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Crytek bankruptcy watch thread

Wirdschowerdn

Ph.D. in World Saving
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UDK, CrySDK are all available. Docs, Tutorials, Workshop videos etc. can be arquired. The rest is up to your real talent and sweat and time you put into it. Becoming a good trained artist takes a long time (and is expensive), that's why all those hacks with no skills or endurance end up being "writers" or producers or marketing drones. It's up to you who you want to belong to.
 

MetalCraze

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Oh I see, so Southpark is like that new direction for Obsidian's future? Fuck.

But Matt Stone believes only Obsidian is capable of making the game look just as crappy as South Park.
Is there any other studio being held in such a high regard?
 

Achilles

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It makes sense. Despite their dreams of making it big on consoles, it hasn't happened and it likely won't, ever. Going after the F2P market is a smart move, since the twin behemoths of COD and Battlefield don't have a meaningful presence there.
 

Wirdschowerdn

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Crysis 3, Ryse and Homefront 2 are not F2P as far as I'm aware. The first F2P game coming from Crytek will be Warface. I'm sure most of you cheapos are gonna enjoy it, 'cause if it has "free" in it's name, everything will be forgiven for the popamole Codex crowd.
I prefer to pay for and play real games.
 

Wirdschowerdn

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This multicult German is explaining to us that when we pre-order Cryshit 3, we will get extra cool thingies like a shotgun with silencer (!).

Are you cool enough to BECOME THE ULTIMATE JUNGLE HUNTER??? Pre-Order now!

 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Crysis 3, Ryse and Homefront 2 are not F2P as far as I'm aware. The first F2P game coming from Crytek will be Warface. I'm sure most of you cheapos are gonna enjoy it, 'cause if it has "free" in it's name, everything will be forgiven for the popamole Codex crowd.
I prefer to pay for and play real games.

But... but all games are free!
 

Papa Môlé

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Homefront? The one of shortest game in the market...? Oh, I get it. Koreans - the common denominator.

This was another game I got in that holiday THQ Bankruptcy Bundle.

Sweet fucking Christ. I have never seen a game so entirely linear, punish you so hard for not following the script, and at the same time so poorly communicate to you what the script is.

There were times I went slightly ahead of a teammate only to be immediately killed by, for one example, a tank busting through a wall for some cinematic event and then a guy to shoot "Look out Tank!" after I was already on the ground and dying. Other times I would hang back thinking I was supposed to be waiting for something until I realized the game was infinitely re-spawning enemies until I got to some random place on the map that I was supposed to be pushing for. Other times the game won't progress until you kill the specific guy your teammate is shouting to kill (good luck hearing that consistently in a battle) and yet other times you can't move forward until everyone in an area is dead.

There are also loads of invisible walls in combat zones, meaning if you think you can get a corner for cover think again. Enemies also have laser accuracy on hard (only against you though) and will hit you through a dime-sized hole. Most of them should have baseball players instead though, because they can throw grenades up and over an sandbag wall, around a crate, and behind the truck you're taking cover in. The AI isn't smart though, regularly I watched an enemy and a squad-mate try to shoot each standing out in the open and hitting a crate or box next to them because their weapons weren't aligned properly.

Every single sequence in that game was frustrating, boring, or both. Single worst FPS campaign I ever sat through. Thank God it *was* only five hours. I can't for the life of me understand why anyone complains about it being too short.
 

RK47

collides like two planets pulled by gravity
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Dead State Divinity: Original Sin
Bloodbowl 2 needs to be free to pay. :smug: default race is human. With rmt player transfer between players.
If its in the game its IN the game!
 

Wirdschowerdn

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http://store.steampowered.com/app/220980/

CryEngine now available on Steam for 10 bucks/month. It's royalty free, but it also lacks source code and console support. Big studios that want the whole package including 24/7 tech/on-site support still gotta shell out $1.2 million (rumored). The FreeSDK is no longer supported with updates.

Meanwhile, grassdoor gives us always a little glimpse into a company's internal politics and health:

http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Employee-Review-Crytek-RVW3413555.htm

Pros – There are lots of talented people to learn from. Some of the smartest people in the business work here. I plan to work with some of them again in the future after I'm safely away.

The Crytek name will still get you some attention from other studios. At least it's a stepping stone. Be quick, exploit it now before the whole mess goes public.

Cons – The usual story: Grew too fast, lowered hiring standards, threw inept "producers" and managers at projects. Chaos and ass-covering ensues. Vultures are circling.

The founder and real CEO is too hands-off and appears to have left Crytek to the other two 'founders' who are highly risk-averse and lack vision. I'm not sure exactly how it works, but Cevat has completely lost control to the point that people just nod their heads and pretend to listen, then proceed to do the opposite of what he asked as soon has his back his turned and he's flying to L.A.

The Kiev and Sofia studios have completely gone rogue at the expense of the vision.

I absolutely cannot recommend this company to anyone from now on. There is no real upside and I see them closing some studios in 2014. They could even collapse completely, or be bought out by a Far-East megacorp.

Advice to Senior Management – Congratulations on killing your visionary self-publishing business. What were you thinking? Merry Christmas! I won't be crunching this holiday.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company


http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Employee-Review-Crytek-RVW4176589.htm

Pros – Crytek used to be a nice place to work at, long, long time ago. Things were not perfect, but Far Cry & Crysis were great games made by great people. It was a time when taking risks and being bold were possible, a time when people were proud to work for Crytek.

Cons – The 3 Turkish owners seem to have abandoned the ship long time ago. No one really knows where the company's heading. Are they too busy driving their Ferraris? Or just overwhelmed and embarrassed by the monster they created? Where are they hiding?

The CEO seems to ignore what games are being developed in his studios or he's just being a very sloppy (self-proclaimed) creative director. Oh yeah, Crytek has a dozen of studios across the world (most of them in third world countries): that's the so-called "world domination"... There are like 1 billion projects developped at the same time. Focus level: 0%. Cancellation rate: 99%.

In Frankfurt, every single creative idea will be systematically ignored. Original projects pitched by capable people are regularly cancelled and teams are randomly shuffled. Instead, the company will now only work on generic f2p copies of existing games. Warface is the pinnacle of this new risk-averse strategy. Creativity level: 0%.

After the Ryse disaster, you might expect the company would rethink it's entire creative process, build a proper structure for reviewing projects and let people work on a project they could be proud of... You fool! You might at least expect better communication from upper management... Nope!

Results: the company is inexorably bleeding talents and cannot recruit senior staff. The Crytek I used to know is nearly dead, replaced by some giant soulless f2p factory.

Advice to Senior Management – Restart the whole thing? Sell? Fire half the staff and keep the members who can actually make a great game? Ask your employees how to improve the company?


Yep. As I suspected. Same old story as always. Too fast growth. Inept management. Decline.

I liked Crytek the most when they were a PC exclusive one-studio dev.
 
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