Blue's News: Comments - Flagship Lives!?

Flagship Lives!?

[July 15, 2008, 7:12 pm ET] - Share - Viewing Comments

A post on the Flagship Studios Website contradicts reports that Flagship has closed, though they do grant that most of their employees have been laid off. They do say, however, that they are still owners of the IPs for both Hellgate: London and Mythos, but that they are currently not accepting new Hellgate: London subscriptions, nor are they billing current subscribers:

San Francisco, CA (July 14, 2008) -- Flagship Studios has announced today that despite rumors to the contrary, the company is still operating.

“It is with deep regret that I must announce that Flagship Studios has laid off most employees. However, the core management and founding team members are still at Flagship.” said Bill Roper, CEO of Flagship Studios. “The past five years have been an incredible experience for us, but unfortunately, we couldn’t sustain the size of the company any longer.”

Flagship Studios owns the rights to all its technology and IP, including Hellgate: London and Mythos. Due to the current situation, Flagship will not be taking any new subscribers for Hellgate: London, and all current subscriptions will not be billed.

Flagship wishes to extend their heartfelt thanks to those that have supported the company and games over the past five years.

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38.	Re: No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 16:08	Prez
	So the employees who worked hard and had no say in the terrible decisions that led to this are screwed and let go, while the heads of the company responsible for the colossal failure keep their jobs, free to continue screwing the consumers. Sounds about par for the course.




	Prez on Soundclick http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pagemusic.cfm?bandID=604888

37.	Re: No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 12:29	JohnnyRotten
	How did Flagship survive being Flagshipped? Because they've got one last flagshipping to do to their customers, ie, sell off the company and then turn out the lights without notice. Flagshipped, flagshipping, flagtarded (ok, I made up the last one). Man, those guys are good. They upgraded the English language. Now that's good work! - J

36.	Re: No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 11:48	Klaus Flouride
	How did Flagship survive being Flagshipped?

35.	Re: No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 10:12	Overon
	My understanding of your understanding is that you lack full understanding of what happened. But that's okay. Flagship lives just like Elvis and Big Foot.

34.	Re: No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 07:35	InBlack
	My understanding is that Roper and a few other members left Blizzard because of conflicting ideas (with Vivendi) about the direction the company will be heading. Roper wanted to (probably) start a new IP and Vivendi wanted to milk the cash cow (Warcraft, Starcraft etc. universe) I think Hellgate would have been a much better recieved game had there been less spin about it, it was marketed as an MMO when in reality its a Hack and Slash action RPG. A shame really, since even in its fucked up form its still the best hack and slash RPG since Diablo2. Im kind of still hoping Mythos will see the light of day.




	I have a nifty blue line!

33.	Re: No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 06:49	The Half Elf
	Um from my understanding Vivdeni was trying to sell off their ENTIRE games division but interested parties only wanted Blizzard.

32.	No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 05:29	Zzet
	However, the core management and founding team members are still at Flagship. That's good, all the useless people are now in one place. Please stay there.

31.	Re: No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 02:58	Proudfoot
	Most of them left Blizz because they thought they were better, and could produce a better game. I'll bet Blizz will let them back if they came crawling, through a pile of burning bile up through the pits of hell after they've fought death matches with toothpicks. Actually Bill Roper left Blizzard during WoW Alpha b/c Vivendi wanted to sell off Blizzard North, and didn't want any input from Roper about it. This pissed him off to no end, so he left. When he left, several biggies left with him.

30.	Re: No subject	Jul 16, 2008, 02:10	Mashiki Amiketo
	Blizzard should hire these guys to help finish Diablo 3. Most of them left Blizz because they thought they were better, and could produce a better game. I'll bet Blizz will let them back if they came crawling, through a pile of burning bile up through the pits of hell after they've fought death matches with toothpicks.




	-- "For every human problem, there is a neat, simple solution; and it is always wrong." --H.L. Mencken

29.	Re: Bummer	Jul 15, 2008, 23:58	WisconsinHoudini
	"Watching this is more fun than actually playing Hellgate." hah! awesome... headline of the year material

28.	Re: Kinda...	Jul 15, 2008, 23:50	JohnnyRotten
	Is that why one ex-Flagship employee stated that the 3 top guys (Roper included) dug into their own pockets and paid everyone a months salary? Granted I don't like Bill, but it's nice to hear that even with the company doing horrible and having to let everyone go, they aren't just kicking them out. Any payout and size of payout are just an unconfirmed rumors at this point. We'll have to wait until a few former FSS types step forward and let us know the truth. Regardless, if true, it tells me two things: [1] How much money senior management made during this whole fiasco, and how little vested the worker bees were. [2] That senior management didn't let the worker bees know how bad things were and basically locked the doors after they left one day. Again, if true, it's a nice gesture, but quite frankly, if I worked at FSS, I would have rather been kept in the loop on the stability of my company all along, and then be able to make my plans accordingly. My feeling is that the company worker bees were kept as much in the dark as outsiders. And for a small startup venture, with a lot of worker bee sweat equity, it isn't right. Edit: "Is" not "s". Me not smartly Edit: Bloody hell. "are" not "is". Me even less smartly This message was edited at Jul 17, 00:32.

27.	No subject	Jul 15, 2008, 23:46	PropheT
	Blizzard should hire these guys to help finish Diablo 3.

26.	with some further thought...	Jul 15, 2008, 23:39	JohnnyRotten
	Props to a carefully crafted statement by Roper. It does make one thing very apparent: FSS is no longer a viable company, and is just a holding shell company awaiting a buyout. Looking at the list of departures (marketing, support, and development staff) also makes it pretty apparent that Hellgate will see no further development while with FSS. It looks like only stakeholders are left (ie, the ones who will make a profit if they can flip one or both of the IP's to another company), while all the wage grunts are gone. By cutting off subscribers, they're setting the stage to turn off the lights on the services. The forums, multiplayer servers, and probably the bulk of their server farm will be going dark in the very near future.

25.	Re: Kinda...	Jul 15, 2008, 23:27	The Half Elf
	Is that why one ex-Flagship employee stated that the 3 top guys (Roper included) dug into their own pockets and paid everyone a months salary? Granted I don't like Bill, but it's nice to hear that even with the company doing horrible and having to let everyone go, they aren't just kicking them out.

24.	Kinda...	Jul 15, 2008, 23:24	JohnnyRotten
	My guess is they are trying to sell the Mythos and/or Hellgate IP before the loan defaults and they loose it completely (and get nothing for it). My question is who would buy the IP with all its liabilities? I wonder if they're trying to play each of their two big creditors off against each other, maybe trying to swap the Hellgate IP to get the Mythos IP back or something. Dunno, but I'm reasonably sure whatever deal they manage to swing will be pennies on the dollar. So, yes, FSS is still alive insomuch as in having senior management keeping themselves on the payroll while letting all the grunts go so they might get to pocket one last payout for their failed company. Customers, of course, are just pesky incidentals to Flagship, so the official forums and the multi-player servers aren't probably long for this world.

23.	Re: No subject	Jul 15, 2008, 23:21	NKD
	Roper is full of crap. Flagship is dead. I'm sorry but once all you have left is management and a couple head guys, you are not a viable company. They will fight a legal battle over HGL and Mythos, lose, and then Roper will accept a job with EA or something. Mark my words.

22.	Re: No subject	Jul 15, 2008, 23:14	Dagok
	What they need to do now is unlock all content to all players. From this point forward, charge for content (Lifetime Subscribers get X number of content updates free), with no subscription. ---------------------------------------------------- Civilization Revolution, Grand Theft Auto IV, GRID PSN ID= Puscifer73 "Blues News" Steam Community... http://steamcommunity.com/groups/bluesnews/ This message was edited at Jul 15, 23:14.




	Left 4 Dead server 64.156.14.145:27015 NoDRM- http://steamcommunity.com/groups/nodrm/ Blues News- http://steamcommunity.com/groups/bluesnews/

21.	Re: Bummer	Jul 15, 2008, 22:36	Reactor
	"I Live... Again." - Caleb LOL

20.	Bummer	Jul 15, 2008, 22:06	rist3903
	Time for them to start making cell phone games, I guess.

19.	ha	Jul 15, 2008, 21:42	Fausticle
	I would take the the word of any random Korean over Bill Roper. Random Korean: Has lied to me 0 times. Bill Roper: Has never told the truth. This message was edited at Jul 15, 21:42.




	~For every prayer HellSlayer makes to his nonexistent God, I shall eat a kitten.

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