kaisersoze, on Sep 4 2006, 12:46 PM, said:
I've heard the team was around 18 current people but now it may be as low as 7-8 people?! Wow.
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Now you're just being silly.
Cerberus_e, on Sep 4 2006, 10:16 AM, said:
Shacknews, if they didn't write that article, wieder would do the interview
A game that doesn't get released and people quitting one after another? Such stories are popular. People really like speculating, and so do I. So do you even, so does everyone
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Well it isn't really the Shacknews article itself. If Shacknews hadn't of written it someone else would have. It was the attention the departures were starting to get behind the scenes that made me uncomfortable doing the interview. I didn't want to potentially toss more fuel on that fire. It would be a little strange for me to continue to ignore the media email requests to confirm relatively straight forward facts, and then answer the sort of questions that were in the interview.
And yeah... I think the Shacknews article itself was fine. I can understand people wishing the speculation part hadn't of been there, but we have to ask ourselves honestly... if the same article had been about id or Bungie (or whatever developer you don't really follow closely)... wouldn't you have had the same questions about them? And that is for developers that don't have the crazy DNF development history on top of it.
I know if roughly 1/3rd of id left in the course of 3 months my eyebrows would raise and wonder why... and I wouldn't be surprised to see a story about it.
RedSplat, on Sep 4 2006, 11:45 AM, said:
I still wonder who the 'traitor' was that gave the scoop to Shacknews.
Could it really have been an ex-3DR employee?
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That's an interesting perspective to take.
If I were to guess based on some of the sort of inquiries *I've* gotten and ignored... it wasn't any one person. Remember, the people who have left almost all started looking for new jobs, and I know I'm not the only one who interviewed or at least touched base with multiple other developers. Everyone going to Gearbox had inquired about opportunities with other developers, or even interviewed with them. So this wasn't really news within the industry itself and that sort of word just spreads. Add in developers talking to their other developer friends about leaving/joining with a new developer and it's really not a "scoop" for a "traitor" to give out.
In other words it was inevitable and I'm honestly impressed it stayed out of the media attention as long as it did. I imagine the departures last week were what tipped the scales for the Shacknews guys to finally feel it was important enough. Based on stuff Maarten and Chris have said since it's clear they had sat on all the stuff leading up to last week and not done anything with it. For example they didn't run a story about me leaving, unlike many other places. So it's a bit silly to call it a scoop or think there needs to be any traitor.
Or think about it like this: If an employee wanted to "lash out" at or attempt to hurt 3DR... don't you think they would have by now? I think that through all the years of development everyone who has been a part of that project has been very professional and agreeable about the entire thing despite clear problems in the past which some even George has come forward with years later. I think everyone should be glad that this professionalism has been maintained and hope that it will continue to be maintained. Nobody needs an open discussion of the pros and cons of the internal situation at 3DR and so far no such discussion has come up. The Shacknews article doesn't really even scratch the surface of that sort of discussion and is mostly the factual reporting of employees combined with some speculation of the implications and reasons.
That's why when George said "you're only getting one side of the story"... he's actually right but not in the way I think he intended it. The public has ALWAYS only gotten 3DR's story. Can you recall a single employee who has "told their side"? The public gets some pretty detailed tidbits of info from time to time that are fully 3DR's story, as well as anytime a news situation does come up (departures, Take 2, etc) it is also the 3DR story in response.
And honestly that's as it should be and everyone should continue to be supportive and glad that it's been that way up until now. Current and ex-employees have not told their perspectives for the past 9 years out of professionalism, respect, etc.
Contrast this with how things went down with other people that left 3DR in the past (Ritual, RBR). They were very free with their opinions, etc. So I think it's a bad idea to start going down the "traitor" route or to suggest any of the people are out to get 3DR. These are good guys (from 1997 till 2006) and we've all worked hard to promote the positive image of DNF and 3DR because we cared about the project that much, we have friends there, it's the right thing to do, etc. No place is perfect which means that of course there are complaints and frustrations... but have you ever heard them from the employees of 3DR?
No.
And there is no secret that the delays are a good reason to complain through the years. That's just natural... but not once has a current or ex-3DR employee gone out there to give their perspective.
So let's keep it that way and not accuse people of being traitors or attempt to belittle Shacknews guys for reporting what was already pretty widely spread information that was going to surface eventually. I know this because anybody that attempted to email me had a more complete story than what was published... so even if I had wanted to respond them... there wouldn't have been anything to add.