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World of Darkness Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 from Hardsuit Labs

Xelocix

Learned
Joined
Dec 25, 2020
Messages
458
Location
Your moms panty drawer
I do enjoy posting doom-and-gloom Glassdoor reviews about this company.

January 11, 2021
"Uncertain past, shaky future"
Current Employee - Software Developer in Seattle, WA
Doesn't Recommend
Negative Outlook
Disapproves of CEO

I have been working at Hardsuit Labs full-time

Pros

Easy job interview

Most devs directly working on project are great

As long as big project going, some short-term security

Can talk with high-level execs

Cons

Can talk with high-level execs, but talk won't bolster morale or provide clear direction

Agendas vs. results often skewed, can spend too much time on abstract politics and personal agendas vs. making the game and getting something running in-engine

FPS studio making an RPG with little experience

Too easy job interviews, results in questionable hires

High turnover rate

Growing nepotism in design/writing

System design skills weak

Poor training in production and lead roles

Future is uncertain after big project is released

Advice to Management

Figure out next steps, communicate them confidently

Recognize past mistakes on project, but also act on them

Please have a more thorough interview process

I'm puzzled how this guy put "easy job interview" as a pro and then followed it up with "Actually it's too easy, needs to be harder and more thorough" and "Most devs directly working on project are great" followed by "devs making an RPG with little experience," "growing nepotism," and "system design skills weak." What makes them great then? I suppose maybe the artists have it together.

This is easily the most unsurprising thing I've read all year so far. It basically just highlights all of the problems that've been hinted at over the past year or two and confirms them.

As for how bipolar/contradictory the pros + cons are, I think it's probably due to this person having Stockholm Syndrome if Hardsuit Labs hired them in the middle of the current """pandemic""". They probably couldn't land a job for months due to how hard the gaming industry has been hit by this shit, and now feel a sense of gratitude to the company as a result. I think it's likely that Hardsuit fired a bunch of people when Covid began, but the game fell drastically behind schedule as a result so they panic-hired new employees once they started receiving financial aid. It would explain their complete lack of care for hiring actual talent, how quickly they've been burning through employees, and all of the Ubisoft whip-crackers they've brought in to speed development up.
 

snoek

Cipher
Joined
May 5, 2003
Messages
1,125
Location
Belgium, bro
Second half of 2021 is the most optimistic official take.
Bah, that's ages. I thought it was originally slated for end of this year, guess Paradox has a lot of money to burn.

They definitely have phat stacks to burn, seeing as how you need to purchase $500 in DLC's just to unlock the full version of their games. Their usual target demographic consist of autistic spergs with too much disposable income on their hands, and they've made a lot of bucks keeping it that way over the years.
autistic neckbeards living off that sweet gubmint money
 

HansDampf

Arcane
Joined
Dec 15, 2015
Messages
1,471
Agendas vs. results often skewed, can spend too much time on abstract politics and personal agendas vs. making the game and getting something running in-engine
I bet this won't reflect in the narrative at all.
 

Takamori

Learned
Joined
Apr 17, 2020
Messages
875
At this point we are just here to watch the plane crash, because the flames and smoke are visible from miles away. Any of you gonna risk on this?
If they manage to put this product on the shelf
 

typical user

Arbiter
Joined
Nov 30, 2015
Messages
957
Can someone please give a TL;DR what is happening with this game and why is it compared to a plane bursting in flames nosediving at tremendous speed?
 

Caim

Arcane
Joined
Aug 1, 2013
Messages
15,468
Location
Dutchland
Can someone please give a TL;DR what is happening with this game and why is it compared to a plane bursting in flames nosediving at tremendous speed?
Pretty much everyone who does anything for the game gets replaced every few months or so, meaning that the game has no consistent direction or vision behind it.
 

typical user

Arbiter
Joined
Nov 30, 2015
Messages
957
Can someone please give a TL;DR what is happening with this game and why is it compared to a plane bursting in flames nosediving at tremendous speed?
Pretty much everyone who does anything for the game gets replaced every few months or so, meaning that the game has no consistent direction or vision behind it.

This is old news, but are you sure lead game designers outside Mitsoda are swapped too? I feel bad for him and Avellone, the trailers for this game and Dying Light 2 when they were around were promising. I just hope their ideas won't get butchered but expanded upon if devs don't want to credit them.
 

ChildInTime

Learned
Joined
Jun 13, 2019
Messages
618
Can someone please give a TL;DR what is happening with this game and why is it compared to a plane bursting in flames nosediving at tremendous speed?
Pretty much everyone who does anything for the game gets replaced every few months or so, meaning that the game has no consistent direction or vision behind it.

This is old news, but are you sure lead game designers outside Mitsoda are swapped too? I feel bad for him and Avellone, the trailers for this game and Dying Light 2 when they were around were promising. I just hope their ideas won't get butchered but expanded upon if devs don't want to credit them.
The lead writer now is a woman who wrote Andromeda and posts shit on twitter like - "Haha entitled white supremacist males". There won't be any ideas left from either Mitsoda or Avellone. In fact there won't be any ideas at all, except npcs shouting trans rights or something.
 

Zombra

An iron rock in the river of blood and evil
Patron
Joined
Jan 12, 2004
Messages
11,539
Location
Black Goat Woods !@#*%&^
Make the Codex Great Again! RPG Wokedex Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! Serpent in the Staglands Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
At this point we are just here to watch the plane crash, because the flames and smoke are visible from miles away. Any of you gonna risk on this? If they manage to put this product on the shelf
Same as anything else I have an interest in. I'll look at reviews and YouTube gameplay footage and decide if it's worth the $ for the best deal I can find.
rating_sawyer.gif
 

Zer0wing

Cipher
Joined
Mar 22, 2017
Messages
2,607
yet another consequence of literally the entire fucking industry banking on the same two shitty soulless game engines. unity and unreal sux!!!
This is why CryEngine is the patrician choice for game development. This and that CryEngine is an equivalent of aircraft industry (in its infancy) - the engineer is the pilot and the first beta tester. If it fails, it drags you down too.
 

Eli_Havelock

Learned
Joined
Dec 22, 2019
Messages
669
This is old news, but are you sure lead game designers outside Mitsoda are swapped too? I feel bad for him and Avellone, the trailers for this game and Dying Light 2 when they were around were promising. I just hope their ideas won't get butchered but expanded upon if devs don't want to credit them.

HSL/PDX said Avellone's work isn't in, and then there was something about STILL looking for a Lead Game Designer familiar with RPG mechanics. Both companies have since morally purified everyone else who might have anything close to those experience requirements, so they're having to rely on useful idiot nepotism hires like Eric Waananen to be Sr. Designers as he pulls another Fantastic from New Vegas. You might remember his "talent" from this sunking ship of a re-skinned ARK.

HSL/PDX have also brought in a Ubisoft wrap-up specialist to cut and box what can be used; this has gone from dumpster fire on a jet plane to full-on Detroit fire.

Agendas vs. results often skewed, can spend too much time on abstract politics and personal agendas vs. making the game and getting something running in-engine
I bet this won't reflect in the narrative at all.

When Damsel was shown off as an exciting character reveal everyone was reassured this was in good hands.
 

Burning Bridges

Enviado de meu SM-G3502T usando Tapatalk
Joined
Apr 21, 2006
Messages
27,562
Location
Tampon Bay
"Most devs directly working on project are great" followed by "devs making an RPG with little experience," "growing nepotism," and "system design skills weak." What makes them great then? I suppose maybe the artists have it together.

When this person says they're great, he probably means he likes them as people, not as professionals. If you're wanting to gain some experience, collect your paycheck and don't really care where the project is going, this sounds like a good place to work. But it's funny that most people leaving sound exasperated with the leadership.

I don't know exactly how it relates to English but here "he tried to give his best" or "he is a nice guy" are about the worst things you can write in an appraisal. It basically means, he started working for us and would never leave on his own accord.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
I think it's probably due to this person having Stockholm Syndrome if Hardsuit Labs hired them in the middle of the current """pandemic""". They probably couldn't land a job for months due to how hard the gaming industry has been hit by this shit

?? Opposite of reality.
 

Eli_Havelock

Learned
Joined
Dec 22, 2019
Messages
669
Just a reminder for what now passes as a Narrative Lead for this game.

Fiction: Equity for everyone!
Reality: Maybe diversity hires should have more qualifications than their skin color/gender/what they fuck, and if they want the qualifications for the good jobs they need to work up from the bottom and do good work like everyone else had to in order to advance. Expecting to fail to success through nepotism and filling diversity quotas is only going to shortcut millions of dollars down the drain, and stockholders hate that even more.
 

Dycedarg

Learned
Joined
Dec 14, 2020
Messages
153
Just a reminder for what now passes as a Narrative Lead for this game.

Fiction: Equity for everyone!
Reality: Maybe diversity hires should have more qualifications than their skin color/gender/what they fuck, and if they want the qualifications for the good jobs they need to work up from the bottom and do good work like everyone else had to in order to advance. Expecting to fail to success through nepotism and filling diversity quotas is only going to shortcut millions of dollars down the drain, and stockholders hate that even more.
Did she work for Hardsuit Labs before becoming Narrative Lead? If the answer is no, then she probably knows almost nothing about the game she will now coordinate.
 

Eli_Havelock

Learned
Joined
Dec 22, 2019
Messages
669
Did she work for Hardsuit Labs before becoming Narrative Lead? If the answer is no, then she probably knows almost nothing about the game she will now coordinate.

Nope. And that segues right into: why was Eric Waananen hired as Sr. Designer in her world? According to her standards, as a white male he must have been hired because he likes dick, thus elevating him to a special protected class. I'm not going to judge him on that if it's his thing, don't even know it is, but being hired obviously wasn't for his "Lead Designer" work on ATLAS (the pirate-themed ARK reskin) or his intern work before then. HSL are still listing that Lead Designer position, which he probably would have snagged if he was a bit more... Rudi, so they could wave him around like how STUNNING and BRAVE they all were and how much diversitalent they collectively have on their team for Twitterati/Polygon photo ops.

Also telling is how Lead and Sr. Producer positions are still open. I mean, who the fuck needs to actually make anything when you can sit around in a virtue circlejerk and milk Paradox moneys like the Romeros? Empire of Daikatana was such a mail-in of a reskinned XCOM.
 

Dycedarg

Learned
Joined
Dec 14, 2020
Messages
153
Nope. And that segues right into: why was Eric Waananen hired as Sr. Designer in her world? According to her standards, as a white male he must have been hired because he likes dick, thus elevating him to a special protected class. I'm not going to judge him on that if it's his thing, don't even know it is, but being hired obviously wasn't for his "Lead Designer" work on ATLAS (the pirate-themed ARK reskin) or his intern work before then. HSL are still listing that Lead Designer position, which he probably would have snagged if he was a bit more... Rudi, so they could wave him around like how STUNNING and BRAVE they all were and how much diversitalent they collectively have on their team for Twitterati/Polygon photo ops.

Also telling is how Lead and Sr. Producer positions are still open. I mean, who the fuck needs to actually make anything when you can sit around in a virtue circlejerk and milk Paradox moneys like the Romeros? Empire of Daikatana was such a mail-in of a reskinned XCOM.
At this point I don't know if this game will even come out. Sure, the company seems like an SJW hugbox, but even the likes of Bioware are able to eventually release their (broken) games. It honestly seems like a scam, as if HSL are trying to bleed Paradox of all the money they can. How long did it take for this person to understand what the previous team had done with the main story, worldbuilding or sidequests? The game was supposed to be released last year, and even now HSL has less than 1 year to complete the project.
 
Self-Ejected

Harry Easter

Self-Ejected
Joined
Jul 27, 2016
Messages
819
I don't think we need to be afraid of the innocent (*snicker*) Paradoxguys getting sucked dry. If it turns out a wreck, they can cut it for taxes or something.

And there were projects that looked more catastrophic and then turned out good. In the end we have to wait. It will probably turn out just alright. A bit buggy here, not special there. Just alright. And if sales are stable there will be at least more Bloodlines - porn on Rule34.
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
Joined
May 29, 2010
Messages
35,656
And there were projects that looked more catastrophic and then turned out good. In the end we have to wait. It will probably turn out just alright. A bit buggy here, not special there. Just alright.

They fired their celebrity writers and replaced them with cheap never-beens, haven't had a lead designer in months, and a bunch of people are posting on glassdoor talking about how upper management has no idea what they're doing and turn-over is sky high and you think there are more catastrophic projects? Are you a Hardsuit employee?
 
Self-Ejected

Harry Easter

Self-Ejected
Joined
Jul 27, 2016
Messages
819
They fired their celebrity writers and replaced them with cheap never-beens, haven't had a lead designer in months, and a bunch of people are posting on glassdoor talking about how upper management has no idea what they're doing and turn-over is sky high and you think there are more catastrophic projects? Are you a Hardsuit employee?

Let's see just the ones from my memory:

Either Dark Souls 1 or Demon Souls had to be rescued by Myazaki, who hadn't any experience as a director back then. And he came in late too, if I remember correctly.

Gothic 1 and 2 were also totally chaotic and it bite them in the ass when 3 came along.

Diablo 1 was a shitshow too, that turned into one big crunchfest. Half of the time it was programmed to be turnbased.

Starcraft 1 first preview got smashed too.

Game development most of the time is a big shitshow, but you don't see any of it. You only see the product and it's either good or bad, but you don't know how fucked up the devs were in the end from the stess and lack of sleep. And if there was any drama before, you forget it after two years.

As for Avellone and Mitsoda: Let's be honest, he just wrote a concept or one or two quests and peaced out. He hasn't done anything else for years now, so there probably wasn't a big cut, when they fired him. And Mitsoda has a record for being a mess to work with, that's why they fired him from Alpha Protocol, so they should have probably done it earlier. It's speaks even against the guy that he got fired for the successor to the one project he got some acclaim.

I don't have any more insights than you, but really, we can just wait ... or panicwank about the future of a game most people have barely on their radar*shrug.*
 

Dycedarg

Learned
Joined
Dec 14, 2020
Messages
153
Either Dark Souls 1 or Demon Souls had to be rescued by Myazaki, who hadn't any experience as a director back then. And he came in late too, if I remember correctly.

I'm sure this Samantha is the new Miyazaki, with the best qualities of both Hayao and Hidetaka put together in the same bald head womyn.

I don't have any more insights than you, but really, we can just wait ... or panicwank about the future of a game most people have barely on their radar*shrug.*

This thread is gonna be the best thing related to this game by a very wide margin.
 
Self-Ejected

Harry Easter

Self-Ejected
Joined
Jul 27, 2016
Messages
819
The second option is obviously the more entertaining one.

No wonder this forum smells worse like a lockerroom sometimes almost all the time.

I'm sure this Samantha is the new Miyazaki, with the best qualities of both Hayao and Hidetaka put together in the same bald head womyn.

Who hurt you?


But to be honest, it would make more fun to speculate how they could've improved the game. Despite the shitty combat and a more versatile use of the disciplines.
 

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