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Turbine Expansions And Turnovers
According to Gamespot Asheron's Call 2 players don't have long to wait before the "Legions" expansion will find its way to store shelves. The content expansion for the graphics intensive game went gold this week. Players of the original Asheron's Call will have to wait until this summer to enjoy their new content, as the expansion has been pushed back for further testing and refinement. Additionally, MMOG industry veteran Jessica Mulligan used the expansion announcements as an opportunity to mention her departure from Turbine. She hasn't publicly stated a reason for her departure, saying only that the decision is unrelated to the expansion titles. Gamasutra has an interview with Ms. Mulligan about the state of the industry up from last week. From the Gamespot article: "Legions will include a new continent, called Knorr, which will increase the size of the Asheron's Call 2 world by 30 percent. Also included in this expansion pack are new playable races (one of which is the much maligned Drudge), three new prestige classes, more than 100 new quests, and 10 new monster types."
I have to wonder. Both AC and AC2 saw real drops in their playerbases since she came along. Yes I know Jessica isn't totally to blame but she was tasked with running the show.
Before Turbine and even before Themis she used to write a column called "Biting the Hand". From here she pointed out the issues in the computer gaming industry. She showed what went wrong, sometimes offered insight as to why, and also showed how most failures were simply repeats of another companies failure.
Yet her stint at Turbine seemed to be oriented towards doing everything she told others they were wrong for doing. Even after Turbine took control of both of franchises they didn't change their tune. They continued the shoddy patches, the leaving of bad exploits in game for long times, and worse actively condoned macroing in their first game AC. They even retreated to the safety of message boards they manage.
It is suspicious she left at the same time the AC1 expansion was pushed back (just 14 business days from its announced release). This all smacks of upper management removing someone (or asking ever so politely) for project mismanagement. It also may be related to a previous article she released which basically attacked a few notable people.
AC2 is effectively dead. Less than 400 people at one time play it at primetime across two servers. Stupid bugs persist from launch still that should have been quietly fixed a long time ago. Its not much fun for a new player as most new areas are simply devoid of players.
AC1 is in slightly better shape. However most of its servers barely crest 500 each. With the latest announcement that number will probably fall further. Worse the Turbine published pictures of the improved textures, no poly changes, were horrid. It was fan pictures from beta that made it look good. The whole expansion left a bad taste in many long time AC players mouths as it smacks of being a reward to those using combat macros (permitted by Turbine). The prime example are "augmentation gems" which are purchasable using experience points. For a macro character that makes them free for all intents. How are real players ever expected to compete?
AC died when Turbine favored experience gaining over the experience of playing. AC had a depth of lore not seen in a MMORPG unti WOW. Yet they sold out to the exploiters and cheaters, also know as macorers. When a game company abandons their integrity the players are not bound to respect them either, let alone pay for the game.
Good riddance Jessica. Hopefully you will take your lack of job at Turbine to get back to writing Biting the Hand and actively identifying what is wrong in the industry - including the problems you caused at Turbine. It would be best if you went back to what you were good at - analyzing from the sidelines instead of being someone in need of analysis yourself.
C.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Can you post a link to the article where she attacked folks? I don't recall anything like that, but I may have missed it.