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38 Studios and BHG closed

Izuno

By Izuno
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ChopperDave

ChopperDave

Posted
Posted

I know a guy who was at BGH. He isn't terribly happy at the moment. But this part (written by an employee) is what gets my blood boiling:

"38 Studios just laid off its entire staff, both Providence and BHG studios are being shuttered.

We have not received a paycheck since April 30th.

On May 15th, we found out we were not getting paid when our checks did not hit our accounts.

Our medical insurance runs out tonight at midnight.

We found this out when an employee's pregnant wife was told by her doctor, this was on Tuesday 22nd May this week.

The company has not communicated anything concrete to the team throughout this process, leaving team members to figure out insurance stop-gaps (where people could afford it), etc. on their own."

Furyo

Furyo

Posted
Posted

The business plan for this company sounds (from the reports) like the worst business plan I've heard of in our industry. Just plain wow. Building a 400 strong dev army to make a MMO...as the company's first game. Wow. Simply brilliant.

And this debacle of a collapse was just baffling and infuriating. Irrational is looking to hire a few of the 38 guys.

Chimeray

Chimeray

Posted
Posted

And another one bites the dust :(

So how come they expected to sell 3m units for a new IP, and an RPG at that... New IP's barely sell anything these days, and it's been like that for years... At least that's my impression.

Launch new IP, don't go all out... Succesful? Alright spend big and make number 2.

The Witcher 2 sold 1,1m units so far...

Just unrealistic expectations, I wonder who's the blame for this. Probably nested...

I suppose the MMO was the last nail in the coffin then? It's a shame cos it looked good, but if you put 400 people to work on something like that results will come quick... It just won't be sustainable.

My sympathy goes out to the people affected :(

Mazy

Mazy

Posted
Posted

It's the usual big budget game stuff; production drags and the budget keeps increasing to the point where breaking even is well above what's actually realistic, at least at full price, and that's assuming that the break even numbers were achievable to begin with.

Really sad tho. Didn't play Amaluer (looked incredibly generic), but I've played a lot of Big Huge's games, huge respect for those guys. Hopefully they can get scooped up by other studios or start new studios.

knj

knj

Posted
Posted

It's like almost written in books that your first project shouldn't be a big game, specially not a MMO shit !

it sad for those guys tho, hope they can pull smth out of it

Izuno

Izuno

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Guess this point was missed in my post above but I'll be more explicit:

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-hist ... nicus-dies

On May 24, 1543, Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus dies in what is now Frombork, Poland. The father of modern astronomy, he was the first modern European scientist to propose that Earth and other planets revolve around the sun.

May 24, 2012: Copernicus the MMO dies.

My friend who was the GM of BHG pointed that out on FB. Anyhoodles... :rolleyes:

http://630wpro.com/Article.asp?id=2462508&spid=37719

Schilling took to his Facebook account striking back at the Rhode Island governor. “"I wanted to clear up some misinformation around 38 Studios first product, Reckoning, Sales of Reckoning OUTPERFORMED EA’s expectations and sold more than 1.2 million units in the game’s first 90 days in the market.” posted Schilling.

So 1.2 million units...let's say average price of $60 at retail/steam. Assume average WSP of $48...that equates to a rough $58 million in wholesale revenues to the publisher on down. I don't know the trickle down to BHG or 38, but it makes you wonder what exactly was going on there. If 1.2 million units in 90 days exceeded EA's expectations, then was this still not enough to prevent this financial problem 38 had? Doesn't add up other than things were not planned or managed effectively, but we're not privy to all the info here.

  • 2 weeks later...
Thrik

Thrik

Posted
Posted

Yeah that's nice to see. :)

Really sad write-up about the studio's demise here:

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/1694 ... Report.php

"While the average company salary has been quoted around $86,000, many many individuals were making far less than that, and living paycheck to paycheck," says a 38 Studios employee. "When we didn't get paid, it immediately became very difficult for a number of people, but they continued coming in and working anyway. As it seemed like things were not being resolved, people started bringing in extra food and leaving it in the kitchen for anyone who needed it to grab."

:sad::sad::sad::sad::sad:

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