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

[Roguey]

I went digging through Paradox's Glassdoor reviews and actually did find a Bloodlines-related one from 2020.

Without internal support, headed for fall
Oct 4, 2020 - Producer in Berlin

Pros

Chance to train and mentor new producers

Chance to start new RPG Division

Company is growing

Lots of potential

Cons

No commitment to RPG Division or 5 year plan which makes setting up plan difficult

Difficulty within studio and within owned studios like Hardsuit on how to develop an RPG – Paradox knows how to make a Paradox game but not an RPG and is resistant to learn

Decisions to change staffing can be sudden and occur with little feedback or warning

Too many production roles for one person to handle because company is growing too fast

Hard to get proper marketing resources and approvals

Distant and distracted department heads

Bad and confusing relationships with influencers

Approvals difficult to obtain

Internal franchise difficulties and managing expectations of community with little support

Little support to overworked dev team both at Paradox and in States

Lack of overall support to outside studios they invest in, both financial and resources

Too hands off with pipelines then suddenly too hands on and punishing to the point of people losing their jobs

Listen to production if they feel outside development design is weak

Drive away managers passionate about product by micro-managing their role and responsibilities

Tencent ownership is a problem for company

Refuse to do careful HR review of work and harassment claims, will resurface if you try and bury them (Deadfire conference event assault claims have never been addressed)

Wishing the Bloodlines 2 team the best, both those gone and those still there

Advice to Management

Lack of Support the studios you invest in, do not punish them

Start new franchises and enter into new genres of games gradually to see how they work, do not try to do too much if not sure what you’re doing

At same time don’t make new roads into franchises with products that are too small (interactive novels when people want Bloodlines 2)

"Paradox knows how to make a Paradox game but not an RPG and is resistant to learn" - guess they picked up nothing from Obsidian, huh?

"Too hands off with pipelines then suddenly too hands on and punishing to the point of people losing their jobs" Ya don't say.

 

[Alienman]

Tencent ownership is a problem for company

This is curious. They own about 5%. Makes you wonder how much trouble you can do for 5%.

 

[The_Mask]

This sounds a lot like a company on its last legs. I've seen this before. When the higher ups don't listen to the trenches, it means money is drying up.

And by trenches, I mean the real trenches. Where people actually work, and make your product happen.

 

[Fedora Master]

Stop acting like this will ever materialise.

 

[Kleptocratic debt serf]

Stop acting like this will ever materialise metastasize.

At this point that would be for the best, or give Wesp5 the source code.

 

[J1M]

Tencent ownership is a problem for company

This is curious. They own about 5%. Makes you wonder how much trouble you can do for 5%.

That is the stake required for the China government to let you release a game in China.

 

[Harthwain]

This sounds a lot like a company on its last legs. I've seen this before. When the higher ups don't listen to the trenches, it means money is drying up.

This is just plain incompetence.

 

[Justicar]

At this point that would be for the best, or give Wesp5 the source code.

Source code for what? They managed to get barely working tech demo for some gayme shows and that's it there is nothing more

Newsflash for paradox retards making even a basic 3d Arpg is at least 10 times harder than making another reskin of your 2d excel spreadsheet manager.

 

[Infinitron]

I went digging through Paradox's Glassdoor reviews and actually did find a Bloodlines-related one from 2020.

(Deadfire conference event assault claims have never been addressed)

Wait, what?

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

I went digging through Paradox's Glassdoor reviews and actually did find a Bloodlines-related one from 2020.

(Deadfire conference event assault claims have never been addressed)

Wait, what?

Look at https://steamcommunity.com/app/236850/discussions/0/3132793555955574592/
"go to their glassdoor reviews section (look up that for paradox interactive, i dunnoi if they censor links here), there are a couple of mentions about it, including them possibly trying to cover an event up and allow the alleged victim to continue working under the accused. somethings going on there for sure."

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Probably something they are trying to blame on MCA.

 

[Lambach]

Former Hardsuit employees are still angry on glassdoor

Leadership needs to do better
Jul 24, 2021 - Anonymous Employee

Pros

I met some of the kindest, most empathetic people. The actual employees at the ground level are wonderful and inclusive.

Unlimited PTO they actually encourage you to use, and the work-life balance is good.

Cons

Leadership says they back their employees, but when multiple devs were being abused by an external collaborator, leadership took the abuser's side immediately every time. They were willing to throw their employees to the wolves to get their game out the door. The values they talk about so much crumbled when actually put to the test. It's one thing to say you care about employees. It's another to actually show it, even when it's difficult.

Many employees were also left in the dark about the health of the company. They were told things would be totally fine and layoffs wouldn't happen after the sudden end of a project, only to find themselves laid off without warning a few months later. Either leadership lied to everyone's face, or they had such a poor understanding of their own company's future they couldn't even see a couple of months down the road. I can't decide which is worse.

Advice to Management

Actually care about your employees. Be honest to them, even when the answer is "I don't know." Defend and protect them even when it's not easy.

Paradox is an abuser now? Swedes, you have some explaining to do.

Follows the same pattern as other reviews - note that the words used to describe the non-managerial staff are always "kind", "inclusive" etc. and never something like "competent", "professional" and the like.

Just further reinforces the point that they were running a daycare center for children LARPing as adults, not a professional game dev studio.

 

[Caim]

At this point that would be for the best, or give Wesp5 the source code.

Source code for what? They managed to get barely working tech demo for some gayme shows and that's it there is nothing more

Wasn't that Wesp5's starting point for Bloodlines 1 as well?

 

[Wesp5]

Oct 4, 2020 - Producer in Berlin

I would guess this is from Christian Schlüter. LinkedIn places him in Berlin and I know that the other producer Florian Schwarzer worked from Sweden.

Bad and confusing relationships with influencers

This could be about OutStar who was fine until they bought her.

Lack of Support the studios you invest in, do not punish them

This could be about firing Mitsoda and Cluney and then the rest.

At same time don’t make new roads into franchises with products that are too small (interactive novels when people want Bloodlines 2)

It sounds to me as if Paradox spends too much money on smaller projects and not enough to get Bloodlines 2 developed who everybody is waiting for.

 

[Dreed]

I went digging through Paradox's Glassdoor reviews and actually did find a Bloodlines-related one from 2020.

(Deadfire conference event assault claims have never been addressed)

Wait, what?

The logical explanation is that he meant Tyranny, or an internal conference about Deadfire before a deal fell through with Paradox and the game went to Versus Evil

The best explanation would be that Paradadox was about to publish Guido Henkel's masterpiece Deathfire

 

[Wesp5]

At this point that would be for the best, or give Wesp5 the source code.

Source code for what? They managed to get barely working tech demo for some gayme shows and that's it there is nothing more

Wasn't that Wesp5's starting point for Bloodlines 1 as well?

Besides that we never got the source of Bloodlines and I wouldn't have understood it anyway , while Bloodlines had hundreds of bugs and many unfinished areas it still was playable from beginning to end. We never saw that with Bloodlines 2, but I can't imagine that it was in such a bad state that they couldn't salvage anything! Didn't they claim to have gotten to alpha a short time before they fired Mitsoda and took it away from HSL? Didn't Outstar claim that she played it and it was fun? I would really like to get my hands on that version, just to take a look at how far they got . I probably wouldn't be able to do anything about it, as Bloodlines 2 was an Unreal engine game and I only know Source, but other modders might be able to reconstruct what Mitsoda had in mind...

 

[HeroMarine]

Tencent ownership is a problem for company

This is curious. They own about 5%. Makes you wonder how much trouble you can do for 5%.

Chinks are incredibly retarded, particularly when it comes to video games.

 

[Bester]

MCA recently retwitted that the guy who wrote music for VTMB finished the music album for "VTMB" 2. And that it was supposedly available on some platform. Did anyone ever find out where?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

MCA recently retwitted that the guy who wrote music for VTMB finished the music album for "VTMB" 2. And that it was supposedly available on some platform. Did anyone ever find out where?

Google Stadia

 

[Vincente]

MCA recently retwitted that the guy who wrote music for VTMB finished the music album for "VTMB" 2. And that it was supposedly available on some platform. Did anyone ever find out where?

Rik recently released an album with all the unused songs from Bloodlines, maybe you're thinking about that one?

 

[Ehrenmann]

Hello guys, I would to inquire about when is the game getting released. I am so hyped. :D

 

[Background Character]

"At same time don’t make new roads into franchises with products that are too small (interactive novels when people want Bloodlines 2)"

I'm glad they didn't listen to this because Night Road was an excellent game and I couldn't give less of a fuck about Bloodlines 2

 

[Inhabitants of Khorinis]

532 pages for a ruined orgasm? Burn this fucking thread!!!

 

[Irxy]

Tencent ownership is a problem for company

This is curious. They own about 5%. Makes you wonder how much trouble you can do for 5%.

In general minority holders have pretty much zero influence on anything. I think he has meant reputational issues for their "progressive" image.

 

[Roguey]

I think he has meant reputational issues for their "progressive" image.

I've observed no such thing though. Can't imagine a Chinese company owning 5% of a company is something most people have any kind of strong feelings about.