I'd bet money that the offline patch wasn't going to make its May release date, a day before it was supposed to drop they would say it had been pushed till August for extra polishing.

jacobvandy wrote on May 8, 2024, 11:19:

Teddy wrote on May 8, 2024, 09:05:
Use your brains for a moment and consider that Microsoft well knew there was supposed to be some big fix coming in less than a month and they still pulled the plug. Anyone who thinks it was a knee-jerk reaction is just plain being stupid. As you said, these people were paid for the last year to continue working on it. A full year and clearly Microsoft was not satisfied with what what they've done and did not think it was worth completing. Regardless of who was at fault for it, look at the game that was released. Do you REALLY trust that the same people that made that suddenly managed to 'fix' it and make it good or great? My bet is that Microsoft took a look at what had been accomplished and realized that the money spent in the last year had been squandered and any more spent would just be adding to the dumpster fire.

So in that case, their reasons are not just short-sighted, but also intentionally rather than ignorantly malicious -- a multi-trillion-dollar company decided to fuck over what few fans of the game there are in order to save what, maybe a million bucks? When that extra couple weeks of work from might have also prevented the game from sun-setting permanently by enabling an offline mode? YOUR bets and guesses are no more or less valid than anyone else's in this thread, yet others are expressing optimism and hope for what could have been, while you incessantly attempt to justify a mega-corp's greed. Which is all this is, at the end of the day...

While you blindly hold to the idea that said company owes it to you to invest millions in a game virtually no one else is ever going to buy. Might want to zip up, your entitlement is showing. There is no malice in recognizing failure and refusing to allow it to become an even bigger failure. There is nothing short-sighted in that either.

Teddy wrote on May 8, 2024, 09:05:
Use your brains for a moment and consider that Microsoft well knew there was supposed to be some big fix coming in less than a month and they still pulled the plug. Anyone who thinks it was a knee-jerk reaction is just plain being stupid. As you said, these people were paid for the last year to continue working on it. A full year and clearly Microsoft was not satisfied with what what they've done and did not think it was worth completing. Regardless of who was at fault for it, look at the game that was released. Do you REALLY trust that the same people that made that suddenly managed to 'fix' it and make it good or great? My bet is that Microsoft took a look at what had been accomplished and realized that the money spent in the last year had been squandered and any more spent would just be adding to the dumpster fire.

So in that case, their reasons are not just short-sighted, but also intentionally rather than ignorantly malicious -- a multi-trillion-dollar company decided to fuck over what few fans of the game there are in order to save what, maybe a million bucks? When that extra couple weeks of work from might have also prevented the game from sun-setting permanently by enabling an offline mode? YOUR bets and guesses are no more or less valid than anyone else's in this thread, yet others are expressing optimism and hope for what could have been, while you incessantly attempt to justify a mega-corp's greed. Which is all this is, at the end of the day...

Squirmer wrote on May 8, 2024, 00:03:

Teddy wrote on May 7, 2024, 20:36:
Redfall is a new, unproven IP that is now irreparably stained. Could they have spent the money to fix it? Sure. But why?

Tell that to the people who bankrolled the past year of extra work on it! Millions more in wages alone spent on it for nothing, more bad management. Whatever reputational damage they were trying to fix for a year they've now made even worse. Put the blame where it really belongs is all I'm saying.

If you say so. I don't know who's reputation you think has been damaged by this. Arkane Austin was already in the toilet from the Redfall release and I don't blame Microsoft one bit for pulling the plug on them. The fact that Microsoft has money doesn't mean they should be expected to throw it into a pit. Use your brains for a moment and consider that Microsoft well knew there was supposed to be some big fix coming in less than a month and they still pulled the plug. Anyone who thinks it was a knee-jerk reaction is just plain being stupid. As you said, these people were paid for the last year to continue working on it. A full year and clearly Microsoft was not satisfied with what what they've done and did not think it was worth completing. Regardless of who was at fault for it, look at the game that was released. Do you REALLY trust that the same people that made that suddenly managed to 'fix' it and make it good or great? My bet is that Microsoft took a look at what had been accomplished and realized that the money spent in the last year had been squandered and any more spent would just be adding to the dumpster fire.

Squirmer wrote on May 8, 2024, 00:03:

Teddy wrote on May 7, 2024, 20:36:
Redfall is a new, unproven IP that is now irreparably stained. Could they have spent the money to fix it? Sure. But why?

Tell that to the people who bankrolled the past year of extra work on it! Millions more in wages alone spent on it for nothing, more bad management. Whatever reputational damage they were trying to fix for a year they've now made even worse. Put the blame where it really belongs is all I'm saying.

I think it would be more understandable if we had a mid publisher here or maybe even a struggling publisher but this is fucking Microsoft we are talking about here. Microsoft raked in a NET INCOME of $21.9 billion (from $61.9 billion revenue) last QUARTER, and as stated before, they made a smooooth $72bn NET PROFIT in 2022 as well as the same $72bn in 2023 in spite of the Actblizz merger. Given the fact that Q1 is traditionally weak, they are on track to an even smooooother $100bn net profit in 2024.

Microsoft, more than anyone else in the entire business, could have very easily afforded to give Arkane the chance of a redemption arc with that planned May update. Given the absurd financials, running a relatively small studio like Arkane Austin is not even pocket change for Microsoft. They could have easily granted them a few months more to turn the ship around (as unlikely as that may seem but still...).

On the other hand, I remember watching the first Redfall trailer when it was revealed at E3 (IIRC?) or a related event (Xbox Summer Showcase or summin'?) and a lot of people were left with a strong 'WTF' impression back then.
So, one could also make a case that Arkane ignored the initial feedback and that they already squandered their chance at redemption before the game was even released. Because the writing was on the wall for a long time. Redfall was a premeditated failure. Arkane stubbornly pressed forward with it anyway and reaped what they sowed.

As always, things aren't as black & white as it may seem. Well, except for the FACT that Microsoft still remains a shit corp, of course .

Teddy wrote on May 7, 2024, 23:52:

Prez wrote on May 7, 2024, 22:02:

...it should be possible to make a bad game without being eliminated for it.

I've been close to writing that very thing all day, because it used to be that way. One bad release was a mistake that was always allowed to be corrected years ago. That hasn't been how game companies operate for quite a while now however.

The average cost to develop a AAA game has gone from around $1-3 million in 2000 to $200 million in 2023. With 100-200 times the money involved, the stakes are higher and the consequences are larger.

No one asked for budgets to grow that ridiculously large, so I am not very sympathetic. Just as movie budgets have ballooned to an absolutely ludicrous degree, game budgets have gotten insane as well.

Teddy wrote on May 7, 2024, 20:36:
Redfall is a new, unproven IP that is now irreparably stained. Could they have spent the money to fix it? Sure. But why?

Tell that to the people who bankrolled the past year of extra work on it! Millions more in wages alone spent on it for nothing, more bad management. Whatever reputational damage they were trying to fix for a year they've now made even worse. Put the blame where it really belongs is all I'm saying.

Prez wrote on May 7, 2024, 22:02:

...it should be possible to make a bad game without being eliminated for it.

I've been close to writing that very thing all day, because it used to be that way. One bad release was a mistake that was always allowed to be corrected years ago. That hasn't been how game companies operate for quite a while now however.

The average cost to develop a AAA game has gone from around $1-3 million in 2000 to $200 million in 2023. With 100-200 times the money involved, the stakes are higher and the consequences are larger.

...it should be possible to make a bad game without being eliminated for it.

I've been close to writing that very thing all day, because it used to be that way. One bad release was a mistake that was always allowed to be corrected years ago. That hasn't been how game companies operate for quite a while now however.

christheshitter wrote on May 7, 2024, 20:06:
So the head studio Arcane isn't being shut down the ones who did Dishonoured and Prey 2017 just it's subdivision Arcane Austin who made Redfall? I got it right? So their wiki page has got it all wrong then.

The wiki page is correct, though I've seen some people misunderstand the story today to mean all of Arkane is now gone, or else not be aware of which team made which games.

Arkane used to be one entity, they all worked together on the first Dishonored. Then they split into two distinct teams, Lyon (France) and Austin (Texas), and have been more or less alternating releases since then. While Austin made Prey (2017), Lyon made Dishonored 2. Lyon also made that standalone DLC aka 'Dishonored 2.5', Death of the Outsider, as well as assisted on those Wolfenstein FPS spin-offs Youngblood and Cyberpilot. Then while Austin made Redfall, Lyon made Deathloop and began working on the upcoming Marvel's Blade.

Squirmer wrote on May 7, 2024, 18:22:
Judging from the reporting on Redfall's development, Arkane was forced to make a game they didn't want to make, they lost all their experienced devs as a result, and now the rest of them are paying the price for poor management.

For people who would still say Arkane fucked up so they deserve it etc, consider that it should be possible to make a bad game without being eliminated for it. Like that's how a well functioning industry should run. The game industry is not well run, we all know this. Don't align yourself with the fucking bean counters.

Sometimes it should be possible. Sometimes it should not. Like it or not, in almost every job and every company there are some tasks or projects that can just NOT afford to fail. If this was a smaller expenditure game, they'd likely have more leeway. But a game where someone hands you hundreds of millions of dollars to make.... you'd better produce something that is at least good. If this was a game sitting at a 70% review score and sold passably well but still at a loss, they would still be in business. They made a game that struggled to scrape up a 50% review score average and it absolutely tanked in sales.

Alternately, if they had been making a game that was based on a solid and rock-steady IP, they probably would have been given the money and time to fix it. I'm pretty convinced that's why Fallout 76 wasn't just plain abandoned. It wasn't for the love of gamers or to be kind to their devs. It was because they couldn't afford to let the game tarnish the Fallout name, so they spent what they needed to in order to try and regain some face. Redfall is a new, unproven IP that is now irreparably stained. Could they have spent the money to fix it? Sure. But why? They weren't going to save the IP by doing so. The next game would have tanked just on the memory of the first unless they managed to pull a No Man's Sky which in my experience is not just rare, but very nearly a unique situation that no one investing millions is going to count on.

As far as the developers themselves, as I read it, all the really good, senior devs and designers already quit that studio, so what was there to save of the studio itself? The lower level devs could have been folded into other studios, perhaps, but that only works if there's room for that.

christheshitter wrote on May 7, 2024, 20:06:
So the head studio Arcane isn't being shut down the ones who did Dishonoured and Prey 2017 just it's subdivision Arcane Austin who made Redfall? I got it right? So their wiki page has got it all wrong then.

As far as I know, Redfall and Prey 2017 was Arcane Austin. Dishonoured and Deathloop are Arcane Lyon.

christheshitter wrote on May 7, 2024, 20:06:
I got it right?

Nope.

So the head studio Arcane isn't being shut down the ones who did Dishonoured and Prey 2017 just it's subdivision Arcane Austin who made Redfall?

- Arkane
- Dishonored
- its

Now it's right...

So the head studio Arcane isn't being shut down the ones who did Dishonoured and Prey 2017 just it's subdivision Arcane Austin who made Redfall? I got it right? So their wiki page has got it all wrong then.

I think you'll find it's spelled boner fide.

Judging from the reporting on Redfall's development, Arkane was forced to make a game they didn't want to make, they lost all their experienced devs as a result, and now the rest of them are paying the price for poor management.

For people who would still say Arkane fucked up so they deserve it etc, consider that it should be possible to make a bad game without being eliminated for it. Like that's how a well functioning industry should run. The game industry is not well run, we all know this. Don't align yourself with the fucking bean counters.

Pretty sad, I really like Tango’s games. I hope the main devs continue with their own studio. Their games seemed more indie style anyway. They don’t need to be triple-A these days. Open a small studio and keep making those great games!

It would be great if this were all about trimming the fat and returning Bethesda to the days of old when they were a seat-of-the-pants developer making great games to stay employed...but this is clearly about maximizing profits for shareholders and executives and was almost certainly part of the calculus that justified a $7.5B purchase of Zenimax in the first place.

Xeth Nyrrow wrote on May 7, 2024, 15:48:
Only reason I can think of is Tango got closed because Hi-Fi Rush was a guinea pig for an Xbox exclusive released on Playstation that didn't do well enough. It's a thin theory I'll admit but what else could it be? The fact it was a Japanese dev studio? Maybe Sony offered them more money.

Oh man, I SO hope Sony snaps them up. Helldivers 2 debacle aside, Sony's been KILLING it with their single player games.

Please tell me no one is shocked or surprised by this. I assume the people laid off weren't. The sword has been hanging over their heads since the purchase. I know the feeling. I had that sword hanging over my head for a decade before it fell.