413 réponses à ce sujet

[JeffZero]

Indeed. (One of those tweets was mine, even.)

No response at all is generally the preferable path in these situations.

[Jaquio]

Guys, not to be a killjoy, but despite the fact that you are clearly enjoying yourselves, I have to say I'm not entirely sure how discussing bobba fett and the merits (or lack thereof) of ME3 endings pertains to the subject at hand, namely the potentiality that Mr. Schlerf might have departed (or might have been departed) from Bioware.

Honestly, I don't know what to think. Though the fact that there even is speculation about the status of the position of the lead writer does raise some concerns. If I were to wage a wild and thoroughly unsubstantiated guess as to what is going on, I would say that either Mr. Schlerf or Bioware has served a termination notice. What often happens in those situations is that the employee goes and stays home for the duration of the notice period, where his employment as such only terminates upon its expiry. Basically, although he's technically still an employee, he's not doing any actual work and he only becomes "practically" fired after whatever the notice period is runs out. This is usually done with departures that aren't exactly friendly. If this is the case, my guess is there won't be any official clarification, whether by means of a press release or simple LinkedIn profile update until the hypothesized notice period runs out and the parting of ways becomes "real" so to speak. So let's wait and see.

So yeah. As I said, wild and thoroughly unsubstantiated.

 

It's speculative sure, but I don't know if I'd go as far as "wild."  I think there's a lot of smoke here, enough to reasonably conclude that there's fire.

 

But yeah, as JeffZero and Killroy have intimated, he's probably gone.  But I'd go as far as to guess that Bioware terminated his employment, or at least forced him out.  If he wanted out for personal reasons, he would have probably addressed that and would no longer list himself as head writer on his twitter feed.  Bioware's silence is also meaningful - although you don't want to talk about the employment status of your current or former employees, you categorically never discuss firings unless absolutely necessary.  It's too much of a litigious liability.

 

Of course, purely speculative.

[Han Shot First]

I wonder if this is responsible for Bioware being so tight-lipped about Andromeda. Other than telling us where it is set, we haven't heard anything substantive about the game. Major rewrites, perhaps?

[Sylvius the Mad]

I'd say people rejected the polychromatic "save the galaxy from space Cthulhu" even more 

I doubt ME3's reception made BioWare worried that they'd killed the franchise.

 

DA2's reception did (they've even said as much).

[JeffZero]

People on average seemed quite fine fighting space Cthulhu. Plenty of casual Mass Effect fans I've spoken with have boasted their knowledge, much of which is limited to, "gotta fight those Reapers." It was accepted pretty well, in my estimation.

[CronoDragoon]

Mass Effect 2 is kind of a weird game for me, because despite agreeing with many of the complaints leveled against it, it remains one of my favorite games. 

 

I don't think that's weird at all. Games like any form of art are more about the experience than some performance review weighing pros and cons. If the experience clicks for you all the bad things can simply not matter.

[JeffZero]

Yep. Reminiscent of my experience with ME3. I'm well-aware of its flaws. I still love it.

[Wulfram]

I wonder if this is responsible for Bioware being so tight-lipped about Andromeda. Other than telling us where it is set, we haven't heard anything substantive about the game. Major rewrites, perhaps?

I don't know. As I recall since they announced they always said they weren't going to say much this year

[JeffZero]

Yeah, I mean, it could tie in. But I haven't expected much from 2015 in general... and so far, I haven't been let down...!

[Killroy]

They try to avoid stepping on their other games' toes. Most of 2015 was for Inquisition. They had to sell DLC.
This has been their strategy for years now. I would imagine now that Inquisition's final DLC has been released they will start dribbling out Andromeda news shortly.

[themikefest]

I wonder if this is responsible for Bioware being so tight-lipped about Andromeda. Other than telling us where it is set, we haven't heard anything substantive about the game. Major rewrites, perhaps?

If that's the case, it might delay the release of the game until 2017

[FKA_Servo]

If that's the case, it might delay the release of the game until 2017

 

That's what I'd expect anyway, honestly.

[Killroy]

Why would they have to rewrite the game? If they weren't happy with what Schlerf was writing they would start pivoting right away. They wouldn't wait until they were 2.5 years into the process and for the pink slip to go out, like they're afraid of making a writer upset. That's not how businesses operate.

[Ahriman]

I wonder if this is responsible for Bioware being so tight-lipped about Andromeda. Other than telling us where it is set, we haven't heard anything substantive about the game. Major rewrites, perhaps?

I don't think it's likely. Bioware are renown for their stories, but honestly it never was Azimov-tier writing, I know people on BSN who could fit into Bioware's quiality standart. I can't imagine how Schlerf would screw up things so much.

[Jaquio]

I don't think it's likely. Bioware are renown for their stories, but honestly it never was Azimov-tier writing, I know people on BSN who could fit into Bioware's quiality standart. I can't imagine how Schlerf would screw up things so much.

 

Yeah, I personally can't imagine that this is necessarily because of Schlerf's incompetence, even though I'm somewhat skeptical that he can bring what this genre needs.  If I were a betting man, I'd assume that almost a decade of apprenticeship under Casey has taught Mac some spectacularly awful managerial skills in his newfound position.

[Han Shot First]

Why would they have to rewrite the game? If they weren't happy with what Schlerf was writing they would start pivoting right away. They wouldn't wait until they were 2.5 years into the process and for the pink slip to go out, like they're afraid of making a writer upset. That's not how businesses operate.

 

Actually it happened with Bungie & Destiny, so its not entirely beyond the realm of possibility. Although with Destiny it seems it wasn't so much rewrites as taking story elements written from that writer and tossing it into the rubbish bin. 

[Killroy]

Actually it happened with Bungie & Destiny, so its not entirely beyond the realm of possibility. Although with Destiny it seems it wasn't so much rewrites as taking story elements written from that writer and tossing it into the rubbish bin.

Destiny is entirely atypical. They took a full game and cut most of its content to sell later as DLC, then scrapped most of that content.
Destiny is not indicative of normal game development.

[LinksOcarina]

I doubt ME3's reception made BioWare worried that they'd killed the franchise.

 

DA2's reception did (they've even said as much).

 

A shame too. I know you are not a huge fan of the game but Dragon Age 2 is probably their most grounded story so far, and with that, for me at least, one of the more complex ones to boot.

[Sylvius the Mad]

A shame too. I know you are not a huge fan of the game but Dragon Age 2 is probably their most grounded story so far, and with that, for me at least, one of the more complex ones to boot.

I'm a huge fan of DA2's plot structure. I've said so many times. There's no clear objective for much of the game. There's an unreliable narrator. DA2 grants the player some amazing tools with which to headcanon.

Unfortunately, the game also fails in ways I never thought possible, so overall it's still terrible, but in that one way DA2 might be BioWare's best game.

[Iakus]

I doubt ME3's reception made BioWare worried that they'd killed the franchise.

 

DA2's reception did (they've even said as much).

The DA2 reception was far less intense than ME3's.

 

But yeah, shooters are cash cows.  It'll take more than tens of thousands of angry fans to shut that pipeline down...

[Mathias]

So Open World AND the Lead Writer no longer working on the game? This is killing my enthusiasm for the game.

 

But to be quite frank I always had very little faith in the next Mass Effect game. Because Mass Effect 3 felt like the end to the franchise. There was this definite attitude from Casey Hudson that this was it. Andromeda honestly feels like Bioware is developing the game because EA told them to because the previous games were successful. I could be wrong but this is the feeling I'm getting here. It's not like Mass Effect 1-3 where there was this huge enthusiasm from Casey Hudson and his team. They had this vision of a story they wanted to tell. 

 

I haven't gotten any of that from Andromeda's team. In fact I'm surprised at how quiet they've been about this game. We still haven't seen ANY gameplay or gotten any real details. I was surprised that all we got was a teaser trailer at E3. I know the game is over a year away (and honestly will probably be delayed anyway), but even still, I find it odd we have to wait til the end of 2015 to finally get some real details on it.

 

EDIT: Not to mention Mac Walters being the Creative Director. Yikes. 

[Killroy]

So Open World AND the Lead Writer no longer working on the game? This is killing my enthusiasm for the game.

Neither of those things is confirmed.

[Mathias]

Neither of those things is confirmed.

 

It's gonna have that Open World approach. I absolutely guarantee it.

[JeffZero]

Totes.

[Killroy]

It's gonna have that Open World approach. I absolutely guarantee it.

Your guarantees don't mean anything to me.