KickStarter Underworld Ascendant is a disaster

[Mustawd]

Too many mexicans, that's the problem.

you spelled “Not enough Mexicans, that’s the problem” wrong.

FTFY tho. Love you <3

 

[Theldaran]

Ukraine is soon-to-be Russia oblast, and on martial law right now, not a very good place to do business.

I really hope that the corrupt AAA and big-company Berlin Wall falls finally, and indies and AA companies replace that festering corpse once and for all. Then again, in a few years they'd grow to be fat cats too and the cycle would repeat (though CDPR is keeping their promises so far).

 

[Nyast]

Yeah, no way they could produce the game with the depth and detail he describes in this video with the money they raised, it was all a pipe dream.

Average programmer on the US costs 85000 dollars on a year of work, even if they cut corners and hired a bunch of mexicans, if those mexicans work on the US, they will still cost alot even if a bit less than a decent programmer and they might not have been worthy anyway as a bad programmer is worse than no programmer at all. Those 900.000 dollars they got was enough to pay 8 people working on a project for 1 year, assuming zero other costs (not realistic at all) just to simplify things and 8 cheap mexicans may not be worth 2 decent experienced programmers.

Considering the game that we got, it's doubtful that they had more than 2, top 3 programmers working on this. The rest of the team are probably artists, which have a lower average salary. Of course that doesn't change the equation all that much in the end, they still lacked the budget to do a decent Underworld 3, no matter how many programmers vs artists they have in the team.

 

[LESS T_T]

A message by Paul Neurath, a kinda apology and postmortem explaining how they took creative risks, some "retconing", funding problems, and their mistakes.: https://otherside-e.com/wp/underworld-ascendant-where-were-headed-how-we-got-here/

Underworld Ascendant: Where We’re Headed & How We Got Here

Charitably, the launch of Underworld Ascendant was rough. On release the game was too buggy and shy on polish. We should have done better, and we deeply apologize to our fans for falling short.

It’s also evident some our fans wanted a game that played much closer to the original Ultima Underworld. It’s been painful to hear these players describe how we missed expectations. Although we tried to be clear with press and fans during the development of the game, in hindsight we could have done a better job communicating what Underworld Ascendant was and what it was not.

Despite the game’s flaws at launch, we believe there is a core of goodness to Underworld Ascendant. Our job now is to address the concerns players have expressed and improve the game; making what is good about the game shine through more brightly.

Improving the game starts with listening carefully. We have been soliciting players’ input, making improvements, and listening more. The day after we launched, the team shifted focus to making the game better. We’re fixing bugs, balancing the game further, and rolling in gameplay improvements. One example — shortly we will roll out a robust SAVE GAME feature, something many fans have asked for. We hope you will be patient with us and give Underworld Ascendant the chance to show it can be worthy.

For a look at our development roadmap going into the next few months, click here.

For those interested in understanding how games get made and where things can sometimes get off track, below is a deeper look into how Underworld Ascendant ended up falling short of our expectations at launch.

The OtherSide Team

17 December 2018



The Backstory
To provide some context, understand that the Underworld series is especially close to our hearts. Those of us who worked on the original Ultima Underworld threw ourselves into that game and took some crazy creative risks. When the game launched, we had no sense if players would like it. Turns out they did. That encouraged us to explore the immersive simulation genre further with games such as System Shock, Thief and Deus Ex.

Two decades later, when we had the opportunity to make a game related to the Underworld series, we jumped at the chance with Underworld Ascendant. However, rather than duplicating our past work, we wanted to try to move the genre forward with some new design thinking.

For instance, we ditched the Ultima Underworld scripted conversation trees with NPCs, and instead told the story through a mix of character voiceovers and lore sprinkled about the world as graffiti carved into stone surfaces for the player to uncover — similar to how we used narrative voice overs in Thief and audio logs in System Shock. We also decided not to build an expansive, continuous dungeon to explore. Instead, we built self-contained corners of the dungeon that players would jump to through magic portals. Ultima Underworld II featured an early version of this approach with portals that led to different “worlds”. In Underworld Ascendant we took that further, parceling out quests that would direct you to a primary goal in particular corners of the Abyss.

There are other examples of ways in which, for better or worse, we deviated from the original Underworld model. Sometimes a less-than-warm reception is in part due to experimenting with new design approaches that don’t fit player expectations for the genre. Players may come around to appreciate these design choices in the years following launch. Or not so much. But as a studio, we will continue to take creative risks even with this reality.

This is not the first time we’ve taken creative risks that didn’t all pan out. It’s also worth recalling that some of the innovations we tried in past games were, at least initially, received less than enthusiastically. Ultimately many came to view these games as classics, but some of the early reviews that the original Ultima Underworld and System Shock were less than kind. For instance:

It doesn’t help that Ultima Underworld’s combat is fairly weak. Many fights felt drawn out… with little variation beyond swinging and healing occasionally. Relying on magic has its own annoyances, given that each spell needs to be incanted with several runes.

Those who like to spend hours with a manual to try to figure out to play System Shock, good luck. The rest of us choose to play Doom II instead, where we get what the game promised – full action without hassles.

Taking creative risks is only a part of the story of Underworld Ascendant’s launch. The project faced funding hurdles early in its development. We had lined up a healthy funding commitment with a partner, many-fold more than the Kickstarter funding we later raised. Unfortunately, several months following the Kickstarter our funding partner made a strategic pivot away from the sort of game we were making, resulting in the funding falling through. We had to make do with a fraction of the funding needed to complete our original vision for the game. We did our best to make forward progress with a tiny team. However, it was slow going as we wandered through a development desert for nearly 2 years.

In the summer of 2017, 505 Games stepped up as our publishing partner to help bring the game home. At long-last we were able to step up the pace of our progress. This past Summer we felt confident that we had scoped the game correctly and that we’d be in solid shape for a Fall 2018 launch.

With 20/20 hindsight we were overly optimistic. Part of that came from our prior experiences making immersive simulations, where a lot comes together in the final months. Having a small development team, along with the legacy of an artificially protracted schedule that resulted in relying on now outdated code, ended up impinging on our ability to execute on the same level of progress. In addition, after having worked on the game for more than three years we lost perspective on where Underworld Ascendant stood. We convinced ourselves that the game was in more robust shape than it actually was. Had we been more objective, we would have held off the launch and worked on the game longer. Instead we pushed hard and hit the planned November launch date.

As a consequence, the game went out rougher than it should have. None of the challenges the project faced are an excuse. We should have done better.

Mistakes aside and despite its flaws at launch, we believe Underworld Ascendant has the bones of a truly good game, and we’re now working hard to make the goodness show through much better.

 

[LESS T_T]

From Discord:

(Jared is that QA guy.)

 

[Infinitron]

Taking creative risks is only a part of the story of Underworld Ascendant’s launch. The project faced funding hurdles early in its development. We had lined up a healthy funding commitment with a partner, many-fold more than the Kickstarter funding we later raised. Unfortunately, several months following the Kickstarter our funding partner made a strategic pivot away from the sort of game we were making, resulting in the funding falling through.

FFS WHY DIDN'T YOU CANCEL THE GAME Very similar to what I thought happened: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/index.p...ant-is-a-disaster.124859/page-22#post-5887836

 

[V_K]

FFS WHY DIDN'T YOU CANCEL THE GAME

Because then they'd have to refund kickstarter money?
I remember there were some recent court cases where the vaporware devs were compelled to do that.

 

[Zep Zepo]

And they didn't come clean with this info that they lost a major funding partner.

Continued to bullshit the backers for 2 or 3 years.

Then throw out some worthless piece of shit of a "game" like the failures they are.

This shit gets better and better they more they open their mouths and try to apologize.

I am laughing every time they try to do some hand waving.

Paraphrased "We never exactly said we were making an Underworld game..."

WTF? It's right there in the name of the game you stupid dipshits! Are you lying to us or to yourselves? Because we're not falling for it.

Zep--

 

[Glic2000]

Yeah, the fact that they were shopping the game around to a publisher (and failing to find one) was never mentioned at all to the KS backers. That should have been mentioned right up front in the Kickstarter; not doing so is very deceptive. There is an understanding with Kickstarter that the creator is trying to raise the amount of money needed to finish the project, not just get the ball barely rolling.

Likewise, I would've been fine if the game wasn't a sequel to Ultima Underworld, if it at least did more or less what was described in the KS. But they didn't do any of that either!

 

[Glic2000]

I mean, making a bad game is one thing, but lying about every aspect of the game's development before/during/after its crowdfunding phase is unforgivable.

 

[Zep Zepo]

Built on lies. Just like the "TOTALLY NOT SCRIPTED GAIS!" Shadow Beast demo (It was totally scripted).

Zep--

 

[Space Nugget]

Are they fucking serious right now? Excusing their shortcomings as if all of that was intended all along - basically telling us now that they were "moving the genre forward" by going backwards? Gimme a break. I was disappointed with the game (I should've known better: the updates and progress throughout the years and months were very telling), but this OtherSide post mortem-of sorts actually makes me angry. Underworld Ascendant is a broken mess, insultingly unplayable, and no amount of polish will amend the deeply flawed and appalling design decisions.

Also, kinda weird that two of 2018's game release bombs were led by Looking Glass veterans. The other one being DumpsterFire 76 (Emil Pagliarulo was/is the Design Director).

Spoiler

ZEP ZEPO WAS RIGHT!

 

[Curratum]

https://otherside-e.com/wp/underworld-ascendant-where-were-headed-how-we-got-here/

What a disgusting, ball-less waste of space. Almost all of it is lies as well.

 

[Space Nugget]

Oh hey, it's Chris and Tim!

Spoiler

Can't wait for a spiritual sucessor of that...

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

Too many mexicans, that's the problem.

Beaners manage to be a nuisance or a hindrance in all walks of life.

 

[Roguey]

He really buried the lede there

"We made the game like this ON PURPOSE (also we were expecting to have a lot more money...)"

 

[Infinitron]

Top-tier rage post by Nyast: https://www.othersideentertainment.com/forum/index.php?topic=7476.msg37235#msg37235

 

[Viata]

This game is a reminder that you need programmers more than anything to make a good game.

 

[Zep Zepo]

And top tier programmers at that.

Does that horse teethed jr. programmer they hired have any pedigree at all in games programming?

Zep--

 

[Viata]

And top tier programmers at that.

Well, you use the kind of programmer you need for the game you want. No way you are going to make Thief with California level programmers, for example. But you can make Outer Worlds.

 

[Nyast]

Top-tier rage post by Nyast: https://www.othersideentertainment.com/forum/index.php?topic=7476.msg37235#msg37235

I'm borderline treating this as a scam now.

I can't get over the fact they knew from the start they didn't have the budget to deliver their Kickstarter and never bothered informing anybody until now.

I'm ready to forgive honest mistakes, even some incompetence, but this is just another level of deceptive practises.

"Oooops sorry guys, that you had to discover that in the postmortem, that we never had the budget to produce the game we described on Kickstarter. Honest mistake. Now let's get back to work on System Shock 3 ! We've learned from our mistakes ! Honest !"

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Paraphrased "We never exactly said we were making an Underworld game..."

Underworld Ascendant Cutpurse: The Lethean Depths

If only they hadn't completely botched it.

 

[BEvers]

Another dev post:

Your comment that UA feels more like a game than a world is spot on. For example, we're looking at how we can restructure the levels so that it feels more like one contiguous dungeon (with load screens of course) without forcing players to go back to Marcaul between quests, taking away players' choice about what to do next. The simplification of the meta could come from removing faction favor and influence so that your journey to stop Typhon follows the storyline quests without all of the forced repetition through levels (and favor could become a thing for folks to earn to get better gear in the store, for example). My vote is also to obfuscate the Doom Counter, which to your point feels too much like an obvious game mechanic.

Anyway, don't hold me to this stuff yet, but let me know what you think. Also, all of this said, being realistic to those of you that though we were making something closer to the original UWs, I don't think we're going to be able to address all of the things that make it feel less like the original UWs, but we'll definitely make the game better. Thief + System Shock in a fantasy dungeon is still my go to simple description of the game

Nyast, you might be right re: PC, unfortunately, but we need to make the game better on PC regardless of the other versions. It does put more weight on the console versions. Of course, any work we do for PC is going to help those as well as Mac/Linux.

One last point about this update. It's a big step in the right direction, e.g., levels do feel more populated, loot is more rewarding, combat is better, etc., but we have more work to do. Most of the engineering time for Update 1 was spent on the save game system so we'll now have those guys able to spend more time on things like AI. The design and art teams can spend time "restructuring" things and make it feel more lived in.

https://www.othersideentertainment.com/forum/index.php?topic=7473.msg37221#msg37221

 

[Nano]

I dunno why they're bothering. I'm assuming post-release support was included in some contract or whatever.

 

[Infinitron]

One of the occasionally helpful oddities of modern game development. It seems no matter how hard a game bombs, additional development is guaranteed until the console port is released. Only then is it allowed to die. (insert Bane gif here)