* Finish Programming the Game, THEN Find a Publisher [Archive]

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Xyyth

06-05-2005, 07:30 PM

Tenka

06-05-2005, 08:23 PM

Xyyth

06-05-2005, 08:58 PM

Tenka

06-05-2005, 10:39 PM

Seems like Heuristic Park was about 5 years in between game releases. In that timeframe and with the funding they already had, you would think this game would have turned out better. It's almost like they did work on it part time while working other jobs.

5 years? .. where'd you hear that? .. DL was only publicly known since last year, I would estimate it was in the works for 1.5 to 2 years max. In any-case since they had to pretty much build the engine from scratch (or build on an engine that was so old they might as well have), anything can happen during that time that sets production back a good month or 2. When it comes to programming no holds are barred, you have to account for murphy's law.. thats why no self-respecting developer sets a release date any closer than a year or a season within the first 3/4 of development.

Unfortunately DC didnt adhere to this common standard when they went announcing dates all over the place which never happened, and it only points out how badly they treated this game up to the point when they released it. HP on the other hand never released any information about the game that they felt wasnt set in stone.. they did release a lot of information, back since april 04 Chuk spoke regularly to potential consumers over at the Typhoon forums and we got to find out a lot of inside information.

But when DC announced the release of a demo and final release of a game back in Sep 04 and Chuk didnt, it became evident the kind of lack of communication and good treatment that was going on between the developer and their publisher.

chamr

06-06-2005, 12:54 AM

Think about it like this: HP is the rock band. The publishers are the label. The label fronts the rock band a certain amount of money to make their album by a certain time. If the band hasn't finished the album on time, but the label thinks it's worth the continued risk, they'll throw a little more money at it. However, at some point, the album needs to be done, or the label needs to pull the plug. Neither DC nor HP have bottomless pockets. I'm sure there's all sorts of stuff that went on and is going on behind closed doors that we have no clue about, but the basic premise of what happened is there's only so long a label can wait before they try to recoup their investment on the rock band. They ain't made of money, ya know.

Bugman

06-06-2005, 01:22 AM

I really dislike Publisher, there are the death for inovations and awesome Games.
Valves steam is also crap but i think its a move in the right direction. Im sick of 1000000000 sequels without inovations just because the Publisher want to make save Money............

Sigarr

06-06-2005, 03:14 AM

What I don't understand is why can't some of these independent companies like Heuristic Park program their game to completion and THEN find a publisher? That way you avoid the hassle of being hurried to market.

If the game is complete and is a very good game, any publisher would pick it up in a heartbeat. It's just good business all around.

Thats Not How the System Works unless You are in the Fortunate Position of being the Developer AND the Publisher Like Sony, Blizzard ( WoW ) and Electronic Arts ( UO).
Heuristic park was Formed By Bradley in 1995 AFTER He had a "Falling-Out" with Sir-Tech who Had Published His 3 Award Winning Crusader Series--1.Heart of the Maelstrom 2. Bane of the Cosmic Forge 3. Crusaders of the Dark Savant. These 3 Games are What Made Bradley Famous and they Made a Lot of Money for Both Sir-Tech and Bradley,especially Crusaders Of The Dark Savant which garnered All awards for the Year and Sold well over 175,000 Copies. The next Game Bradley was scheduled to do ( Before the Falling-out ) for Sir-Tech was Wizardry 8 Which ended up Being Developed and Published by Sir-Tech of Canada. Bradley Had Nothing to do with that at all-He was out on His Own. He began Developing a New Game He Would Call " Wizards & Warriors". Then He Began the process of Securing a Publisher. When a Developer Goes "Publisher Hunting" and he gets an "Interested" Publisher He Will then Send them a "Proffer". This includes the Percentage of the Game that is Currently Coded and Tested ( Most Publishers won't touch Anything that is not,at least,60% Finished ). From there the Developer Tells the Publisher How Much " Funding Money" He needs and the length of Time Expected to Complete the Game. From there,a Contract is Signed Between Developer and publisher. Unfortunately for many a Developer,Once the Contract is INKED by both parties the Publisher is Now " In the Drivers Seat" and call all the Shots. Bradley Finally Secured Activision as Publisher-Funder For his "Wizards & Warriors" Title. One Critical Thing to Keep in Mind Here is that the Publisher Is "Guaranteed" the First Money From Sales "Off-The-Top" before Any other Monetary Distribution is made. For Arguements Sake,Lets say that Activision agreed to Fund $200,000.00 PLUS whatever percentage Of "Funding-Fee" Interest was Agreed upon--this can Range between 17-35%. In this case,lets say Activision Charged a 25% "Funding-Fee" Which Means that Activision gets the FIRST $250,000.00 from The Initial Sales of the Game BEFORE any other Distribution of Monies are Made. This is where Things can get a bit "Hairy". The "Suits" at the publisher May Decide that the Developer is Taking too Long and that they Do not Want to Risk putting anymore Funding into the Project. They Push for a Pre-mature Release and that is Exactly what happened with Wizards & Warriors. Activision "Pulled the Plug" on Further Funding and the Game was Released before it Was Totally Completed. Further,Activision would Only Agree to Fund ONE Patch. The Second patch was Released By HP themselves. Unfortunately,for Bradley, Sales Were Not that Good. Activision,at Least, Recouped the initial 200K Plus a Profit of of 50K from funding Fee Interest. Bradley Was Lucky to have done Little More than "Break-Even" on the Game.
Bradley Had begun Work On Dungeon Lords sometime in 2000 or certainly by 2001 as that was the First Time I ever saw a "Brief" Interview with Bradley on what his New Game would be like. Bradley went "Publisher-Hunting" and was never Able to Secure a First-Rate Publisher so He Finally had to Settle for Going through an "International Consulting Firm--Schanz" to Secure A Publisher for the North American Area as well as other areas of the World-ended up having 5 Publishers World-Wide. The Rest is "History". DreamCatcher Became the "Prime Publisher"--The "Funding" Publisher. We All Know how it has Gone from there! We just don't know the Contract "Details" between HP and DC. What We Do know is that DC Pushed hard for an "Early Release" and,of Course,being in the "Drivers-Seat" they Got it. Where it actually Goes from here only Time Will Tell.

Xyyth

06-06-2005, 03:40 AM

You would think he would learn after the first time this happened and now it's happened again. It looks like he won't make much money from this game either.

NecroViolator

06-06-2005, 04:46 AM

Tenka

06-06-2005, 06:03 AM

I wonder what happened to the Super Programmers ?

I mean, yeh it takes YEARS to program from Scratch but Dungeon Lords was built on a OLD Game Engine, you would at least think they have gotten further than this...

There was Programmers that "Programmed" and made the Graphics "Models" all by them selves and released a game within a Year... WITHOUT BUGS and Dead parts of the game... Their games were really GREAT...

Probably not within the last few years ... can you name any? .. most of that kind of development existed around the era of Doom to the Era of Quake. To compete in nowadays market you have to be able to make super-hyper-mega-duper-bump-mapping-aspect-lighting-multiple-shadow graphics... which takes way too much manpower for 1 person to handle alone, at least not to complete within a realistic time frame. Of course this doesnt mean its still not a good idea .. in fact I would love to see someone do it, I would expect the games 'flash' to be not up to par but people who want to make games on their own bad enough usually have some really cool idea for a game that they need to get off their chest, and therefore it should show-off some creativity and perhaps even spark interest in the market allowing for a new genre to grow.

txa1265

06-06-2005, 08:49 AM

Zyxial

06-06-2005, 09:36 AM

It is the nature of the beast you might say. And it seems more true of RPG titles.

I also have Wizards and Warriors... I only found one major problem with that game that was thoroughly aggrevating, and that was the vampirism curse. The having to wait for the merchant texts to scroll wasn't that much of an issue for me, as I would just worked on things around the house during the wait (laundry, dishes didn't pile up, and my house was probably the cleanest during that time). I found that to be quite an in depth and thoroughly enjoyable game. A game that encouraged me to buy Dungeon Lords.

There is a huge disparity between these 2 games... and their states of release, content, and enjoyment. This should have been a much better game than it is... and you can see it, sense it, feel it, and hear it listening to this forum and the reviews...

I also agree with the finish than find a publisher. If DW hadn't spent all the money he had made from his prior releases than he could have spent more time developing this before seeking a publisher. It was a tough financial 3 years for everyone, considering the things that took place over the past 3 years. Maybe poor investments or just the downturn of the economy put DW in a position of having to. I can't say and is only speculation.

Actually, after I get done ripping thru Blade a few more times... I think I will load up Wizards and Warriors... that was a very nice RPG. And I should have time to finish the game before the second patch is forthcoming at this rate.

The environment, the story, the npcs, and just the flavor... Even with some of the bugs it had I found this to be a very fun game to play...

Oh and the best part of W&W was the box or website really didn't mention things that was never seen in the game.

I can live bugs, I can even pet them and feed them, and even accept them lovingly... but its the lies that leave a bad taste in your mouth...

wolf

06-06-2005, 09:38 AM

You're right, Xyyth, he should have learned from W&W: if DW Bradley had the same sort of experience with Wizards & Warriors 5 years ago, I have to conclude then that this current fiasco with DL is partly his fault.

Of course, what I would like more than theories is a little communication from someone official telling is what actually happened. If DWB wants to make some easy money in the future, he should write an autobiography, or better yet, a "fake" autobiography where he can make up names of companies he's had, projects he's been involved in where we all recognise them but nobody can sue him for defamation because of the "fictional" nature of the book.

In the words of a favourite Offspring song, "When will the truth come into season, I have a feeling it'll be a long time"....

Karas

06-06-2005, 09:55 AM

To compete in nowadays market you have to be able to make super-hyper-mega-duper-bump-mapping-aspect-lighting-multiple-shadow graphics... which takes way too much manpower for 1 person to handle alone, at least not to complete within a realistic time frame.

Unless of course you are John Carmack.... :)

txa1265

06-06-2005, 10:01 AM

Unless of course you are John Carmack.... :)

Um ... no. id software is huge, and the portion of Doom III that Carmack had any direct part of doing was pretty small. In the early days, he did the whole engine, now he is just the technical lead.

Mike

txa1265

06-06-2005, 10:03 AM

You're right, Xyyth, he should have learned from W&W: if DW Bradley had the same sort of experience with Wizards & Warriors 5 years ago, I have to conclude then that this current fiasco with DL is partly his fault.

That's the sad thing - reading Wizards & Warriors reviews you hear about the multitude of publisher problems, how he basically tried to 'finish & publish', and all the other stuff. It makes it pretty sad seeing how things are going now.

I would love to see a 'post-mortem' with Bradley on this at some point ...

Mike

wolf

06-06-2005, 10:31 AM

Yeah, when the moratorium on his NDA expires... :(

Tenka

06-06-2005, 12:57 PM

Um ... no. id software is huge, and the portion of Doom III that Carmack had any direct part of doing was pretty small. In the early days, he did the whole engine, now he is just the technical lead.

Mike

Umm ... yea I was going to say. Carmack not only had little to do with Doom 3's development/coding but Doom3 had a huge dev team behind it, not to mention that it alone took 6 WHOLE years for it to be completed with all the manpower and funding behind it.

The good thing about Id is they dont have to deal with the Dev vs Pub problems that others go through. Ever since they invented the FPS they have been swimming in money and can fund their own development, which is why they can take 6 years to make a game. I garantee you no Publisher in the world will fund a project for that long.

chamr

06-06-2005, 01:43 PM

I too would love to see a post mortem at some point, because I'm sure there's all sorts of things that happened that we have no idea about. I've been in the software development business my whole career, the last 8 years as a project manager. You'd be surprised how often stupid crap comes up that derails your project. On top of that, it's often very challenging to get technical folks and business folks to work together in a productive, efficient manner. That's even when a company invests in professional project management. I doubt HP or DC did that. More companies than not still fail to realize they cost themselves far more in not hiring professional project managers than they save by not paying them. Penny-wise, Pound-foolish. Anyhoo, I'm certianly not going to make apologies for HP or DC. There's no arguing that they botched the release and I'm sure there's plenty of blame to spread around. That said, it's still a really fun game, and we can only hope they have the time/money/endurance to get a few more patches out before economics dictate they move on to the next thing.

Alfheira

06-06-2005, 01:52 PM

Selling Computer Games today seems to be more like a stock market. If the ranking of an announced game is high enough in the pre-order lists a proper package is wrapped around the latest beta and it's rushed out. "SELL IT NOW!, SELL IT NOW!" - seems I can still hear the echoes of the DC marketing division. "Let the customers complain, most of them are wimpy cowards without the spine to take it back to the store". That's how money is made nowadays in the game business.

araczynski

06-06-2005, 02:01 PM

Unless of course you are John Carmack.... :)

man, that guy's been doing nothing but milking that first game. ever since then he's had other programmers doing the hard work.

buy hey, if he can keep milking the industry for his high salary, all the more power to him :)

txa1265

06-06-2005, 02:02 PM

"Let the customers complain, most of them are wimpy cowards without the spine to take it back to the store".It isn't just games, nor is it just software - remember how WinXP was released with a list of over 200 known bugs still on the boards? And in general there is a risk analysis done - because most modern products worth owning (aside from a Pet Rock) are too complex to map all possible effects and interactions across all possible install bases - so they must be released with a known possibility, and probability, of failure.

Mike

chamr

06-06-2005, 03:26 PM

It isn't just games, nor is it just software - remember how WinXP was released with a list of over 200 known bugs still on the boards? And in general there is a risk analysis done - because most modern products worth owning (aside from a Pet Rock) are too complex to map all possible effects and interactions across all possible install bases - so they must be released with a known possibility, and probability, of failure.

Mike

This is especially true with software. Many folks like to make comparisons to regular consumer products, but the two aren't comprable. Engineering and manufaturing a car, for instance, is a more easily controlled and predictable process. More of a science than an art, if you will. Coding software, especially software that is broad in scope, is a much more slippery endevor. More of an art than a science. While there are certainly many methods you can apply to control quality with software development, they aren't easy to do and are often very time consuming and costly due to the many, obscure inter-dependencies software is subject to.

Xyyth

06-06-2005, 03:29 PM

It isn't just games, nor is it just software - remember how WinXP was released with a list of over 200 known bugs still on the boards? And in general there is a risk analysis done - because most modern products worth owning (aside from a Pet Rock) are too complex to map all possible effects and interactions across all possible install bases - so they must be released with a known possibility, and probability, of failure.

Mike

I remember when Windows XP was released and Paul Allen was holding his big PR performance on TV saying how it is the most secure operating system and so forth. Windows XP security was so unstable after release that they are still plugging up security leaks today.

I hate it when people stand up there and blatantly lie to the public just to hock their shizzle. But, what can you do? You either use Windows or you go buy a Mac or use some other obscure operating system that nothing runs on. With games like this, they are a dime a dozen and consumers have a bigger choice. The developers should take special care to get it right the first time and not continuously repeat past mistakes. That's just stupid.

Shock

06-06-2005, 03:53 PM

I haven't seen more of these, but saw an estimate of the development costs of Vampire the Masquerade: Redemption, the 2000 RPG. Look at these numbers:

Full Time developers 12
Contractors 8
Budget $1.8 million
Length of development 24 months
Release date June 2000

This was *5* years ago, and the game was much smaller than DL, with *no* sidequests (not even class-advancement), and was pretty much totally linear.

Scale that up to today's costs, move the 20 total to 30, add in the extra 2-3 years of development time, coding and testing time ... and you end up with a game that must have been at least $4-5Million.

That is not the type of money a developer can just swallow.

Mike

But that's just it. They are using a lot of elements from Wizards & Warriors to make Dungeon Lords. Why on Earth would it take that long to complete this game? Well, I guess they still didn't really complete it. I understand what you are saying but I don't buy that excuse when it comes to HP and Dreamcatcher.

Instead of waiting for 60% of the game to be completed before finding a publisher, they need to wait until it's 90% completed and then maybe stuff like this won't happen.

txa1265

06-06-2005, 04:05 PM

I understand what you are saying but I don't buy that excuse when it comes to HP and Dreamcatcher.

I'm not excusing anyone, I'm just stating that the modern reality of game development costs makes it nearly impossible for a small developer to 'self-fund' ... unless they have day jobs ;)

Mike

Shock

06-06-2005, 04:09 PM

Maybe they should get day jobs.

Right now, they are working for charity because not many are gullible enough to buy their game right now with all these problems. Hence, they aren't making that much money. It's their own fault.

Tenka

06-07-2005, 02:37 AM

You know.. I would argue that the W&W engine was so far behind that they practically had to scratch build it.. of course there isnt enough evidence to prove or disprove that. The fact of the matter remains that good games take a long time and any programming project can have bugs/incompatibailities at any time which delays a project further.. at any time you could add a module to your program and have it conflict with everything else, at any time you could attempt a new module and have so many bugs to fix that it is unfeasible to add the feature within the remaining time. Designing any programs and specifically Games and Media applications dont just take time.. they take leniency, and any developer or publisher who doesnt accept that fact is doomed to fail.

Shock

06-07-2005, 11:22 AM

Considering the quality and rating of most Dreamcatcher games, I would say they are doomed to fail. Someone there needs to wake up.

Shock

06-07-2005, 03:45 PM

"As you might imagine, during the past several decades my approach to creating leading edge RPG and my computer game design philosophy has evolved quite a bit, and Dungeon Lords is a quantum leap, the crowning achievement of a lifetime's worth of experience to create a new class of RPG that really takes you there" - quote by DW Bradley

Takes you where? Back to the software store? haha!

snowdog

06-07-2005, 08:38 PM

chamr
Senior Member Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 102
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Think about it like this: HP is the rock band. The publishers are the label. The label fronts the rock band a certain amount of money to make their album by a certain time. If the band hasn't finished the album on time, but the label thinks it's worth the continued risk, they'll throw a little more money at it. However, at some point, the album needs to be done, or the label needs to pull the plug. Neither DC nor HP have bottomless pockets. I'm sure there's all sorts of stuff that went on and is going on behind closed doors that we have no clue about, but the basic premise of what happened is there's only so long a label can wait before they try to recoup their investment on the rock band. They ain't made of money, ya know.

I love the rock band analogy but you forgot about the groupies.
All the people who payed for for this album are the groupies.
And, like usual, the groupies get screwed.

chamr

06-08-2005, 01:16 AM

I love the rock band analogy but you forgot about the groupies.
All the people who payed for for this album are the groupies.
And, like usual, the groupies get screwed.
:D good one

NecroViolator

06-08-2005, 10:15 AM

~Tenka...

Yes I can name one...
Tony Crowther... Made games by himself... Captive. Captive II, with Models... :eek:
Tony did the Programming and GFX, his brother made the music... :D

What are family for... ;)

txa1265

06-08-2005, 11:40 AM

Shock

06-08-2005, 08:26 PM

How about someone who works here giving us all an update on the situation with Dungeon Lords? Some of us are curious as to what's happening with this game and to what degree stuff is being fixed.

EmilyH

06-08-2005, 11:27 PM

There was Programmers that "Programmed" and made the Graphics "Models" all by them selves and released a game within a Year... WITHOUT BUGS and Dead parts of the game... Their games were really GREAT...

I think they must have all got laid off and their jobs went to India.

Seriously, have you tried looking for programming jobs anytime recently? Not much out there that is anything other than senior-level development, at least in the Midwest.

Shock

06-09-2005, 01:04 PM

I think they must have all got laid off and their jobs went to India.

Does that mean there won't be a secret cow level?

NecroViolator

06-09-2005, 02:05 PM

~Mike, txa1265

He has programmed games on the PC as well...
I cannot remember that bloody name of the game...
It was a awesome game though... It was on 5 CDs... A RPG....

txa1265

06-09-2005, 02:10 PM

~Mike, txa1265

He has programmed games on the PC as well...
I cannot remember that bloody name of the game...
It was a awesome game though... It was on 5 CDs... A RPG....

Cool - but I couldn't find it ... regardless, it is an extreme rarity ...

Mike

Shock

06-10-2005, 04:19 AM

~Mike, txa1265

He has programmed games on the PC as well...
I cannot remember that bloody name of the game...
It was a awesome game though... It was on 5 CDs... A RPG....

Is this something recent because I don't know of many RPGs that came out on 5 CDs. I remember Stonekeep but that was on less than 5 CDs I believe and he wasn't associated with that.

Emulated

06-10-2005, 04:33 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by txa1265 It isn't just games, nor is it just software - remember how WinXP was released with a list of over 200 known bugs still on the boards? And in general there is a risk analysis done - because most modern products worth owning (aside from a Pet Rock) are too complex to map all possible effects and interactions across all possible install bases - so they must be released with a known possibility, and probability, of failure. Mike
Quote: chamr
This is especially true with software. Many folks like to make comparisons to regular consumer products, but the two aren't comprable. Engineering and manufaturing a car, for instance, is a more easily controlled and predictable process. More of a science than an art, if you will. Coding software, especially software that is broad in scope, is a much more slippery endevor. More of an art than a science. While there are certainly many methods you can apply to control quality with software development, they aren't easy to do and are often very time consuming and costly due to the many, obscure inter-dependencies software is subject to.

Xbox and Ps2 games are crapy and most of the time have bugs also, you would think that if they knew the system specs for the Xbox or Ps2 they would be able to make it bugless but there still in the games

NecroViolator

06-10-2005, 07:43 AM

I remember something with the name "Realm" or "Realms" in the name... :confused:

Shock

06-10-2005, 02:42 PM

What I find disturbing is that a post like the "Concerning Developer Bashing" post which is sort of in favor of the mods and devs gets locked out.

http://dreamcatcherinteractive.com/forums/showthread.php?t=23145

I mean, out of all the negativity on this messageboard, that one post gets locked. People are seriously living in an alternate reality. What a joke.

Patch61

06-10-2005, 02:53 PM

That thread got locked because it devolved into name-calling and flaming. Well, maybe devolved isn't the right word, because it started with name calling. ;)

Shock

06-10-2005, 02:54 PM

So what's new around here?

Shock

06-10-2005, 08:28 PM

Gamespot Interview (http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/dungeonlords/preview_6100790.html)

GS: Tell us a bit about the game's magic system. How flexible and powerful will it be, and will every class have some kind of magic ability or just certain ones?

DWB: On magic: There are four distinct schools of magic and more than 90 spells in all. (Or maybe there are more than 120. I lose count!)

GS: In cooperative mode, will the game scale in difficulty to accommodate the number of players?

DWB: Yes, absolutely. The game actively considers the party's relative strength and makeup, and so the challenges are weighted accordingly. I should also point out that Dungeon Lords allows players to import their single-player character heroes (presumably already developed to some degree) into the multiplayer campaigns.

GS: And when can we expect Dungeon Lords to wrap up development so that we can finally play it?

DWB: Dungeon Lords is coming this fall for the PC. We also have big plans for the franchise thereafter! Stay tuned!!

-----------------------

RPGDot: As for gameplay and interface: Is there an automap, a journal and a quest book? Are there multiple choice dialogues?

DW Bradley: Yes, of course! Dungeon Lords is very involved story-wise, and is a fairly massive world, it would be a crime to expect anyone to keep up with everything without these kinds of helpful features. If by "multiple choice dialogs" you are asking whether there is game branching based upon player's choice of response to dialog, then yes, absolutely

-----------------------

http://www.pewterkingdom.com/Olszewski/RonLeePinocchio1539.jpg

Emulated

06-10-2005, 09:06 PM

The funniest thing still hast to be the part where he said: Yes, of course! Dungeon Lords is very involved story-wise, and is a fairly massive world, it would be a crime to expect anyone to keep up with everything without these kinds of helpful features.

a link to keep you Occupied untill patch ;)
http://dreamcatcherinteractive.com/forums/image.php?u=60390&dateline=1117234405

ForceInfinity

06-10-2005, 09:14 PM

Xbox and Ps2 games are crapy and most of the time have bugs also, you would think that if they knew the system specs for the Xbox or Ps2 they would be able to make it bugless but there still in the games

Just from a software engineer's point of view, I can tell you that role playing games, especially those that are non-linear are probably the toughest games to program because you have to account for about every conceivable way a player can take through the game, play balance, write a database for the items, yada yada yada

You're not going to find everything and it's never going to be perfect...and if your publishers/managers tell you to jump off a cliff, you got to jump off the cliff or lose your job..

No win situation really

Nobody

06-11-2005, 05:42 AM

Games of 5 CD's:
How about "Baldur's gate" I and II.

Priest4hire

06-11-2005, 06:32 AM

I remember something with the name "Realm" or "Realms" in the name... :confused:

Realms of the Haunting. Not an RPG but it did come on a number of CDs - mostly due to the numerous FMVs it contained. Didn't exactly have a cutting edge engine even when it was released. Good game though. Since then Antony Crowther has worked on a number of games the last of which was Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. He most certainly did not program that game by himself. Actually, he's listed as designer among 16 other fellows.

NecroViolator

06-11-2005, 07:00 AM

Yes, BUT, BUT, I was talking about when he MADE the games himself on the Amiga... AND Mike said he doesn't remember any PC Games he programmed on... Tony Crowther was the Lead programmer in games and I loved his work... At least he made sure there was no BUGS...And his games were COMPLETE... God I love big letters... Gota stop that... EEK time... :eek:

The Realms Of The Haunting was before this GFX with Hardware Acceleration.
I believe Voodoo came out that same year...

God so many years have pasted ?.. And yet we still cant get anything right...

My years should be on the backside of the milk carton because I wanna know where they all went... :eek:

Xyyth

06-11-2005, 02:03 PM

So, I heard that Mindscape has picked up Dungeon Lords for International release. Is this true?

Xyyth

06-11-2005, 09:14 PM

Nevermind to my question above. I found the answer.

NecroViolator

06-12-2005, 06:28 AM

Mindscape....
Arent they the company that released some games for the Amiga and PC a long time ago... ?...
And I wonder if Tony Crowther "used" to work there as well... :eek: ...
Wonder if he is still there... :rolleyes:

Shock

06-12-2005, 10:48 AM

I really don't give a **** about Tony Crowther. He hasn't done squat lately and I don't know him. If you want to talk about him some more then go make a seperate thread about him. I never owned an Amiga and don't plan on digging through garage sales just to find an archaic dinosaur so I can play his old azzed games. Jeesh! If you're trying to hunt him down for a date then go try a dating service.

Shock

06-12-2005, 10:49 AM

By the way, has anyone actually played "Wizards & Warriors"? Is the game good?

Visigoth

06-12-2005, 10:57 PM

I remember something with the name "Realm" or "Realms" in the name... :confused:

Realms of the Haunting? Good game.

Shock

06-13-2005, 12:39 PM

By the way, has anyone actually played "Wizards & Warriors"? Is the game good?

I guess not.

txa1265

06-13-2005, 12:43 PM

By the way, has anyone actually played "Wizards & Warriors"? Is the game good?

I'm not sure about here, but I have heard decent things about it elsewhere ... I bought it but have gotten bogged down in Character Creation - since you can roll a vastly different character, I spend way too much time getting 'good' rolls ...

You can get it cheap, and if you are into that sort of thing, it is supposed to be decent.

Mike

Xyyth

06-14-2005, 02:47 AM

This sounds exactly like Wizardry 8 also. I just reinstalled that game on my computer and I know it's going to take forever to make 6 characters. I've noticed the controls are kind of funky in that game sort of like Gothic 2. At least both are supposed to be good games.

Sigarr

06-14-2005, 04:08 AM

By the way, has anyone actually played "Wizards & Warriors"? Is the game good?
I played it when it was first released. Its a Decent Enough game and Worth Playing. You can probably find a copy fairly cheap on eBay.

AEROPAIN

06-14-2005, 06:18 AM

The only way to improve this game is to start over and trash the present 1.
Thourght i would add my own cents worth now i have almost finished it.And that is this game sux,i mean really sux.Im one of those people who starts a game has to finish it no matter how bad except for one exception which was DAIKATANA :o
This game looks and feels like it was destend for a 90`s release or even an early 2001 but not 2005?.Im guessing an employee found this unfinished title wile dusting the unfinished junk pile or it was given to Heuristic Park,Typhoon Games by the rival competition to ruin them(sucess)<some one send them a clue.This is coming from a person who spends more time playing games than living,sad but true!Onn top of all that i enjoy this patictular junra of games.

AEROPAIN...

Xyyth

06-14-2005, 03:53 PM

The graphics in Dungeon Lords look more polished than Gothic 2 and I think that game came out in 2002. The graphics aren't really the problem. It's the wonky AI and the missing elements.

Xyyth

06-16-2005, 01:00 PM

I think the majority of people expect a reasonable amount of quality from the games they buy and Dungeon Lords wasn't really even up to that standard when released. I don't think the consumer's expectations were too high. I think the quality control of the game was too low. It might be just complete enough to be playable but there's a lot of missing stuff that was intended to be in the game.