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[a1s]

The company didn't start in game-dev. Their primary business has always been about the utility software.

<sigh> Yes it did. Like many companies of the era it was made by punk kid who viewed gamedev as a fun steeping stone to serious business (Infocom is perhaps the most famous example of this NOT working out). Arguably Stardock of 1993 is not the stardock of today (most of the company died with OS/2, making it lose most of their talent (not Brad though, obviously) and making them the developer of Windows reskins that we know and love), but I still think there's heredity.

[Rollory]

Brad Wardell has balls?

Yes.

Yes, he has the balls to tell mutually contradictory lies from week to week and expect not to get caught.  This guy does the legwork on rounding up all the various quotes:

http://scarsofwargame.com/DevBlog/?p=1452

Key bit: July 31, Wardell makes a post on his blog where he references all the design elements of the game that are bad - everything the players (and reviews) have been hitting him for.  Post-launch, he claims he had no idea the design elements were bad and was blinded by love of the product.  These two things can not both be true.

nenjin gives other examples in his post upthread.

Wardell's trying to play the plain-talking straight shooter and regain some ground with style points and hope nobody noticed how he's been contradicting himself.

It's never the crime, it's the coverup.

[nenjin]

Yeah, if anything this release has taught me not to go to bat for Wardell. I'd sort of forgotten all the pre-release dev diaries where he pointed to stuff going "it's bad!"

Also, I started playing Dominions 3 yesterday. Wardell should be ****ing ashamed.

[EuchreJack]

He's a CEO.  So far, his behavior is abhorent, but still better than almost anybody else with his job title.

EDIT: And what happened to this tread?  I go away for two days, and it's on page two?  Blasphemy!

[nenjin]

He's admitted mistakes were made and is detailing the update process. Yes, that makes him better than most AAA devs.

But most AAA devs wouldn't have stampeded out the door with their release either, and would have caught what apparently Brad and all of Stardock missed: that the game was barely functional when they released it.

So that makes him worse than a AAA dev in my book. A communicative dev who thinks more like a publisher doesn't earn points with me versus devs who say nothing, but put out a polished game when it was done or when their publisher forced them to go gold.

Rushing I can forgive. Rushing and blanketly declaring people are wrong about your game, when you haven't even sat down with the release version, I do not. That speaks to personality and culture issues with a dev house, that might be forgiven with a top quality release. But shit like that plus a bad release? Mmmmm no.

[Deon]

I was going to say something else about CEOs and Brads and how they are right or wrong...

But I won't.

Come on. Is there a reason to say the same thing over and over? Brad is a liar and Stardock failed, we know it. Let's try something new.

EDIT: And what happened to this tread?  I go away for two days, and it's on page two?  Blasphemy!

I'd say, let it die rather than continue discussing the same shit over and over .
Or say something related to the game and not more drama about Frogboy.

[nenjin]

Don't you have to actually buy a copy of the game before you can tell us we need to talk about the game? As someone else said on the their forums, bitching about Brad and Elemental has been more fun than playing Elemental. And I've only gotten about $25 worth of bitching out so far.

srs edit

[Deon]

Don't you have to actually buy a copy of the game before you can tell us we need to talk about the game?

No?

Ahem, you're probably right, sorry .

I think I will still buy it, but only when it's patched up enough to play it with friends.

[Viken]

The game is getting there, Deon.  Slowly but surely the game will turn into what everyone wanted and expected, even if we have to wait a year for it to be patched in full.  Don't worry about that. 

[thvaz]

I think Im crazy, but Im loving the game.

[GaelicVigil]

Don't know if anyone else has seen this yet, but a former Civ 4 modder has created an awesome app for making random maps.  What you end up with is 100x better than the default maps:

http://forums.elementalgame.com/395529

[Shadowlord]

Aha, but notice what Frogboy just said about how "That first expansion pack will be free to everyone who owns the game at the point of v1.3." That first expansion pack being the one with the multiplayer in it. Now invert that statement.

[Deon]

Do you mean those who purchase it later will have to pay for it? O_o

Don't know if anyone else has seen this yet, but a former Civ 4 modder has created an awesome app for making random maps.  What you end up with is 100x better than the default maps:

http://forums.elementalgame.com/395529

It's Cephalo! He's a god. He has made the PerfectWorld utility for DF too. He's just too awesome not to make it . Now when there're people like him modding the game, I am not worried about Elemental's future.

P.S. Send him a PM saying how it's cool, thanks and stuff like that. He deserved it.

[GaelicVigil]

Don't know if anyone else has seen this yet, but a former Civ 4 modder has created an awesome app for making random maps.  What you end up with is 100x better than the default maps:

http://forums.elementalgame.com/395529

It's Cephalo! He's a god. He has made the PerfectWorld utility for DF too. He's just too awesome not to make it . Now when there're people like him modding the game, I am not worried about Elemental's future.

P.S. Send him a PM saying how it's cool, thanks and stuff like that. He deserved it.

Wow, didn't know he did the same thing for DF.  Why this guy isn't working for some major gaming company by now making bank, is beyond me.

[Bluerobin]

Just thought I'd mention a post from yesterday that mentions they're working on patch 1.08 that includes turning the multiplayer on. They (Brad) say it'll be out late this week.