It is good to have a book on the shelves, but the book itself is not good.

My opinion of course, but bleh, it was not good.

You're entitled to your opinion of course. But I think the point the other poster made is legitimate. Elemental doesn't lack for backstory.

As for design... when you're designing a game on top of a mature platform, you know what you're working with.  In Elemental, the challenge on the design was dealing with a platform that was changing and having to alter the design.

I guess it's true what they say, you're only as good as your last game. I suppose I should just toss out two decades worth of editor's choice awards because Elemental was disappointing. Because, you know, I personally programmed the whole game by myself and every game feature or design choice was made in a completely academic setting where the sky was the limit... 

Kael's a friend of mine, we speak regularly and have for a long time. He's a very good designer and project manager. But the difficulties Elemental faced were not ones of design or a lack of backstory.  

To paraphrase, you have to work with the engine and development capabilities you've got. That's what happened with the stand-alone FFH. It's not an issue of design, it's an issue of development.

People look at Galactic Civilizations II and say "Great game!" but it's equally important to remember that its design derives from the fact that it was built on a platform that had been perfected over the previous nine years (Pear).

By contrast, Elemental: War of Magic 1.0 was released on a platform (Kumquat) that was released simultaneously and we all saw how that worked out.  Even in the 30 days since Elemental was released, the engine has made great strides and over time it'll become vastly more capable where the design and the engine are better matched up.

People without practical experience in software engineering act like you can just wave a magic wand and a complex software platform "just happens".  There's a lot of moving parts.  Scratch beneath the surface of any major game and you'll find a very large piece of software engineering underneath.

Long live Fall From Heaven!

Well the fact that Elemental is built off a new engine is hardly an excuse for it's issues.  It may be a reason, but not an excuse.

It boils down to 'the engine wasn't ready' instead of 'elemental wasn't ready', both equate to the same underlying failure.

Anyway, the comparisons between FFH and Elemental are not exactly technical, but about content from what I can see.  There's no reason Elemental couldn't have more/better content.  The combat and magic systems in particular are so devoid of interesting content (or just include broken mechanics which make them uninteresting) that you can't simply blame it on the engine.

Well the fact that Elemental is built off a new engine is hardly an excuse for it's issues.  It may be a reason, but not an excuse.

What does that even mean?  If the context is that I should hang up my hat as a game designer then yea, it's quite relevant.

 
It boils down to 'the engine wasn't ready' instead of 'elemental wasn't ready', both equate to the same underlying failure.

Do you have a game you've designed? ALL engines have limitations.  Try doing tactical battles with Gamebryo (what Civ IV used and Call from Heaven used). 

There is no such thing as a perfect engine. You do the most with what you have.

Anyway, the comparisons between FFH and Elemental are not exactly technical, but about content from what I can see.  There's no reason Elemental couldn't have more/better content.  The combat and magic systems in particular are so devoid of interesting content (or just include broken mechanics which make them uninteresting) that you can't simply blame it on the engine.

I look forward to your game and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.  In the meantime, go somewhere else.

Crikey.

So much negativity on all sides.

What he said was spot on, and this response was completely uncalled for. Guess nothing's changed.

Good grief. As a programmer, I can see that ti would be fairly easy for something as complex as the game appearing to work as intended before release and turn out to be far from ready. Just stop complaining and saying how things should have been and either go away or post constructive ideas for how to improve the game.

I'm sorry you think your purchase entitles you or others to endlessly complain or criticize our work on our own forums.  I can assure you it doesn't.

We are doing our best to address the needs and requests of our customers.  I will also continue to suggest that those who think we somehow intentionally or maliciously released something that was incomplete not purchase our future titles (or as the user above said "peed" on them).  The free market will decide whether there's continued demand/desire for our games.

Dadoo talks about spending $50 on a game that didn't perform to his satisfaction. Well, I spent millions on said title and I'm not terribly happy either. Unlike say 2KGames, we're privately held.. So I have to decide every day what projects get funding and what don't.  So I can assure you that no one is unhappier with how Elemental launched than I am. That's one of the reasons why I get so aggravated when someone suggests we knowingly released it with problems. 

It is always very tempting to vent about mistakes made in the past.  But what is done is done.  Now, the challenge and opportunity is what we do in the future.  I'm putting my money where my mouth is -- on Elemental and its subsequent updates. I am hoping that the community believes in it the way I do.

I agree they should have been caught. What would you have me do at this point? Would you like me to terminate the entire development and QA teams for it? Would that satisfy you? 

I'm here to help. But some of you seem to want to just endlessly vent on what happened. To what end?

I've tried to be as transparent as I can in communicating the process that led to the disappointing launch of the game. I've also outlined what we're doing to address that going forward and our plans to make sure that the game continues to get better.

For some of you, Elemental is a $50 game that was disappointing.  For me, it represents an investment of millions of dollars and 3 years of my life that has resulted in a seemingly endless deluge of anger and hatred often directed at me personally.  

I've acknowledged the mistakes I've made during the course of the game's development. But that doesn't mean I'm a bad game designer or project manager.  I founded this company on my own in college over 15 years ago and turned it into a $20 million company by making mostly sound business decisions and producing successful software products. My career has had its successes and its failures.  I try my best to learn from mistakes and move forward.

That's where we are now.  We've had a solid month of nearly uninterrupted criticism and often fairly harsh and occasionally vile commentaries directed as us.  It's time to take a deep breath and move forward and remember that the people on both sides of the screen are human beings.

We're here for you guys and we love doing what we do.  Let's roll up our sleeves and make some cool stuff together.

I understand where Brad is coming from. I worked at an engineering firm for period during my life where we had to work with..

• Budgets
• Designs
• Due Dates
• Software (What we used to build it on)

That's why I'm kinda chilling back here because I can understand the stress - I really can. The budget can influence the design, the due date (possibly in relation to the budget) can influence the design, and the limitation of the software can influence the design. I've also worked the 100 hours per week, trying to cram everything into a short period of time to meet the due date - you get so stressed that a thick fog rolls in and you can't think straight. Basically how I dealt with the stress is just telling myself that I'll do what I can do to the best of my ability, if people don't like it tough. Granted, I didn't tell clients that, I just told myself that.

I think Elemental is a good game, but it has a bunch of rough edges. This is pretty common for games built on a new engine. Give it a bit of time, let it work itself out (aka developers working on it to polish it) and it will be a gem. I can see people a decade from now saying "Hey, I hope you make this game like EWOM - man that game was good!". Like others have stated in the past, MoM is a memorable and enjoyable game. Yet, it had a very rough launch as well - yet with a bit of time it was a gem itself. I think EWOM will follow in those footsteps, at least concerning turning it into something very enjoyable as well as memorable in the long run.

[quote who="Xan" reply="92" id="2791248"]
@Dadoo2: For someone who can't even construct a properly quoted response you sure complain a lot about the faults in others.  Do you think Frogboy personally codes pathfinding in the game? If not, what does your comment have to do with game design? 

 
[/quote]

you do realize you press the little the quote button and it does the rest. this is what it produces. obviously this website has a problem with my browser or my browser settings, i must therefore be a moron, eh?

you also realize i have only posted about 20(guess this makes 21) messages, and that was my first post in this thread. wow, i just never shut up do i? and i bet all 21 are complaints too.

As for the rest, Frogboy crossed a line in my book, i called him on it. He's not pressing the matter, i won't.