Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Point

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Cybernetic pig
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Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Point

Post by Cybernetic pig »

http://www.kotaku.com.au/2013/01/rumour ... nt-studio/

The legend himself, laid-off?
I'd give him my soul for him to make another FPS/RPG/ImmersiveSim.
Ultima Underworld, System Shock and Deus Ex. He raised the bar, only for it to not be met again by anyone else to date (in my opinion), except maybe Obsidian's Fallout: New Vegas.

The industry is begging for another Spector-produced epic right now, with the state it's in. The questions are, does he still have what it takes, can he get a decent publishers support (Bethesda may be a good option), and of course, does he still even want to continue designing games (if the rumours are true and he is actually laid-off anyway)?

The reason for most of his (Superior) games failing commercially before was down to what I believe to be mainly one thing- poor marketing. The products that are popular are the ones that are usually just aggressively marketed to the masses, in my observations. Although some worthy ones make it far enough without (Deus Ex for example).

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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by DDentonas »

Bethesda a good publisher? Valve all the way!


Or better yet, kickstart a new IP, that is going to be DXs successor (unlikely, DX had a MAAAAAAAAAAAAAASIVE budget, the people could not fund such a proect.. Maybe if he made it episode by episode?)
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by gamer0004 »

Not sure whether an episodic release would be much more doable. I guess much of the difficulty in making a game like DX is in the tech and game design.

But a KS for a new DX might be able to attract a budget of 4 or 5 million. Warren Spector and Deus Ex are big names.

Also, I didn't know Epic Mickey 2 was even released. Perhaps a lacklustre marketing was to some extent responsible for the meagre sales?
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by Jaedar »

Epic mickey 1 sold like 600k copies, Epic mickey 2 sold like 200k. ( I ain't got no linky for proof, but it's what I heard)

It's no wonder the studio is being shut down, with sales like that.
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by DDL »

I personally just can't fucking stand mickey mouse, the big-eared little bastard.

I dunno why, but my brain has always kinda viewed the "disney pantheon vs warner bros pantheon" as equivalent to DC vs Marvel, with disney and DC being somehow more...ethically inflexible and puritanical (and nonsensical), and Warner and Marvel being slightly edgier and marginally less nonsensical.

Ok, I still wouldn't've played "Epic Bugs Bunny", but I would've liked the idea more.


....actually, "Epic Marvin Martian" would probably have been balls-awesome.


Anyway, yes: if Spector wanted to do another DX-a-like, kickstarter would be the way forward, since he'd mostly be looking for money from the DX generation (who are probably earning enough now, and who hold a lot of love for oldschool Warren Spector).
Thing is, though: I'm not sure he wants to. He's never struck me as the kind of person who does one thing, and does it well. He's more...auteur than that.
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by gamer0004 »

I think you're right. But at this point he doesn't have the luxury to do what he likes, and revisiting an old type of game may be a safe yet interesting and challenging option.
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by DDentonas »

gamer0004 wrote:Not sure whether an episodic release would be much more doable. I guess much of the difficulty in making a game like DX is in the tech and game design.

But a KS for a new DX might be able to attract a budget of 4 or 5 million. Warren Spector and Deus Ex are big names.

Also, I didn't know Epic Mickey 2 was even released. Perhaps a lacklustre marketing was to some extent responsible for the meagre sales?

Dont underestimate the time and money to design and create a DX level. Sure much of the money at the begining would go to tech and design, but then they would need money to make each level as DXy as possible. I imagine They would need 7M to cover tech and design and then 1M per mission. I think i heard WS saying that DX costed 500M? But i'm not sure about that. Also i'm not sure that Spector could work with so little money. He has always worked with big publishers.
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Cybernetic pig
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by Cybernetic pig »

DDentonas wrote: Dont underestimate the time and money to design and create a DX level. Sure much of the money at the begining would go to tech and design, but then they would need money to make each level as DXy as possible. I imagine They would need 7M to cover tech and design and then 1M per mission. I think i heard WS saying that DX costed 500M? But i'm not sure about that. Also i'm not sure that Spector could work with so little money. He has always worked with big publishers.
500 million? I think you are way off. More like 5 or ten, maximum.

I have no proof of DX's budget, but only recently have games started getting budgets of 9 figures, thanks to (sigh) graphics.

Skyrim= $100.000.000... and it sucked, imo. Sold it's soul to the casual gaming devil, though with a budget like that they had no choice.

A hardcore mode would have been appreciated at least, though.
Last edited by Cybernetic pig on Tue Jan 29, 2013 6:20 pm, edited 4 times in total.
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by DaveW »

Jaedar wrote:Epic mickey 1 sold like 600k copies, Epic mickey 2 sold like 200k. ( I ain't got no linky for proof, but it's what I heard)

It's no wonder the studio is being shut down, with sales like that.
Epic Mickey sold 2.8m and Epic Mickey 2 sold 1.15m excluding the 3DS version.
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by DDL »

Cybernetic pig wrote: Skyrim= $100.000.000... and it sucked, imo. Sold it's soul to the casual gaming devil, though with a budget like that they had no choice.
Um...well, if you're going to spend 20 mil and recoup 80 mil, or spend 100 mil and recoup 400 mil, then the second is ALWAYS the better course, so really: if they wanted to actually make money, they had no choice. And holy shit, did skyrim sell well. So....if "selling your soul to the casual gaming devil" is what they did (which is a tad debatable), that is clearly a really, really good path to go down.

Plus the elder scrolls games are like, the pinnacles of insane moddability: if you can't find a "hardcore mod" that's hardcore enough for you, you're simply not looking hard enough (or looking hardcore enough?).
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by Jaedar »

Mods cannot fix core mechanics that are inherently broken.

aka the problem with every TES game ;)
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by Jonas »

Jaedar wrote:Mods cannot fix core mechanics that are inherently broken.
Every true total conversion ever created begs to differ, Jaedar. Modders have turned Half-Life 2 into an RTS, for crying out loud.
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by Cybernetic pig »

And holy shit, did skyrim sell well. So....if "selling your soul to the casual gaming devil" is what they did (which is a tad debatable), that is clearly a really, really good path to go down.
So you would be perfectly ok if Warren Spector made a DX-alike game in the near future, but it turned out like Invisible War, or worse than IW? (Imo IW wasn't that bad, just nowhere near as good as the original).
I would be devastated myself, as I said- the industry needs saving. Plus I would be so hyped because there hasn't been a good FP/RP/IS since 2002 (Arx Fatalis), except for FO:NV (haven't played STALKER yet as you know).
Well I suppose you could count TNM, but it was not 100% designed as an Immersive Sim (still rather absorbing though).
Plus the elder scrolls games are like, the pinnacles of insane moddability: if you can't find a "hardcore mod" that's hardcore enough for you, you're simply not looking hard enough (or looking hardcore enough?).
I don't have a PC capable of running Skyrim, so I was stuck with vanilla Skyrim on console. But I've always been stuck with consoles for newly released games and that was fine until recent years when everything became a casual gaming fest (slight exaggeration).
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by Jaedar »

Jonas wrote:
Jaedar wrote:Mods cannot fix core mechanics that are inherently broken.
Every true total conversion ever created begs to differ, Jaedar. Modders have turned Half-Life 2 into an RTS, for crying out loud.
That's true I suppose. But imo total conversions like that are on the very edge of being mods and very close to simply being different things in the same engine. I mean, did they turn HL2 into an rts, or make an rts in the source engine?

Is Expeditions a "Three kingdoms online"* Mod? :P

*(apparently the first game made in unity)
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Re: Rumour: Disney Is Closing Warren Spector’s Junction Poin

Post by Cybernetic pig »

Jonas wrote:
Jaedar wrote:Mods cannot fix core mechanics that are inherently broken.
Every true total conversion ever created begs to differ, Jaedar. Modders have turned Half-Life 2 into an RTS, for crying out loud.
What Jeadar said. A TC is not so much a modification of the original work as it is an new game using the assets, in most cases.

What if I wanted to play and enjoy Half Life 2, but the only way core mechanic x had been fixed was from playing an RTS and therefore core mechanic x is not in the game at all?

Skyrim would take years to "fix", nearly every dungeon would need redesigning, Gameplay mechanics overhaul, quest improvements etc (just my douchey opinion).

I get what you are saying though, any game CAN be "fixed", but the SDK needs releasing and in the case of core mechanics/design, a whole load of time.
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