Slashdot Mirror
Ion Storm To Finish Thief III?
Lumpish Scholar writes: "Slashdot already reported Looking Glass Studios (creators of Thief, Thief II, and other games) declared bankruptcy. The irony was, their publisher, Eidos Interactive, was pumping all their money into Ion Storm's effort to finish Daikatana. Now, according to this story in Salon, Eidos has bought the rights to Thief III (presumably an asset when Looking Glass was dissolved) and has handed the work over to Ion Storm (under the helm of Warren Spector, not Daikatana's John Romero). Small world, innit?" Wow, that's cool. This should happen more often, I think.
For anyone who didn't read the article, Warren Spector was one of the original Looking Glass designers, and was even involved with the first Thief early on. He's produced many fine games, and I believe he'll do a good job on Thief 3. I don't think it'll be exactly the Thief 3 we would have gotten from Looking Glass, but I do believe we'll get a game worthy of the name Thief. The rest of the LG team(s) have spread to the wind, but some of them are still together. They won't be doing Thief, but I bet we'll see something great from them too, somewhere down the road.
I don't think the problem is that Ion Storm is making the sequel, but that Eidos turned their back on Looking Glass when they needed help, only to buy the rights at a yardsale.
I don't think Ion Storm did anything wrong in this situation, Eidos did. That's what I'm upset about, and what I think the original commenter is upset about. Ion Storm was duing what it was supposed (well, maybe not Romero's team), Eidos cheated looking glass.
Perhaps Eidos thought that it was doing its job in throwing its weight behind the much-hyped game, much as record labels throw their support behind the hottest artists. Perhpas it didn't think LG's titles would sell? Well, they bought the rights to it (and we saw what happened to Daikatana). . .
I believe the legally correct phrase is "John Romero's Daikatana's John Romero" and not simply "Daikatana's John Romero" /. authors suck it down...sorry.
On August 12th, Shoeboy will make
--Shoeboy
(posting anonymously to preserve my precious karma)
P
Hemos, when questioned by Congressman Nitwiddle, explained that through a previous deal, the editors of Slashdot agreed to double post any story by Eidos Interactive, particularly when containing ANY information about "Ion Storm".
Cowboy Neil went on to state that the deal was that Slashdot was to be given 1 case of lager beer every time this happened, and that by double posting, the editors not only hoped to split up negative comments on flops such as "Daikatana", but also manage to fulfill their lifelong dream of sitting in a jacuzzi filled with ale.
Eidos took the stand next, explaining that "no such deal existed in written, or oral form" and that by double posting stories of Eidos and Ion Storm, the potential for negative comments increased two fold.
Ken Williamson, a lawyer for the slashdot team, claimed that it simply was not a possibility, as there aren't that many "nerds" who honestly care about how badly Eidos is going to screw up an otherwise great game. He also went on to state that Eidos was in violation of the First Amendment.
Eidos countered, by stating that the First Amendment didn't count in areas that were specifically "free speech", and referred to the Supreme Court ruling of Metallica vs. the Offspring; a ruling that mandated that by selling T-Shirts that violated Metallica's money making endeavors, the Offspring gave up their First Amendment Rights, and should look towards their Fourth Amendment rights to rectify the situation. Judge Morely stated simply, "Just shoot em, it'll cost less."
Cowboy Neil and Hemos counterpointed that the negative comments were intermingled with good ones, and that if they were going to be sued for the negative ones, then they should be paid for the good ones.
Eidos stated firmly that it had not, nor would it ever deal with traitorous bastards who took their beer and drank it, too.
krystal_blade
It will be easy to motivate our fellow man; there is hardly anything people treasure more than not being annihilated.
Wow, that's cool. This should happen more often, I think.
Looking Glass Studios was tricked, raped, pillaged, and salvaged by Eidos. Eidos made an initial proposal to fund LGS through it's projects, but there were a few projects it was not interested in. So instead of 'wasting' their money on side projects, when all they wanted was the money-maker Thief, they devised a plan.
LGS knew they needed to be bought out, and went off and started hitting up all the major publishers who would be interested. They hit up Eidos, and Eidos made them a deal, and in such a way that LGS gave up on searching for more money, confident that Eidos would pull through for them. At that point, Eidos just sat back and waited, not sending any checks. Shortly after, LGS went bankrupt, that much we know, because of Eidos not funding them as they should.
Now what do you see happening? Looking Glass Studios was auctioned off by it's creditors to pay the bills. The vulture Eidos then came in and bought up projects that they wanted, at cut-rate prices. Much less than they would have paid in the first place.
This is a highly unethical, unsuitable business practice, but it occurs many times, and makes me sick to my teeth.
Yes, I'm happy that Thief 3 is being finished. But, I didn't want to lose my favorite company in the process, because Eidos was money-hungry.
Before everyone who doesn't bother reading the article (like a few people who have already posted ;p) makes the "oh no, Daikatana's creators are in charge of Thief" comments, note that Ion Storm Austin has the Thief licence. Austin is responsible for such quality games like Deus Ex and..um...well now Thief. Ion Storm Dallas(or some other place in Texas - I'm tired ;p) is the team responsible for John Romero's Daikatana (now in bargain bins across the world ;p).
Come to think of it, that might have been kinda interesting...
Reminds me of a blurb my friend submitted to PC Magazine many years ago that they printed on their back page: "Did you hear that id Software and Brøderbund are merging? They're working on a new game called 'Where In Hell is Carmen Sandiego?'."
--
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Hmmm,
Good developer makes great game and goes out of business because bad developer with big ego gets all publishers money and makes crap.
Yea, I can see why this should happen more often....NOT!
-g
As much as we all want to believe that Eidos sinking money into Ion instead of LGlass caused the latter's death, it simply isn't so.
Salon has an earlier article where Geoff Keighley points out the basic truth: "Looking Glass folded because it wasn't making money".
We all want brilliant games like Tthief and System Shock to make millions, but they don't. Games like Soldier of Fortune and Who Wants to be a Millionare do.
While Eidos didn't help Looking Glass as much as they probably could have, it didn't make economic sense for them to keep a studio whose games were low to negative profit ventures. (I'm not saying sinking $30 million into Daikatana was, but Eidos bad decisions are the reason they themselves are in financial difficulty now.)
Basically, it comes down to this: We can't blame Ion Storm for Looking Glass' demise. (although they may contribute to the possible death of Eidos) We can only blame a market where Barbie Fashion Designer and Bland Genre Clone® are the only things to make large profits.
Intolerant people should be shot.