of months (he gave lots of notice, which is very nice of him). With him leaving, I am basically the senior developer on Hellgate. Tyler, Dave, and Peter (the founders) are the only other programmers who were around beforehand, and I was the first programming hire after that. With Dave and Peter on other projects, and Tyler basically no longer a programmer, I’m what’s left after he leaves.

Thing is, the way things are going I’m likely to be the only programmer still working on Hellgate left from the original crew. I’ve heard rumours that other programmers and artists are thinking of leaving.

I was so disturbed to learn that all of these people are leaving that I couldn’t concentrate, and I left work early, claiming illness. I don’t want to leave Flagship. I’m happy here. I like the people, I like the environment, I like the pay, I like the location... There’s so much good about it. I’m not considering leaving. It’s just overwhelming and depressing having all of these people go. Every time a programmer leaves, it’s more work for me. Every time an artist leaves, it’s less content that we can create for Hellgate in the future.

Tyler is talking about replacing our programming intern with a designer. I’m fighting against that, because we need more programmers! We can’t just put it all on me.

Bah. Listen to me whine. It could be much worse, of course. At this point, though, what I need is some fresh projects; I’m getting burned out on Hellgate.